Underworld - Classic or Dud?

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (1582 of them)

Does anyone else have trouble remembering what Underworld songs are called? I could make a complete list of Underworld song titles and have no idea what songs they refer to, minus Cups, Blueski, Born Slippy, and Stagger. And King of Snake and Bruce Lee (duh).

That said, they are one of my faves.

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Saturday, 26 June 2004 22:23 (twenty-one years ago)

I have a hard time remembering the titles of any of their pre-_Beaucoup Fish_ songs besides the singles.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Sunday, 27 June 2004 00:50 (twenty-one years ago)

Second Toughest In the Infants would top my albums of the '90s list if I did such a thing.

― Gear! (Gear!), Sunday, 27 June 2004 00:56 (twenty-one years ago)

Second Toughest is my favorite. I listened to it every night at bedtime for a year.

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Sunday, 27 June 2004 18:44 (twenty-one years ago)

yes, stiti is an epic album and my second favorite album of the 90's. that reminds me that i need to buy another copy since mine is so beat up from constant use.

― todd swiss (eliti), Sunday, 27 June 2004 19:27 (twenty-one years ago)

Roxy you are very wise. What I love most about STITI is that it hasn't aged a damn bit since the day it was released.

― Gear! (Gear!), Monday, 28 June 2004 05:59 (twenty-one years ago)

i got their 1991-2002 double cd collection thingy for $10 last week. bargain!! it's tops.

― gem (trisk), Monday, 28 June 2004 06:07 (twenty-one years ago)

I listened to _Second Toughest..._ recently to see if I was wrong way back when I labelled it as disspointing and boring. I wasn't. What the hell are you people seeing in this album? There's only one song on it that I ever want to hear EVER.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 28 June 2004 13:09 (twenty-one years ago)

Which song?

I think it would ride pretty high in my best of the 90s, FWIW. For all I know I might have bypassed electronic music almost entirely if not for that album and 'In Sides'

― DJ Mencap (DJ Mencap), Monday, 28 June 2004 13:36 (twenty-one years ago)

"Pearl's Girl", of course!

"Juanite/Kiteless/Confusion The Waitress" would pass muster if it wasn't 8,000 years long.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 28 June 2004 14:11 (twenty-one years ago)

Dan, you're listening too hard.

Mencap, me too! I owe it al to STITI. It's the record that got me into electronic music, house music, DANCE music even.

gem, is that comp really worth buying? Couldn't I just burn it myself? What's the appeal?

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Monday, 28 June 2004 14:49 (twenty-one years ago)

Aha, now I understand I think; I'd been into electronic music for a good... what, seven, eaight years before _Second Toughest..._ came out and needed no gateway.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 28 June 2004 14:53 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm not the biggest STITI fan, but I have to at least say it's the closest they've come to holding a mood. It's all very blue and cool. "Rowla" is the only thing on there comparable to the spiky "Dinosaur Adventure 3D" or "Cowgirl" but even it seems to fit somehow.

― Vinnie (vprabhu), Monday, 28 June 2004 18:35 (twenty-one years ago)

Is "holding a mood" a euphemism for "making every song sound almost exactly the same"?

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 28 June 2004 18:40 (twenty-one years ago)

Dan you're wrong sir and I demand a retraction. I hope someday you hear it the same way I do!

― Gear! (Gear!), Monday, 28 June 2004 18:42 (twenty-one years ago)

It would be nice because then people wouldn't think I was contrary just for the sake of being contrary.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 28 June 2004 18:59 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.bizspirit.com/images/sysimage_publishing/Books/Contrarian%20Mgmnt.jpg

― Gear! (Gear!), Monday, 28 June 2004 19:03 (twenty-one years ago)

is that comp really worth buying?
No music collection is complete without "Rez".

― Barry Bruner (Barry Bruner), Monday, 28 June 2004 19:35 (twenty-one years ago)

Isn't that on the Cowgirl EP?

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Monday, 28 June 2004 23:41 (twenty-one years ago)

i love STITI but i didn't pick up on Dubnobass... til a while after that came out so that affects things i'm sure.

'Rez' was a rare example of a video making me dislike the track more (which i initially thought was ok, then liked a lot) as opposed to the other way round. still prefer 'Cowgirl' tho.

― stevem (blueski), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 01:28 (twenty-one years ago)

They were the first electronic act I got into and I loved loved loved them, but I still do not own STITI. To my knowledge I've only heard it once and I think I was drugged up. Didn't leave an impression. Maybe Dan could give me his copy?

― Sonny A. (Keiko), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 01:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Second Toughest is okay but it's not as good as the first or the third album - the "dance" sections just aren't physically compulsive enough.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 01:48 (twenty-one years ago)

Is "holding a mood" a euphemism for "making every song sound almost exactly the same"?

Heh, the last three on there especially just kind of go by in a nameless haze (bringing us back to roxy's point).

― Vinnie (vprabhu), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 01:49 (twenty-one years ago)

is that comp really worth buying?

not if you have all of the originals of course. but i don't. so it was for me.

― gem (trisk), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 01:51 (twenty-one years ago)

making every song sound almost exactly the same

There is nothing in the songs "Blueski", "Stagger" and "Juanita" (for example) that sounds anything like anything in the other two.

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 01:55 (twenty-one years ago)

STITI is still years ahead of the curve, yo.

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 04:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah roxy but that's because they're all in different genres; there's still a monochrome pall to a lot of it. Beaucoup Fish is formally less varied but it feels much more dynamic.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 05:21 (twenty-one years ago)

that monochrome pall is part of what i find really absorbing about second toughest. i find it difficult to explain how that is different from merely "boring" or "featureless" but somehow the songs are distinct, yet flow naturally one into the other without any giant leaps or gaps.

partly i think the danceability of second toughest is subtle yet powerful- the repetitive figures of the "juanita/kiteless" opening block at first just make you bounce around a little bit, jiggle a leg in your seat or whatever, but by later you're humming along with the vocoder and it picks up speed. this is opposed to the danceability of, say, "push upstairs," which just starts bashing down the door and forcing you to dance with the detroit-ness of it all and builds even more on that.

― .rob (rgeary), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 05:30 (twenty-one years ago)

that is all to say, i do find second toughest physically compulsive but in a back-door kind of way- you have to hear the tracks a few times before you find them compulsive, whereas underworld's most obviously danceable tracks ("rez," "born slippy," much of beacoup fish) instantly commands dance reactions from the first beat.

neither is a better approach.

― .rob (rgeary), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 05:32 (twenty-one years ago)

Second Toughest is okay but it's not as good as the first or the third album - the "dance" sections just aren't physically compulsive enough.

OTM OTM OTM OTM and incidentally this is why "Pearl's Girl" is the only track on the album that works.

_Second Toughest..._ comes across like they took the miniscule edge of _dubnobass..._ and sanded it off of every track, leaving a completely innoffensive and uninvolving puddle of bland (with the SOLE exception of "Pearl's Girl"); the entire reason why most of those songs work better in a live situation is because beefed up through a gigantic club system with all of the live filter processing and feedback inherent in the setup the tracks regain bite and crispness. I first heard most of the _Second Toughest..._ material live at one of their shows in support of the album and was DEEPLY LET DOWN by the faceless blancmange that they put in the stores, so I basically turned back to the drum n bass CDs that were piling up next to my stereo and wrote them off for YEARS.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 12:12 (twenty-one years ago)

three months pass...

Is the recent double-album singles collection the best place to start> I sincerely doubt I will ever invest in buying all their albums.

― The TAO that can be Posted is not the TAO! (The Tao that can be Posted is), Thursday, 7 October 2004 02:15 (twenty-one years ago)

that should, of course, read as "?" -- cuz i'm asking.

― The TAO that can be Posted is not the TAO! (The Tao that can be Posted is), Thursday, 7 October 2004 02:26 (twenty-one years ago)

yeh it's not perfect but provides an adequate guide

― Freelance Hiveminder (blueski), Thursday, 7 October 2004 08:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Classic.

I've been meaning to listen to dubnobass and stiti again - it's been a while.

― sleep (sleep), Thursday, 7 October 2004 14:38 (twenty-one years ago)

is the recent double-album singles collection the best place to start
It is the perfect place to start because it contains many singles that weren't on the albums.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Thursday, 7 October 2004 15:47 (twenty-one years ago)

(and because everything on it is awesome, of course. But in particular, some of their finest singles weren't on the albums, including their finest, "Rez")

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Thursday, 7 October 2004 15:48 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't have the double singles-thingy, but can unreservedly recommend Dubnobass... and Second Toughest. You will (or should) buy them both, since they contain amazing tracks that aren't in turn included on the singles thing. Which I should get myself...

― Dark Horse, Thursday, 7 October 2004 17:27 (twenty-one years ago)

Essential Underworld songs you won't get off the hits:

Spoonman
Juanita: Kiteless (preferably in some version that cuts the "To Dream of Love" part)
Eclipse
Minneapolis
Confusion the Waitress
Cherry Pie
Cups
Dark & Long
maybe Why Why Why

burn a CD-R, get the hits, and that should be about all that's necessary.

― The Good Dr. Bill (Andrew Unterberger), Thursday, 7 October 2004 17:34 (twenty-one years ago)

i had such an urge to listen to Rowla yesterday i dl'd it at work tho i have the CD at home

― Freelance Hiveminder (blueski), Thursday, 7 October 2004 17:39 (twenty-one years ago)

their live set is really good too, everything everything.

― still bevens (bscrubbins), Thursday, 7 October 2004 18:53 (twenty-one years ago)

This band is fucking fantastic. Second Toughest placed number one on my '90s ballot (and a couple of others).

― Gear! (Gear!), Thursday, 7 October 2004 21:01 (twenty-one years ago)

Tonight on Radio 1 at 11pm, Underworld are guest presenters on the John Peel show slot.

Rick and Karl will be presenting Tuesday night's show.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/alt/johnpeel/thisweek/thisweek.shtml#sess1

― DJ Martian (djmartian), Tuesday, 19 October 2004 19:38 (twenty-one years ago)

it's on..........

― DJ Martian (djmartian), Tuesday, 19 October 2004 21:03 (twenty-one years ago)

for those not as familiar with Underworld, i highly recommend tracking down some of their remixes of other peoples tunes. Simply Red - Thrill Me, Spooky - Schmoo, Drum Club - Soundsystem, Leftfield - Song of Life, Saint Etienne - Cool Kids of Death (Full 12" Mix) to name but a few...Underworld are awesome straight through...skip the bangers (Rowla etc.) and head for the deeper tunes.

― biznotic, Tuesday, 19 October 2004 21:40 (twenty-one years ago)

two months pass...

Okay, this live recording of "Moaner" I've found is absolutely BLINDING.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 4 January 2005 22:15 (twenty-one years ago)

Also, "Rowla" fights with "Luetin" as being their best album track ever.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 6 January 2005 19:11 (twenty-one years ago)

OMG I LOVE THE ORIGINAL "Born Slippy" SO MUCH NGAAAAAAAAAH

(yes I recently downloaded the live BBC mp3s)

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 6 January 2005 19:37 (twenty-one years ago)

The original's great. I've never been arsed with the famous one; it sounds like "Wonderful Christmastime".

― KeithW (kmw), Thursday, 6 January 2005 19:45 (twenty-one years ago)

three weeks pass...

8 years after the fact "Push Upstairs" is suddenly one of my favorite songs. WTF?

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 27 January 2005 17:48 (twenty-one years ago)

8 years? nope, 6.
Start of 1999 'B.FISH' came out.

these days i'm always surprised how much i like '100 days off' whenever i re-listen to it. they fckn ruled didn't they?
they might again!

― piscesboy, Thursday, 27 January 2005 17:57 (twenty-one years ago)

Skipping 1482 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.