Cyberaktif

Cyberaktif grew out of Vancouver's closely connected electronic music scene in 1990, bringing together Bill Leeb of Front Line Assembly with cEvin Key and Dwayne R. Goettel of Skinny Puppy. The collaboration reunited Leeb and Key, who had worked together during Skinny Puppy's earliest years, with Leeb again using the name Wilhelm Schroeder that he had adopted while a member of the band.

Leeb and Key's musical connection stretched back well before Cyberaktif. The two met in Vancouver in the late 1970s and became part of the city's club scene, including the Luv-A-Fair. Key later credited Leeb with introducing him to artists including Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire, music that helped redirect his own interests toward the harsher electronic approach that developed into Skinny Puppy. Leeb subsequently left Skinny Puppy and established Front Line Assembly, while Goettel joined Key and Nivek Ogre in Skinny Puppy.

Cyberaktif came together informally after Leeb returned from a Front Line Assembly tour and stayed with Key in Vancouver. In a November 1990 radio interview, Leeb recalled that the two began talking about their earlier years together and decided it would be fun to make an electronic record. They contacted Jim Nash of Chicago's Wax Trax! Records, and the project quickly took shape with Goettel joining them. Key later remembered that the uncertain state of Skinny Puppy following the recording of Rabies gave him the opportunity to reconnect musically with Leeb.

The first Cyberaktif recordings appeared on Wax Trax! with the singles ‘Temper’ and ‘Nothing Stays’, followed by the album Tenebrae Vision in 1991. Recorded at Vancouver Studios, the album combined Leeb's vocals and songwriting with Key's production, engineering and programming and Goettel's keyboards, sampling and writing. ‘Nothing Stays’ remained closely associated with Cyberaktif long after the group ceased recording.

The album also featured Blixa Bargeld of Einstürzende Neubauten. Leeb and Key had met Bargeld when Einstürzende Neubauten performed in Vancouver during Expo 86. While Cyberaktif was recording, they learned that Bargeld happened to be in the city and invited him into the studio. He contributed vocals, piano and production to ‘Paradiessiets’, and also participated in material issued with the Temper single. Leeb recalled in 1990 that Bargeld's appearance came together within hours rather than through any advance arrangement.

Cyberaktif was conceived as a studio project rather than an ongoing band. By late 1990 Leeb was already describing it as something that had been made because he and Key had time available between their principal groups. Skinny Puppy soon entered another intensive period of recording and touring, while Leeb continued with Front Line Assembly and his numerous related projects. Key later said that there was never a discussion about making a second Cyberaktif record during those years. Goettel died in 1995, leaving Tenebrae Vision as the sole Cyberaktif album for more than three decades.

Interest in the recordings continued. Toronto's Artoffact Records returned Tenebrae Vision to circulation with a vinyl edition in 2017 and an expanded remastered edition in 2018. The latter collected the original album with material from the ‘Temper’ and ‘Nothing Stays’ singles and a previously unreleased Beatbox Inc edit of ‘Nothing Stays’.

Leeb and Key began working together again years later. Front Line Assembly and Skinny Puppy toured together in 2014, an experience Key remembered as unusually enjoyable, and he subsequently began developing electronic pieces that he initially thought might become Skinny Puppy material. When that album did not materialize, Leeb and Rhys Fulber approached Key about using some of the music for Cyberaktif.

The revived Cyberaktif became a three-way collaboration between Key, Leeb and Fulber. Key developed grooves, sounds and rhythmic ideas at his Los Angeles studio and sent the material to Fulber, who shaped the material into song arrangements. Leeb then developed and recorded his vocal parts. Fulber described the process as moving from Key through himself to Leeb, while Leeb emphasized that the finished album was the work of all three musicians. Greg Reely mixed and mastered the recordings.

The resulting album, eNdgame, appeared through Artoffact Records on February 2, 2024, thirty-three years after Tenebrae Vision. Eric Peterson, Dre Robinson and Guilherme Pires also contributed to the sessions. Key described the record as “pure Vancouver.”

Speaking after the release of eNdgame, Leeb described working again with Key as completing a circle that had begun with Skinny Puppy four decades earlier. Fulber said the album came together unusually quickly once the three musicians found their working method.

-Robert Williston