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All Music Guide Review:
Review by Wilson Neate
At the end of the '80s, Wire retired its so-called "beat combo" identity and set about working with synthesizers and sequencers. The result was 1990's Manscape, an album that suffered from overproduction and suggested that the band was not yet entirely at home in its new, digital environment. Life in the Manscape -- three versions of which appear on this EP -- was the album's only single. While a lesser band might have been proud of this admittedly catchy piece of synth-oriented pop, it was far from indispensable Wire fare. Rather, "Life in the Manscape" is the tired and unimaginative sound of a group at its nadir. Not even the extended, cheesy-keyboard-laden 12" remix frees itself from the original's ploddingly anthemic grip and its irritating, stick-in-the-head chorus. Without a doubt, Colin Newman's sneering vocals gave early Wire's angular, minimalist songs an added ironic edge. Here, amid trudging sub-dance beats, they simply render the song's analysis of what the fall of the Berlin Wall would bring to the former East Germany -- "Free speech and more TV" -- trite and cute. These are the last two adjectives one should associate with Wire. Nevertheless, the two other tracks featured here show '90s Wire in a more favorable light. "Who Has Nine?" and "Gravity Workshop" were both recorded during the sessions for Manscape but not included on the album. With their heavier beats, darker grooves, abrasive guitars, and Graham Lewis' deep vocals, these numbers find the band putting its newer technology to more effective use, albeit still in a very '80s way. Wire has always been most compelling when it does the unexpected; with the single Life in the Manscape, the band unfortunately took the path of least resistance and the results are best forgotten.
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