Review - Lou Reed: Metal Machine Music

It’s confusing. You don’t hear stuff like this …ever. Not on purpose; not accidentally. I’ve heard the album questioned a number of times. I’ve had lengthy discussions on the album. I’ve heard rumors, but I also have my own theories. And I’m not really sure that the truth matters. Not for this one. Maybe it’s out there, but I’d rather speak on conjecture to what it could be and might mean.

This is Metal Machine Music. Best listened to at excessive volumes in a small, dark room, this is Lou Reed’s brainchild, consisting of an hour of nothing but modulated guitar feedback. My understanding is that this was recorded by taking two guitars and amps in a room, cranking them, and letting resonant harmonics do the rest. And that doesn’t seem too far from whatever the truth happens to be.

Essentially, it is one of the earliest and most well-known experiments delving into noise music. And this may be one of the rawest examples of noise music. After all, what else would you call an hour of guitar feedback?

But just as importantly as it is noise, I think there is music in there. Throughout the hour you hear oscillations, harmonic resonance, and amplitude swells. Those types of properties are what shape sound and what shape music. Those are some of the key building blocks of what the general public will call “music.” And, for the most part, this is being achieved naturally. Yes, it has a start and an end (sort of; the original record has track 4 drop into an infinite loop), but between those fixed points is nature. It’s the resonance of the room, coupled with the perpetual motion of the amplified string vibrations playing the very strings which are being vibrated.

The whole piece could be summed up by saying that it is energy, in the form of sound, searching for stability. And, in a sense, with the last 1.8 seconds originally falling into an infinite loop, that is how the piece resolves.

When you think about it, mathematically, it makes sense that a) you would eventually reach some infinite loop and b) it would take a long time. Granted, the infinite loop at the end was fabricated, but the concepts still remain. Given two guitars and two amps, you have two systems, each being comprised of 2 (or 3) pickup inputs, which each have a minimum of 6 string (I would assume that 6-string guitars were used) inputs. Those different strings are different gages, are tuned uniquely, and may even have the ability to fall out of tune with the intense resonant forces being placed on them. That resonance comes from the output from the speakers and the geometry of the room, but is dictated by everything down to the outlet voltage and how that fluctuates. Perhaps it could be phrased as "the music of science" ...or physics, or nature, etc.

When you’re talking about music, you’re usually thinking of this pretty sounding stuff. You’re looking for all of the right tonal properties and everything to be acting in harmony with one another. You’re looking for order that is dictated by that harmony of notes and tonal textures meshing together.

And that’s what throws people with this piece. It isn’t that glorious harmony or man and machine. Instead, it’s the process by which natural laws governing machines are able to form that harmony; it’s so much deeper than the crap playing over the speakers today at work.

But that doesn’t mean it’s a fun listen. The first time I listened to this album, I was alone, in the dark, playing it as loudly as I could. It was an experiment. It started out confusing, but ended incredibly disorienting. See, there are methods of torture/interrogation involving sensory depravation involving excessively loud music, darkness, and probably some other weird, messed up crap, designed to make you lose every frame of reference you have. And that first hour was what I would imagine that to be like. I could see where that sort of thing could mess people up.

But I think the strangest part is the silence when it is over. When you're searching for resolution for so long, you lose sight of what resolution is. Silence doesn’t make sense. Lost within the hour of trying to see construct within a wall of noise, the silence ends up as unsettling as the noise. It’s an interesting place to be.

And unless you live under a rock, you probably know that Lou died the other day, October 27. Otherwise, I’m fairly certain that I wouldn’t have subjected myself to this in the middle of my work day. Not that the album isn’t intriguing; it’s just not the easiest listening. At all. After silence stops being so unsettling, I’m gonna stick with that for the rest of the day. But if you haven't had your fill of Lou for the day, check out the album: