Metal Machine Music: Unplugged

Alternative Press - "...Heard now, METAL MACHINE strikes us as a mellow Merzbow work with neo-classical aspirations. What once seemed like a freeform f**k-off to rock music now seems ripe for study in college composition courses." The Wire - "It actually sounds more dynamic and complex than the original, but sticks to the contours of Reed's piece faithfully." The Wire - Included in The Wire's "50 Records of the Year 2007". Uncut - 3 stars out of 5 -- "[S]ince its release in 1975 METAL MACHINE MUSIC has been reappraised as an important piece of avant-garde classical music and a forerunner of industrial rock." Mojo - 3 stars out of 5 -- "[B]oth a sensual post-rock symphony and a right old racket. Ahead of its time, too, for the thrilling lock groove finale anticipates virtually every rhythmic development made since." Uncut - 4 stars out of 5 -- "Get in the right frame of mind, and listening to MMM can be as meditative as observing the diurnal course of the Empire State Building." Spin - "MMM has inspired generations of background din since."

On this CD re-issue of the original 1975 RCA records disc, we hear an unrelenting, seeringly beautiful electro-acoustic composition for electric guitar and an array of "consumer-priced" sound-processing devices and amplifiers used by most bands of the mid-70's...inspired by La Monte Young's Dream Music installations, this one-time spontaneous production of Reed's pre-dated a great deal of rock-sound inspired new music (Branca, Chatham etc.) ...feedback and a lot of the Keith Richards-effect (maximum volume through small speakers) which lends a feeling of infinite universal and atomic surface compression permeating everything ..."Passion-realism was the key" is the significant line from the otherwise rather posed liner notes...sudden silences leave the listener floating. ~ "Blue" Gene Tyranny|