Metallic Life Review by Matmos–Album Review
Metallic Life Review by Matmos–Album Review
Long-running experimental electronic music duo Matmos is back with their 20th album, Metallic Life Review. The duo, Drew Daniel and MC Schmidt, partners in music and life, create intricate yet witty soundscapes through unexpected samples and found sounds, often centered around a specific theme. Past albums featured samples of plastic surgeries, their washing machine, and the Smithsonian Folkways archive.
Metallic Life Review, as its name implies, is a metal album. Only the metal in this case refers to samples of a wide variety of metal objects, too many to list here. A sampling of the samples in the credits includes an afro rake, fence post connectors, aluminum foil, a cemetery gate, nitrous oxide canisters, U.S. quarters, and a metal biscuit tin.
Some actual instruments also make appearances on the songs, helmed by several notable contributors, including Thor Harris (percussionist for Swans, Shearwater, and many more), Jason Willett (guitarist for Half Japanese), and noted pedal steel specialist Susan Alcorn. Alcorn tragically passed away earlier this year just as Matmos was finishing the album. They dedicated the track “Changing States” to her loving memory.
The album serves as a kind of retrospective of the band’s 30-year career, with sounds captured throughout the band’s entire existence. You can trace a direct line from 2019’s Plastic Anniversary to this album, which also explores found sounds.
When I first heard the pitch for the album, I expected to hear abrasive industrial sounds like one of their influences, Einsterzunde Neubauten. However, this album is wonderfully melodic and whimsical, but not in a trite way.
That said, there’s a dark edge here, the yin to the whimsy’s yang. Death permeates the album, with a second song dedicated to David Lynch’s memory.
The first cut “Norway Doorway,” opens with a foreboding gong, then the long, drawn-out squeal of the titular door opening, sounding more like a saxophone than a door. However, for all its menace, the gong reminds me of the opening title sequence for Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The song sets the tone for what’s ahead: menacing yet humorous soundscapes.
Obie Feldi
“Changing States” opens with the late great Susan Alcorn’s dreamy pedal steel, which forms the underlay for the song. The duo overlays their samples, percussion and xylophone. The song takes off in flights of fancy but is always brought back down to earth by Alcorn’s pedal steel.
On “Steel Tongues,” a song they describe as being about late-stage capitalism — where U.S. quarters provide the beat, marching the listener literally to the grave (an Irish cemetery gate swinging shut at the end) — the song sure is lighthearted. You’d think steel tongue drums would have sharp bites, but instead, they feel more like soft kisses.
“Chrome Reflects Our Image” is a love letter to David Lynch and Angelo Badalamenti, so it’s only fitting that they dedicated the song to Lynch. It has a synth bass line straight out of Twin Peaks, only minus the menace heard elsewhere.
Obie Feldi
The final, nearly 21-minute title track was recorded live and occupies the whole B side of the album. The song is a 4-part suite that, much like the album itself, encapsulates the band’s lengthy career, with samples going as far back as 2007 and as far away as parts of Europe.
Long-time fans will find a lot to love here. Newcomers have a great entry point into the band.
Matmos marks the release of this album with a US tour this summer, starting tomorrow in New York City at the Knockdown Center.
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