''Mind Hive'' is the seventeenth studio album from English

art punk Art punk is a subgenre of punk rock in which artists go beyond the genre's rudimentary garage rock and are considered more sophisticated than their peers. These groups still generated punk's aesthetic of being simple, offensive, and free-spirit ...

band

Wire Overhead power cabling. The conductor consists of seven strands of steel (centre, high tensile strength), surrounded by four outer layers of aluminium (high conductivity). Sample diameter 40 mm A wire is a flexible strand of metal. Wire is co ...

, released on 24 January 2020. The release was preceded by a

music video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing devi ...

for "Cactused" made up of clips from the forthcoming documentary ''People in a Film'' and streaming audio for "Primed and Ready". They also announced a brief tour of North America to promote the recording.

Critical reception

Review aggregator

AnyDecentMusic? AnyDecentMusic? is a website that collates album reviews from magazines, websites, and newspapers. Primarily focused on popular music – covering rock, pop, electronic, dance, folk, country, roots, hip-hop, R&B, and rap – albums are ad ...

assess the critical consensus as a 7.7 out of 10. ''

Brooklyn Vegan ''BrooklynVegan'' is an American online music magazine founded in 2004 by David Levine. The company is headquartered in Brooklyn, New York, United States and originally focused on vegan food and the music community in and around New York City, ...

'' praised the album saying Wire "have honed a sound that pulls from all periods of the band."

Alexis Petridis Alexis Petridis ( el, Αλέξης Πετρίδης; born 13 September 1971) is a British journalist, head rock and pop critic for the UK newspaper ''The Guardian'', as well as a regular contributor to the magazine '' GQ''. In addition to his mus ...

of ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide ...

'' gave the album four out of five stars and said, "If ''Mind Hive'' were the debut by a hot new band, you suspect what's left of the music press would be doing their nut over it."

Accolades

Track listing

All songs written by

Colin Newman Colin John Newman (born 16 September 1954) is an English musician, record producer and record label owner. He is best known as the primary vocalist and songwriter for the post-punk band Wire. Early life Newman was born in Salisbury, Wiltshire ...

, except "Oklahoma" by

Graham Lewis Graham Lewis (born Edward Graham Lewis, 22 February 1953) is an English musician. Lewis is the bassist with punk rock/post-punk band Wire, a band formed in 1976. Biography On Wire's first studio album Graham Lewis was credited as ''Lewis''; ...

. All music by Wire. All lyrics by Graham Lewis, except "Cactused" and "Unrepentant" by Colin Newman. (Songwriting credits as per liner notes for ''Mind Hive'') #"Be Like Them" – 3:51 #"Cactused" – 3:35 #"Primed and Ready" – 2:44 #"Off the Beach" – 2:23 #"Unrepentant" – 5:01 #"Shadows" – 2:46 #"Oklahoma" – 3:08 #"Hung" – 7:54 #"Humming" – 3:30

Personnel

Wire *

– bass guitar, backing vocals on "Be Like Them" and "Cactused", synthesizer on "Oklahoma", vocals on "Oklahoma" and "Humming"; effects on "Hung" * Robert Grey – drums, cymbals on "Unrepentant" *

– vocals, guitar; keyboards; acoustic guitar on "Be Like Them", "Off the Beach", "Unrepentant", and "Shadows"; 12-string acoustic guitar on "Off the Beach" and "Unrepentant";

stylophone The Stylophone is a miniature analog electronic keyboard musical instrument played with a stylus. Invented in 1967 by Brian Jarvis, it entered production in 1968, manufactured by Dubreq. Some three million Stylophones were sold, mostly as chi ...

on "Hung";

tenor guitar The tenor guitar or four-string guitar is a slightly smaller, four-string relative of the steel-string acoustic guitar or electric guitar. The instrument was initially developed in its acoustic form by Gibson and C.F. Martin so that players of ...

on "Be Like Them" and "Unrepentant" *Matthew Simms – guitar; synths on "Be Like Them", "Primed and Ready", "Unrepentant", "Oklahoma", and "Hung"; effects on "Hung"; organ on "Humming" Additional musicians *Sean Douglas – organ on "Humming" *Harald Pettersson –

hurdy gurdy The hurdy-gurdy is a string instrument that produces sound by a hand-crank-turned, rosined wheel rubbing against the strings. The wheel functions much like a violin bow, and single notes played on the instrument sound similar to those of a vi ...

on "Oklahoma" Technical *Colin Newman – producer, mixing *Sean Douglas – engineer *Matthew Simms – additional engineer *

Denis Blackham Denis Blackham (born in 1952) is an English music mastering engineer. He began his audio mastering work in 1969 at IBC Studios in London, and later worked for Polygram, RCA, The Master Room, Nimbus Records, Tape One and Porky's. In 1996 he set ...

Critical reception

Accolades

Track listing

Personnel

Charts

See also

References

External links