Cybernetic

I got "Cybernetic" a while back, and haven't really listened to it much. Well I have formed my opinion on this band now, so I feel that I can accurately review this album.

QUICK NOTE: If you are not a fan of industrial metal then this is not for you. Moving on.

The album starts off with the very awesome title track, setting the atmosphere of the album almost instantaneously. You can almost feel that you are in a huge industrial setting...As I listen to this, I imagine myself in a post apocalyptic world, akin to the movie "Blade Runner". Although I can definitely tell that there is a very industrial feeling to this album, there is also a very dark atomsphere blended in very well.

Now, like any industrial band, Cynicon does not have very complex riffage at all, no solos, and the sound tends to drone on a bit. Now don't get me wrong, they do this exceedingly well. Anyone that is a fan of Fear Factory's older works, "Demanufacture" and "Obsolete" will really like this. The vocals really stand out...it's hard to describe. They have a sort of "black metal shriek" quality to them, but not so much. The best quality of the vocals, however, is how they blend in with the melodies of the music...it's just great.

The guitar work is just awesome. If you are biased against simple riffs then you might not share the same opinion as mine, but I really enjoy the riffage alot shown here. The drums I think are programmed, but it's hard to tell, they sound so much like the real thing. I have no complaint about the drumming here, but they could be better.

The fantastic keyboards are the main thing that has made me like this band. Ailorn has done an awesome job in creating a very dark industrial atmosphere that blends in perfectly with the rest of the music to create very good music. "Intragalactic" and "Presence" have intros that just scream techno though, but it's a very good thing.

Overall, I think this album was done pretty good. The production is crystal clear, and their are only a couple of flaws that I think really bring down the music. I think the drumming could be better, and they could definitely use a lesson in aggresive riffage. Other than that, though, this really is a good album. Any fans of industrial metal, or even fans of extreme metal that don't mind keyboards should really give this a try.

This album is Cynicon's first full lenght album, and I cannot say I am very impressed. They play symphonic/industrial tinged extreme metal. The guitars are rather understated, meaning that it sounds like youre listening to them through a blanket. The bass is almost non-existent. The drums aren't bad if fact thats probably the best part of this album. The vocals are similar to what you would find in black metal except for the clean vocals which sound like a horrible attempt to copy king diamond(I hate king diamond's clean high pitched vocals). These clean vocals are what makes the album suck so bad. Most of the music isn't very fast although the faster songs on the album are its redeeming ones.

Its starts out with Cybernetic which is one of the best songs on the album. This song has a cool beat and overall sound. It takes a bit to get started but still good. The rest of the album is on a downward slope from here.

It moves to Astral Luminescence which would be a good song if it weren't for the clean vocals which plague this song at approximately 2:13, they only appear for a few seconds in this song and it goes back to being a good song which fortunately balances it out. This song is pretty slow but gets faster at parts. None-the-less Astral Luminescence is amongst the top three.

Neutronomicon, one the less interesting tracks on the album but still a solid track, theres no icky clean vocals here so that makes me happy.

Then it goes on to Intragalactic which I must say is the worst song on the album. Its pretty much all clean vocals except for some parts. It’s a bad song but there are some good parts tucked in there surrounded by the horrible parts. The vocals are not the same King Diamondish ones from before but still bad.

For MUCH relief it returns with Presence which has that same cool sound that the first two songs had. And like those two good songs on this album it takes a bit to get started, and yay no clean vocals.

Momentary is an allright song but smells of clean vocals, it gets a tad bit boring half-way through.

The last song Enlightenment has its good parts and its bad parts. It starts out like a promising song but goes to suck as soon as those clean vocals leap in, then goes back to an allright song just as fast as it went. It's listenable.

As I stated many times before those clean vocals are horrible. Either this band should pawn who ever sings those and get someone better, or just drop them altogether. If this band decided to do that I might consider calling this a good band, but until then theyre
not really worth more than 3 good songs. If you want to hear how this should sound go listen to Lunaris's ....The Infinite.