POSSE! YOU KEEP THE SPIRIT ALIVE! It's the 1990s ELECTRONIC ALBUMS poll results!

Thankfully Clone is now compiling early, hard-to-find Drexciya material, though the compilation format is a bit weird (so far they've released two comps, which come in oversized digipaks, and which both have only 45 to 50 minutes of music).

ok that was some hyperbole, it's a good album, but you know what i mean. fucking IN SIDES! FREQUENCIES! HOMEWORK! and then this solipsistic blahness. it did sound fresh at the time but i swear to god if i hear another wistful downtempo album

― hot slag (lukas), Friday, November 2, 2012 5:40 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

"Wistful" is not the first word that comes to mind with that record for me. For me, it feels like an exploration of bygone sounds, but in a way that highlights their strangeness, underlines the distance between then and now, and experiences the past as this sort of alien, almost queasiness-inducing thing. It's nostalgia as a trip, sure, but not always a happy one.

at a guess, because you're the only person who voted for it

― sug night (sic), Friday, November 2, 2012 5:45 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Ha, point taken (though I missed the poll entirely). It's a shame their stuff has been so hard to come by for so long.

xxxp I still love The Orb, Chems or Orbital not so much. they are all relics though.

Well "relic" is subjective. Not sure how you can say they all are, unless you think all dance music ages badly.

Nice to see Flux Trax 2 in there. The first volume isn't an especially coherent compilation but it's an incredible seection of 90s greats, many of which I expect to see in the tracks poll:

http://www.discogs.com/Various-Flux-Trax/release/42195

1 vote for Hongkong and none for Biokinetics? Regretting not voting now.

for everyone saying so-and-so did the same thing BoC did 20, 30 years before, wtf are you listening to because i want it

1 vote for Hongkong and none for Biokinetics? Regretting not voting now.

― a panda, Malmö (a passing spacecadet), Friday, November 2, 2012 5:54 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

That's what I'm screaming... For me, those records (and The Quest) are TOTALLY canonical. It makes me wonder if a lot of folks who weren't around for them at the time actually haven't ever heard that prime-era Basic Channel and Chain Reaction stuff?

The font is terrible, but the MHTRTC cover image is one of the most perfect evocations of an album's contents in my library.

I'll note, as others surely have, that *the faces are bleached out* on it, too. That's not exactly "wistful"...

And the title is incredible, too.

monolake, drexciya, robert hood, maurizio, model 500...

i refrained from voting b/c i thought i didn't know my 90's shit, expected the results to school me. this list blows.

"or everyone saying so-and-so did the same thing BoC did 20, 30 years before"

This is almost never true about anything. There's one internet commenter who absolutely insists that there's nothing on Kid A that Can didn't do first.

Which Model 500? Deep Space is overrated imo.

Well "relic" is subjective. Not sure how you can say they all are, unless you think all dance music ages badly. Dance music ages great!, it has very pronounced cyclical returns, present in lots of forms of culture but especially pronounced in dance music, see the recent returns to organ led skipping garage house. wether the current vogue well get back around to dubby slightly cheesy tripped out ambient or rock/techno hybrids with liam galleger singing over top first is your guess as good as mine. sorry i actually do like the chems but those first two Orb albums a very nostalgic for me.

I was expecting Geogaddi to poll above Mhtr. In the end it didn't even appear! (fine by me by the way)

Out of all the various genre/decade polls run on ILM, this is the one where I've been familiar with the highest percentage of the albums in the countdown. There are a lot of records here that really opened my ears to various different sounds, not just the ones I voted for either. Something like In Sides... I was obsessed with that when I was 16, I'd heard nothing else like it. BoC wasn't my #1 choice but I'm happy with it winning.

I'm struck by just how little critical revision of the 90s consensus has occured so far - this list could have been picked from any number of contemporaneous review sites, and there really isn't a single surprise (aside from the St. Etienne showing by indie diehards).

Geogaddi came out in 2002.

Ah, good point.

are you happy with the results, tuomas?

I think most of the critical revisionism of 90s dance - to the extent it has been going on - has been focused on areas which are more tracks-focused than albums-focused.

This list seems depressingly boring to me but I suppose that was inevitable.

are you happy with the results, tuomas?

There are some good albums there, no doubt. But like I said a while ago, I'm surprised how very, very Brit-centric the list is: 41 out of the top 50 albums come from the UK. As someone who was listening to a lot of German techno in the 90s, I'm a bit disappointed it's represented by only three albums, all of which may be there because the artists behind them (Voigt, Burger, Basic Channel) became more hip in the 00s than they were in the 90s. (They're all great albums though, don't get me wrong.) My number 1 album (Air Liquide's Nephology) is German, and no one else voted for it... :( An equal disappointment is that all of American dance music is represented by Carl Craig alone.

I'm sure there were some interesting / original choices in people's lists. It's just when you put them all together, more often than not, the old favourites get hashed out.

I still listen to the Orb today, though Orbus Terrarum is my pick for the one that held up the best

i refrained from voting b/c i thought i didn't know my 90's shit, expected the results to school me. this list blows.

yea i am starting to wish i voted regardless of my level of expertise. i understand that it'd be annoying to split hairs over various strains of '90s electronic stuff but this sorta feels pointless

seems like ambient/idm stuff is pretty unavoidable in the general '90s canon, we all have heard or know that we don't want to hear those albums by now, but dance stuff is still p underrepresented outside of obvious stuff like daft punk/prodigy/basement jaxx. tho tim is otm about 90s dance being more about tracks than albums

happy to see landcruising/paperclip people/burger/ink show up. more annoyed than ever at ilx's undying love for autechre

Pansoul by Motorbass is also better than 90% of this list...

LOL

It's the 'old favourites' that didn't get hashed out because the spaces were taken by lesser material that surprises me though.

Like, 'A Silent Introduction' only managed 64 but every single Autechre and Aphex Twin-related album of the 90s makes the top 60.

'A Silent Introduction' is substantially more canonical/revered in general than 'Chiastic Slide' (widely considered to be the least of Ae's 90s albums).

So the implication is that there's a bit of a structural bias in this poll towards IDM and UK album dance that lifts even lesser lights, rather than just populism/the wisdom of crowds at work.

Blech 2 beating The Joint is another example - I'd expect Artificial Intelligence or Northern Exposure or Logical Progression to, but in what world apart from a Warp bubble is Blech 2 even particularly remembered?

Of course it's wrong to read too deeply into these results given that Blech 2, say, only got 3 votes.

x-post

Motorbass is a phenomenal record! How many albums were people allowed to vote for? I want to create a list of my own just for fun.

An equal disappointment is that all of American dance music is represented by Carl Craig alone.

DJ Shadow is from California.

but isn't dance music

how many ballots were received for this?

24 for the album vote.

I'm lolling at the results of polling, not at motorbass

There was one unweighed ballot, so it's 25 in total. As I said, the tracks poll was clearly more popular.

Thank you for doing the poll, Tuomas.

Carl Craig - More songs about food and revolutionary art ?
Drexciya ? Motorbass ? Superdiscount ? Speedy J ? Surgeon ?

I was surprised not to see 94 Diskont by Oval, too...

Yeah nice work Tuomas - thoroughly enjoyed that. Looking forward to the singles poll.

Yes, thanks for doing the poll.

And, of course, thanks to you, Tuomas! I pulled out a lot of records the past few days because of this poll.

Pansoul by Motorbass is also better than 90% of this list...
And yet only me and one other voted for it

Yeah great work Tuomas, can't wait for the tracks rollout.

here's my ballot

b12 - time tourist
blaze - basic blaze
motorbass - pansoul
juan atkins - sonic sunset
green velvet - constant chaos
flare - reference to difference
herbert - 100 lbs
rob hood - internal empire
ken ishii - jelly tones
jeff mills - live at the liquid room
moodymann?!?
mr fingers - introduction
andrea parker - kiss my arp
plastikman?!?
ron trent - primitive arts
glenn underground - atmosfear
two lone swordsmen - the fifth mission

i didnt see jelly tones in the noms list otherwise i would have voted for it.
I did kinda rush my ballot in to meet the deadline as i had been busy with the 80s poll

1) Leftfield Leftism
2) LFO Frequencies
3) Underworld Dubnobasswithmyheadman
4) Orbital Orbital (Brown Album)
5) Squarepusher Feed Me Weird Things
6) Squarepusher Hard Normal Daddy
7) Prodigy, The Music for the Jilted Generation
8) Mouse on Mars Autoditacker
9) Mouse on Mars Niun Niggung
10) Future Sound of London, The Dead Cities
11) Future Sound of London, The Lifeforms
12) Dave Angel Tales of the Unexpected
13) Dave Clarke Archive One
14) Chemical Brothers, The Dig Your Own Hole
15) Chemical Brothers, The Exit Planet Dust
16) Black Dog, The Bytes
17) Autechre Tri Repeatae
18) Aphex Twin I Care Because You Do
19) Aphex Twin Richard D. James Album
20) Boards of Canada Music Has the Right to Children
21) Future Sound of London, The Accelerator
22) KLF, The Chill Out
23) KLF, The The White Room
24) Orbital Snivilisation
25) Oval 94 Diskont

Couldn't resist sticking a few dj mixes in there. Somehow managed to exclude the Paperclip Ppl album.

1. Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 85 – 92
2. Black Dog, The - Bytes
3. Boards of Canada - Music Has the Right to Children
4. Autechre - Incunabula
5. Photek - Modus Operandi
6. Black Dog, The - Spanners
7. LFO - Frequencies
8. Orb, The- Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld
9. Harri - Subculture: A House Music Experience
10. Orbital - Orbital (Green Album)
11. Goldie - Timeless
12. LTJ Bukem - Mixmag Live
13. R Hawtin - Mixmag Live
14. Various - True People: The Detroit Techno Album
15. Kenny Larkin - Metaphor
16. Robert Hood - Nightime World Vol. 1
17. Derrick Carter - Back To Basics: Cut The Crap
18. Coldcut - Journeys By DJ
19. Luke Slater's 7th Plain - The 4 Cornered Room
20. Nu Yorican Soul - Nu Yorican Soul
21. Polygon Window - Surfing on Sine Waves
22. Grooverider - Grooverider's Hardstep Selection Vol. II
23. Orbital - Orbital (Brown Album)
24. Kruder & Dorfmeister - DJ Kicks
25. Ultramarine - United Kingdoms

13. R Hawtin - Mixmag Live

^^ this is a good pick

16. Robert Hood - Nightime World Vol. 1

^^ always had a hard time getting into these, recently dug it back out, it's pretty good but i don't think i "get" everything he's doing on this album

Yup it took me a while to get into the Rob Hood. I think approaching it like a jazz album (as per the cover) helped. Some of the drum programming is sublime.

I just cooked up a hypothetical ballot... Surprised not to see any Fennesz even nominated! Also realized in researching that a LOT of good records came out in 2000.

Aphex Twin – Selected Ambient Works Vol. 2
Drexciya – The Quest
Burger/Ink – Las Vegas
Porter Ricks – Biokinetics
Gas – Konigsforst
Carl Craig – More Songs About Food and Revolutionary Art
Plastikman – Consumed
Boards of Canada – Hi Scores
Aphex Twin – Richard D. James Album
Basic Channel – BCD
Theo Parrish – First Floor
Dettinger – Intershop
Boards of Canada – Music Has the Right to Children
Drexciya – Neptune’s Lair
Fennesz – Plus 47 Degrees 56 Hrs 37 Min Minus 16 Degrees 51 08
Monolake – Hong Kong
Seefeel – Succour
Paperclip People – The Secret Tapes of Dr. Eich
Daft Punk – Homework
Oval – 94 Diskont
Motorbass – Pansoul
Orbital – Orbital 2 (The Brown Album)
Autechre – Amber
Robert Hood – Internal Empire
Ultramarine – Every Man and Woman Is a Star