To commemorate the 40th anniversary of this release, Orgasmatron is being rereleased as a double CD, with the original album alongside the remixed album, and with five bonus tracks from Radio 1’s Friday Rock Show. When first released in 1986, there was a degree of disquiet in the band, with both Lemmy and Phil Campbell being unhappy with the sound quality, but for this edition the original studio tapes have been remastered and cut at half speed, with a brand new remix and remaster created from the original stems. As was said… “the aim was never to replace the original, it was to bring out more of what’s inside it.”
When releasing new music, many bands try for originality or to do something different from their previous album, but this was rarely an issue for Motörhead, who’d hit on a formula which worked, was liked by their fanbase and gave them a solid identity. They very rarely strayed far from what gave them their name, which led to the inevitable jibes of “every album sounds the same,” but since when was it so wrong for a band to play to its strengths?
Despite the disquiet about sound quality, Orgasmatron is as solid and uncompromising as the great man himself ever was, with fine performances from all concerned. It’s also the first album to feature the four-piece Motörhead line-up… Lemmy, Phil Campbell, Würzel and Pete Gill, though Pete is now the only one still with us. The album glistens with quality and was probably by some distance the heaviest album they’d recorded up to this point. It’s a mix of hard rock and metal with a punk underlay, with tracks like ‘Ain’t My Crime’, ‘Built for Speed’ and ‘Nothing Up My Sleeve’ leaning towards classic rock. There’re a few rehearsal tracks which’ll be of interest mainly to diehard fans, alongside blistering versions of ‘Killed by Death’ and ‘Nothing Up My Sleeve’ from the Friday Rock Show.
The album was originally released in 1986, with a deluxe reissue in 2010, and now there’s this… how many copies does one fan need? There’s probably no answer to this, but one thing’s certain, which is the 2026 remix versions are the best-sounding tracks… ‘Deaf Forever’, ‘Doctor Rock’ and ‘Orgasmatron’ are now so much clearer. The guitar separation on ‘Mean Machine’ is easier to pick out and the music sounds much crisper and cleaner.
The remastering and remixing have undoubtedly improved the sonic quality of the album, but it’s very much one for the diehard fan or the completist.
