Machina / The Machines Of God

Rolling Stone (3/16/00, pp.71-2) - 3.5 stars out of 5 - "...The songs go back to the basics of would-be hit singles: riffs, hooks, bridges, choruses....Guitars rule...[and Jimmy] Chamberlain's drums stand shoulder to shoulder with the guitars....the music surges forward once again..."
Spin (3/00, pp.145-6) - 7 out of 10 - "...right away on MACHINA, [the group] is rocking again...hurtling forward within that patented dreamy gauze....it's quite a tripartite structure: Commerce, Craft, and Coloring. A road that forks 3 ways..."
Q Magazine (4/00, pp.84-5) - 4 stars out of 5 - "...Billy Corgan is miserable as sin and functioning perfectly well....a wonderful rock album....a near perfect synthesis of MELLON COLLIE's rock power and ADORE's finesse..."
Mojo (3/00, p.98) - "...packed with Corgan's familiar ruminations, and further cements the band's position as post-grunge 'ubermeisters'....[MACHINA] settles onto an essentially nu-metal tack, while making some entertaining detours along the way..."
Alternative Press (3/00, p.94) - 3 out of 5 - "...the audio-verite diary of the past few years....a much more fully realized version of ADORE....There's plenty of noise-soak to go around during the wilder moments, and enough soft lyrical sentiment for high-school couples..."
NME (2/26/00, p.36) - 6 out of 10 - "...a bloody, self-flagellating atonement for Corgan's prior assertion that rock was dead....grand, ambitious [and] immense..."
Melody Maker (3/7/00, p.46) - 4 stars out of 5 - "...Now that the Pumpkins have sieved out all the repellent grunge effluent from their songs, it suits the music perfectly....[They] are at their best undercutting their rock with beautiful poignancy....Let it consume you."
CMJ (2/28/00, p.3) - "...a beacon in a dark night for music fans disheartened by the inevitable re-dumbing-down of pop music....a lethal missive from a band that continues to remain true to itself..."