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16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Only 4 unreleased tracks..., 22 Oct 2007
Firstly the plus side to this 3rd (!) UK CD version of John Foxx's seminal electronic masterpiece 'Metamatic'.
We do get all the B-sides to the associated singles. Also, the out-take 'Young Man' from the first Virgin CD release is added - why this was left off Edsel's previous release is a mystery. And we do get 4 (yes 4) unreleased tracks and the Smash Hits flexi-single 'My Face'. Housed in a jewel-case (thank you Edsel - no more digi-pak's please!), the booklet is nicely sepia coloured and contains all the lyrics and some very stylish period photos of John. We've had the interview / review on the last re-issue so no great loss that one is missing here.
Now to the minus points.
Firstly, despite what the sticker on the case says (and other reviewers), there are only 4 unreleased tracks. The alternative version of 'He's A Liquid' has already appeared on the excellent 'Modern Art' compilation. And secondly, why isn't the remixed single version of 'No-One Driving' included? Or the 'Miles Away / A Long Time' single? Maybe there's a good explanation for this but CD space isn't one of them.
So, to sum up, if you haven't yet got one of the previous versions of this album on CD yet (and if so, why not?) this is a well-designed package of a defining moment in electronic music history. With just a little more care this could have been the definitive version. As it is I'm left feeling that we fans are being just a little bit ripped-off.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
My Youth Revisited....., 26 Oct 2007
Forget Midge Ure and Gary Numan as talented as they were ... Mr Leigh (sorry Foxx) deserves all the plaudits for introducing the U.K.to electronic music, under the influence of Kraftwerk with this groundbreaking piece of work."Plaza","He's A Liquid","Underpass","No One Driving" and my personal favourite "030" form a completely astounding collection that deserves much greater credit."Miles Away" should have been included. Bought this on vinyl in 1982 aged 15-Pure genius.Buy this,open your mind, be prepared for barren,dystopian landscapes (similar to those portrayed in "A Clockwork Orange") and enjoy.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Are you under 40?, 26 Jun 2008
Tricky this. Everybody who writes a review of this album is going to be positive because, frankly, why bother taking the trouble to review a 28 year old album if you hate it? And because it's so damnably obscure pretty much everyone is going to have first bought it about 28 years ago too. Therefore, looking at these reviews is like looking into the John Foxx fanclub site. So I want to sound a note of caution, just in case anybody younger than 40 stumbles across these reviews.
Metamatic sounds dated. It couldn't really come from anywhere but 1979-1980. Anybody trying to sound like this now would be more funky, less po-faced. I loved this album once, but as the early 80s passed away I distanced myself from this album like a steaming mess I'd accidentally left on someone's kitchen floor.
For various reasons I came back to it a few months ago. I slapped it on the pod, played it shuffled in with a hundred other bands and classical riffs and gradually removed the songs that didn't stand up against the competition... and I was genuinely surprised by how much was left.
The opening, Plaza, is a marvellous thing, a bleak-funk tune, impossible to dance to unless you have one leg longer than the other, and lifted surprisingly by a confused bass-player's doodlings. A bit later the run of eerie gems from Blurred Girl to Tidal Wave is genuinely touching.
Finally, and most importantly, comes Touch & Go, the album's closer. When I first got the original record home this track came as a crashing disappointment. Where was the romantic closing number I'd come to expect? Instead all there was this wonky, clanking, speeding up, slowing down thing with a white-man rap over the top. I realise now how wrong I was. Why no-one has ever used Touch & Go on a film soundtrack I don't know? This stark bright thing is possibly the most moving song/soundscape that Mr Leigh (and his former bandmates, maybe) ever wrote.
You could probably jettison the rest, album tracks or filler material (I still enjoy Glimmer, Mr No and This City but they're hardly great, and I'm waiting for the dance remix of A New Kind of Man before I go clubbing again). If they'd taken the filler out I'd have given this six stars... although apparently that's not allowed... bummer.
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