The Man-Machine took me some real time to get into. I kind of regretted my decision to listen to this album about halfway through the opening track “The Robots”. The whole thing felt incredibly plodding, like it was struggling to find its purpose for existing. But the longer the song went on the sheer audacity of the whole experience began to make sense– this was a group of humans pretending to be robots making music that other robots would listen to. Once I accepted that silly premise (and dealt with the foreboding sense of dread about AI that naturally followed that realization) I eased into the album and actually rather quite enjoyed the experience. The pulsating dreamy trip of “Spacelab” and “Metropolis” are what androids dreams sound like after they count their electric sheep.
Standout Songs: “Spacelab”, “Metropolis”
