The Roots of Electro-Pop-John Foxx's Metamatic Turns 45: The Echoes Interview

In the 1980s, you couldn’t be sure now long New Wave music would last. But now in 2025, Depeche Mode, Orchestral Manouvres in the Dark and Gary Numan are still recording and touring, and newer bands like Ladytron, Washed Out, Emma Anderson, Maps and World Brain are ascending. It’s a sound that isn’t going away. This year, one of the most influential albums of electro-pop turns 45, Metamatic by John Foxx.

JOHN FOXX: That was the thing that fascinated me most about synthesizers. Whenever you get a new instrument it changes the shape of the music completely. You write your music, and you write to accommodate the qualities of the machines.

Musically adventurous and lyrically trenchant, Metamatic remains a timeless artifact of electronic music and pop. We’ll hear John Foxx, Gary Numan and Gareth Jones talking about this release and its creation 45 Years ago.