Top 50 Most Overrated Electronic Albums

don't get re albums that supposedly sound dated re electronica.
I mean, I still listen to Kraftwerk/Yello/Cabs/Pedro/Prefuse 73 etc a lot.
if its good upon release, then its good a few years later even if there are new generations of software that may be better now.

More about changing styles/aesthetics imo

but that happens in every genre

isolee 'wearemonster' got overrated imo, 'rest' was way better but critical attention was inversely proportionate

Though production techniques can factor in...some end up sounding 'timeless' or 'classic' because they keep getting re-used, others are popular for a minute and then not so much (like sidechain compressing everything to the kick drum, or glitchy Pro Tools sample chopping all over the place, or putting mid-tempo breakbeats through guitar pedals in a way that sounds very '90s, etc)

xp

but that happens in every genre

Exactly?

ok thought we were saying electronic stuff gets pegged as dated more than other genres and positing theories as to why

that was Moka's post i dont really agree w it either

100% agree w/r/t Isolee. Rest is much better than wearemonster, but perhaps the people who loved wearemonster were new to the genre and so they overvalued the album because they weren't around for the release of Rest.

it's an obvious point but dance music can get just as caught up in roots and tradition as others musics, like deep house for ex

it's not all "must generate new alien sounds"

I think stuff that's using a brand new instrument or tool gets pegged to a time... until there's a revival a couple decades later and then people marvel about how "contemporary" something sounds

sometimes it's just revisiting older sounds, but other times it's enthusiasm for something new that's a different take

for instance, all the eurorack stuff now

do I need to dig around and find out what eurorack is ?

it’s a modular synth system

someone had the genius idea to come up with a standard form factor/voltage/specified cable for modular synth units so you can put them all in a little box or cabinet and plug them all together using the same cables

you've heard a bunch of stuff in recent years made that way, trust me

it's the thule roofbars of synth

you've heard a bunch of stuff in recent years made that way, trust me

I have no doubt that's true.
however, I have never heard that phrase before.
ta.

someone had the genius idea to come up with a standard form factor/voltage/specified cable for modular synth units so you can put them all in a little box or cabinet and plug them all together using the same cables

Robert Moog did that in 1964!

"today" is my jam off wearemonster, so so dope

xp yeah, but someone had that genius idea again in the mid 90s

and thus the cycle of modular synth rises again

btw the coolest niche thing now is the vcv rack software, which in a recursive manner, emulates and gives people a way to build modular synths in software and wire them up. other software has done it but this is a pretty cool framework

link for a nice example https://www.facebook.com/groups/vcvrack/permalink/184204178906401/

Mark Fell is God, afaic

― brimstead, Thursday, May 17, 2018 5:16 PM (two days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^

like for all of the interviews he gives where he's just so anti-dancing (yawn), he sure has made some v. funky (and gorgeous) music

Wearemonster generated a lot of buzz at the time but it doesn't seem to have lasted in the critical memory in the way that, say, Alcachofa has. Isolee in general now feels like one of those producers who made so many great, detail-packed records and now gets overlooked in the rush to lay hosannas on Villalobos as the crowning auterish genius of his era.

(Beau Mot Plage has lasted, obviously, but individual tracks rarely feel over or underrated in the way that albums do)

I like a lot of early Bicep tracks and remixes but their album was just really formulaic and boring, not in a joyous and familiar way but in a predictable and unthrilling way

Yeah. I bought the album purely on the strength of seeing it appear several times in the ILM 'best of 2017' poll, not previously having heard a note of it. I was quite dismayed by how pedestrian it is. Probably the first time that the hivemind has let me down.

"probably the first time that the hivemind has let me down"

If that was only your first time, you're in for a world of hurt

challop: SAW 2 is 85% meh

I have a bunch of Thomas Koner CDs that I picked up because The Wire was all over them, and I'm still not sure just what the hell I'm supposed to be hearing! (The Porter Ricks stuff is pretty good, though.)

Wearemonster generated a lot of buzz at the time but it doesn't seem to have lasted in the critical memory in the way that, say, Alcachofa has. Isolee in general now feels like one of those producers who made so many great, detail-packed records and now gets overlooked in the rush to lay hosannas on Villalobos as the crowning auterish genius of his era.

― Matt DC, Saturday, May 19, 2018 4:49 AM (six hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this to me feels like a better example of 'overrated' than villalobos for that reason kinda? like, i also actually want to listen to achso but not wearemonster

that said 'rest' is pretty awesome to me still in the way that mid 00s villalobos is

I've always felt that way about SAW2

köner is awesome
thirded on the SAW2 "what gives?"

I agree with the post upthread to the effect that a lot of the excitement around Wearemonster was catch-up for people who missed Rest the first time around. The former is still a great record IMO, but Isolee's "auteur" period was really in the years leading up to and culminating with Rest (see also the early singles, many of which ended up on Western Stores, and stuff like the remix of Blaze's "Lovelee Dae").

There's still total classic tracks in the following years like the "Lent" and "Sweet Chat Rio" remixes from 2003, and especially the "Cardiology" and "Africa / Brazil" remixes from 2004, but they're more like superb dancefloor articulations of all of the producer's assembled tricks and tactics (no surprises that this stuff is often my favourite Isolee) (actually in retrospect Playhouse really missed a trick by not putting out a remixes collection at about that point).

The fact that Isolee was really an auteur in the years before the microhouse / minimal crossover means that, while Wearemonster arguably was overrated on release, Isolee as an artist is now underrated - perhaps because more people had the luxury of following the tail end of Villalobos' classic era in real time, it's easier to think of his work as "important" in a way that is less obvious for Isolee.