Rhys Fulber

Nowell Rhys Fulber is a Canadian electronic musician and producer. He is a member of Front Line Assembly[1] and Delerium, along with Bill Leeb. He also records under his own name and under the name Conjure One.

Rhys Fulber
Fulber with Front Line Assembly at Wave-Gotik-Treffen 2018
Fulber with Front Line Assembly at Wave-Gotik-Treffen 2018
Background information
Birth nameNowell Rhys Fulber
Born (1970-10-10) October 10, 1970
Vancouver, Canada
GenresAlternative metal (production), electronica, industrial rock, techno
Occupation(s)Producer, musician
Instrument(s)Keyboards, synthesizer, sampler, programming
Years active1987–present

Biography

Fulber was born in Vancouver, British Columbia on October 10, 1970. His father, a musician, was born in Germany and his mother was from Great Britain. His father introduced him to the music of Led Zeppelin and Kraftwerk; they both attended a Kraftwerk concert in 1975. Fulber became interested in music and started drumming on his father's instruments at a very early age. Along with Kraftwerk, Fulber's electronic influences included Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD), Jean-Michel Jarre, SPK, and Pete Shelley's Homosapien (1981). He has cited OMD as his favourite band in his youth.[2]

His father later built and ran a recording studio, catering toward the local punk rock scene. As a youth, Fulber spent a lot of time at the studio. In 1984 he started becoming more interested in electronic music and acquired his first synthesizer.

In 1986, he became friends with Bill Leeb, who had just left his former band Skinny Puppy.[3]

Fulber is a first cousin of Shawn Atleo (Ahousaht First Nation), a Canadian activist and politician, who was elected twice as national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, serving 2009 into 2014.

Early music career

Fulber's first involvements in Front Line Assembly were one song on their second cassette release Total Terror, and then three songs on The Initial Command. He also contributed to Delerium's debut album, Faces, Forms & Illusions. During this time he started the band Will together with Chris Peterson, John McRae and Jeff Stoddard, which lasted from 1987 to 1992.

He joined Front Line Assembly for their first tour, Gashed Senses & Crossfire in 1989. He then joined Delerium full-time when Michael Balch left.[4] Until 1997, Fulber was involved in all Front Line Assembly, Delerium and side projects with Bill Leeb, including the albums Tactical Neural Implant and Hard Wired from Front Line Assembly, and Semantic Spaces and Karma from Delerium.

A photo of Rhys Fulber performing with Conhure One in Germany, 2015.
Rhys Fulber live with Conjure One at the Nocturnal Culture Night festival in Germany, 2015

Leeb and Fulber released several albums as Synæsthesia, including Embody, Desideratum[5] and Ephemeral.

Fulber was nominated for the Jack Richardson Producer Of The Year award at the 2008 Juno Awards and won two Junos with Delerium for Best Dance Recording in 1998 and 2000.

Discography

This section lists only regular full studio albums.

Techno released under his own name
  • Your Dystopia, My Utopia (Sonic Groove, 2018)
  • Ostalgia (Sonic Groove, 2019)
  • Diaspora (aufnahme + wiedergabe, 2020)
  • Resolve (FR Recordings, 2020)
  • Brutal Nature (FR Recordings, 2021)
  • Collapsing Empires (Sonic Groove, 2022)

Conjure One

Delerium

Fauxliage

Front Line Assembly

Intermix
  • Intermix (Third Mind, 1992)
  • Phaze Two (Third Mind, 1992)
  • Future Primitives (ESP-Sun, 1995)

Noise Unit
  • Response Frequency (Antler-Subway, 1990)
  • Strategy of Violence (Dossier, 1992)
  • Decoder (Dossier, 1995)
  • Drill (Off Beat, 1996)
  • Deviator (Artoffact, 2021)

Synæsthesia

Will

Production

As Front Line Assembly was beginning to peak, their UK label Third Mind was bought out by Roadrunner Records, a predominantly metal label. An up-and-coming band on the label Fear Factory was looking to expand their sound with remixes and new label mates Front Line Assembly were contacted. This led to the influential Fear Is the Mindkiller EP. From this more metal themed work followed while Fulber was contracted to contribute keyboards and de facto additional production to Fear Factory's breakthrough Demanufacture album, defining their signature sound. Fulber had also contributed backing tracks around this same time to new Canadian industrial rock band Econoline Crush, leading to their signing with EMI Canada and eventually his first full length production job handling their debut album Affliction, spawning minor Canadian rock radio hit "Wicked". From there his production career grew and became more varied. The later success of Delerium bringing him into more adult music formats with artists like Josh Groban and Serena Ryder. Based out of Los Angeles since 2000, he currently works out of his own studio, Surplus Sound in Van Nuys.

For musicians

For other media
  • 2000: Gun Shy (additional score)
  • 2002: Coors Light - "Rock On"
  • 2006: Justice (theme programming)
  • 2020: Cyberpunk 2077 (two tracks for game play[6])

References
  1. Bogdanov, Vladimir (May 14, 2001). All Music Guide to Electronica: The Definitive Guide to Electronic Music. Backbeat Books. pp. 149–. ISBN 9780879306281. Retrieved June 6, 2012.
  2. McDonald, Seth (2003). "Conjure One". Industrial Nation. No. 17. pp. 70–73. ISSN 1062-449X.
  3. Leeb, Bill; Fulber, Rhys (December 18, 2015). "Front Line Assembly "Caustic Grip" Retrospective". Release Magazine (Interview). Interviewed by Johan Carlsson. Gothenburg: Release Musik & Media. Archived from the original on December 21, 2015. Retrieved February 12, 2020.
  4. "Caustic Grip". AllMusic. Retrieved June 16, 2013.
  5. Brenholts, Jim. "Desideratum Album Review". AllMusic. Retrieved September 19, 2016.
  6. "Rhys Fulber: new Conjure One album plus a ton of other stuff". Retrieved August 10, 2020.
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