Nine x Seven (RSD 25)

For RSD 2025, the influential band will be releasing a new double LP edition of their Nine Sevens box set of 7” records, first released in 2018. Combining their early singles with more obscure later-period tracks underlines the depth and strength of Wire’s catalogue. This is pop art as art/pop—an exploration of the blank canvas of pop culture and how far that canvas can be stretched, from three-minute constructs to ambient washes.

The 7” single was always the ultimate artifact and statement, with the A-side capturing the band momentarily paused in time, distilled and freeze-framed into eternity with less than three minutes of electric sound. These “sevens,” released between 1977 and 1980, mark Wire’s remarkable evolution from their brilliantly monochromatic early phase to the textured, almost psychedelic unzipping of their sound and vision.

Compiling Nine Sevens into a double album makes for an unusual documentation of the band during this period. The first disc largely follows the structure of a singles/greatest hits collection, while the second veers wildly off course, ending up somewhere far from where it began. A conventional Greatest Hits album—besides being conceptually a bit naff—would, if strictly based on charting singles, contain only one track! A Best Of is subjective and somewhat redundant in the age of Spotify playlists. The only true common thread among these tracks (besides being by Wire) is that they were released—or intended to be released—on 7” between 1977 and 1980. Nine Sevens is both title and elevator pitch.

Wire always understood the language of pop—how to play with it, deconstruct it, and reassemble it into new and thrilling forms. Decades later, these sonic adventures still sound like slices of perfect pop/noise and hits from a parallel universe.