There has always been an argument attached to "Orgasmatron". Forty years on, MOTÖRHEAD's camp has done something about it — without throwing anything away.
The "Orgasmatron 40th Anniversary Edition" arrives November 6 via BMG. Released in 1986 with the lineup of Lemmy, Phil Campbell, Würzel and Pete Gill, the album pushed the band further into heavy territory while keeping the speed and the aggression intact, and "Orgasmatron", "Deaf Forever" and "Built For Speed" became live fixtures. What it also became was the record everyone argued about, because Lemmy and Campbell both felt Bill Laswell's production had drained power and bite out of the songs.
So: the original studio recordings have been remastered and cut at half speed from the original tapes, and longtime MOTÖRHEAD producer Cameron Webb has built an entirely new remix and remaster from the original stems. Both are in the box.
"There was some controversy in the sense that both Lemmy and Phil Campbell felt that some of the power, bite and energy had been lost in Laswell's final delivery," the MOTÖRHEAD team explain. They describe sitting around a coffee table months ago, drinks in hand, wondering what the album would sound like in Webb's hands — and asking themselves whether it would disrespect Laswell's work to offer the alternative at all. "We concluded a big fat 'no'! It would be an added adventure if people wanted to take it. So we asked Cameron if he was up for it. And he screamed a rather enthusiastic 'yes'!"
For Webb, who produced six MOTÖRHEAD studio albums, it was personal. "My brother introduced me to 'Orgasmatron' when I was 14 years old. I heard the song and thought, 'Is this even music?' It was like the devil coming through my cassette tape. And I loved it."
He was careful about it. "I love the fact that the original is wild and a little messy," he says. "I wanted to be respectful to what Jason Corsaro and Bill Laswell created, rather than simply trying to make it sound like a modern heavy metal record. When we opened up the original 24-track tapes, you could really hear how creative they were with the sounds, particularly the drums."
And he mixed it for two men who are no longer in the room. "Lemmy and Phil both said they didn't like the original mix, so I thought about what they might have asked me to do if they were sitting next to me. I tried to channel what I knew about them and their approach to recording — bringing out the bass here, defining the guitars there — while still respecting what was already there. The aim was never to replace the original, but to reveal more of what was inside it."
The edition runs to a deluxe 3LP bookpack and a 2CD, both carrying the remastered original mix, the Webb remix, studio rehearsals and outtakes from 1985, and the complete BBC Radio 1 "Friday Rock Show" session from 1986. A single LP on transparent violet vinyl presents the original album alone.