This 2002 album was the last in the incredible series of albums by the Los Angeles group Fear Factory for Roadrunner Records, but it was actually the first. Huh? Let us explain — or better yet, you can read the two sets of liner notes that accompany the package. Before briefly signing with Roadrunner, Fear Factory recorded a full album in 1990 with producer Ross Robinson. The band and Robinson had a falling out, but ironically, it was a cassette recording of this album that earned them a deal with Roadrunner. Once Fear Factory exploded with the release of Demanufacture in 1995, Roadrunner acquired the rights to the album from Robinson, but waited until 2002, when the band took a break and left the label. But more interesting than the story behind the music is the music itself. For Fear Factory fans, Concrete is a true treasure — half of the songs are new, while the other half appeared in re-recorded form on their first album Soul of a New Machine (and particularly attentive Fear Factory fans will notice snippets of the new songs appearing on subsequent albums). But above all, Concrete showcases that very early on, Fear Factory had perfected the heavy melodic verse-chorus formula followed by so many nu-metal bands to come.