After Wire’s amazing first trilogy of albums, it seemed somewhat clear that the band had started incorporating more left-field elements with 154 (clears throat: Possibly the most underrated post-punk album out there).

In 1983, Bruce Gilbert and Graham Lewis of Wire teamed up with Mute Records founder Daniel Miller to craft a proto-electronic barnburner. Or So It Seems is often dismissed as a novelty/one-off, but I’ve come to love this album. It is very experimental and exemplifies what the early days of Mute Records was all about.

My favorite track, “Long Sledge,” is a nearly 17-minute industrial dirge, complete with what can only be described as a giant metal ball rolling on a giant sheet of metal; it’s marvelous. This stuff would fit right in in a David Lynch movie. This may not delight fans of Wire, but who cares.