The Dillinger Escape Plan's latest full-length (after a five-year hiatus and the addition of hellhound vocalist Greg Puciato) may prove to be too extreme for even hard-core metalheads. Yet, being the smartest cult rockers on the block -- fans like to call the band's ultraprecise, quick-shifting brand of serrated songwriting "math metal" -- the players seem well aware of the overload potential of their vision. So they've devised an ingenious option for listeners who would like to experience the new CD in bite-size chunks: All but two of Miss Machine's 11 songs have been formatted into doses of approximately 15 seconds in length (in other words, there are 99 total "tracks" here). Thus, rather than endure the relentlessness of each song in its brutal entirety, listeners who so desire can use the CD player's shuffle function to savor the album in innumerable schizoid sequences. This approach yields a dynamic soundtrack that is both brilliant and tolerable.
