Motorhead-Orgasmatron Review

                Motorhead returned with a new lineup and with their seventh album in 1986. Orgasmatron has generally been cited as having solid songs but lacking adequate production. Let’s take a look at what I believe to be an unsung classic deserving of a little more attention and see if the complaints of production are really formed in fact. 

                The album opens with “Deaf Forever”. The song, like many a Motorhead tune is about blood and stone. The tale seems to concern the battles of the Vikings, and is of course quite violent and gory. The song is fairly standard for the band, but battle samples distract the listener somewhat and don’t really add much to the song in my opinion. Not bad, but not really a classic. The next track is a true pleasure. “Nothing Up My Sleeve” is classic Motorhead, and the minute the insanely overdriven bass kicks in you know you are in for a dose of musical adrenaline. The song is basically about distrustful and slippery woman, of whom Lemmy has surely met many during his adventures. The song has a very familiar beat, basically more of the same thrashy rock that Motorhead had been perfecting for years at this point. New drummer Pete Gill does not quite hit the sticks as hard as regular drummer Phil Taylor but does a more than adequate job here. An underrated Motorhead classic. “Ain’t My Crime” is basically Lemmy telling a cheating and lying woman off yet again. It is here we see Lemmy having little regard or concern for this woman, basically expressing his lack of interest or concern in the failed relationship. Stone Cold forever indeed. Late guitarist Wurzel was added to the band’s lineup just before the recording of this album, but I believe that Motorhead has and will always work better as a trio. Wurzel’s solos often fail to impress, and he did not really add much to the band’s sound in my opinion. The solo for this song feels quite limp, lacking raw energy and overdrive. “Claw” is Motorhead taking the piss a  little. The song is about the power of a man’s ….well… you know what.  In the song, Lemmy is able to lure other men’s women into bed with him to do the  ”horizontal dance”.  No messing around, plain and simple Lemmy is purest rock star on Earth and when he says he will steal your girlfriend, he means it. The double-bass drum work is quite good, and meets the Motorhead standard set by Phil Taylor. The end of the song is slightly goofy, with Lemmy messing around screaming about his “Claw”. Despite the end, the song is very good.  I would like to have heard a longer solo however, and some sampled “block” sounds are totally unnecessary. 

                “Mean Machine” is Motorhead at hyper speed.  The song is blistering fast, perhaps a little bit too much. I could not really make heads or tails of the lyrics, but the song appears to either be about a lost woman or a bomber and its pilot blowing up things. In any case, the song is simply too fast for my taste. The song feels rushed through and almost produces a headache. Drumming is intense and tight, but the guitars sound somewhat tame and processed compared the edgy and raw Punk-like guitars of earlier albums. Skip this one. “Built For Speed” brings to mind the classic sound of the band and slows down the beat to a nice pace. The song is basically Lemmy’s mission statement, proclaiming a long life and a long time spent partying, drinking, and bedding a “million” girls. The song is one of the band’s most “Metal” songs and is fairly crunchy and heavy. The song is quite enjoyable, despite the very simple guitar solos. “Ridin’ With The Driver” appears to be about the power of one of Lemmy’s loves; trains. The song again has quite a Metal feel to it, and the beat sounds like the clacking of train tracks. The verses are quite interesting, and chug along like a locomotive billowing black smoke out into the countryside. However, the chorus is quite an odd stylistic move for the band and does not really work musically for me. The listener begins to notice a difference between the two guitars and their interplay, one guitar is often distorted and the other is quite clean and often uses common 1980s guitar effects like reverbs and compressors. The result is a strange contrast between the two guitars, as in the chorus of this song. This is again why I believe that Motorhead works better as a one- guitar band. 

                “Doctor Rock” is one of the band’s most famous songs.  I have never been very fond of the song, and the song sounds like a cheap Kiss knock-off. The lyrics consist of Lemmy rhyming words such as “ill” and “pill” with each other, and they are dunderheaded even for him. The song is repetitive, and the stupid lyrics are repeated over and over. The song really lacks any bells and whistles, and the lack of a definable solo disappoints the listener. Not a highlight of this album. The album closes with “Orgasmatron”. The song is a Motorhead classic, and for many one of their most progressive songs. The song is basically about a post-apocalyptic situation where the world is suffering at the hands of an evil demi-god. Lemmy adopts the voice of Orgasmatron, and gives a deep growl that he uses from time to time. The song is interesting, and fairly long for the band. 

                Orgasmatron is an interesting album, but non-fans of the band will probably not find much to convince them otherwise here. For those who enjoy Motorhead, this is a fairly essential piece of their canon despite for obvious filler. Good, but not a bona fide classic.  

Rating-7.5/10

The Replacements-Pleased to Meet Me Review

                 

                 The Minneapolis quasi-Punks returned with their fifth full-length album in 1987. “Pleased to Meet Me” is considered by many to be the final true Replacements album as other albums after this would involve minimal input from the rest of the band and were essentially solo albums by singer Paul Westerberg. 

                The album opens with “I.O.U”. Although still retaining some Punk elements, the song actually has quite a Rockabilly feel.  An interesting little song about what appears to be the legal system and punishment. However, the album is perhaps best remembered for single “Alex Chilton”, a fan boy tribute to songwriter Alex Chilton of Big Star. The song is an absolute classic, and shows a nice musical homage to one of the great songwriters of our time, despite the extreme romanticizing of Chilton’s life and career. The song really shows that the Replacements were in many ways becoming a pop band at this time, as this is about as poppy as it gets in their discography.  The song will instantly become lodged in your brain, a great song. “I Don’t Know” shows the increasingly experimental use of different styles  by the band. The song incorporates horns into the mix, although it does not really detract from the overall feel of the song.  The song features bored band members responding to Westerberg’s questions  with little enthusiasm via backing grunts The song really mirrors the famous image found on the cover, a kind of psychotherapy session that shows the band confused about their recent critical and semi-commercial success. “Nightclub Jitters” is an experimental kind of “Cocktail Jazz”   song and easily one of the worst songs musically that the band had recorded. The song is a sordid tale of life at night, and all of the creeps and creatures that come out at this time and drunkenly fill up nightclubs and bars. The lyrics are introspective, but the music is not really a fit for the band and sounds very out of step with its soft-Jazz vibe. Skip this one. “The Ledge” is a tale that was supposedly written about suicide and faced controversy upon its initial release.  Although quite tame nowadays, the song is quite visceral but catchy at the same time. The song moves quite away from the band’s Punk roots and incorporates fairly lengthy guitar solos and guitar effects such as the dreaded chorus effect;  which was quite popular at the time in contemporary music but actually works here musically. 

                Side Two opens with “Never Mind”, what appears to be a breakup song. The song is about the hopeless disintegration of a relationship that appears to be beyond the point of repair. Acoustic guitars give the song a more folky feel, and the song is definitely mellower than earlier songs by the band. Nice female backing vocals again give the song a sentimental and emotive feeling, making the sometimes abrasive music of the band a much sweeter pill to swallow. A nice short and sweet song by the band. “Valentine” is a kind of love letter to an object of infatuation. A love song, showcasing the bands more gooey and gushy side. Tommy Stinson’s bass is of particular note here, with complex fills that Mike Dirnt of Green Day and other Punk bassists spent the better part of a generation trying to emulate. Again, quite mellow and sappy, but never fake or contrived. “Shooting Dirty Pool” is a classic bar anthem, another tale from the seedy underground; a place that the bands frequented more than a few times. The song has some warped slide guitar and soloing, a rarity for the band. The song again adopts a kind of rockabilly feel, but updates the sound with modern production and effects. The song is a tad short, and feels more like a joke song than a fleshed out idea. “Red Red Wine” bears no relation to the UB40 original, instead it is a love letter to the red stuff; name checking various companies that produce the stuff and detailing other forms of alcohol abuse. The band was no stranger to alcohol abuse at this point, and it makes sense to write a song about one of their favorite past times. The song is again fairly rockabilly, and sounds somewhat like the direction that was adopted by Social Distortion and other Punk/Rockabilly bands making an impact in the late 1980s.  Although meant to be somewhat ironic, the band was intend struggling with substance abuse that even culminated in the ejection of guitarist Bob Stinson in 1986, so not really a laughing matter at all. “Skyway” is a sign of things to come, a very poppy and folky acoustic number about vagrancy, passing glances, all wrapped into a soft and gentle song really about love in unlikely places. The track is quite different, but those who enjoy Westerberg’s solo output are sure to find something they like here. The album closes with the very famous “Can’t Hardly Wait”. The song is classic Replacements, cold like a Minneapolis winter in terms of instrumentation, but bursting with emotion lyrically. The song is quite catchy, but the horn and string sounds produce a kind of unnecessary bombast that I feel was totally overdone and somewhat tacky. The song is about love and failure, good intentions gone wrong constantly in terms of love. Our hopeless protagonist wants to express his love for someone, but is constantly meet by roadblocks.  “Naked” versions of the songs can be heard by Westerberg solo, as all of the fancy bells and whistles in the production were a tad annoying for me. Otherwise a great song. 

                “Pleased to Meet Me” is without a doubt the final classic Replacements album. Although having more than a few blemishes, people could do far worse than purchase this album. Despite the lack of Bob Stinson on guitar and the often cheesy horn and string sounds, the album is still a classic piece of 1980s alternative and a fitting entry in the band’s discography. 

Rating-8.0/10

Korn-The Path of Totality

    The veteran "Nu-Metal" band return with their tenth album and a radical new musical direction. The Path of Totality was produced a venerable smorgasbord of "dubstep" producers including almost household name Skrillex. Let's take a look and see if the much-hated band took a dubstep in the right direction, (sorry, could not resist that joke).

        The album opens with "Chaos Lives In Everything", and really shows the massive stylistic shift the band have undertaken. Long gone are ultra-distorted guitars and bass, replaced by mostly electronic drum beats and heavily distorted synths. The lyrics of Jonathan Davis remain relatively similar to past Korn efforts, concerned with all things dark and buried within the psyche. The direction is honestly not always terrible, and Korn sound relatively rejuvenated compared to other recent efforts. The song does have a slightly misogynistic hint to it, and some of the language Davis expresses about a woman he wants to kill and rape will make some uncomfortable, but no more uncomfortable than previous Korn albums. Next is “Kill Mercy Within” produced by dubstep superstar Noisia.  The song has a much mellower feel than Korn has ever had, and the guitar is barely even distorted at all. The vague lyrics about hate, open sores, and alienation are fairly standard for Korn, and at this point Korn is sure to be much more appealing to frustrated youth than the now adult generation that grew up with them. Despite the musical evolution, Korn retains the same juvenile lyrics that now sound silly coming from someone over 40. “My Wall” bears no relation to the poem of the same name, and concerns isolating oneself from others. The song is an atrocity. Davis aims for some really high notes here, revealing his vocal limitations. The extremely low backing vocals sound really processed and sound ridiculous instead of creepy. Again, the lyrics are extremely bland and cliché, showing little maturity or evolution. The dubstep production starts to lose its appeal at this point, with each song sounding almost interchangeable with the next. Really quite a dud of a track.

            Lead single Narcissistic Cannibal shows that the talents of producer extraordinaire Skrillex are not really what is being called into question here. The song contains some interesting elements, an interesting organ sound, trademark quaking Korn bass, and some fairly pumping dubstep beats supplied by Skirllex. The song is really not bad, even if the title is quite silly. A good example of this collaboration working. “Illuminati” lacks any definable elements. Despite having a decent groove, the song is fairly repetitive and the chorus really lacks an oomph and feels anti-climactic. The outro shows Korn at its most limp, without any aggression and inducing sleep. “Burn The Obedient” brings back some of the rap elements that Korn helped to introduce into “Nu-Metal”. The rapping segments are barely audible, and production was quite weak on this song. I began to miss the guitars at this point, and this album has basically abandoned the genre that Korn helped invent. Davis sounds like a snarling dog at the end of the song, but this vocal style loses all validity when accompanied by a basic dubstep beat without any “balls”. The lyrics show the twisted fantasies of an outsider, and is sure to appeal to those who still find Korn’s music to be meaningful and deep. For the rest of us, Korn fail to show much evolution and quick simply lack depth and range.

            The album continues with “Sanctuary”, a fairly slow and glitchy song. The song talks about drugs and sedatives, but the song feels more like a sedative itself. The song’s guitars feel tame and buried, and the drums sound terribly plastic-like and outdated. Screaming backing vocals and nasty feedback leave the listener with a horrible taste in their mouth, to use a somewhat cliché metaphor. Really quite terrible. “Let’s Go” is fairly similar to the rest of the album and does little to convince the listener of the validity of this project. However, the song features some decent bass work from “Fieldy”, an underrated bassist to say the least. Guitars however make a welcome return here, and the song is perhaps the most rock-like on this album. However, I believe that Korn has immensely suffered as a result of the lack to two guitarists since the departure of “Head” after a religious awakening. The song has a decent chorus, but the chants of “gotta get away” over and over start to irritate quickly. Average in every way, but slightly better than most of the album. Lead single “Get Up!” is an interesting experiment, and this album works the best when Skrillex has control of the knobs. However, the song’s chorus is fairly boneheaded, but really no more so than most of the band’s previous output. As aforementioned, the song’s “real” instruments feel buried in a mix of electronic soup. I don’t feel that the dubstep direction has added anything to Korn’s sound, and actually detracts from the overall musical experience. Despite the obvious flaws, the song is actually quite catchy and has a nice breakdown where all elements of the song are thrown in a musical blender and chopped and screwed in the way that Skirllex knows best. The warm synths on the chorus  are actually quite interesting, and it is nice to see Korn try something new. “Way Too Far” again incorporates synths into the dubstep mix. Despite the lame grunting verse vocals, the chorus is quite enjoyable and contains some cool dubstep cinematic-like vocals and a nice jackhammer-like dubstep beat. The song is actually not bad, and shows the Korn and dubstep are not totally “out of step” and can exist together. The album closes with “Bleeding Out”, a fairly standard Korn song despite the obvious inclusion of electronic elements. Here, the synths and beats feel totally unnecessary and tacked on. The gentle pianos are not horrible, but the video game synths and dubstep beats are so tired by this point. The inclusion of bagpipes at the end of the track is a curious choice, but not enough to save this track or this album.

            “The Path of Totality” is a bold experiment by a band trying to stave off increasing commercial and critical obscurity. Despite a few clicks, the overall result is not really something  that has staying power or musical appeal. The very hyper-quick nature of the dubstep beats make the listener lose interest very quickly, and the musical direction of the album feels like a gimmick soon after the second or third song. Additionally, Davis has shown little lyrical evolution since 1994’s “Korn”, and in some ways appears to be going backwards. Finally, the songs real instruments are given a secondary focus here, and are sadly missed. Skip this one and get “Follow the Leader” and  “Life is Peachy” if you are in the market for some reason for some “Nu-Metal”.
Rating-3.5/10
       

Neil Young-Trans Review

                A very peculiar effort from Mr. Young released at a time when much of popular music had become increasingly electronic in nature. “Trans” borrows obvious stylistic cues from “Krautrock” artists such as Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream as well as “New Wave” artists and is about as far removed from Young’s earlier folky efforts as one could possibly imagine. Deeply abnormal for Neil Young; however, “Trans” is an partially interesting listen for those with an open mind. 

                Opener “Little Thing Called Love” is not terribly different from much of Young’s earlier output and does not shock the way that later songs do. The song is a kind country-tinged and sappy song about the singing the praises of love. The song actually sounds more like Young’s later 1980s releases, and sounds very out of place on this otherwise quite experimental album. Catchy, but a slightly average rocker. “Computer Age” at times reminds one very much of Kraftwerk’s “Computer World”. Synthesizers are all over the song, and many of Young’s fan base cringed at this idea. Young’s vocals are processed through a primitive vocoder, a machine that preceded the modern “auto-tune” effect we all know. This effect covers much of the album, love it or hate it. The song is honestly not bad, but feels like an imitation of Kraftwerk’s musical style and it’s a very drastic difference for the mostly organic Young.

                “We R In Control” continues usage of the processed vocals. The song is about a sort of “Illuminati” like organization that is in complete control. Young’s voice is totally unrecognizable and it sounds like a typing program for the mute. Angular guitars remind one of Devo, one of the clear influences on this album. The same lyrics repeat over and over again, and the song sounds way too mechanical and silly. The highlight of the album for me was “Transformer Man”. Beneath all of the studio electronics, the song is actually quite good. Vocoders expand somewhat Young’s limited vocal range and make them a little easier to swallow. Like Kayne West on “808s and Heartbreaks”, young adopts a mechanical alter-ego to give his songs a much different range and a unique persona. The song is really about just that, using machinery and technology to change aspects of human life quickly and easily. A interesting little song and very catchy. 

                “Computer Cowboy” shows again the theme of contrast between old and new life on the album. Besides the vocoder effect, the song is fairly traditional in terms of musical elements.  The vocoder gets really annoying by this point, and actually starts to make the listener frustrated and annoyed.  This is especially apparent here, as the song is otherwise fairly normal sounding. The lyrics concern a sort of cyborg cowboy, roaming cities and range late at night trying to escape technology’s reach. The song includes an electronic facsimile of a horse trotting, a truly lame artistic decision. A total dud of a song. “Hold On To Your Love” is a fairly standard sounding song by this album’s standards. The song occasionally receives airplay on satellite radio, but still contains synthesizers and electric piano sounds; a huge mistake in the eyes of many of Young’s fans. These sounds actually don’t bother as much as the robotic vocals, and don’t really detract despite being fairly thin and cheap sounding. The song is actually fairly optimistic about love, and somewhat sweet and endearing tune. The song continues to explore the cowboy theme on the album, with lonesome slide guitar-like sounds adding some Western motifs. 

                “Sample And Hold” would not sound entirely out of place on an album by “Pet Shop Boys” or other such acts of the 1980s. The song concerns what appears to be some sort of digital dating service, and the creepy element of robotic love instantly reminds one of Kraftwerk. Twisted and distorted lower-end bass sounds really add a sleazy and gritty feel to the song. The robotic vocals actually work here, reflecting the emotional barrier that is produced by human interaction with technology. Young’s processed guitars sound interesting, and show his increasing exploration of distortion.  The song gets to be somewhat repetitive after the four-minute mark, and starts of outwear its welcome. The song could have easily been trimmed in half, and the later four minutes mostly repeat the chorus many times atop fiddling with guitars and drum sounds. Not bad, but too long. “Mr. Soul” is fairly conventional remake, but makes use of a very horrible drum-machine to propel the track along. The song lacks any sort of “low-end”, and it sounds very weak and thin. The song really fails to match the “Buffalo Springfield” original, and is a totally useless endeavor.  Skip this version, get the original classic. The album closes with “Like an Inca”, a Latin-influenced jam that really sounds much more conventional. The song reminds of Carlos Santana in the lead guitar, and shows Young’s more than decent guitar skills the most out of any song on this album. The lyrics concern getting back to the more primal instincts of ancient human societies, and it was nice to deviate from the mechanical theme dominating most of Trans. However, the song is a strong stylistic deviation from the rest of the album. Also, the song sounds quite dated and was actually a leftover from a previous session. Finally, at over nine minutes, the song feels like an extended jam and the listener is sure to lose interest. 

                “Trans” is a mostly forgotten album and an anomaly in the Young canon. “Trans” makes some bold artistic decisions, but really strays too from Young’s folk rock to be really considered. The songs are simply not that strong, and the mostly horrible electronics seem to be trying to mask that fact. Additionally, the albums wears its influences on its sleeve far too much, sounding often like a cheap parody by Liam Lynch rather than a true artistic direction. Avoid this one .

Rating-5.0/10

Billy Idol-Cyberpunk Review

                Generally considered to be one of the worst things to make it to disc; 1993’s “Cyberpunk” is considered by many to be the worst concept album ever and one of the worst albums ever period. I had to hear this thing for myself, and was lucky enough to find it for a low low price of $2 after some bargain searching through discount bins. Let’s take a look at Cyberpunk and see if the album really deserves such a savage beating. The album contains a number of short segments that bridge songs, and obviously I have chosen to ignore these sections.

                The album opens with “Wasteland” which sounds like a soundtrack for a Super Nintendo game. The horribly dated and digital electronics are utterly pathetic even by 1993 standards. The song concerns atheism in the post-apocalyptic future that Idol created for this album. The song is horrible in ever sense, Idol constantly repeats “no religion” over and over until you instantly want to remove the disc from the drive.  The next proper song is “Shock To The System”, which contains very low-grade samples of electricity signals. The song is really not all that different from most Idol tracks, with a slightly Punk song structure, albeit in a much more ridiculous guise here. This song is really quite shit, but one of the “better” songs on this album. The lack of electronics probably helps the song avoid total disaster, as that particular area has never really suited the snarl of Idol. “Tomorrow People” heads back into techno mode, this time with slightly better results. The song instantly reminds one of the Happy Mondays and the whole “Madchester” scene of the early 1990s. Some gritty distortion and danceable beat give the song some decent qualities, but fails to impress. “Adam In Chains” begins with a hypnotic spoken-word introduction that sounds like a relaxation tape your mother would listen to. The dub bass is a half-decent sound exploration, but the spoken-word robotic vocals annoy and anger after the one-minute mark. Idol eventually comes in and delivers a half-decent vocal about lost love, but at this point the listener has lost all interest in the song. “Neuromancer” sounds like industrial-lite, and here Idol delivers a vocal that reminds of INXS.  The song is not offensive, but adds little to change your opinion of this album at this point. “ Power Junkie” is a horribly grating affair, and will test the limits of your patience. Here Idol repeats that he is “going crazy” several times, which is exactly what I wanted to do during this song. The guitar solo is utterly pathetic and cheap 1990s digital keyboards sound like they are off a Casio demo track. The song is terribly repetitive, and Idol barks like a rapid dog throughout the track. 

                “Love Labours On” sucks the big one. The song incorporates “Eastern” sounds such as sitar and a slightly raga-like beat. The quite distorted guitar drowns out Idol’s vocals, and the digital sitar is paper-thin and sounds very phony and tacky. The lyrics are barely audible, and the song really shows the shoddy mixing job on this album. Idol does deliver a decent howl that sounds somewhat like vintage “Cult”, but the vocal performance is driven down by lame effects applied to Idol’s voice. The worst sin committed on this album is the techno/industrial cover of The Velvet Underground’s “Heroin”.  The song sounds more like the soundtrack for the movie version of Mortal Kombat than the Velvets, and is easily one of the worst covers I have ever heard. This is a complete and utter disgrace with horrible production, shoddy electronics, and Idol screaming his way through the track. Like most the album, the soul has been sucked out of the music through the use of very cold sounding beats, production, and overall feel. This song is terrible in the worst way imaginable. “Shangrila” continues the exploration of “Eastern” influences and is meant to evoke a deeply spiritual and meditative vibe. Instead, the song is extremely cliché and induces nausea. The laughable combination of didgeridoo and sitar samples show that the song is simply trying too hard to be “ethnic” sounding in an all-you-can-eat buffet kind of way. Idol channels George Harrison here, but the lyrics sound contrived and amateur.  Another dud on this increasing terrible album. 

                “Concrete Kingdom” makes use of tabla drums and chanting to again go for a world music vibe.  The song reflects the growing divide between modern urban life and the values of religion. The song contains some nice sweeping analog synthesizers, deep techno bass, and solid production and sampling. One of the better songs on this album. “Venus” reminds one of Depeche Mode in some way, telling of sexual seduction with a backing track clear influenced by the rising “trip-hop” movement from the U.K.  The song also reminds one of the production style of regular Madonna produced “Stuart Price” as well as additional Madonna producer “William Orbit”. In this regard, Cyberpunk did predict the stylistic trend in popular music production that would become the standard as the 1990s rolled on. Decent track, but by no means a lifesaver at this point.  “Then The Night Comes” sounds like a cross between INXS and the Cult, but not exactly like either band. The samples were produced using very primitive computer programming by today’s standards, and are really starting to show their age. The guitar work is decent enough, but like most of the album is quite distorted and contrasts with the cold sounding digital feel to most of the tracks. However, I think Idol did intend to show this contrast musically. Idol’s scream outwears its welcome quickly, and the song is very long and loses any kind of luster after the 3-minute mark. The album closes with “Mother Dawn”, a quasi-spiritual affair with female backing vocals that would not sound out of place on “Dance Mix 1993” or any such compilations. The lyrics lack any sophistication and good luck finding out what the song is about. The beat is repetitive and begins to annoy quickly. A lame duck. 

                “Cyberpunk” is horrendous. Although never a critical darling, Idol made a huge misstep here. However, the bold experimental certain was a brave move, but one that did not pay off. The really cold sounding feeling of the album, the inclusion of spoken-word segments, the lame themes of cyber-culture, and the overall dated production produce an boring, too long, and often laughable piece of work that should be avoided by all of those who value good music. As bad as people say. 

Rating-1.5/10

Peter Gabriel-"3" Review

                The former Genesis madman continued his series of eponymous albums in 1980 with “Peter Gabriel”, or as some call it “Peter Gabriel 3” or “Melt”. The album has been received a great deal of positive press over its thirty plus year gestation period. Let’s take a look and see if the album really holds up as well as critics say. 

       The first thing you will notice is how crisp the album sounds despite the increasing age of the album. Gabriel has always been known as a mad scientist in the studio, and “3” was one of the first commercial albums to make use of sampling and the “Fairlight” digital recording system. The album opens with the incredibly creepy “Intruder”, a song about home invasion giving us a look at the inner monologue of a criminal mind. The song features atonal guitar chords, giving a sense of unease paranoia. Sampled sounds pepper the song, and marimbas and glasses add a general feeling of mischief. Drums are treated, but quite warm and the song has a quite heavy beat. Primus would later cover the song, and the influence on the alternative movement that would develop in the late 1980s is very obvious. This is not normal music, and Gabriel is at his most experimental on “Intruder”. “ No Self-Control” continues the slightly depraved themes of the album, telling of a man unable to stop eating, sleeping, etc. The interesting marimba piano sounds drive the song, accompanied by mutilated guitars with heavy distortion. The chorus is quite poppy, but still experimental. It uses sample human voices, in a way that had not really been attempted before “3” in popular music. Interesting “mutant” pop. 

                “Start” is a very short instrumental that contains a nice sax solo, accompanied by lush synthesizers. “I Don’t Remember”  then kicks into Gabriel’s signature 1980s sound; mechanical digital drums, deep effect-covered funk bass, and warbling vocals.  The song was interesting, and is a sort of blueprint for Gabriel’s later and more commercial sound on albums such as “4” and “So”.  The lyrics concern memory-loss, and shows Gabriel’s ability to manipulate lyrics to turn virtually any morose or perverse topic into a slick pop song. “Family Snapshot” is a quite slow piano-driven song. The slow and emotional piano chords soon turn into a guitar/sax Springsteen-like romper. The songs feel a tad disjointed, and the three different sections have a very different feel respectively. The lyrics are really quite melancholy, and Gabriel really has the ability to make even grown men cry. An interesting patch work of a song, but not a classic. “And Through The Wire” is a much more rollicking number. The phenomenal fretless bass work is moved along by a nice acoustic drum beat. The garage-like guitars show that although he was often were digital in terms of recording, Gabriel’s songs always find a way to incorporate some elements of non-digital recording and can be quite organic. The song is optimistic and hopeful like much of Gabriel’s work, suggesting that despite difficulties and restrictions in life (the metaphoric “Wire” here), we are able to overcome adversity. The song is easily Gabriel’s most Punk like song, although definitely not subscribing totally to that particular genre’s rules. 

                The album is perhaps best remembered for classic-rock radio staple “Games Without Frontiers”. I have always enjoyed this song, even if it does sound quite a bit like Phil Collins at times. The comparison to Collins comes from the use of Roland drum-machines, which Collins was also using at this, time. The siren-like guitars add a sense of death and destruction, and a nice thick and distorted bass provides a very low growl. Although dated, the synthesizers add a nice vintage feel to the song, and the middle portion of the song contains a section that could easily be considered among of the primary influences on the “Jungle” genre of electronic music that would gain popularity in the early 1990s. “Not One Of Us” continues Gabriel’s common exploration of xenophobia and exclusion. The song concerns the “us verses them” mentality, perhaps a reflection of the increasing political tensions in the world at the time. The song is very “New Wave”. using computer-samples atop a punk-like drums and mechanical bass lines. The song has a very paranoid feel to it, like most of the album. Gabriel’s exploration of cultural themes continues to the present-day, as I believe he is truly an anthropologist wrapped in the guise of a pop singer. “Lead A Normal Life” is a mostly-instrumental song that uses a few heavily manipulated vocal samples. Gentle pianos and marimba samples provide a very calming effect, and Gabriel adds a few sparse lines about what appears to be life in a mental health treatment facility. The song is calming, but also quite unsettling at times, with a heavily distorted minimalist middle section playing before fading away back into the calming marimba/piano instrumental. Tribal drums come in towards the end, and set us up for the album’s final track. Single “Biko” is a wonderfully inspiring tale of the human spirit. The song concerns Steve Biko, the murdered South African activist who died in a brutal prison beating during apartheid-era South Africa. The song is Gabriel’s first full-scale exploration of African music, and African choirs, grunts, and electronic-tribal drums really show a world music flair to the song. Funeral bagpipes provide a very somber feeling to the song, and it is hard to not be moved by this song and the sacrifice paid by Biko. Great song. 

                “3” is a strong contender for Gabriel’s best album. The album pushed forward the use of sampling, world music, and generally set the new bar for pop music in 1980. Countless imitators would try to replicate “3”, but all would fail. Like Gabriel himself, this album is a true original. Fantastic.

Rating-9.5/10