Recorded in three distinct sessions and partially refined from pre-Godflesh demos, Streetcleaner is a weighty, bleak album that blends heavy metal with industrial music by means of production-emphasised bass, distorted guitar and, most importantly, machine percussion.

Streetcleaner was supported by a series of concerts where Godflesh played alongside Napalm Death, and it was on the North American leg of the tour that the band began to gain significant international traction.

Many other metal bands have cited the album as particularly influential, including Neurosis, Fear Factory and Isis, and Godflesh frontman Justin Broadrick considers it one of his landmark releases.

[2] Future frontman Justin Broadrick (guitar, vocals and programming) joined Fall of Because in 1984 and introduced Green and Neville to Swans, Sonic Youth and Discharge.

[5] That EP, though described by critics as raw and unrefined, is considered one of the originating industrial metal releases and proved to be the foundation upon which Streetcleaner would fine-tune Godflesh's approach to the genre.

[10] Before they could release the EP on Swordfish, Godflesh were acquired by Earache Records, and Digby Pearson, the label's head, urged the band to shelve the tracks and instead focus on putting out a complete studio album next.

[13] This choice was at first made out of necessity since Broadrick could not play the beats he wanted acoustically (he described himself as "[not] a great drummer"),[13] but he came to embrace machine percussion and consider it a defining feature of Godflesh.

[23][24] Unlike the music of Napalm Death's 1987 album Scum, a release for which Broadrick provided guitar shortly before starting Godflesh,[25] Streetcleaner is exceptionally slow,[22] and the focus is placed on percussion and bass rather than vocals or traditional riffs.

[26][27] The style of guitar playing has been described as abrasive and deliberately grating,[21][28] and the album is laden with factory sounds, stiff mechanical beats and overwhelming washes of noise.

[12] The screamed vocals, which Consequence of Sound's Andy O'Connor called "spine-chilling" and "some of the angriest verses laid to tape",[35] are harsh and regularly noted for their punchy efficacy.

[36][37] Eduardo Rivadavia of Loudwire called the song "the genre standard",[38] Decibel's Jonathan Horsley referred to it as "anthemic" and Revolver described it as "far-beyond-heavy".

[42] Luca Cimarusti of the Chicago Reader described "Christbait Rising" by writing, "Drum machines clank and scrape by, creating an eerie cyber-racket, while Broadrick and bassist G. Christian Green lay down impossibly heavy riffs on top.

[44] Because the percussion on "Pulp" features little to no changes over its running time, Godflesh occasionally performed extended versions of it where they simply allowed the machine to continue.

Much of the track puts the squealing guitar of Broadrick at the forefront, but significant portions of the second half descend into heavy, repeating percussive movements where all instruments double the drums.

The album's eighth song, its title track, begins with a sample of convicted serial killer Henry Lee Lucas speaking during an interrogation.

[11] The song itself is characterised by the drums and bass trading off with the vocals and guitar, and it concludes with Broadrick repeatedly shouting "furnace" as he grows gradually hoarser.

[45] Because they were recorded apart from the album, they are compositionally different, more focused on propulsive hard rock riffs and beats than the stark, industrial sterility of Streetcleaner proper.

[58] While the vinyl and cassette versions contained ten songs, the CD release included the Tiny Tears EP as a set of bonus tracks.

[62] Apart from these initial tours, Streetcleaner tracks have remained a staple of Godflesh's set lists, and the album has been performed by the band in its entirety twice: once at Roadburn 2011 and once at the Hospital Productions 20th anniversary show in 2017.

[26][69][70] Ned Raggett of AllMusic praised Godflesh's ability to deliver the apocalyptic impact of metal without resorting to invocations of Satan and death, and he highlighted the precision of the execution as particularly impressive.

[8] Chicago Tribune's Greg Kot called the album one of the most menacing ever released,[71] and Entertainment Weekly's David Browne emphasised how intense and frightening it was.

Neurosis said that the album "was a game changer for everybody" that "forever changed heavy music",[75] and Burton C. Bell of Fear Factory said, "[it] is a fantastically produced and written record; every song is an opus".