Interview: Dino Cazares from ‘Fear Factory’

After 20 long years American Death Metal outfit Fear Factory are still going strong, with their explosive hardcore riffs and fiery lyrics still packing plenty of punches. We sat down with the group’s guitarist Dino Cazares to discuss how he keeps his music fresh and Fear Factory’s latest album ‘Genexus’.

You’re coming here for a tour in March, are you excited to come back to Australia?

Yeah, we love touring in Australia, it’s one of our favourite places to perform!

What can we expect from your live shows this time around?

Definitely high energy performances. Playing a lot of our old stuff from ‘Demanufacture’ and ‘Obsolete’, but also our newer stuff.

How would you sum up your latest album ‘Genexus’?

Definitely up there with our better albums. I think it’s a really good album.

Do you have a favourite track on ‘Genexus’ that you especially connect with?

Probably Soul Hacker, you know the chant in the chorus “You’ll never take my soul!” it’s really catchy and an awesome song to play live.

Your bio says Fear Factory always has a thirst for technology, specifically how the band views the world. What are your morals views on the world?

The world is obviously in a really bad state. We have to keep our eyes open. There are different forms of terrorism. Like internet terrorism. The internet as really opened up the world to a lot of people. To people who we would never communicate to ever. Now the internet has opened up, people can hack worldwide, it’s kind of scary times, we like to be optimistic on where things can be going. We hope that we can combat this negativity that we have in America and across the world.

You guys have an interesting view on how fast technology is advancing, are you for or against robotic technology?

For robotic technology. If it’s for the right reason, it can be done for the right reasons. We have little robots to do things. Like if someone wants to leave a bomb in a car, we can get a robot to dismantle it, not a human so it can actually save lives. The robot can be controlled by a computer that can do the tasks precisely without error, unlike a human. We use technology in day to day life as we have grown up with it and it has involve so much that we don’t realise that we have this working computers. We can talk to them and they can talk back. People have relationships with their cell phones, people are actually addicted. They are addicted to social media, these are real issues actually. I’ve realised some people don’t even look at you when they talk to you, they are too busy looking at their phones.

What are your main influences when you write music?

Well me. But not necessarily just me, but the band. The band is our main influence. We can always go back and see what we have created over the years. But when we back stated back in 1990, we had many influence. Nine Inch Nails, all the death metal bands, all the thrash metal and classic metal bands that were around at the time. Now a days we have such a big catalogue, this is our ninth record. We can look back on what we done and not lose focus on who we are as a band.

What made you choose the instrumental brand of equipment that you use?

The minute I see Angus Young playing guitars really made me want to play guitar. When I was around 9 or 10 I think, and I was just like woah! I heard guitar driven guitar before, like I have listen to Black Sabbath. Heard a million of other bands in the 70. But the minute that I saw AC/DC I was hooked.

You’ve been playing music for over 20 years, how do you keep it interesting?

Ear to the street, like listening to other forms of music. Listening to bands because music involves. Like now there is this new thrash movement which I personally think is all repetitive. But there are other bands that are moving forward. For me, I like listening to new music, I like being inspired by other forms of music. Anything from soundtracks, to movies, to new bands. A lot of that stuff I like to keep up on what’s going on, on what people are listening to nowadays. All of that will help me keep Fear factory fresh, what we can do to keep Fear Factory Fresh.

We can also be influenced by ourselves, but by listening to other forms of music to keep my mind fresh. I’m not talking about a guitar riff, I mean like how people are structuring songs, how a conductor conducts a song, or constructs and orchestral piece. You know sound is a big influence, and also helps us to stay fresh and to really to spark an idea to us. It can be any sound, it can be anything. I could open the window and hear someone working on a construction down the street and hear a clang sound and that would influence me and I would be like WOW! That’s really cool! I’m constantly thinking music in my head, like if I hear a ting, it could be a rhythm and could be just a sound, and that helps me stay fresh and helps me keep my mental chops up.

What would you say is essentially the heart of Fear Factory?

The heart of Fear Factory are the mechanical sound with beautiful melodies.

Fear Factory ‘Regenera’ Australian Tour

THUR 2 JUNE
The Tivoli, Brisbane
FRI 3 JUNE
UNSW Roundhouse, Sydney
SAT 4 JUNE
Prince Of Wales, Melbourne
TUE 7 JUNE
HQ, Adelaide
WED 8 JUNE
Metropolis, Perth
Get Tickets HERE