why don't you poll me I feel like flying to... the UNDERWORLD Poll Results thread -- produced by Smith & Hyde for ILM Artist Poll #102

http://ghostable.uk/public/ilx/underworld/u058-978304.png

58. Winjer
372 points, 9 votes
1999 album track from Beaucoup Fish

VHS promo

Although not a highlight from the album that pummelling bassdrum pattern on Winjer is pretty novel and makes me wish they'd experimented more rhythmically on that level.

Well, okay. Having had an opportunity to at least listen to the first half of _Beaucoup Fish_, I'm somewhat staggered by how much I actually LIKE it! Granted, it's all stuff I've heard before, but if the rest of the album holds up, I'm going to have to temper many of the negative things I've said about them.

― DJP, Friday, January 19, 2001 12:00 PM

So, after that initial euphoric burst, I've come down somewhat on encountering "Winjer", although I note that as far as vaguely-ambient Underworld nonsense goes, it's pretty damn cool. So, we're still in the plus column...

― DJP, Friday, January 19, 2001 12:00 PM

https://i.imgur.com/xDWSIdW.jpg

I'm voting "Winjer" so it doesn't get shut out

fuck "Bruce Lee"

― DJP, Wednesday, July 6, 2011 11:19 PM

"Winjer" and "Kittens" were the songs that made me stop just dismissing this album out of hand and really LISTEN to it, at which point I realized that "Push Upstairs" wasn't the plodding mess I'd claimed but was actually bludgeoning awesome.

― DJP, Wednesday, July 6, 2011 11:51 PM

I had Winjer high up on my ballot - it's a really beautiful ambient track, except with pounding kick drums.

http://ghostable.uk/public/ilx/underworld/u057-601792.png

57. Between Stars
376 points, 11 votes
2010 album track from Barking

official video by Michael Horsham
DVD video by Dylan Kendle & Jason Kedgley
audience video 2009

yayyyy

live audio 2010 (link at 38:55)

Between Stars is a superior euphoric house banger to Always Loved imo - the latter is a little ploddy, if I can go against the tide.

― rhythm fixated member (chap), Saturday, September 4, 2010 12:04 AM

oh yeah between stars was aite too

― deej, Saturday, September 4, 2010 12:29 AM

https://i.imgur.com/tnMR1fo.jpg

still love barking, some of my favorite underworld jams are buried in the second half like "between stars" and "grace"

― BradNelson, Wednesday, March 21, 2018 7:33 AM

fan cover

Barking was full of bullshit collaborators. It wasn't really an Underworld album.

― brotherlovesdub, Friday, March 11, 2016 7:49 AM

it's still really great imo

― BradNelson, Friday, March 11, 2016 7:50 AM

also "between stars" is evidence they should compose with darren price more often

― BradNelson, Friday, March 11, 2016 7:51 AM

^^^^^^^^

― DJP, Friday, March 11, 2016 7:52 AM

+1 for Darren Price

― brotherlovesdub, Friday, March 11, 2016 9:19 AM

is the line on this "Everybody cram" ??

choon

http://ghostable.uk/public/ilx/underworld/u056-960281.png

56. Brilliant Yes That Would Be
378 points, 8 votes
2018 digital single

video by Simon Taylor
extended album audio

this one is great, i don't think i rated it though -- i have a hard time rating their more ambient stuff because it's not what i "expect" i guess when i am going thru a bunch of underworld music? my ballot is embarringly in the "yes but can i dance to it" camp

dance slower!

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bhhf8TUnk3n/?utm_source=ig_embed

Nice 'n moody - Fenneszy guitars in the last part

― willem, Tuesday, April 10, 2018 6:56 PM

Absolutely love this. Something tells me it's not a conventional lead single though. I'm still guessing we'll get something closer to Riverrun this year rather than a standard album.

https://i.imgur.com/WRtZdI7.jpg

I've listened to electronic music long before there were synthetic drum beats attached to it. Dance music is great, but electronic music without the constants beats is also fantastic, and there is also a place for it. The mind picks up the rhythm in music and silently plays in your head, which I think allows the brain to better react in a more creative way, instead of being sledgehammered by an unrelenting beat. Don't stop. Please live forever. This is Love. Heartbreaking.

that guy otm

Also appreciated DJP's Beaucoup Fish journey!

https://media.giphy.com/media/J5ALczinm6l0GRh91A/giphy.gif

no no no too soon

“Winjer” and “Kittens” are 100% responsible for me transitioning from “I like some Underworld songs but on balance… I don’t trust them artistically” to “I fucking love this band and the rule, who cares if I dislike some of their output”

Winjer and Kittens are both amazing

"Brilliant Yes" just missed my ballot. Love the combination of sounds they use

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55. Something Like A Mama
384 points, 11 votes
1999 album track from Beaucoup Fish

VHS promo
live audio 1999

xps... funny. I got into them a little before Fish and love those first two Mk2 albums front to back. Skym, Winjer, Mama, and to a lesser extent Kittens was the first time I was like, well, they can't all be classics. This thread seriously going to make me go back and listen to the back half of Fish extra close, lol

if you're wondering who voted for Something Like A Mama, it was me.

― brotherlovesdub, Thursday, July 7, 2011 2:27 AM

"Something Like A Mama" (jungle-inflected track like "Pearl's Girl" with its tongue in its cheek) and of course "King Of Snake". It's a strong album.

― Tim, Tuesday, October 17, 2000 11:00 AM

Mama Nuxx Jam audio 2000
fan piano cover

https://i.imgur.com/msusGar.jpg

"Something Like A Mama" is one of the few completely static Underworld tracks I like, largely because of those swooping synths and the breakbeats.

― DJP, Thursday, November 11, 2004 12:15 AM

There is no mention of Darren Emerson here, but I think he contributed a lot to Underworld

I see Drift series as something else, but otherwise he was involved in the four best albums of theirs - dubnobasswithmyheadman, Second Toughest in the Infants, Beaucoup Fish and Everything, Everything

ctrl + f ;)

saw them in concert twice during that period and it felt he brought a lot to their sound, at least live

only mention in thread earlier:

Can someone explain to me what, exactly, Darren Emerson was doing in Underworld, with examples provided from the recorded music? I can one sound in "River of Bass" that seems to be emanating from a DJ and aside from that I figure him for dead weight. If I'm out of it, enlighten me quick.

― roxymuzak, Thursday, July 10, 2008 12:48 AM

Cute. At some point (after it turned out they weren't lost without Darren, as some feared at the time) I did a little Googling to see if there was any clue about their division of labour in writing or in studio, but no one seemed to really have a clue.

https://i.ibb.co/ZYTCCrZ/zepp-rickhands.gif

no no no too soon

― maf you one two (maffew12), Friday, June 12, 2020 9:46 AM (two hours ago)

http://ghostable.uk/public/ilx/underworld/u054-128579.png

54. Listen To Their No
385 points, 8 votes
2019 digital single as part of Drift

video by Simon Taylor

No way!!! Come on people!!!!

this is, of course, completely fucking killer

― BradNelson, Thursday, May 23, 2019 10:29 PM

whoa, this is right up there with "Two Months Off"

though I think they might have recycled the "Skyscraper" bass line ;)

― frogbs, Thursday, May 23, 2019 11:30 PM

Sydney Opera House live promo

yea I've probably listened to it a dozen times already. woke up with it stuck in my head. starting to get really jealous of everyone who gets to go to those shows, there are so many new tracks that would just be killer live

― frogbs, Saturday, May 25, 2019 1:15 AM

https://i.imgur.com/YMVNmlE.jpg

I first heard "Doot Doot" when I was 8 years old. I'm 45 now, and had no clue I'd be enjoying this music MY ENTIRE LIFE.

Jesus, I still can't get over this. Gotta admit, I was losing the love after the last 2 albums. In fact, the last time I really loved any Underworld tracks was Downpipe and Scribble. This is another level.

this put me into tears on first listen. it's a modern, reinvigorated Two Months Off. truly one of the best tracks to come out of DRIFT thus far

audience video 2019

This thread gives me the impression that Underworld has, in the last four months or so, released approximately 138 hours of can't miss, best-they've-ever-done material.

― Eric H., Saturday, May 25, 2019 2:44 AM

lol that last quote cracks me up

"Something Like a Mama" is so good, easily my favorite on the back half of BF. Love how it glides between the light and heavy beats effortlessly

I see Drift series as something else, but otherwise he was involved in the four best albums of theirs - dubnobasswithmyheadman, Second Toughest in the Infants, Beaucoup Fish and Everything, Everything

how soon they forget!



One of the zillions of Underworld threads here has the guy that ran UW's website arguing politely with Ronan about the substantive amount of influence Emerson had on the group's direction, and noting that the music is nearly entirely the creative output of Mr Smith.

Even in the first days when one might expect him to have had the most impact, loads of the writing credits are still Smith / Hyde. Emerson's only credited with Skyscraper and Surfboy on dubnob, he's credited on Dirty but not Dirty Epic, he's on Spikee and Karl isn't on Dogman Go Woof, not on Rez, on Telematic but not Slippy or Nuxx...

(also nb: he didn't write Dark & Long, but he did write on 215 Miles, Spoon Deep, Burts, Thing In A Book, Dark Train, Dark Hard and Most 'Ospitable :D )

They move to anonymous group writing credits after that, but by 1997, Rick is taking solo producer credit.

It made sense 20 years ago to guess that they might be left rudderless without their young groovy pal, but hearing his coma-inducingly dull solo chuggers should have allayed any fears tbh

yea hearing Emerson's solo work definitely gave me the impression that his influence was more to nudge them in a more fruitful direction. still, I'm curious what AHDO would've sounded like had he stayed on.

great, thanks sic. I forgot they had a time with detailed credits. Karl's book sorta glazed over the writing, making Darren look crucial as their link to "the culture" at the time, "road testing" (an hour away) new material in his sets in London. Karl also credited the kid for making him feel like his guitar could sound cool with the music they were making (probably relates to Dirty Guitar), which is a cute through line in the book: Karl threatening to throw away his guitar 1000 times.

Everyone seemed to lose their shit over Border Country but Listen To Their No is the better track imo

Also, just reading that Underworld Vs Orbital thread and there are some hard takes in there

https://i.ibb.co/xDCKY7V/pals-1983-long.gif

My read is that Rick basically needs or likes to have one consistent, trusted person to ask "what do you think of this?," whether or not they're contributing their own ideas. He works most fruitfully when that person is Karl Hyde and Karl's contributing his own ideas, but they're not always on the same page.

(He and Alfie only let Karl join {freur} because he'd written one really good new song, and they make him promise to not be a rock dick anymore; eight years and five albummy things later, Underworld mk1 fall apart after Karl chucks a bunch of tantrums and insists the whole band rerecord an album that everyone else reckons sounds great as just Karl & guitar over Rick & a computer.)

He also seems to prefer that person to be someone he knows well and has worked with for a long time. Darren Price had been Underworld's regular tour DJ for a decade or so before he got hired as a permanent part-time studio whatever-he-does for Rick. Interviews and Drift writeups around the Misterons stuff suggest that JBO's Steve Hall is regularly relied on as a sounding board, and he's been working with Rick for 28 years now. When Rick's on a Danny Boyle project, it seems that they two work tightly together, and Karl may or may not pop in and add something here and there. It took them being invited to collaborate on Downpipe to open up to other collaborators for Barking, and there they did two tracks with the Downpipe fellas (and Rick found another reliable coworker for a few years in High Contrast).

When Underworld mk1 split, the core band had been together for a decade, since Rick was just about a teenager. Emerson wasn't picked because he was a promising songwriter, or a prodigy of a producer; he just happened to meet Rick Smith at a point when Rick was creatively alone, he knew enough to be able to mess about in a studio, and as a working DJ he had a feel for music that was able to pulse and change throughout a varying period of time, which is what Smith was looking for. We don't know how much he wrote, or produced hands-on, or was involved technically in their improvisational stage approach (though he was surely a big part of it philosophically) -- but even if his only job was to go "yeah I like that" or "how about you try this instead" when Rick played him stuff, and to test demos out in clubs, that was obviously an absolutely crucial contribution to what the group wanted to be at that time.

Seems fair to guess that Emerson and Smith's specific alchemy shifted after Second Toughest, as they start being credited separately for remixes around 1996. Listening to their fertile period of remixing together, and what they each did separately immediately after, might hint at what each brought to the team, or could just show the different directions they were heading. Whether they'd both gotten the most out of the partnership, or whether Darren did just prefer to make more money travelling the world as a DJ, it's hard to argue that '99 was the wrong time to part.

Here's Darren enjoying his life a few years later.

bring back channel V

Still listen a lot to this great mix from Emerson from 1995. Not really trance though

This thread gives me the impression that Underworld has, in the last four months or so, released approximately 138 hours of can't miss, best-they've-ever-done material.
― Eric H., Saturday, May 25, 2019 2:44 AM

lol that last quote cracks me up
― frogbs, Thursday, June 11, 2020 10:08 PM (yesterday)

LOL, Drift made me have to temporarily unbookmark the main Underworld thread.

uh, good news

https://underworld.bandcamp.com/

Wow, RicksDubbedOutDriftExperience

Okay, everyone revise their ballots and we'll start over again next week

o7

I think I completely forgot to put Cherry Pie on my ballot

http://ghostable.uk/public/ilx/underworld/u053-649633.png

53. Glam Bucket
392 points, 10 votes
2007 album track from Oblivion With Bells

audio
audience video 2007