40 Fun Facts About Fear Factory

Which rock band, recording next door at Bearsville Studios, asked Fear Factory to turn Demanufacture down?

Bon Jovi was cutting These Days when one of its engineers complained that Fear Factory's noise was bleeding into the drum microphones.

Which British singer joined Fear Factory on its hit cover of his own 1979 chart-topper?

Gary Numan sang on the band's version of Cars and also speaks the sample that opens the title track of Obsolete.

Fear Factory said Demanufacture, about a man battling a machine-run government, drew on which science-fiction film?

The Terminator shaped an album on which each song is a chapter in one man's struggle against the machines that rule him.

Fear Factory's EP Fear Is the Mindkiller quotes a litany against fear from which science-fiction novel?

Dune gave the EP its name, taken from the incantation Frank Herbert's characters recite to steady themselves, while the record itself holds remixes of the debut album.

Fear Factory spent September 2010 opening arena shows in New Zealand and Japan for which band's World Magnetic Tour?

Metallica's Christchurch dates went ahead weeks after the Canterbury earthquake, once the arena was found to be undamaged, with Fear Factory opening.

Fear Factory formed in 1989 in which California city, where its guitarist had come up through the thrash scene?

Los Angeles is where the band reportedly spotted a factory guarded by riflemen near its rehearsal room, the sight that inspired its name.

Which stadium rock band's early single did Fear Factory cover on Transgression, a choice later blamed on its label?

U2's I Will Follow was the cover, and the Irish group had a part in the band's origin too: the singer was reportedly recruited after being overheard singing New Year's Day.

Fear Factory's Zero Signal plays on the soundtrack of which 1990s film based on a video game?

Mortal Kombat's soundtrack features the band's singer twice, making him the only artist on the album to appear with two different groups.

Which post-apocalyptic game hides a computer terminal entry referencing Fear Factory's album Archetype?

Fallout 3 names a mainframe the Archetype FF06, and the note about cleaning a virus from it is signed with the surname and initial of the band's singer.

Fear Factory's singer fronted Plastic Planet, the 1995 debut by a band founded by the bassist of which group?

Black Sabbath's Geezer Butler named the project after himself, and Fear Factory later opened for the reunited Sabbath in Birmingham.

Which Fear Factory co-founder, who quit in 2020 after 31 years, is known for mixing death growls with clean singing?

Burton C. Bell can still be heard on the album released the year after he left, because he had recorded his vocals for it back in 2017.

Which founding Fear Factory guitarist left in 2002, returned in 2009 and also recorded bass on several albums?

Dino Cazares spent the gap leading other bands, then patched up his friendship with the singer in 2009 and rebuilt Fear Factory around the two of them.

Fear Factory appeared at which metal festival in each of its first four years, starting with the 1996 launch?

Ozzfest was launched by Sharon Osbourne after Lollapalooza turned her husband down, and Fear Factory went on to headline its second stage in 1999.

Which thrash metal frontman invited Fear Factory onto the first Gigantour, the festival he launched in 2005?

Dave Mustaine's invitation came at a price: the label reportedly pulled the release of Transgression forward by months so the band had a new album to tour.

Which record label signed Fear Factory in 1991 and released its first four studio albums, through Digimortal?

Roadrunner Records also issued the band's shelved 1991 demo album after the 2002 split, a release the members were divided over: the guitarist welcomed it, while the singer objected that the tapes were sold without the band's consent.

Fear Factory's Bite the Hand That Bleeds, from Archetype, features in which horror film that launched a long franchise?

Saw put the song on its soundtrack album, and the music video was included as a bonus feature on one edition of the film's DVD.

Which Fear Factory song from Demanufacture had a video included in the game Test Drive 5 and was covered by Epica?

Replica was played by Epica at the Whisky a Go Go in 2007 with Fear Factory's founding guitarist joining the Dutch band on stage.

In which country did Fear Factory's Demanufacture go gold and Digimortal reach the top ten of the albums chart?

Australia has long been a stronghold for the band, which chose a festival there for its unannounced live comeback in 2004.

Singer Milo Silvestro, chosen in 2023 after Fear Factory auditioned more than 300 people, comes from which country?

Italy supplied the winner of a search in which the band's founder had said gender would play no part in his choice.

Which Dutch producer, later the composer of Mad Max: Fury Road, remixed Fear Factory on the album Remanufacture?

Junkie XL, real name Tom Holkenborg, went on to score Deadpool and the Sonic the Hedgehog films long after his 1997 work for the band.

Which founding Fear Factory drummer played so precisely on Demanufacture that critics suspected a drum machine?

Raymond Herrera in fact played to a click track and used triggers so that every kick-drum hit sounded the same, however hard it was struck.

Christian Olde Wolbers, Fear Factory's bassist turned guitarist, was born in which country before emigrating in 1993?

Belgium's port city of Antwerp was his home until he moved to the United States, where a member of Biohazard introduced him to the band two weeks before a tour.

Which band's singer heard Fear Factory's Concrete demo and recommended the unsigned group to his own record label?

Sepultura's Max Cavalera passed the tape to A&R man Monte Conner after a string of other metal labels had turned the band down.

Which hip-hop group lent a rapper to Fear Factory's Digimortal after two band members played on its album Skull & Bones?

Cypress Hill's B-Real raps on the album's only song not written by the band, and Fear Factory also played the group's Smoke Out festival.

Fear Factory's singer called it a dream come true to guest on The Last Sucker, a 2007 album by which band?

Ministry frontman Al Jourgensen was one of his heroes, and he sang on three of the album's songs before joining the band on tour.

Which science-fiction film, first sampled on Fear Factory's debut, became a recurring theme the band keeps quoting?

Blade Runner shares the debut album's sample list with two war films, Full Metal Jacket and Apocalypse Now.

Which dystopian novel joined 1984 and The Boys from Brazil in inspiring the story behind Fear Factory's Obsolete?

Brave New World fed a tale the singer wrote in two weeks, in which machines built to make life easier have pushed humanity aside.

Which Fear Factory song on Obsolete features a stand-up bass and hip-hop scratching that divided the band?

Edgecrusher was played on an upright bass that Evan Seinfeld of Biohazard had given the bassist, and the scratching was resisted at first by the guitarist.

Which Fear Factory album, released in 2010 on Candlelight Records, was the first after its founding guitarist returned?

Mechanize followed a legal standoff in which two ousted members insisted they were still in Fear Factory and that its name had been hijacked.

Which Front Line Assembly member co-produced Fear Factory's Obsolete and played all of its keyboard parts?

Rhys Fulber first worked with the band in 1993, remixing its debut into an industrial EP, and went on to produce most of its later albums.

Which producer recorded Fear Factory's shelved 1991 album Concrete, then used it to win work with Korn?

Ross Robinson won the rights to the master tapes after the band refused the contract he offered, and the album stayed unreleased for eleven years.

Which label turned down Fear Factory's early demo, then signed the band in 2014 and released Genexus?

Nuclear Blast had passed on the very tape that later won the band its first deal, and it stayed the group's label for the album after Genexus too.

What did Fear Factory's founding guitarist play for the first time on Obsolete, dropping the band's tuning to A?

A seven-string guitar took the sound so low that the bassist switched to a five-string bass to keep up.

Bassist Byron Stroud came to Fear Factory after its 2002 split from which extreme metal band led by Devin Townsend?

Strapping Young Lad shared him with Fear Factory until it split in 2007, and he never actually recorded on any of Fear Factory's albums.

Bassist Tony Campos, who joined Fear Factory in 2015, belonged to the original lineup of which industrial metal band?

Static-X counts him as its longest-serving member, and he had already played alongside Fear Factory's guitarist in the extreme metal band Asesino.

Which band did Fear Factory's founding guitarist start during his years away, releasing Bleed the Fifth in 2007?

Divine Heresy made that debut with former Machine Head guitarist Logan Mader producing, and fired its first singer after an onstage altercation.

Under which name did Fear Factory form in 1989, before briefly calling itself Fear the Factory?

Ulceration was picked, the band said, simply because it would be a cool name, and it lasted about a year.

Which Fear Factory album was first announced under the title Monolith and held its departed singer's final vocals?

Aggression Continuum was recorded in 2017 but held back for four years by legal disputes, by which time the singer had quit.

Instrumental versions of three songs from Fear Factory's Demanufacture play in which 1997 vehicular combat PC game?

Carmageddon used the title track along with Body Hammer and Zero Signal, each stripped of its vocals.

Which Digimortal single took Fear Factory into the Mainstream Rock top 40 and has a video ending on the Vitruvian Man?

Linchpin peaked at number 31, and its Thomas Mignone-directed video also shows what looks like a polygraph machine.