What's the best of these electronic live albums from the big 90's acts?

It's true that live albums by dance artists are rarer because not many dance artists do anything that would merit packaging a live performance.

The ones that are heralded are precisely the ones that "make interesting improvements and changes to the tunes". Typically, live dance albums are as much indebted to remix culture as to the notion of a live event.

The artist I always wish had done a live album is Isolee - the version of "Beau Mot Plage" he performed live in 2001 was one of the most intense, insane freak-outs I've ever had the privilege to dance through.

Not that it's all in the vein of ruminative expansion: e.g. Everything, Everything is effectively a hits mega-mix adopting an efficient "don't bore us, get to the chorus" approach, which in itself results in interesting, at times spectacular production choices - "Juanita" and "Cups" are so much larger-sounding here than on record. It's a great album precisely because it flirts with redundancy - not by being redundant itself, but by rendering the studio albums redundant (though I'm too much of a deep house fan to want to say goodbye to the original version of "Cups").

Also from memory the live "Cups" doesn't have the amazing false ending which totally makes the original.

Hmm perhaps we need a thread on amazing false endings in dance tunes (see also that stuttering wind-up in Basement Jaxx's "Same Old Show" - one of the finest moments in any piece of recorded music ever).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNfMLo7TmlI

Tuomas you really don't know what you're talking about on this one.

yeah Tuomas it seems unlikely you've heard any of these albums

I dunno, it's pretty easy to be dismissive of live dance music in the era of laptop performance and there's something weirdly buzz-harshing about going to a club and being confronted with a dude hiding behind a little glowing Apple sign. But I don't think that's something you could level at any of the artists here, although if I were being uncharitable I'd say that The Chemical Brothers live disguise the fact that they're not really doing much onstage with colossal levels of banging and spectacle, and nonetheless The Chemical Brothers live >>>>>> any of their records.

Also I'd say go so far as to say that of the big 90s acts the ones who most successfully made the "dance album" feel like a brilliant idea did so by making the whole record feel like a really awesome DJ mix or live set - Exit Planet Dust, Orbital's Brown album, etc. Obviously the Chemical Brothers went on to make the idea of a "dance album" feel like a terrible idea but hey.

Tuomas you really don't know what you're talking about on this one.

yeah Tuomas it seems unlikely you've heard any of these albums

No, I haven't - like I said in my first post, I just find the whole idea alien. I'm not against seeing electronic dance acts live if they manage to create a spectacle around their music (though as Matt points out, this is not often the case), but in those cases it's the spectacle itself that's the draw, and not the difference between the original recorded song and its "live" reproduction. What I like most about electronic music is the craftsmanship, the careful way every sonic detail of a track has put together to make it work as a whole, and obviously that sort of thing is hard to improve in a live performance. I've seen many gigs by electronic musicians that I've enjoyed because of the performance aspect, but I've never felt that the version of the track played live would improve on the previously recorded version.

I guess the only partial exception to the above are cases where electronic musicians are creating new music on site instead of playing their old tracks; I've seen artists like Ovuca and Pan Sonic play gigs like this. But even in those cases the main attraction is witnessing the music being born out of thin air, and not necessarily the actual quality of the music being produced like this. If I were to listen to recordings of these performances afterwards, I doubt they would compare to the studio tracks these artist have crafted with time and care.

re: Daft Punk live album

This album is like the best comedy record of the year

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Sunday, December 16, 2007 9:27 PM (4 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

[*Electronic fart*]
[Rapturous cheers]
[*ffffaaart*]
[Orgiastic applause with some tears and shudders]

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Sunday, December 16, 2007 9:27 PM (4 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this was the other reason that ALIVE 1997 was good

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v51/samluv616/Picture283.jpg

xxxxxps chemical brothers take half their studio on stage, it's kind of insane what they do.

"“Tom tends to do the lion’s share of the mixing,” Matt explains, “and then Ed does the lion’s share of the twiddling with envelopes and filter sweeps, mapping stuff to mod wheels and just messing about with it. There’s always one of them who’s darting around grabbing hold of things, but Ed does a lot of the hands-on stuff with the synths, while Tom’s more kind of nailed to the desk, just keeping a lid on it.

“If you went to five shows in a row, they’d all be different, sonically and musically. Apart from anything, there are often mistakes. One of them might go to dub a delay onto a synth, put it on the main kick drum by mistake and then go, ‘Hang on a minute, I quite like that!’ and play around with it for five minutes. And then the next night, they’ll do it again at the same point and just refine it a little bit. The show is an ever-changing thing, a lot of the time, for that very reason. Because there are so many parameters, you can’t reproduce them exactly every night and you will end up with these little happy accidents.”

that daft punk thing is stunning tho, will vote that

Well, like I said, in genres like jazz or funk or rock there's an in-built improvisational element, so live performances might make interesting improvements and changes to the tunes, and that's why you might fancy listening a recording of them being played live. But electronic music doesn't have that improvisational element (or at least genres like house and techno don't, there are other electronic genres that are more friendly to improv), the tunes are meant to sound exactly like they are on the record, the way they sound is the whole appeal of this music

you should watch this then, pretty much the opposite of "how this was meant to sound on record":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeLiUstn2jE

(btw all these albums are good counterexamples to what you're saying, especially the Orb one)

I've seen many gigs by electronic musicians that I've enjoyed because of the performance aspect, but I've never felt that the version of the track played live would improve on the previously recorded version.

But usually when you see non-recorded musicians you think every version of every song they play improves on the previously recorded version?

YOu are arguing against these four albums for something they don't do; they all have heavy amounts of rearrangement* and improvisation (within song frameworks) and performance, and are all really good**. It's thus something of a waste of time to continue arguing, when you could listen to / watch them instead and then have some idea of why people might like them, instead of telling us we're dumb for liking them.

* basically your position is "Why would you ever listen to a 12" of a song by any of these bands? How pointless, they already recorded it once." (okay DP don't really release multiple versions of their own stuff, but it applies to all the others)
** I haven't seen Don't Think, it only screened one night here, but I did see that tour so

It's also not like all dance music is so complex and involuted that it cannot be reproduced in varied form live at the same or a higher standard. And a lot of thought and attention has gone into creating means by which electronic producers can do just that.

There's a separate issue with demanding this of electronic producers, saying they must be able to put on an interesting live show to be worthwhile. But I think we can reject this line of argument while not rejecting all live performances and live performance products, in the same way that we can reject the idea that dance music should be judged primarily by albums while still thinking certain albums are fantastic.

I mean, we get it, Tuomas, your life was changed by rave and none of the early 90s European techno artists you like get enough respect; this doesn't mean that they came up with the only possible way to create or enjoy dance music.

non-recorded musicians

non-electronic, sorry

It's thus something of a waste of time to continue arguing, when you could listen to / watch them instead and then have some idea of why people might like them, instead of telling us we're dumb for liking them.

I didn't say these albums are bad, or that anyone is "dumb" for liking them, I was merely stating the reasons I personally don't feel like listening to live albums by electronic dance acts. I'm sure other people can enjoy them in ways I probably don't, and I've nothing against that.

* basically your position is "Why would you ever listen to a 12" of a song by any of these bands? How pointless, they already recorded it once."

It's not the same: the 12" version and the album version are created in the same manner, whereas the live version isn't.

I mean, we get it, Tuomas, your life was changed by rave and none of the early 90s European techno artists you like get enough respect; this doesn't mean that they came up with the only possible way to create or enjoy dance music.

I have idea no idea what this has to do with the discussion here? And I enjoy plenty of dance music from different eras that's created in various ways, I've even enjoyed many dance music gigs, I just don't feel I'd enjoy live recordings of them.

Underworld by a country mile, although the Chems film is excellent.

Don't know what live house and techno you've seen Tuomas, but there can (and should) be a lot of improvisation involved in performances, from re-arranging performances on-the-fly with features like clips in Ableton, live filter tweaking, riding volumes, tweaking effects, as well as live keyboard playing, percussion - and live programming. True, some people because some people turn up and play tracks straight in Traktor.

And it doesn't have to be laptop drive: how about someone like Persues Trax with an all-hardware set-up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1TGGShk4eg

Sorry for not checking my writing above, it's bloody awful. Speaking of bloody awful: here's an track I improvised live a month ago: http://soundcloud.com/glocknspiel/matty-balaam-citrus-jam

Both Daft Punk live albums are great but 1997 >> 2007.

Also European Club Gig is better than Everything Everything but that wasn't an official release.

Alive 2007.

It makes me love life when I was previously feeling down. I know it's corny, but it's true.

Underworld's Live in Tokyo 25th November 2005 is pretty great, too, if a little much to take in one go.

I'm very partial to that one, IMO it's just as good as the rest here, but it's very long and I doubt many here have heard it, so it's off the poll

Alive 2007 fills me with regret every time I play it for not seeing them on that tour.

I wish i could remember seeing them on that tour a bit better

Comment on a youtube of Orbital playing in Sydney last week, for Tuomas:

Best thing about that clip is it shows that Orbital really do play live... You can see them fuck up there (if you're a geek) - the big synth riff from Impact's supposed to kick at 0:09, and you can see Paul (on the right) throw his hands in the air when it's meant to happen, but instead the tune drops into the breakbeat. Then he fiddles around to rework it, drops it down to a single note, then brings the synth riff in. Good recovery.

Alive 2007 fills me with regret every time I play it for not seeing them on that tour.

i guess i could've gone but tickets for the greek theatre started at something like $80 and i just kinda figure no show can really be that good

it was

It was like $120 here because M0dular made it into a spurious "festival" in a stadium with Van 5he, Cut C0py, Musc1es, The Pre5ets and The Bang Gang Deejays playing from 2pm before the standard 15-minute Sebasti4n & Kavinsky warm-up DJ set and I still say you chumped yourself

Van 5he, Cut C0py, Musc1es, The Pre5ets and The Bang Gang Deejays

even though some of these have been responsible for some good music, reading the above line filled me with fear and loathing.

we didn't go until sunset obv

Comment on a youtube of Orbital playing in Sydney last week, for Tuomas:

Best thing about that clip is it shows that Orbital really do play live... You can see them fuck up there (if you're a geek) - the big synth riff from Impact's supposed to kick at 0:09, and you can see Paul (on the right) throw his hands in the air when it's meant to happen, but instead the tune drops into the breakbeat. Then he fiddles around to rework it, drops it down to a single note, then brings the synth riff in. Good recovery.

Eh? I was never saying that these acts don't actually play live, just that live playing rarely improves the music.

do you ever see non-electronic bands live?

Eh? I was never saying that these acts don't actually play live, just that live playing rarely improves the music.

― Tuomas, Tuesday, 15 May 2012 07:21 (1 hour ago)

Well I saw Underworld live a shedload of times in the early to mid nineties and they certainly improved the music.

Highlight was probably a 2 hour set in the Dance Tent of the Phoenix Festival. It was one continuous mix with lots of improv from Karl and the majority of songs radically different from their studio versions.

UW does this a lot - their studio stuff is awesome, but...I feel like going through all the live stuff, they just have a tendency to nail it from time to time and perfect these already great tunes (check some of the live versions of "You Do Scribble", they almost make me glad they never tried it in studio)

I also have a Denki Groove live album that I really wanted to add to the poll but I doubt anyone has heard it. I did post a video of them above but I think this one adds to the discussion because it's easily one of the most "live" albums of the group, they're constantly mixing things that shouldn't go together and doing a ton of shit on the fly, much of which only kinda works out, but the album as a whole is still incredible. Alas,

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Closer than I thought it would be, though I figured that would be the order.

underworld are so cheesy. never really listened to them before outside of remixes and singles, listening to everything, everything now

someone really needs to show them how to change the quantize setting in their sequencer

Yeah! You tell 'em, champ!

Are you paying attention, Underworld?

0 is harsh on Don't Think which is pretty great

getting into this now, ha, they sure love their jd-800 presets! /startrekman

yeah I think that maybe not enough people have heard it? It is fairly new but IMO compares pretty well to the others

btw calling UW "cheesy" - c'mon, son. maybe listen to one of their full albums.

kind of hate the vox on underworld albums. they've always been a stumbling block for me.

Weird, I consider that their best asset. UW have a "new wave gone techno" approach which really appeals to me. No surprise since they were actual New Wavers for a while.

"new wave gone techno" had never really occurred to me but I can see that. terrible "brit pop gone techno" chemical bros tracks like "the test" are more along the lines of what I'm thinking of. admittedly, that's more of a stretch than your angle and probably a little unfair. underworld vox are definitely more integrated/fundamental to the band's sound than pastiche chemical bros tracks, but ultimately, they just both grate on me in similar ways.

To be fair I kind of liked "The Test" as well. so maybe my opinion isn't worth that much.

I guess I'd have to know exactly which songs you're talking about - "NUXX" is one thing, but I don't know how anyone could hate the vocals on "Dirty Epic"; it's one of the few tracks where Karl really gets to air his voice out and the effect is incredible. Also there's a bunch of tracks out there with cut-up vocal fragments - there's a newer tune they did, "Back in the Fears" which is just a bunch of vocal loops and a shimmering guitar - not something the Chems or any other of these groups could do. Obviously it's possible that you just don't like his voice but IMO he's better than any of the guest singers or vocalists that the other electronic groups got, and they've done a lot with the vocals that you probably wouldn't hear on the songs on Everything, Everything

I'd just listened to everything, everything, so yeah, "born slippy/nuxx." but I will check out "dirty epic" and see if it clicks w/me.