Underworld - Classic or Dud?

I totally can vibe with OWB up unti "Ring Road" pops up, at which point all of the good will I've built up over the preceding songs evaporates and I have to tap out

It really strikes me as if they said to themselves "what if we took the one or two redeeming qualities in 'Bruce Lee' away and stuck the result in the middle of the new album?"

As for Second Toughest, it's what got me hooked on Underworld and will always be my sentimental favorite. Though "Stagger" will probably always zero plays on my iTunes.

Underworld were given the Innovation in Sound Award last night for their work on the Olympics.

http://i.huffpost.com/gadgets/slideshows/258303/slide_258303_1667730_free.jpg

I think I said upthread, I first heard the 2nd Toughest material by walking into a live gig blind that I heard about from a dude hanging out in my apartment with one of my roommates; I had the "Born Slippy" single and knew about their Change The Weather/Underneath The Radar era and wanted to see what their show was about. The whole thing floored me. I ran out and bought the album the next day and the entire thing just felt... weak, and non-present.

I love Oblivion With Bells! Best Mamgu Ever is one of Rick Smiths finest 'Reich-ian' repetitive piano pieces and a track I can listen to over and over again. Faxed Invitation is also a sleeper worth spending time with. Glam Bucket was absolutely HUGE when played live but it's a case of 'guess you had to be there' because it can come across flat on the album. Overall it's a really solid record and my only complaint is Holding The Moth. That track was much stronger live before the album was released but they over worked it and it came out sounding stilted and awkward.

xpost so we're basically saying the same thing. First taste was the sweetest taste.

Personally I don't have a problem with "Ring Road". I was okay with "Bruce Lee" and "Trim" too. Obviously not the best UW has to offer but as a one-off thing I don't have a problem with it. The chorus is good, at least. Agreed about "Glam Bucket" too. It's like "Twist" from AHDO, it's decent enough on the album but it feels like they really figured out what to do with the track live. Then again UW is really much different live and in studio. In the studio everything is perfected in its own way (I really like the studio version of "Holding the Moth"!), but yes it does lose some of its spontaniety.

"Best Mamgu Ever" is the one track that's been hitting me very hard lately and honestly I think it's one of their ten best. I'm a huge fan of the "Big Sister" EP they did and this is really just an extension of that. The way the vocals are mixed in is really astounding, but like all great UW tracks it just builds up under your nose, before you know it there's a long guitar solo and like three vocal parts. Those three final tracks on OWB are all fantastic ("Good Morning Cockerel" is really a beautiful thing. No way do Orbital or the Chems or Fluke do something like this).

i like the iciness of STITI, it's definitely colder in sound but it feels like a 2 AM train ride through an endless metropolis to me which probably hits me more than their warmer or plurier stuff.

I agree. I think the thing that I like so much about "Juanita" in album form is its majestic restraint, i.e. those alternating chords in half-heard choral background instead of juicy synthesizer hits.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4Brfp118S0

Karl Hyde solo album in the offing:

http://www.factmag.com/2013/01/24/underworlds-karl-hyde-announces-solo-album-edgeworld-stream-the-first-track-inside/

balls

Lanois!

well sort of

It is isn't it? It's also a little bit Talk Talk-ish, and a little bit like Small Hours by John Martyn

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01828/edgelands_main_1828410f.jpg

^ guessing that this book provided some of the inspiration for the project

Listening to the sample again, he should obviously have released this thing in late autumn/early winter

that sample really doesn't reveal a whole lot. but I do really like the ambient side of the group; the I'm a Big Sister EP and Rick's Bungalow With Stairs release are both excellent listening 30 minutes before bedtime

although Bungalow really creeps me out

Pre-ordered. Can't wait. Cut Clouds sounds beautiful.

http://www.karlhyde.com/

frogbs, do you like the Breaking and Entering soundtrack? I'm equally excited for Rick Smiths new soundtrack for the Danny Boyle film.

not as much as the two releases I mentioned; it's a little too much "background" for me, though some of the tracks ("Happy Toast" in particular) are real stunning

Track sounds lovely.

That book is awful, by the way.

The album is very nice.

great to see them (among very few other dance/electronic type bands) in BBC6's Best 100 Songs Of The Last 10 Years poll yesterday, keeping their end up at number 77 with Two Months Off amid the nu-folk and skinny indie kids.

For a moment I thought one track sampled Hans Appelqvist.

don't know if this was covered but barking is still pretty awesome

djh, what album are you talking about? breaking and entering or the new Karl Hyde?

i'm a little relieved at how well Barking has held up for me over 15+ listens. it's crazy that as a 14-year old my favorite groups were Underworld, the Chems, and Orbital. and now those three are responsible for some of my favorite albums of the last couple years. I figured they were all cooked!

again though let me stress how fucking incredible Oblivion With Bells is; it sinks in the way AHDO never quite did.

I will never understand how people underrate AHDO the same way I will never understand how people underrate Come With Us.

what do you like so much about it? i love the first two tracks and the last two - the middle section is what gets me. I like parts of it such as the wobbly off-beat rhythm on "Little Speaker" or the ambience of "Twist" (the live versions blow this out of the water by the way) but a lot of it feels uninspired for this band...particularly "Dinosaur Adventure" which seems like an analgam of past UW successes constructed just for single purposes; "Sola Sistim" doesn't really go places and much of "Little Speaker" is kinda lame, especially as the bass drowns out everything else. I still like the album and think it's actually quite good for a post-2000 release from an electronic act but it was definitely a drop off from the first three. Come With Us I'd rate on the same level - not as good as the first three, does have some great tracks, just not enough substance for me

"Twist" is one of my favorite tracks on the album, right behind "Luetin" and "Two Months Off"

Basically techno samba is one of my favorite things in the world

Luetin and Trim are the two sleeper-keepers for me. Their Peel versions are great too. Mo Move is also killer. Frogbs OTM re: live version of Twist being superior to the album version. DA3D is a track I never play but I think Chicken Lips did a decent remix.

Yes on all of that. Plus, "Sola Sistem" is maybe my very favorite of their atmospheric downtempo mood setters.

Sure "Dino Adventure" is sort of epic-on-autopilot, but most of the remaining album is good to great. Even at their best, almost everything they've done since is adequate to good.

And Come With Us doesn't remotely flag until Side B. Genuflect before "Star Guitar" or gtfo.

I like "Trim" as well. But it's kind of a minor track. I dunno, maybe not liking "Sola Sistem" much is why I don't really see it as being that great an album. Seems like a pretty key piece. As for Come With Us - you said it, I like "The Test" a lot but the second half really seems low on ideas.

Brotherlovesdub: apologies for slow reply. The Karl Hyde album.

Is it in the vein of Louisiana from Barking? Mostly downtempo?

Not a million miles from that. Not bangin'. But very good.

(Haven't got Barking and had never heard Louisiana before - glad to have heard it - Thanks)

DUDE GET BARKING, IT RULES

I have done as you instructed.

djh, if you like that vibe from UW, you should check out their remix of Manic Street Preachers. took a few plays for me but this is one of my favorite tracks they've done recently (and I like most of what they do). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiyfisEvo7U

mildly OT (totally different vibe) but you just inspired me to search "underworld remix" on youtube and, damn, i haven't heard this drum club remix for a long time, it is amazing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4X6U10V6ftk

That Soundsystem remix is great. The remixes UW did between 93-95 were really incredible. Zion Train, St. Etienne - Cool Kids of Death, Orbital - Lush, Spooky Schmoo etc etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G13i_pIfQbo

No love for 8 Ball in this thread makes me sad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6TNriSWRW0

Granted, a lot of my love for 8 Ball comes from how I still perceive it as the last truly great Underworld track. They've released some decent material since, but nothing that compares to their '90s output.

If they'd ended their run with 8 Ball, I wouldn't have minded at all.

Completely agree on 8 Ball. Loved that song, and then A Hundred Days Off came out and I was hugely disappointed. I've enjoyed some of their stuff since then, but it all feels really flat compared to their 90s stuff.

I dont really agree with that but it's a case where their 90's output was so good that you can't really blame them for not living up to it. Underworld from 1993-1999 was such an insane run. As for 8 Ball it's disappointing that it's going to remain kind of an obscurity, I would have loved it on AHDO. But they've definitely done great stuff since - most of OWB is incredible, Barking is very very good, the second and third Riverrun EPs...not to mention a lot of the stuff that's gone unreleased (thinking mostly of Silver Boots and Bamboo...)

I listened to OWB again for the first time in years a few months ago and was startled by how great it was right up until "Ring Road" started, at which point I went "oh yeah, I forgot what a horrible momentum killer this song is" and turned it off

I don't know that I've played the second half of the album more than three times

that's definitely a mistake - the three tunes that end the album are ace. I love each one of them. To be honest I was never that bothered by Ring Road (or Bruce Lee, or Trim), I like the chorus fine, but it is quite an odd choice for the middle of an album.