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Front Line Assembly > Tactical Neural Implant
| Third Mind records TM 9188 2, CD 1992 Third Mind TMD 9188 [US] |
| CD 199? Appolon APCY-8089 [Jap] | LP 1992 Third Mind TM 9188 1 [UK] |
Released on CD and 12" LP.
2006-05-19
Check out these very cool scans of the japanese version of the album:
Booklet 1 - Booklet 2 - Cover
Tracklist:
01. Final Impact (6:02)
02. The Blade (5:53)
03. Mindphaser (5:04)
04. Remorse (5:44)
05. Bio-Mechanic (5:26)
06. Outcast (5:22)
07. Gun (6:19)
08. Lifeline (5:07)
Japanese CD bonustracks:
09. Toxic
10. Mutilate
11. Mindphaser (12" Version)
Credits:
All titles written by Bill Leeb and Rhys Fulber. Production and programming: F.L.A. Engineering and additional production: Greg Reely. Assistant engineer: Mike Landolt. Programming facility: F.L.A. HQ. Recording: Creation Studios, Vancouver, B.C. Technical advisors: Bryon Low, Chris Bryant. Live assault assistance: Chris Peterson. Front Line Assembly: Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber. Art/Design: Dave Coppenhall. Photographs: Brian Williams.
Published by Roadcrew Music Inc. (BMI)/Roadster Music BV. Issued under license from Third Mind Records.
Review
If you are looking for the milestones in the history of techno and industrial music, look back at the 1990-1992 years and listen to some of the best releases ever made in these musical genres. In these years, technology for music creation was still in full evolvement, and some musicians were really experimenting to search for the limits of what the
available equipment could do. Not only to find new sounds, but also to put them in more sophisticated music, to discover new textures from these new sounds and use them in different ways. These discoveries would establish standards for years of music to come. In that time, listening to that music gave to us the feeling of listening to the future... and so it was, listening to the same stuff today doesn't make us feel out-of-date... Of these "classics", one came from Front Line Assembly. In 1992 the "Tactical Neural Implant" album was released and is still the most famous production we know from this band. Even today fans are discussing a lot about this album, many of them feeling that this is the ultimate album that Leeb and friends have ever produced.
What made this album so brilliant was it`s textures. Although still a kind of industrial music, this one added a new level of complexity in song structure and composition, while being somehow more accessible to new fans, less aggressive, less abrasive, more melodic, and also more dance-oriented. The previous album (Caustic Grip) showed a new tendency to use sound sampling as a main component of the music. This time the samples are really omnipresent, mostly extracted from sci-fi and action movies, but also from industrial and techno musical sources and from the machines themselves: sound bits created and morphed in unique ways on any electronic stuff, then sampled to make a new instrument or a new rhythmic element. Noteable are the "very electronic but non-abrasive" sounds that populate all songs. All these together create aural atmospheres and unique soundscapes of their own, mixing gothic feelings with ambiences from virtual worlds a la Blade Runner, wrapped into dancey, layered songs that you can easily become addicted to. Some people say this is "soundtrack music for the dance floor" or, in the inverse mindpath, "dance music for the living room". Personaly I describe this as "dance music for earphones", because you need to devote all your attention to it. Behind the main groove of each song there are many tiny details. Each listening session makes you discover a new sound, a new loop buried somewhere behind. The very layered nature of the compositions means that listening again and again, these songs won't become annoying over time.
And if you like the vocal side of music, this album pushed the limits of vocal processing where it has never been before. They managed to alter the voices so much to give them new personalities, adapted to each song. This is not aggressive distorsion : this is vocal re-creation that gives me the impression that not only can humans sing, but also their mind, a voice becoming something else than a physical characteristic of a human being. And the lyrics are, in my opinion, the best of all FLA albums, previous and next, still in the usual themes of death, technology domination, apocalyptic wars, etc. The samples often complete the lyrics. The album also demonstrated at its best the talents of the nearly-third member of the band : Greg Reely. Making a music so dense and so complex, yet, so easy to listen to was unique to that guy. By the way he morphed each song and placed it in the aural bandwidth, he created tri-dimensional atmospheres from the music Leeb and Fulber created that a Dolby Pro-Logic audio system is necessary to reproduce it as it was the sound of a movie. Music seldom play as well as movies on Pro-Logic systems, except TNI...
I could end this review with a song-by-song review, but I'll let you discover it for yourself. Some highlights: the first song "Final Impact", a mid-speed song with brillant textures, the second track "The Blade" with its house flavor, the third one "Mindphaser" which became a classic, and the ultimate FLA track "Gun": beginning slow and ambient, adding layers one by one, until its gets to a kind of military techno-industrial hymn that is amazing.
Review by Bernard Bastien (aka Neologue)
Review from Melody Maker at time of release.
(Exact date of publication unknown.)
FRONT LINE ASSEMBLY - TACTICAL NEURAL IMPLANT (Third Mind)
THE Canadians Front Line Assembly sound stronger and greater than ever before. In the mid-Eighties they, along with their European counterparts, Front 242, presented us with dystopic vistas of contemporary society. Their lyrics talked of a fascist, machine-dominated world and their sound - huge, cinematic and machine-generated - lent fearsome expression to a general but barely articulated techno-fear. Nowadays samplers, sequencers, Nintendo, satellite TV and the neo-hippy raver have all but assuaged those fears and Front Line Assembly have responded by turning inwards and examining the self. And, unsurprisingly, given their remorseless pessimism, they conclude that it's really no better in here.
The music, always gothic, is now more reminiscent of the Church and charnel-house than missile silos and the Pentagon. Persuasively, Front Line Assembly veer between the crack of a whip and the thwack of a cleave and the vocals cut from the typical growl to a plaintive, electronically multiplied lament. The buzz-words now, at least those afforded the privilege of rising through the mix to become audible, are Pain, Guilt, Remorse and, of course, Jesus.
It's worth mentioning that "Tactical Neural Implant" is Front Line Assembly's most melodious and accessible album to date, having more in common with Nine Inch Nails than Skinny Puppy. Having said that, their perpetually dour disposition will doubtless still be off-putting to many, no matter how good they are with a tune. It there's any hope at all in this album it lies in the title that suggests our bad blood has more to do with nurture than Nature. Take them to your hearts. It sounds like they need it.
THE STUD BROTHERS
Review from Music From The Empty Quarter issue 5 May 1992
FRONT LINE ASSEMBLY - TACTICAL NEURAL IMPLANT
Third Mind TM91882 CD/LP
This long-awaited follow-up to Caustic Grip comes hot on the heels of Intennix's subtle dance divisions. Tactical Neural Implant lies somewhere between the two, with a slight leaning reminiscence of Caustic. Bill Leeb and Rhys Fulber only really have one aim and that's to totally bombard and overtake your mind with machining visions of their own creation. This album heads ever closer to their idea of a Virtual Reality holocaustic euphonious trip. No need to rely on the butchery which became the Canadian duo's trademark a year or so ago, they've now refined their weaponry, nagging and poking around your brain-cells. An overloading, without overcharging and blowing fucked heads to pieces. Tunes here, such as The Blade, drag their ripening drum-beats to body-enticing, patterned depths, controlled and sluggish movements. And when the intention is not to move, they'll recoil in the thought-waves invoking ordered response. These two pilots of FLA make ideal Dr. Jekyll's in their bid to dominate, conceiving our dream states and riding rough-shod over them to parallel their own. They blast away on the cyber-flighting Mindphaser, an ultimate spectacle, where imagination revels in truth, but what the hell is truth? FLA guide us further into their terroristic army of robotic truth... On their voyage into the altered-state they compel in the belief they'll conquer all. Lifeline returns in human form, the commanding Leeb voices an illusioning mortal feel, but the creator's have no intention of relinquishing their position - they are leaders after all!
FLA will not rest until we all follow, android-fashioned to their selective, thought-bending, Bio-Mechanics of the musical world they'll draw into a safe-haven of circuits and meld your mind. FLA are assembling another generation. In God we may not trust, but give FLA everything. Tactical Neural Implant IS inside.
Deadhead
Review from Volume Issue 3 1992
FRONT LINE ASSEMBLY - TACTICAL NEURAL IMPLANT
With the recent plethora of FLA spin-offs (Delerium, Intermix, Cyberaktif, Will) there was a danger that Bill Leeb and Rhyss [sic] Fulber were ghettoising their areas of interest - dancefloor, ambient, techno - well away from the main unit. On the evidence of this LP, thankfully, that isn't the case. It is, however, their most commercial work to date and sounds at timws like a homage to DAF and Depeche Mode. Outstanding tracks are 'Mindphaser' and 'Blade' but the commercial one - hit single, maybe? is 'Lifeline'. Light years ahead of 'Caustic Grip' and 'Gashed Senses And Crossfire'. TU
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Last updated 2007-09-22 20:25:18 by: epidemic27.
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![Booklet 1](javascript:openWindow("index.php?picture=images/pictures/covers/mindphaserJPN01.jpg");){kind=link}
![Booklet 2](javascript:openWindow("index.php?picture=images/pictures/covers/mindphaserJPN02.jpg");){kind=link}
![Cover](javascript:openWindow("index.php?picture=images/pictures/covers/mindphaserJPN03.jpg");){kind=link}