Spectrum Culture: Metric, Synthetica

New on Spectrum Culture, I review the latest record from Canadian band Metric:

"The fifth full-length record from Canada’s synth-pop/New Wave/post-punk/garage band Metric, is a concept album of sorts about the role of technology and artificiality in modern culture. As if to reinforce the sense of alienation and ennui expressed through frontwoman Emily Haines’ lyrics, the music is mostly predictable, mechanical and largely devoid of anything that resembles personality. We have before us an extraordinarily, sometimes maddeningly, consistent album, one that fills the listener with the sensations of a streamlined society, the kind Donald Fagen was talking about on his 1982 hit “I.G.Y. (What a Beautiful World).” There’s no denying that Haines and friends evoke a specific world throughout Synthetica. It’s just not one that’s especially original, or even pleasurable to explore."

Read more here:

http://spectrumculture.com/2012/06/metric-synthetica.html/