Icon of Coil

Machines Are Us (Metropolis)
By DJ Carrion

With Sebastion Komor lending his talents to the future pop supergroup Brudershaft, and Andy Laplegua off doing his solo noise project Combichrist (as well as a ton of remixes), it’s a surprise Icon Of Coil found the time to release the long-awaited follow up to 2002’s The Soul Is in the Software.

Practically every song on this album is a dancefloor scorcher, Machines Are Us setting a new standard in quality in a genre that literally pumps out so much garbage that sounds the same and lacks substance. Varying vocal styles and the help of vocoders and a small female vocal cameo on “Wiretap” show the diversity and improvement in vocals compared to previous albums. Songs like “Faith: Not Important” and “Sleep: Less” are some of the most down-tempo tracks the band has released, while the rest, like “Android” and “Transfer: Complete,” are hard adrenaline-fueled anthems.

You can hear a little bit of Combichrist bleeding into “Pursuit” with its pounding beat, and when the chorus hits, the song is ready to explode. A good song for the dance floor. The final song I could’ve done without, because “Pursuit” leaves you excited, waiting for more, while “Release the Frequency/Afterwords” just tapers off. But that’s pretty much the only complaint I have with this album.
(PO Box 54307 Philadelphia, PA 19105)