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Cover Art Meat Beat Manifesto
Original Fire
[Nothing/Interscope]
Rating: 7.9

Okay, I was turned off at first because hey, who are they to go telling me how to beat meat? I mean, Karl Marx was bad enough with that Communist thing. I know what to do. Don't need no Manifesto ter tell me.

Then I listened to it. Remixes. You know what that means, right? Weak-ass, thinned-out songs. No. Original Fire gave my head and eardrums a solid sledgehammering with unceasing electro/industrial beat for 60 minutes without any loss of interest or kneejerk rejection reaction. Several times I looked down to see my foot tapping. I even thought a few times: "That's a damn good beat, never heard that before." Voices are pure background (if you can't hack Josh Wink's "Are You There?", forget it). It's repetitive and heavy and god only knows why, but I like it.

-James P. Wisdom

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RATING KEY
10.0: Indispensable, classic
9.5-9.9: Spectacular
9.0-9.4: Amazing
8.5-8.9: Exceptional; will likely rank among writer's top ten albums of the year
8.0-8.4: Very good
7.5-7.9: Above average; enjoyable
7.0-7.4: Not brilliant, but nice enough
6.0-6.9: Has its moments, but isn't strong
5.0-5.9: Mediocre; not good, but not awful
4.0-4.9: Just below average; bad outweighs good by just a little bit
3.0-3.9: Definitely below average, but a few redeeming qualities
2.0-2.9: Heard worse, but still pretty bad
1.0-1.9: Awful; not a single pleasant track
0.0-0.9: Breaks new ground for terrible
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