Man Machine Poem | ||||
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Studio album by The Tragically Hip | ||||
Released | June 17, 2016 | |||
Recorded | Bathouse Recording Studio, Kingston, Ontario | |||
Genre | Rock | |||
Length | 41:25 | |||
Label | Universal Music Canada | |||
Producer | Kevin Drew, Dave Hamelin | |||
The Tragically Hip chronology | ||||
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Singles from Man Machine Poem | ||||
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Professional ratings | |
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Review scores | |
Source | Rating |
Exclaim! | 8/10 |
Man Machine Poem is the thirteenth full-length studio album by Canadian rock band The Tragically Hip, released on June 17, 2016 on Universal Music Canada. Produced by Kevin Drew and Dave Hamelin, the album is named after a track which appeared on the band's previous album Now for Plan A.
The album's first single, "In a World Possessed by the Human Mind", was released in April.
Prior to the album's release, the band announced that lead singer Gord Downie was diagnosed with brain cancer in December 2015. The cancer has responded favourably to treatment but is not fully curable, and the band toured in summer 2016 to support the album on what may be the final tour of their career. The band and critics have cautioned, however, against interpreting the album in light of Downie's health, as it was written and recorded before his diagnosis. As well, although some media coverage has referred to it as the band's final album, nobody associated with the band has stated that; rather, the possibility remains open that the band may still record further albums conditional on Downie's health.
Writing in Exclaim!, Stuart Henderson described the album as "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." In the Edmonton Journal, Fish Griwkowsky described the album as "a deep-felt, summer highway album that briefly escapes the weight of the doom we all share — not alone, but together in the dark".
The album garnered a longlist nomination for the 2017 Polaris Music Prize.
All tracks written by Gord Downie and The Tragically Hip.