Lou Reed’s “Metal Machine Music” is being reissued on limited-edition metallic silver vinyl for Record Store Day 2025 Seen as a massive middle finger aimed at his record label RCA — and perhaps fans — when it was released in 1975, Lou Reed’s fifth solo album was 60 minutes of sheer punishing noise. Dubbed “The greatest record ever made in the history of the human eardrum” by famed rock critic Lester Bangs on its release in 1975, “Metal Machine Music” was a punchline for years but has gained fans in recent decades as experimental music has neared the mainstream. This 50th anniversary edition has been pressed on silver vinyl and given reimagined cover art.
A silver vinyl (and cover) pressing of what was once called Lou Reed’s most divisive album, but which has since been reappraised to become his most far-sighted. Certainly four sides of unrelenting feedback (“recommended cuts – none,” claimed Billboard’s review) unquestionably laid the final foundations to the rise of electronic noise, while the album has since encouraged both live performances and acoustic cover versions.
It also sounds great on headphones, as the all-pervading roar is undercut by some really rather pleasant melodies — you just have to listen closely enough. It’s fun, too, if you’re sitting on a bus with it playing, while imagining how it sounds to your fellow passengers. There’ll be no rinky-dink tinny percussion leaking out of this one. Buy it, play it, absorb it. Nobody would describe “Metal Machine Music” as Lou Reed’s most commercial offering ever. But they said that about “Sister Ray,” as well.
The Fat Angel Sings 