Cubanate

A strong but not perfectly successful improvement over Antimatter thanks to an increased sonic variety, Cyberia deserves more than a little credit for its design sense alone. Located under the clear CD tray in the spine section of every copy, and thus viewed right next to the semi-anguished picture of Heal on the front cover, is a chunk of computer motherboard and transistors, taking the man-machine fetish that electronic music thrives on to new lengths. The music itself? After a quick instrumental bit of vocal ominousness, "Oxyacetylene" rips in, as solid as the earlier "Body Burn" while thankfully not quite sounding exactly like it, as so many of their other early tracks did. Things throughout Cyberia generally work a bit better than on Antimatter due to a stronger sense of different sonic approaches; even the basic but crisp and attention getting bouncing of small drum tics from speaker to speaker at the start of "Build" makes for a good change. The increasing hardcore techno influence makes for even fiercer sonic underpinnings throughout, while still riffing and shouting with the best of them in industrialville. Small downside: the various remixes included at the end of the disc add little to the originals, and including yet another version of "Body Burn" seems rather pointless ~ Ned Raggett, Rovi