Discovery vs. Rooty

I mean.. Rooty's not bad, but let's be honest here..

prefer "Rooty." but then again, I really hate "one more time."

Holding any record from the last ten years up to Discovery is pretty unfair IMO

good poll but who are we kidding here

british people vs. robots

voted rooty to be difficult

in all honesty its definitely not been victim to the same insane amounts of overplay in the past couple years

Holding any record from the last ten years up to Discovery is pretty unfair IMO

Fixed.

it would take something spectacular to stop Discovery being my favourite album of the decade, so. but Rooty might be my favourite British album of the decade. i stopped listening to albums in 2001 btw.

can you stop posting to ILM then

i wish :(

I voted Rooty because I don't want this to be too much a bloodbath.

me too lol. might even vote rooty again tomorrow!

Early polls indicate: Rooty in landslide victory.

That's what I'm thinking.

was going to vote Discovery because it has better songs but rooty might be a better album.

Romeo has one of the best video clips ever.

these came out right before and after my 21st birthday, the summer before i took a year off from school to live with friends in a huge college town. so many good times while these two cds were playing.

^^ Like many, I loved Discovery, but considered it to be front-loaded. It wasn't until I started reading about, and listening to, the live stuff from last year that I started seriously revisiting the second half of the record. And goddam if it didn't blow me away all over again. That album is the gift that keeps on giving.

er.. xxpost to gr8080

homework vs. remedy??

Human After All vs. Crazy Itch Radio

Discovery, but both are hella dope

^

these are like the only two canonical dance albums i don't like :(

i mean, rooty obv. still only really like about two daft punk tracks, none off discovery as far as i know. rooty is the least good basement jaxx album but it's still ok.

i mean least good basement jaxx album out of their big three, the radio itch thing doesn't exist to me

these are like the only two canonical dance albums i don't like

Is there a canonical dance albums thread? There should be.

I went Rooty on this for album-as-album reasons.

discovery is so much better but i am feeling rooty when they're paired up like this

that sentence makes no sense but i guess i'm falling into the "discovery is overplayed" camp

discovery is a stronger overall album imo, but rooty is much more fun.

rooty!

Discovery better on paper
Rooty better in practice

interesting how much Discovery seems to resonate with young Americans or is this gateway album to dance music (despite the DP not being American can o' worms). or maybe it's just ILM. when i first got here it was Tom Ewing leading the 'omg best album ever' parade for it but 99% of the time now it's US dudes treating it like the Sgt Pepper of House.

listened to 'rooty' for the first time in years last week. its brilliant indeed and its better than i thought it was but my heart belongs to 'discovery'. there was quite a few people disspointed with 'rooty' when it came out, no?

you could say that about 'Discovery' just as easily (half the people who bought and adored 'Homework' for starters)

yeah i know it's always boring bringing up pitchfork but didnt they give it a v average review and then put it top (or almost top) of some list of the best albums 2000-04?

Pitchfork review of Rooty.

Who the fuck was Malcolm Seymour III. Google coughs up nothing more recent than 2004.

i killed the fool

The album's single, the creepily Janet-esque "Romeo," commences the program on a bitter note.

so many things wrong with this sentence

these are both great albums, this is a bit of a toughy, i mean obv discovery but i kind of agree that rooty has a bit more shine right now cuz i've heard discovery stuff so much over the last while while poor b jaxx seem so unloved these days.

god what is the deal with that rooty review.

COME ON MALCOLM

what does creepily janet-esque even mean?? it's creepy to sound like janet?

Best Daft Punk album vs second worst Basement Jaxx album. No contest.

2nd best album by both.

Man that Human After All vs Crazy Itch Radio poll is gonna drive you mad.

Discovery is so ridiculously overrated.

Lex, do you dislike the Robyn song on Crazy Itch Radio and "Take Me Back To Your House"? Both of those pretty much make the album for me (along with "Run For Cover" but I totally get why that would not be anyone's favorite song).

lol 'second worst', makes it sound like they've released over 10 albums as opposed to just 4

there's not a track on 'Rooty' I dislike (which is making me re-evaluate greater love for 'Remedy' love more because e.g. 'Bingo Bango' is kinda weak really. i don't know how/why someone would've been disappointed with 'Rooty' if they loved 'Remedy' tho.

with 'Discovery' there's only one track i can't be doing with (the closer).

Man that Human After All vs Crazy Itch Radio poll is gonna drive you mad.

Jaxx remix of 'Technologic' beats both

what does creepily janet-esque even mean?? it's creepy to sound like janet?

i know, that sentence makes so little sense that it doesn't even get to wrongness.

i can't remember any of the songs on crazy itch radio now...am definitely sure i didn't like the robyn one though (as i dislike robyn generally).

remedy is just a mighty, mighty work.

'Breakaway' is my favourite Jaxx song now (after ultimate jam 'Fly Life')

<3 "Romeo" FOREVER, but I can't not vote for Discovery.

never got the hang of basement jaxx, so discovery it is because that's one of the best albums ever.

lol i knew yall were contrarian but this is pretty amazing

It's not amazing, it's par for the course!

hope geir posts

you realize you said that out loud

nah i typed it

interesting how much Discovery seems to resonate with young Americans or is this gateway album to dance music (despite the DP not being American can o' worms). or maybe it's just ILM. when i first got here it was Tom Ewing leading the 'omg best album ever' parade for it but 99% of the time now it's US dudes treating it like the Sgt Pepper of House.

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― They're a '90s odd couple. And an odds-on choice for laughs. (blueski), Thursday, September 25, 2008 4:32 AM Bookmark

It's the gateway house album thing. Also the fact that it is brilliant.

@ Dan: "Take Me Back to Your House" is the only awesomely good song on Crazy Itch, whereas all the other Jaxx albums have at least several awesomely good songs.

'Bingo Bango' is kinda weak really.

waht

crazy itch has a bunch of good songs, u dont like that 'smoke bubbles' or 'lights go down'???

discovery is pretty dope but this "best album ever" rep it has is o_O

"Smoke Bubbles" is prob. my second fave on Crazy Itch, although wtf at them jacking a Lauryn Hill song:

Can't remember "Lights Go Down".

also i didnt even mention 'hush boy' which was the reason i bought the album in the 1st place

or 'hey you' which had the crazy slide trombone thing during the chorus

Oh yeah. Definitely good. Sounds like side 2 of Kish Kash. I'll probably have to pull out the album and reevaluate, I just wasn't much impressed with it when it came out.

xp: Never liked "Hush Boy" at all.

so much rong up in this thrizzle

"Discovery". In spite of its aptly titled finishing track.

"Geir Hongro Is Wrong About Pretty Much Everything"?

"Hongroe Is Playing At My House"

"Too Long" is perfect (including length-wise).

Crazy Itch Radio is fine (though I think "Run 4 Cover" doesn't work, you can hear what they were going for but they don't get there), just... lesser... than the first three. But "Hush Boy" is way underrated.

The first three BJ albums I rank pretty much equally.

discovooty?
rootscovery?

"Too Long" is exactly 10 minutes long. Perfect.

if pressed i think rooty is better.

ilm always makes me feel bad and rong for only really loving the first four tracks on discovery.

you are bad and rong. how could you not even love "Crescendolls" and "Short Circuit"?

"crescendolls" is one of the better discovery album tracks i think, but - and i know this is an extremely clichéd thing to say about daft punk - i do find it too repetitive; halfway through i find myself wanting a new hook. "short circuit" is fun but i rarely crave that sort of harsh herky-jerky style. i mean i enjoy these songs well enough, but i don't think i could ever love them.

but you know the most important thing is how wonderful "one more time" is, clearly j0hn d is more bad and rong than me : )

screw "Crescendolls" and "Short Circuit", how can you not love "Voyager" or "Face to Face"?

Argh I meant "Crescendolls" and "Face To Face". Those and "Too Long" are my favourites of the non-singles.

'face to face' is def my favorite

Argh I meant "Crescendolls" and "Face To Face". Those and "Too Long" are my favourites of the non-singles.

i actually 100% agree with this, but still i don't love any of these nearly as much as the singles.

It's all about Verdis Quo

Crescendolls is the fucking tits, there's something so clean and sharp about it, it's my favourite on Discovery, actually.

Take Me Back To Your House is by a long way the best track on Crazy Itch Radio - it's one of only three incidences in the Jaxx back catalogue (the others being Romeo and Good Luck) where the singer they've brought in nails their performance so perfectly, plays their character so convincingly that the song ends up just perfectly crystallising a feeling. There's such neediness in the "I'm lonely, so lonely won't you come home with me" bit.

(There are other great vocal performances across their first three albums, but they don't feel quite so... personal).

lol thanks for rendering my just-deleted list post irrelevant

"Feels Like Home" absolutely belongs on that list, though. Also, "Get Me Off".

I'm sorry but the argument that Discovery is more of a singles album is ridiculous. Does Rooty have a seamless House Opera made to it that eerily fits with all the music??

Also, discovery is the ultimate dance crossover IMO, whether that's a good or a bad thing to anyone here. it was/is the biggest dance "album" of the past 10 years.

Is it really?

I always got the impression that Discovery puzzled more people than it clicked with, that there were widespread expectations that the second DP album would be huge but that DP blew it by going top pop/conceptual/"ironic".

It seems to me that DP's rep has grown heaps more in the last four years or so with all the crossover dance blatantly ripping them off.

Certainly in 2001 you were much much much more likely to hear "Where's Your Head At" played at crossover dance style nights than anything off Discovery.

There are a lot of people who moan about Discovery in even the most slightly underground dance circles.

It all rules obviously but "Too Long" has a special place in my heart.

Human After All vs. Crazy Itch Radio

Daft Punk's best album versus Basement Jaxx's worst album. I'd take Human After All over anything in either catalog. I might go so far as to call it the best album of 2005, even.

Discovery and Rooty both incredible, though.

I always got the impression that Discovery puzzled more people than it clicked with, that there were widespread expectations that the second DP album would be huge but that DP blew it by going top pop/conceptual/"ironic".

Really? It felt huge and inescapable over here, it was pretty much the last big crossover dance album really. I mean, the 00s hasn't really been about that at all.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

omg the tension is unbearable WHAT WILL WIN

Finally pulled the trigger for Discovery.

I'm fascinated by Rooty but I'm in love with Discovery, so the latter it is. Also; fake guitar solos. But then; Joy Div postpunk bass on "Romeo"'s chorus. Ahhhhhhhhhh hmmmm

Oh also best Discovery track for me is SUPERHEROES! Kinda

discovery just slays rooty. rooty is fantastic as long as you don't try to compare it to discovery.

"Music Sounds Better With You" is better than every single track on Discovery but is not better than every single track on Rooty.

rooty has loads of crap unmemorable songs

which ones were those again?

qed

"Music Sounds Better With You" is the "Everybody Dance" of house music

has there ever even been a nice big post on ILM that explains why Discovery deserves this level of love? i looked at old threads with it in the title but didn't find much (lots of arguing about Homework tho). i can't even remember who wrote the blurb for it in the 00-04 albums poll.

"rooty has loads of crap unmemorable songs"

um, no.

think he was just having a bit of a laugh there

oh yeah it was TE of course
This record means a lot to me. My strongest memory of it is linked to
this board, oddly enough. It was summer 2001, the big rooftop party at
Suzy's block of flats where London ILX really got going. It was a
fantastic day. As the afternoon lazed on and we all got drunk we
decided to go and put Daft Punk on the stereo - about half of us
danced around like wallies and sung "One More Time" as loudly as we
could. Every time I play that song it reminds me not to give up on
pop, people, stuff. Bad times are cyclical: the beat will come back,
the dance will go on. That sounds corny - well, the song sounds corny.
But I honestly believe it, and I love Daft Punk for catching that
feeling.

There are lots of rational reasons to like Discovery. It is elegant.
It is playful. It is a sketchbook of most of the possibilities
remaining to house music (my original draft expanded at some boring
length on this). It is full of noises you knew were beautiful and
noises you didn't know were beautiful. It has the best love song of
the decade on it (and "Something About Us" is pretty fucking amazing
too). Thomas and Guy-Manuel look fantastic in their robot suits. Also
I'd be lying if I didn't admit I like how they baffle and even annoy
some people. But the main thing I love about Discovery is its
optimism, its love of life in all its bathetic, glorious, cheesy,
beautiful diversity.

(In the context of this list I am hugely tempted to contrast that
optimism with - well, you can probably guess, and do it yourself.)

I think you either hear that optimism in Daft Punk or you don't. If
you don't, you probably hear it somewhere else. People listen to music
- and sorry if this bit gets embarrassing - to make their lives
better. People talk about that music, discuss it and share it to make
each others' lives better. And so here we are. I have not lived up to
this philosophy that much on ILM. ILM in general has not lived up to
that philosophy much. But it's done a better job than almost anywhere
else I can think of on the Internet. What I'm trying to say is
thankyou Daft Punk, and thankyou ILM, and even if sometimes I'd
happily see this place deleted I think in ten years time I'll be
really proud of having started it. Now go and listen to this record
again you fuckers. Tom Ewing

"why Discovery deserves this level of love?"

because it is one of the pinnacles of postmodern excess and simultaneously transcends that.

xpost, if that's true, my ilm sarcasm detector is malfunctioning today.

I was kinda serious...tho obv if I can't remember it I need to listen again, hence my sarcasm.

It just will never be as BIG a work as Discovery for me. And I did like Rooty at the time but seldom think about it now, or listen to it, whereas Discovery will never really leave me.

When I first listened to Discovery, it sounded to me like they muzzled themselves so they could ensure getting on the radio. Maybe I would change my mind if I listened to it again but the singles have not made me interested (and it's not even like I think the singles are bad aside from "Digital Love"; I just wasn't in love with them).

In comparison, Rooty is about a bazillion times more interesting, thrilling, engaging and in line with what I want out of an album. It zooms through a bunch of different styles, moods and tempos, making every song a distinct event while weaving them all together into a great, irresistible package.

because it is one of the pinnacles of postmodern excess and simultaneously transcends that.

It just will never be as BIG a work as Discovery for me. And I did like Rooty at the time but seldom think about it now, or listen to it, whereas Discovery will never really leave me.

I just think Discovery sounds timeless (within the bounds of house music). While it may not seem too original if taken from the French house perspective of the time. Rooty sounds boringly dated to me. Like the late 1990s, like the Spice Girls.

btw i was agreeing with those italicized points

because it is one of the pinnacles of postmodern excess and simultaneously transcends that.

this sort of thing is all anyone ever says about it. that's my point really.

What it comes down to me for me is that maybe Basement Jaxx tend to do too much, whereas Daft Punk could imo almost always do more.

Nate Patrin as recently as a couple years ago considered Discovery his album of the decade. (Don't know if he still feels the same way.) I'm sure there are some old ILM posts explaining why.

because it is one of the pinnacles of postmodern excess and simultaneously transcends that.

I really think if you're going to say something like this, you need to say what you mean by "postmodern excess" and how Discovery is both the epitome of it and transcendent of it, otherwise you come dangerously close to coming across as saying "I like it and I am very very high".

I think what Dan said is, certainly in practice, why I liked Rooty more at the time and still do now. That makes it sound a bit like a work that rewards people who can't pay attention but their ATD is frequently super-high and massively rewarding (tho no more no less than on Remedy or Kish Kash).

dan preferring rooty is like a caricature of how i see dan's taste (minus the goth-y parts) but everyone voting discovery is like a caricature of how overblown that record's rep has become

i still love both tho

Yeah, it's pretty obvious between the two albums which one is pandering to my musical tastes!

"This one sounds like accessible French house music, while this other one sounds like someone threw Prince, New Order and Cece Peniston into a blender. Which one do you like more?"

on some level i 'know' that discovery is bigger, and feels more 'important,' and probably has stuck with me and has less rough edges or however you want to explain it, is less 'everything in a blender!' and more focused

im just enjoying the contrarianism of preferring the record that hasnt been played to death the past couple years

"I really think if you're going to say something like this, you need to say what you mean by "postmodern excess" and how Discovery is both the epitome of it and transcendent of it, otherwise you come dangerously close to coming across as saying "I like it and I am very very high"."

thank you for the belly laughs.

i sincerely do believe it and i am not very very high unless lack of sleep counts.

the simplest way i can put it which is not plain enough is:

"postmodern excess" = everything about discovery quotes something else; it is top quality pastiche
transcendent of it = you can safely ignore the above and the album loses none of its power because the musicality is so strong

imo all the best works of art embody this quality (contradiction, paradox) in some form or another.

so it's The Ramones of house?

summing up discovery as "this sounds like accessible french house music" makes you sound like a reductive doofus

That's what it sounds like, though!

so it's The Ramones of house?

No, that is officially Mylo's Destroy Rock'n'Roll

For me, it's Discovery, no contest. It still sounds amazing. I don't think Rooty is even the best Basement Jaxx record.

yeah, Kish Kash 4 life : D

is my 2nd fave after Kish Kahs tho

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

lol i knew yall were contrarian but this is pretty amazing

― Mohammed Butt (max), Thursday, September 25, 2008 10:41 AM (6 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

haha i guess it was just the loud ones

The big oppositions people are setting up in this thread can get kinda ridiculous. Here's a different tack:

I think what makes Discovery so remarkable to me is that in the best songs there's a unified combination of groove/song/sound/mood into a single overwhelming monolithic concept that possesses an undeniable force or momentum. "Digital Love" most obviously: the way the central riff emerges from the EQing, interacts with the vocals, blasts off into a ridiculous keytar solo, and collapses into that astonishing breakdown... It's like, as a listener, you're being carried along on this primal, unstoppable upsurge of emotion, and that effect has some air of inevitability to it, like the blueprint for this song was set down in a cave somewhere several eons ago, and has just been waiting for the chance to emerge. And maybe this last point is key: on this record Daft Punk frequently feel like they're tapping into something much larger than themselves, like a modest science experiment that accidentally and unintentionally perfects a method for nuclear fusion - very much 'Discovery' rather than 'Creativity'. See also the central riff in 'Aerodynamic' which surely is the sound of the engine at the centre of the sun. There's almost an impersonal quality to this music, in the sense that it 'transcends' (to use tricky's term!) any specific content, quality of context - like, if you don't feel the entire content of your existence summed up in this music it's because your existence is too small, too partial, crucially flawed even.

Basement Jaxx never feel this way, but that's not at all a criticism. One thing that doesn't get talked much about the Jaxx is how personal their records sound. Perhaps because when people talk about 'personal' or 'intimate' music what they mean is that the music constructs a persona so vivid and so sympathetic that the listener feels like they're close enough to touch them. BJ don't offer a 'persona' as such (to the extent that they're there, they're multiple, and the duo give a lot of space to their singers to help define this) but the music feels so obviously, unambiguously the product of their own creative effort, every sound feels absolutely stamped with their creative personality - and it's as if there are no barriers shaping or moulding this personality, it's just streaming forth in what ever form it wishes to take (which is partly why critics deride them for being wilfully perverse). This effect is heightened on Rooty which is neither checked by an allegiance to the house form as Remedy was, nor devoted to song-structure as Kish Kash was. So there are house anthems and songs, but these choices don't feel conscious at all, it's just a snapshot of the inner workings of the minds of the music makers. My last comment is a bit telling actually: BJ's music is music I can feel quite rockist about, it prompts me to marvel at the ingenuity and scope and tirelessness of its creators. But maybe this is the kind of area where rockist principles stand convicted of being underutilised rather than overutilised: it rarely occurs to us ask whether music such as this can offer some sort of charismatic personality (as opposed to persona) - and it's precisely here where the duo excel. Unlike Daft Punk, the Jaxx never let me forget this is their world I've stepped into, but at the same time they make me want to forget. I want to reorder the universe such that "Romeo" and "All I Know" become my songs, not theirs, my logic not theirs.

The competing feelings these records offer are hard to choose between. Discovery has that grand romantic feel of the world spirit of history tugging you forward: forget yourself and your puny existence, become unified within something much bigger than you are. Rooty is a spirited defence of the notion that it is difference (from ourselves) that makes beauty and enjoyment possible. In this particular case, most of the time I side with the former, not because it's better, but because on some muso-philosophical level I already agree with Basement Jaxx, and simply don't expect a strategy such as Discovery to work on me. The fact that it defeats me so easily imbues it with an evil genius quality that gives the record a slight edge for me.

has there ever even been a nice big post on ILM that explains why Discovery deserves this level of love?

was gonna post a link to Tim's old Skykicking review but don't think that's necessary now. brillant stuff right there.

I guess the reason why I disagree with that take on Discovery is that I've never felt that the mood of the album was in any sense an undeniable force. It just felt like a vaguely-cheesy house album to me when I first heard it, particularly when compared to Homework, and I never have understood why it affects others so much and doesn't touch me at all.

Basically, I equate it with that Avalanches album that is loved by everyone in the tiny world I inhabit except for me. I think it's grossly, massively overrated but I've given up hope that I'll find anyone who agrees with me.

fwiw, I too dislike the Avalanches album.

discovery is the bomb diggity

i like the avalanches album but agree its way overrated.

also: hi cameron.

overrated by whom? that record has more haters on here than bjaxx or daft punk

"overrated" in ILM speak can mean pretty much anything, as long as it at least means "there is someone somewhere in the world who likes this record more than me."

put me in the avalanche hater column

put me in the shady 'SITL>Rooty>Discovery' nook

posts very much in character

I guess the reason why I disagree with that take on Discovery is that I've never felt that the mood of the album was in any sense an undeniable force. It just felt like a vaguely-cheesy house album to me when I first heard it, particularly when compared to Homework, and I never have understood why it affects others so much and doesn't touch me at all.

Basically, I equate it with that Avalanches album that is loved by everyone in the tiny world I inhabit except for me. I think it's grossly, massively overrated but I've given up hope that I'll find anyone who agrees with me.

all this otm, i also hate that avalanches album - like not just "this is blah and doesn't move me", like discovery, but active "this is fucking annoying bullshit apart from 'frontier psychiatrist'" hatred

hey lex

it's great how we all get on despite being so fucking different

I can't believe that the one Avalanches track Lex likes is "Frontier Psychiatrist" - Lex, that's like the one big slide into indie-approved sniggering amidst almost an entire album of pop-approved wide-eyed sincerity!

do people who like Discovery but not SITL like 'Live At Dominoes'?

I don't really like Live At Dominoes - it reminds me of one of the dozens of vague imitators Daft Punk spawned, who have the mistaken belief that sounding a bit like Discovery means they'll automatically be as good.

funny that seeing as it was released before (altho not very long before) Discovery.

Yeah I'm not really saying that's what the Avalanches were trying to achieve, it's more that that one track reminds me of a load of subsequent bad corny-indie-fuck Daft Punk bandwagon jumping nonsense.

SITL = SILY??

yes. don't know where i'm getting SITL from. i need to start eating before 1pm.

xpost such as? (i'm genuinely curious)

'Live At Dominoes' is a trippier or blurrier (but in no way weaker) take on what something like 'Crescendolls' was tapping into

Haha this thread is a revelation!

I never knew that so many people didn't like The Avalanches; I think I took Tim's view of it, mixed it in with the praise from an IRL friend, and blindly superimposed it on everyone else who mentioned it.

Avalanches beat either of these

See? I bet that actually says "The Avalanches are super-overrated, you're right."

maybe part of the problem there is they only have the one album and it gets eulogised as a one-off instant classic - as time goes by it's cult status grows on that basis (a bit like Endtroducing until The Private Press - i always think of SILY as the FUN Endtroducing). i wouldn't be that bothered if they never do release a second LP. with Discovery i did like it overall but was really keen for them to put something else out sooner rather than later (but figured they'd need another 4 years as they had before), and after Human After All this just intensified. at the other end of the scale Basement Jaxx kept knocking out albums every 2 years (like the Chems) until after Kish Kash which was just re-assuring and fwiw i can look at them as providing the best first three albums out of any artist i care about in my lifetime (altho maybe Portishead can finally rival them now).

But ILM is the only place where anyone remembers Since I Left You!

so much tl;dr here

ts;dc

blaow

Not sure I'd be able to choose between Since I Left You and Discovery... Love Rooty too but not nearly as much.

too SMUG; didn't care

I voted for Rooty, incidentally

^ this