Hard Wired

Front Line Assembly | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (November 14, 1995)
• Original Release Date: November 14, 1995
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Metropolis Records
• ASIN: B000005OOZ
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #73,379 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #49 in Music > Indie Music > Alternative Rock > Goth & Industrial
  • #69 in Music > Alternative Rock > Goth & Industrial > Industrial > Industrial Dance

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Much more impressive than I expected..., February 28, 2003

By 

S. Walden (Woodstock, GA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hard Wired (Audio CD)

I'm not good with "labelling" music. When I was growing up, you either listened to "metal", "rap", "rock" or "pop", and that was pretty much it. Now there's a sub-classification for every CD in the world. So what is Front Line Assembly? "Goth-industrial"? How about "Spooky Dance Music"? Or if I was a real music critic I'd call them "Angst Driven Heavy Dub Electronic Post Pop Distortion Artists". That's great, and mighty creative to boot, but it doesn't tell you a ... thing about what FLA sounds like. The most accurate, or perhaps easiest, way to describe them to the uninitiated is an unholy fusion of Skinny Puppy, Ministry, Fear Factory and an angry Atari 2600. If you're a fan of any of the aforementioned bands (or liked abusing your old-school Atari), this band, and more specifically this album, is for you. Crunchy, razor-sharp guitars meet creepy vocal fx galore, a conglomeration of heavy HEAVY near-techno drum beats and about eight miles of deep bass. This CD demands to be played loud and WILL challenge your stereo system. All the tracks on this disc are good, and while some are weaker than others this is one of the few discs I can play all the way through without skipping songs. My personal faves are "Circuitry" (I bought the CD for this track), "Mortal" (very weird atmospheric instrumental), "Modus Operandi", "Barcode" and "Infra Red Combat" (... I assure you it's an awesome track). One word of note: Most people seem to feel that "Tactical Neural Implant" is the Grand Poobah of FLA albums. I don't really know about that since I don't have that disc, but I can say with all certainty that "Hard Wired" is one of the better CDs in any genre I've heard lately. While it is the first FLA CD I've purchased, it's label-defying sound has assured that it won't be the last.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Takes on almost an organic-like form, May 25, 2005

By 

Staring Girl "Staring Girl" (Thornton, CO) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hard Wired (Audio CD)

I actually give this 4.5 stars.

Infra Red Combat is right up there with my favorite `industrial' songs of all time. I love music that builds and builds into a mound of emotion and sound, and this song does just that. The whole album almost takes on an organic-like form. Every piece twists and grows through amazingly talented instrumentation, vocals and lyrics. I'm not even going to attempt to analyze every track or do a long drawn out comparison from previous albums, because I'm just not good at doing that. I will, however, tell you this is (in my opinion) Front Line Assembly's finest piece of work. I have listened to this album countless times from start to finish and it never fails to amaze me.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sci-fi horror in your music is what you need ? Get this !, January 12, 2006

By 

SOUNDWAVE "ICE-T" (Decepticon Headquarters) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hard Wired (Audio CD)

A hard and heavy FLA album with a bit more of that fear that makes you grip onto your chair than most of their other albums have, except of course 'CAUSTIC GRIP', now that is as cold as it gets, but this is on the other side of the fear scale, as I get a feverish fear feeling from this cd. This album is almost like The Black album was for Metallica, I'm not saying it sounds anything like it, but FLA have grown into a competent beast and at the same time have become a bit too cliched, but this is still an excellent cd with lots of interesting aspects that will make you think "f$#k, this is pretty good music" especially upon first listen. It's quite hard to say this isn't a good listen. There's quite alot of that early 90's sci-fi movies feeling here, which works really well. The BASS lines are incredible, plus there are guitars on this album which I don't like that much, but they don't really bother me either like they did on the 'MILLENIUM' album.

Hard Wired is worth having in your cd collection, but make sure you also get Caustic Grip, Gashed Senses and Crossfire, and Tactical Neural Implant. Total Terror II is a must have if you like simple effective beats with samples and a jumpy bassline, very early 80's typical electro/synth that is fun to hear again and again.

Hard Wired is as the name implies, it is a hard album with wires hooked up to the guitars and synthesizers. The result is a very chaotic ensemble of hard driving syth/bass, haunting samples, and a rhythm guitar that takes the music into a more organic form, but still retaining their purpose which is to accompany the lyrics which are mainly focused around disease, epidemic, war, murder, death, all envisioned in a sci-fi perspective. The vocals on track 6 are amazing. One must hear this album in order to fully appreciate it.