The French WB-project totally seduced me through their demo-work. It's time now for the real stuff, so my expectations have been much higher when seeing this band releasing its very official CD-steps. The Replicant-maxi isn't exactly what I will call a major success. The FLA-emulating still goes on, but the title song hasn't the requested club-power for this CD-format. WB will maybe never become a pure club-band for being a little bit too extreme and still in industrialism, but it's just that they didn't exactly chose the right piece! The few guitar samplings injects some more power and dynamism (just like FLA ever did) into EBM written structures. The remixes of "Replicant" by Omnicore and H.I.V.+ are quite well done. The "The Box"-song, which is nothing else than the b-side is still very interesting. I like the refined guitar sound while the whole song is extremely diversified, being constructed with a wealth of sounds. While I do believe that it's not a successful song for a maxi, Replicant already gives a very good idea about the capacities of this French FLA-clone!

DP / Side-Line (10/2002)

The name of the band, the title of this album, the artwork and last, but not least the music... it all reminds to Frontline Assembly! That's the main point that really hurts me with the French project. It sounds like a pure copy and adulation of B. Leeb. Musically speaking, WB remains an instrumental project and that's a bit regretting! The music is extremely elaborated, but the presence of a vocalist could propel the music to a higher standard. It's not that you feel like an absence neither a gap, but the "Deceiver"-cut, which contains (it seems) real vocals with a great vocoder effect, injects an extra bonus to the composition. From the very first song, "One step downward", you feel the influence of FLA in the bass lines, the rhythmic and the global mood running through the compositions. The "Replicant"-cut, which we already know from the maxi, goes on in the same line. Track 4, "Down" brings some diversity and a more personal approach according to the style. The song has been built up with an irregular rhythmic while the structures are moving on the edge of experimentalism and industrial. The industrial touch comes constantly back and has been accentuated on the great "Pro-Gen" and "R.I.P." songs. The beat is a bit more bouncing while an icy effect recovers the sounds. It's a mixture of EBM and industrial with a flavour of techno. "Twisted cell" is another cool cut that sounds like containing a few vocals lines too. Or is this nothing else but sampled vocals? Well, the samplings are multiple in the work of WB, and that's another common point with their idols. "Subhuman" is a last cool song. I really love the sounds and the terrific guitar parts of this cut. WB confirms the strong potential of their demo work, conceiving a mature album... but still illustration less originality. Anyway, the cloning has been totally successful!

DP / Side-Line (10/2002)