Lou Reed - Metal Machine Music
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CD Details
Artist: Lou ReedEdition: Music CD
Format: Limited Edition
CD Release Date: 2000-10-10
Music Label: Buddha
Soundtracks:
- Metal Machine Music, Part I
- Metal Machine Music, Part II
- Metal Machine Music, Part III
- Metal Machine Music, Part IV
Music reviews of Metal Machine Music
Music Review: Clearing the air part 3
Rating: 3 Stars
First time was White Light/White Heat...next was
quitting the velvets.
And then there came Metal Machine Music.
I've listened to parts of this record a number of times and have always felt something different each time. However I believe like most "art", it was meant to affect different people in different ways. And it might never affect you the same way twice. Think Nine Inch Nails meets John Cage meets MC5 meets LaMont Young. And I don't mean just bits of those artists separately and the influences thereof, but rather all of them playing simultaneously at extreme ear shattering volume. The affect of listening to this on headphones is enough to inflict psychotic reaction. It is NOT music to do housework to. Unless that housework involves demolition.
Having said that, I also believe that MMM was recorded for 1 specific reason. Lou was trying to "clear the air" of all the quote, unquote "sally can't dance, your rock 'n'roll animal". Which I think means all the fans of those records and others like them. He was casting those fans aside much the same way that Little Richard threw his jewels in the river or Brian Wilson stopped recording and writing music at the height of his popularity. All probably felt a certain amount of pressure, both from record companies as well as the fans to keep churning out the same product over and over with new and different wrapping.
Many times that gets to be the disillusionment of rock stars. The need to sell "product" as opposed to creating music that means something and has relevance to themselves and their fans. The rock music world rises, falls and changes much too quickly for most stars to retain their shine and fans become impatient for their favorite star to produce the next music masterpiece that resembles and continues the original greatness that they achieved early in their career.
Most groups or even solo artists don't make it past 2 or 3 records because the fanbase moves on to newer, shinier versions. So what Lou did was to circumvent the eventual fanbase collapse and took an axe to his own career by releasing quite possibly the most unlistenable record ever produced. And just to make sure the destruction was complete he recorded 4 sides of it and put a cover on that made it seem like this might be a live recording to entice those leftover Rock'n'roll Animal fans. Lou knew that the shine on his star was quickly becoming faded and felt he still had much more creativity to sell, so he destroyed himself publicly, and then quickly re-invented himself with a new record label and new, self-controlled image. At the same time he was recording and releasing MMM he was planning a major career move to take control of the production and release of his music, instead of leaving it to the whims of the record company and the producers that were assigned to him, as happened early in his career.
I, for one, preferred Lou Reed music with a capable producer such as Bob Ezrin or David Bowie that knew what Lou Reed music should sound like, better than Lou knew himself. But alas, Lou thought he knew better so we have a dozen or so records of Lou's music post-MMM that sounds and feels like someone that can write great songs but doesn't necessarily comprehend how they should sound.
Be that as it may, I would recommend this record only to those brave souls who enjoy the sound of the death and subsequent re-birth of a rock star. It is most assuredly not a pretty sound, and more than likely harkens to Lou Reed's personal recollections of horrors of eletro-shock thereapy which he, himself endured as a young man at the insistence of his parents, mixed in with drug abuse, alcoholism and all the "friends" and nightmares he formed throughout his life at that time.
Clearing the air sometimes requires total annihilation and Lou Reed certainly achieved that with this record. You have now been forewarned. Proceed at your own risk, because there's a wasteland here with no happy ending.
editor's note ( this is a continuation of a previous review by the same reviewer under a different name. And should not be considered plagiarism).
Description of Metal Machine Music
Out of print in the U.S., this a mid-priced 1992 reissuefrom RCA Germany of his hour long experimental album for thelabel, originally released in 1975. Four tracks, all partsof the title cut.Alternative Rock CDs
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