madonna: ray of lights vs. smashing pumpkins: adore vs. depeche mode: ultra vs. tori amos: from the choirgirl hotel vs. roland orzabal: tomcats screaming outside vs.

I think the Cure songs that best fit the thread are Wrong Number and their cover of World In My Eyes.

I was thinking Mixed Up.

Mixed Up is not a part of this trend any more than “W.F.L” or “Fool’s Gold” are.

I don't think The Cure is part of this at all, really.

would Chromatics fit into this? going from a punk lo-fi style band into an Italo-disco style act.

bands that change their sound completely like that are kind of a different thing, i think. i associate this period with one album detours.

i think there might be one person left from the og chromatics? it's almost like maybe the band broke up but johnny jewel wanted to still use the name? it is a cool band name.

madonna interview Tim posted was great, thanks Tim

The thread specified late 90's - early 00's. To my ears, Wong Number ('97) and World in My Eyes ('98) have that electronic texture that was being used at the time. Also More Than This and A Sign From God. (x-post)

13 by Blur, right? At least a few of the tracks seem to go down this path, plus produced by Orbit

Also, Medazzaland by Duran Duran seemed distinctly informed by electronica, even though they've also been synthy

always been*

Guys it’s simple: if the stylistic development has no conceivable relationship to quote unquote “electronica” then it is not part of this thread.

Chromatic definitely don’t count.

wanted to like Ghostyhead a lot more than I actually did.

Chromatics are the best part of a decade too late?

It's not really a coincidence that the vast majority of the records in the original post are from the same year, and a general sense that the a lot of the defining musical narratives of the 90s had played themselves out by 1998. With a lot of these records you get a sense of artists spinning around trying to work out what to do next. Once again it's Ray of Light that feels like the most sure-footed step here.

A lot of this general malaise feels embodied in UNKLE's 'Psyence Fiction' but that obviously isn't within the remit of this thread.

iirc Madonna had a few other producers in mind for Ray of Light before or at least in addition to William Orbit so think she was spinning around as much as anyone - but the album does a good job of sounding like it was always meant to sound I guess.

oh shit here's one i completely forgot about: twilight as played by the twilight singers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwS4Rby2Re0

yesssss good call

Kid A is a bit too late to qualify (it's really the first of a particular kind of 00s record rather than a late 90s phenomenon),

we don't really need to talk about radiohead any more than we already have obv but surely kid a is a part of this phenomenon, "rock band explores electronica" was the overwhelming press narrative w/ this album and i think predecessors like u2, pumpkins, and rem who had already dabbled with electronica possibly allowed for the success of something like kid a, it was such a common arc for a band at that time

And in a sense, what the artists were really engaging with was the uncertainty of what it meant to be modern and "alternative" in the late nineties, which you could boil down to appearing on the cover of Spin with slightly oddball make-up and ensuring that your music felt like it could soundtrack that cover photo

ha this is amazing. otm.

i agree with the people who have suggested that the "talk show host" remix on the romeo + juliet soundtrack has more to do with this thread than kid a

though technically one of the options in the poll is "too late to qualify" (the orzabal record is from 2002, it just sounds like it was recorded in 1998)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxkYMCA104o

actually it's from 2001. sorry, that's an extremely misleading youtube embed

^^^ i really love this record now

i agree with the people who have suggested that the "talk show host" remix on the romeo + juliet soundtrack has more to do with this thread than kid a

― ToddBonzalez (BradNelson), Wednesday, November 15, 2017 4:24 PM (forty minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I don't. The approach of Kid A isn't distinct, it's part of the same continuum.

Also, if Guerrilla doesn't fit (it does) then Madonna and Depeche Mode sure as hell don't.

ok thanks turrican

you know who really started this trend was the beatles maaan

but anyways i am so grateful for this thread because it got me browsing through the 1998-2002 spin archives on google books https://books.google.com/books?id=NhMpG7hKAr0C&source=gbs_navlinks_s

the first Natalie Imburglia album would definitely qualify as "token electronica sounds" in places

the vein of albums brad is identifying are generally referencing mainstream forms of electronic music; Radiohead were/are more interested in the Warp catalogue and austere early electronic music

Basically, if it doesn't sound like it could have been on a split single with Republica, move on.

(I realize I've torpedoed my Cure argument here.)

x-post:

'Everything In Its Right Place' and 'Hope' feel like they both come from near enough the same place to me.

y/n: Moby is the mirror image of this phenomenon

Animal Rights already mentioned upthread

the first Natalie Imburglia album would definitely qualify as "token electronica sounds" in places

as opposed to all her earlier work? it's not like she was Laura Imbruglia previously

does supposed former infatuation junkie work? i'm on the fence

also i revisited pop for this and it's really astounding how "miami" derails the whole thing

another one of U2's geography lesson songs that faceplants a bit (New York, Elvis Presley and America, Elvis Ate America, The Hands That Built America)

though i actually mostly like all of those except for the last one

Miami placement is OK if you think of that as side 2.

as opposed to the middle track on side C?

That works, too.

'Miami', 'The Playboy Mansion' and 'If You Wear That Velvet Dress' back-to-back just kills the album, IMO.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

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

lol how did Up beat Adore

does supposed former infatuation junkie work? i'm on the fence

― ToddBonzalez (BradNelson), Wednesday, November 15, 2017 4:47 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

missed this thread but glad this one got named, i think it counts. so many tracks are really "loop"-oriented... even "thank u" has those big crunchy beats rolling in.

^ otm!

Madder Rose's Tragic Magic probably fits here

adore meanwhile has many fine qualities but at the time felt like a letdown for me because it WASN'T all in on "electronica" - where Eye and TEITBITE had whet my whistle for this new futuristic incarnation of the Pumpkins. i like it better now as the hybrid/quilt that it is but i would have been down for twelve tracks of loops and keyboards supporting billy's angst.

This was a great thread despite so many people determinedly missing the point. lol how did we ever manage to survive the turrican era.

One 1998 album that we forgot about but which you can tell fits this trend even just from the title and the front cover (which looks like a photo shoot for Spin Magazine) is Robbie Robertson's Contact from the Underworld of Redboy.

Passengers easily one of my favorite albums. Plenty of music from that era that bangs, but Passengers (along with dubnobass) one of my only portals to what anticipating the future felt like back in the early-mid 90s.

The rest of the appeal is prefigured by the cover. Combine Eno's ambient floating in space with his "African robot factory", for a feeling of effortless repose in propulsion. Also Bono at his least annoying.