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Rating: After releasing three excellent albums as the leader of Ultravox!, John Foxx decided in '80 to embark on a solo career.
His former band dropped the exclamation mark along the way and shifted towards more commercial synth-pop sounds, (doing so with a lot of class nonetheless) abandoning the decidedly punk nuances of the early days. Foxx, on the other hand, surrounded himself with synthesizers in search of coldness, total rarefaction, the most antiseptic electronics.
With this intent, he released this masterpiece. His is a journey into depersonalization, everything (or almost everything, as we will see later) within this album evokes non-feeling, alienation. The sound cuts through you like a sharp blade, it feels like being projected into a completely mirrored room. Everything is reflected, a myriad of sound reflections that disorient you.
The synth raises its voice menacingly, looking down at you from a great height in "He is a liquid," a "ballad" that is nothing short of spectral. But here one does not feel fear, anguish, no, here one is completely annihilated by an intense and white light, there is no place for feelings, these are like crystallized. Foxx's approach to the work is philosophical, his aim is not to "use" the machine, nor to escape the machine, he wants to "lose himself in the machine," the only way to exorcize the cybernetic universe that dawns from afar.
"Metal Beat" is the manifesto of this philosophy, a geometric march with Foxx's robotic singing seemingly conversing with the sound. Never had the synth produced such subtle and sharp sounds until now; This track is a theorem, his philosophical theorem.
The next "No One Driving" seems to possess almost a certain "warmth," but it is only its proximity to this "monster" that makes it appear so. In reality, it perfectly follows the trend of the album.
"New Kind Of Man" is dominated by apocalyptic synthetic waves, Foxx seems to have lost the space-time coordinates ( "He WAS a new kind of man..." ), he seems to see what he could have been without knowing if he is now what or who.
At this point, he tries to declare a plea for help in "Blurred Girl," but now, swallowed by a hypnotic spiral of synths, he sinks further away, a victim of his curiosity, and his voice resonates with a dramatic echo. The effect this time is poignant, the only emotional glimmer of the album, and it is an intense, paralyzing emotion.
With this solo debut, John Foxx demonstrates all his potential, offering an intellectual transposition of what would later become, in the best cases, refined danceable music for "dandy" discos. His language will remain unmatched, demonstrating the greatness, admittedly somewhat unrecognized, of this artist.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Plaza (03:55)
On the Plaza
We're dancing slowly, lit like photographs
Across the Plaza
Toward the shadow of the cenotaph
Down escalators, come to the sea view
Behind all the smoked glass no-one sees you
A familiar figure comes to meet you
I remember your face
From some shattered windscreen...
Across the Plaza
A giant hoarding of Italian cars
Across the Plaza
The lounge is occupied by seminars
Down escalators, come to the sea view
Behind all the smoked glass no-one sees you
A familiar figure comes to meet you
I remember your face
From some shattered windscreen...
From the Plaza
The highways curve in over reservoirs
On the Plaza
A queue is forming for the cinema...
Down escalators, come to the sea view
Behind all the smoked glass no-one sees you
A familiar figure comes to meet you
I remember your face
From some shattered windscreen...
On the Plaza
On the Plaza
On the Plaza
On the Plaza
On the Plaza
On the Plaza
On the Plaza
On the Plaza
02 He's a Liquid (03:03)
He's an angle
She's a tangent
There's some flowers on the bathroom floor
He's a clicktrack
Now she makes a flashback
He's a liquid
He's a laugh
She's a graph
He wears a sticky white shirt and tie
In those viscous clothes
His watch hand glows
He's a liquid
She's elusive
He's adhesive
He's a trickle down a falling wall
They get married too much
She's a soft touch
He's a liquid
He pulls
She pushed
They read The Bible about the flood
She draws the curtains
'Cos now she's certain
He's a liquid
03 Underpass (03:57)
Standing in the dark
Watching you glow
Lifting a receiver
Nobody I know
Chorus:
Underpass
Underpass
Well I used to remember
Now it's all gone
World War something
We were somebody's sons
(Chorus)
Over all the bridges
Echoes in rows
Talking at the same time
Click click drone
(Chorus)
Misty on the glass now
Rusty on the door
Here for years now
Click click drone
Click click drone
Click click drone
Click click drone
Click click
(Repeat chorus and fade)
04 Metal Beat (03:02)
Chorus:
Metal beat
Metal beat
Metal beat
Metal beat
Jim Suit
Black hair
Dim skin
Gold teeth
A trickle voice like a silver sheet
The pulling of the light
Reflecting in my eyes
Pick up a flip-top box from a vinyl seat
(Chorus)
Drift in
Drift out
We're gone
I'm here
Click on
Click off
No, no
Don't get too near
Name on the shatterproof glass
Melt into a mass
Let's slide across me in this heat
(Chorus)
08 030 (03:18)
Male caucasian
Pattern scarring
Domestic gestures just like mine
Kennedy hairline
Remix features
Someone pushing through my outline
Chorus:
Voices merging
Faces blurring
Voices blurring
Faces merging
Lieutenant 030
Lieutenant 030
X-rays match up
Sunlit concrete
Missing since 1963
File a decaying car
Buried in the sand
Empty clothing blows across a beach
(Chorus)
09 Tidal Wave (04:17)
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Goes by my window
We're swimming
It's morning
No sound at all
Through floors of apartments
Background dissolves
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Goes by my window
You're balancing bravely
It's been so long
You're speaking
Can't hear you
No sound at all
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Goes by my window
A glimpse of old sunlight
No sound at all
A flicker
Of flashback
Background dissolves
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Tidal Wave
Goes by my window
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Other reviews
By Rocky Marciano
"Metamatic stands as a cold and tense synth-pop monument."
"The perfect, clean, and antiseptic sounds radiate future and nocturnal atmospheres, with Foxx’s hypnotic vocals wandering amid sharp and evocative melodic structures."
