Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark [OMD]: The Pacific Age (1986)

I almost hate to say it, but this is my least favourite OMD record, to 1986. I might even say that I dislike the record. I would rank it in last place of all OMD records. I won't go as far as to say that I hate it, but I struggle to find much to appreciate in it. I like (Forever) Live and Die on some level. Southern has always felt like a noble song, if you can call it a song. I don't mind Shame and The Dead Girls. I've never really liked Stay, and even Anny McCluskey agrees with me on that one, if I can accept what he said in an interview. I just do not get what they were doing here. Here is the reception section from Wikipedia, which really sums it up:

The Pacific Age met with negative reviews from the British music press. Melody Maker described the record as "Wheezing, crumpled and limp... a bitter, bitter disappointment". In Sounds, it was portrayed as "Slick and slobbery, just a bunch of bored (sounding) professionals really". In a retrospective review, Trouser Press said: "Except for the smoothly contrived hit "(Forever) Live and Die" and the catchy "We Love You," this dilettantish mess is less a set of songs than a meaningless collection of sounds." A more favourable Dave Connolly of AllMusic noted "OMD's mastery of melody and mood" and wrote that the group "continues to string snippets of sound together to create interesting patterns", as well as "bring their technical skill to bear on a few cuts". In a 2013 online poll, The Pacific Age was voted the 46th best album of 1986 based on the opinions of almost 53,000 respondents. Andy McCluskey said that on The Pacific Age, the band had "lost the plot" due to being afforded "no real time to take stock and write some decent material"; he also feels that the album's production "just doesn't sound like [OMD]". McCluskey noted that the record features tracks he wishes the band had never released, but considers "(Forever) Live and Die" to be "a good song" [source]

There's not much that I can add to that. In isolation, the songs do not irk me so much, but as a set, there is something really unsatisfying about them.