Matrix Soundtrack CD

THE MATRIX was nominated for the 2000 Grammy Award for Best Soundtrack Album. "Bad Blood" was nominated for the 2000 Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance.
This is a fine disc to slide into the player in that interplanetary orbiter you're driving around these days, and crank to bang-your-head decibels just as you go all afterburner into the Forbidden Zone. The Matrix movie soundtrack is a loud, awesomely wild ride that brilliantly illuminates real links among hard rock, hip-hop, and electronica with a hi-sci-fi flair (and flare) for fusion. These sounds are deep, dark, and resonant, as is the tone of the film, with the blackest moments provided by Meat Beat Manifesto in "Prime Audio Soup," Rob D. with "Clubbed to Death," and Propellerheads' "Spybreak! (Short One)." The brimstone burbles on with super-scale performances by Rage Against the Machine and "Wake Up," Marilyn Manson's "Rock Is Dead," and Monster Magnet's absolutely otherworldly "Look Into Your Orb for the Wanring," guaranteed to punch a hole in your wall if Ministry's "Bad Blood" hasn't done so already. The album's mega-cut, however, is no doubt Hot Rod Herman's outlandish remix of Rob Zombie's Halloween rave anthem, "Dragula," which would be worth the price of admission alone even if the entire effect were not the hardest-core theme park sonic extravaganza around. A rockin' ear-blaster for this world as well as the next. ~ Becky Byrkit
The futuristic sci-fi/action flick THE MATRIX features Keanu Reeves as the potential savior of the human race. Whatever one's feelings about this questionable casting decision, the film's soundtrack is an arresting collection that combines industrial with electronica-derived styles and a touch of good old hard rock. Ministry and Marilyn Manson represent the industrial end of the spectrum, while Propellerheads, Prodigy and Rammstein contribute electronic-based, beat-driven tunes that accentuate the film's future shock aspect. Rage Against the Machine closes things out with a characteristically driving rocker, "Wake Up," providing a cataclysmic ending to a soundtrack full of end-of-the-century weltschmerz.

Marilyn Manson,Ministry,Prodig Rob Zombie,Deftones,Machine ++Entertainment Weekly (5/7/99, p.65) - "...six parts extreme metal from the likes of Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie, throw in some electronic mayhem from Propellerheads and Prodigy, add a pinch of Teutonic rage courtesy Rammstein, and voila' - you've got a potent musical Molotov cocktail..." - Rating: B+