HighSchoolJenn asked me about Underworld. Oh, the girl had no idea what she was getting into. Here's what I wrote.
Here's the brief on Underworld. They started off as crap and added Darren Emerson to their lineup to eclipse Depeche Mode in the "my favorite band" category with their release Dubnobasswithmyheadman. This record took things I liked - electronic rhythms, stream of conciousness lyrics from Karl Hyde, and production (mostly by Rick Smith) that never strayed from beyond excellent and put them together, causing much orgasming in my truck whilst I tootled around in 1994. (The track "Dirty Epic" on your CDs is from that album.) They followed up with Second Toughest In The Infants, a harder album that explored more and more electronic territory and jumping genres with ease.
Then, it happened. The song. The one Underworld song everyone knows. "Born Slippy" was a single that came out between the two albums and while it got Mixmag's "Tune Of The Week" award, it didn't do much business in the charts. It was a heavily-remixed b-side version (with vocals) that was attached to Danny Boyle's adaptation of Irvine Welsh's novel Trainspotting that exploded. Pete Tong seized it and played it every week on his top-rated BBC dance program until JBO re-released the ".nuxx" version as a single in its own right. DJs played it. Radio loved it. Football hooligans sang the "Lager, lager, lager" chorus. It hit #2 in the charts. Pretty good for a band whose big step into electronic music was an ambient remix of a dodgy Simply Red tune.
1998 brought Beaucoup Fish and even more album sales. In some places more sedate that Second Toughest, this album proved that Underworld knew exactly what they were doing, better than anyone else out there. A massive tour ensued, documented on the album and DVD Everything, Everything in which the band proved that techno can be live and it can kick your puny ass. It also marked the departure of Darren Emerson, who left to pursue his DJ career and run his own label, Underwater. Last year, A Hundred Days Off came out. The first album by the core duo of Smith and Hyde, it was received well and managed to garner a few critical raspberries for just being excellent instead of unexcelled. This year sees the release of the anthology mentioned in my blog and, hopefully, a new album being recorded.
Here's the brief on Underworld. They started off as crap and added Darren Emerson to their lineup to eclipse Depeche Mode in the "my favorite band" category with their release Dubnobasswithmyheadman. This record took things I liked - electronic rhythms, stream of conciousness lyrics from Karl Hyde, and production (mostly by Rick Smith) that never strayed from beyond excellent and put them together, causing much orgasming in my truck whilst I tootled around in 1994. (The track "Dirty Epic" on your CDs is from that album.) They followed up with Second Toughest In The Infants, a harder album that explored more and more electronic territory and jumping genres with ease.
Then, it happened. The song. The one Underworld song everyone knows. "Born Slippy" was a single that came out between the two albums and while it got Mixmag's "Tune Of The Week" award, it didn't do much business in the charts. It was a heavily-remixed b-side version (with vocals) that was attached to Danny Boyle's adaptation of Irvine Welsh's novel Trainspotting that exploded. Pete Tong seized it and played it every week on his top-rated BBC dance program until JBO re-released the ".nuxx" version as a single in its own right. DJs played it. Radio loved it. Football hooligans sang the "Lager, lager, lager" chorus. It hit #2 in the charts. Pretty good for a band whose big step into electronic music was an ambient remix of a dodgy Simply Red tune.
1998 brought Beaucoup Fish and even more album sales. In some places more sedate that Second Toughest, this album proved that Underworld knew exactly what they were doing, better than anyone else out there. A massive tour ensued, documented on the album and DVD Everything, Everything in which the band proved that techno can be live and it can kick your puny ass. It also marked the departure of Darren Emerson, who left to pursue his DJ career and run his own label, Underwater. Last year, A Hundred Days Off came out. The first album by the core duo of Smith and Hyde, it was received well and managed to garner a few critical raspberries for just being excellent instead of unexcelled. This year sees the release of the anthology mentioned in my blog and, hopefully, a new album being recorded.
