[canuckeh]

Will update this first post as published reviews begin to trickle in:

Music Express (no rating):
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://themusicexpress.ca/man-machine-poem-the-tragically-hip/">http://themusicexpress.ca/man-machine-p ... cally-hip/</a><!-- m -->

Toronto Sun/Postmedia (4/5): <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/the-tragically-hips-man-machine-poem-a-final-piece-of-dependable-rock">http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/th ... dable-rock</a><!-- m -->

Edmonton Journal (4.5/5):
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://edmontonjournal.com/entertainment/twilight-tragically-hip-album-man-machine-poem-innovative-beautiful">http://edmontonjournal.com/entertainmen ... -beautiful</a><!-- m -->

Exclaim (8/10):
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://exclaim.ca/music/article/the_tragically_hip-man_machine_poem">http://exclaim.ca/music/article/the_tra ... chine_poem</a><!-- m -->

Canada.com (Album of the Week):
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://exclaim.ca/music/article/the_tragically_hip-man_machine_poem">http://exclaim.ca/music/article/the_tra ... chine_poem</a><!-- m -->

NOW Toronto (3/5):
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://nowtoronto.com/music/album-reviews/the-tragically-hip-man-machine-poem/">https://nowtoronto.com/music/album-revi ... hine-poem/</a><!-- m -->

Winnipeg Free Press (4/5):
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/arts-and-life/entertainment/music/new-music-383220111.html">http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/arts-a ... 20111.html</a><!-- m -->

[gsmacleod]

So excited for this album - new album day is always such an exciting day but much more so when it's the Hip!

Shane

[direwolf74]

"there are no obvious classics that catch you immediately, but the material has a way of seeping into your consciousness after multiple listenings; transforming from songs heard to essence experienced."

This sentence could be used to describe every Hip album released over the last 10 years. At Transformation is probably the only song in recent years that I would call an instant classic, probably because it harkens back to the DFN/Henhouse era in terms of it's overall sound and structure.

[gsmacleod]

"there are no obvious classics that catch you immediately, but the material has a way of seeping into your consciousness after multiple listenings; transforming from songs heard to essence experienced."

This sentence could be used to describe every Hip album released over the last 10 years. At Transformation is probably the only song in recent years that I would call an instant classic, probably because it harkens back to the DFN/Henhouse era in terms of it's overall sound and structure.

I don't think there has been a song since Save the Planet or maybe Tiger the Lion that grabbed me on the first listen like some of their earlier stuff.

However, after all few spins, I'm hooked. Same with the two we've heard from this album - a few listens and I can't stop humming the tunes.

Shane

[Killer Whale Tank]

The last song to grab me immediately and knock me over was 'Poets.' But direwolf74 is SO right - their songs have a way of growing on you, like a quiet lover to whose charms you gradually awaken and then, one day, you realize you're all in. I remember when I first heard Plan A, I found little of interest; yet I kept finding those songs coming back into my mind. They wouldn't let go and it was THEM that forced me back to the record. Right now I'm having the same experience with 'The Grand Bounce,' an album I never properly listened to, and which is only now revealing the logics of its melodies and its sound to me.

It's rock music for mature listeners, played by mature musicians whose art has grown with them.

[NegPhil]

Old happens. It's not that I don't want the rockers anymore it's more about what I need. I need music for the hour drive home after a fourteen hour day at work. Music for Sunday afternoon spent smoking a joint and cleaning the house. The rockers are all well and good but they don't really fit my life now as much as when I was young. Why would I expect them to fit theirs?

[rob68]

The reviewer is clueless to the fact that the album was entirely written and recorded months before Gord's diagnosis.

[canuckeh]

Toronto Sun/Postmedia Network is out and includes a track-by-track review

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/the-tragically-hips-man-machine-poem-a-final-piece-of-dependable-rock">http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/th ... dable-rock</a><!-- m -->

a few excerpts:

Great Soul
“Nothing works,” Gord growls in his lower register. “I tried nothing and I’m out of ideas.” Not so the band, which supplies spare backing that expands and evolves as Downie moves from intimate rumination into high-range, transcendent yowl. A standout.

Hot Mic
“I am the hot mic,” claims Downie. “I pick a fight.” Fittingly, the track comes on dark, heavy, aggressive and claustrophobic, with thumping drums, buzzy guitar and a reverberating solo swirling around anxiously delivered yelps and lyrics about shadows, feeling the unseen and falling to your knees. A bruiser.

Ocean Next
From beast to beauty. The penultimate ballad begins with plucked acoustic guitar with dusty vocals, gently drifting over top of a beat that ebbs and flows. Some shimmery slide guitar and a low-neck melody with a dash of surfy twang continue the aquatic theme. “I’m so relaxed,” says Gord. “Be happy, it’s all you need.”

[direwolf74]

Toronto Sun/Postmedia Network is out and includes a track-by-track review

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/the-tragically-hips-man-machine-poem-a-final-piece-of-dependable-rock">http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/th ... dable-rock</a><!-- m -->

Very cool! I've always enjoyed reading Darryl Sterdan's track-by-track reviews. He does a great job of giving you a general feel for the album even though you haven't actually heard it. Just wish it would hurry up and leak already.

[Killer Whale Tank]

5 days 'til Drop Day... :thumb: don't know how much longer I can wait

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbUlkyGWQ2E">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbUlkyGWQ2E</a><!-- m -->

[gsmacleod]

Toronto Sun/Postmedia Network is out and includes a track-by-track review

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/the-tragically-hips-man-machine-poem-a-final-piece-of-dependable-rock">http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/10/th ... dable-rock</a><!-- m -->

Great read - thanks for posting!

Shane

[direwolf74]

Review from the Edmonton Journal.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://edmontonjournal.com/entertainment/twilight-tragically-hip-album-man-machine-poem-innovative-beautiful">http://edmontonjournal.com/entertainmen ... -beautiful</a><!-- m -->

"Twilight pressure or no, Man Machine Poem is a deep-felt, summer highway album that briefly escapes the weight of the doom we all share — not alone, but together in the dark. It’s terrific."

[daylight]

Here's one from Exclaim!, where the grading curve seems to be 8 = good, 9 = great, 7 = bad. I don't recall ever seeing them go below a 7.

The Tragically Hip's 13th studio album is a darkly illuminated, late-career curveball likely to please and confound in equal measure. Rarely since their mid-1990s heyday has the multi-platinum-selling band sounded so intent on crafting something different.

[andrew sharpe]

Here's one from Exclaim!

Whether these songs were written before or after he began to grapple with the diagnosis,

Tough for me to pay much attention to a review where the author doesn't bother to do five minutes of research. He does redeem himself though:

Goddamnit, I just don't want — nobody wants — this to be the last album by one of Canada's most consistently rewarding bands. But what a piece of luck that we get to have this record. What a piece of luck that we've been able to enjoy their music for so many years. What a piece of luck that we'll always have the Tragically Hip. Fully, completely. Ours.

[daylight]

I was initially annoyed by that, but after re-reading interpreted as "(it doesn't matter) whether..."

Probably the wrong choice of phrasing, though.