Despite their cyberpunk lyrics and visions of dark, technologically warped futures, the mood that Switzerland’s Sybreed rustle up on God Is An Automaton is so paralysingly dated it’ll make you check the back of the CD for a ‘use by’ label.
With guitars droptuned to an inch of Slipknot’s debut, and the electronica peppering the record sounding so trite that even Spineshank would’ve thought twice about it, the album is a barrage of nu metal’s creakiest clichés. It’s no surprise that longtime Fear Factory collaborator, Rhys Fulber, is here on production duties, with so much of that band’s riff-salad approach being emulated without the talents of Cazares and co to give …Automaton the songwriting backbone it sorely needs.
The lack of irony when Benjamin Nominet croons ‘I start to realise the limitations of my attempt to truly understand the misery of man’ during No Wisdom Brings Solace on a record so lacking in musical or intellectual nourishment is enough to give you an aneurysm. There’s so little of interest here that you’ll feel bad for the bin you’ll inevitably cast this record into.
