Underworld poll

i know 'sunshine' wasn't officially released

It finally was a few months ago.

Second Toughest

Everything DVD

Dubnobasswithmyheadman
Beaucoup Fish
Everything, Everything [live]
A Hundred Days Off

one of these, will figure it out later
(prob BF)

Beaucoup Fish.

really the only reasons I'm not slam-dunking this for BP are "...mmm skyscraper i love you...", "Dirty Epic", "Two Months Off" and "Lutein"

Everything, Everything

all the time

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUIDMM0LD8Y

Dubnobasswithmyheadman. That was the only time I was really interested in them, and even then I didn't like the vocal stuff as much as I did the instrumental tracks, like the original version of "Dirty". Though "Cowgirl" is a classic tune still.

Also, "Why Why Why". Was that on any of the albums?

Everything, Everything

I'll probably wind up voting for Everything, Everything but this poll should have included the 3CD Live in Tokyo 25th November 2005 set. Listening to that now. It's fucking awesome.

Why, Why, Why was not on an album but the Japanese 2cd reissue of Dubno has a 3in bonus disc with Why, Why, Why and Rez.

second toughest for sure. i really do love underworld.

Dubnobasswithmyheadman
Second Toughest in the Infants
Beaucoup Fish

Pretty unbeatable 1-2-3 of albums IMO. A difficult choice, but I think Dub... has to take it for me.

Lovely Broken Thing
Pizza for Eggs
I'm a Big Sister, and I'm a Girl, and I'm a Princess, and This Is My Horse
The Misterons Mix

Never heard these ones, how do they compare to the better known stuff?

Beaucoup Fish for me, it's just so... banging. I mean really thumping.

Lovely Broken Thing
Pizza for Eggs
I'm a Big Sister, and I'm a Girl, and I'm a Princess, and This Is My Horse
The Misterons Mix

I just assumed these were a joke and didn't actually exist.

weird I put on everything everything last night for first time in ages...for me that's still one of my all time favourite albums. juanita/kiteless is just so fucking incredible.

dubnobass easy

Lovely Broken Thing, Pizza For Eggs and Big Sister all feature about 5 or 6 tracks each in a continuous mix. Mostly ambient and experimental but there are some great tracks hidden in each. The Misterons Mix was a compilation of the best bits by Steve Hall (I think) that came free when you purchased the other 3. Each came with a pretty big photo gallery of pics taken by Karl.

2d toughest for sure. love this group so much.

I have these two versions of the Dark & Long CD single, together well over 90 minutes of excellent mixes.

http://www.discogs.com/Underworld-Dark-Long/release/15659
http://www.discogs.com/Underworld-Dark-Long/release/79866

Lovely broken thing > I'm a big sister >>>>>>>> pizza for eggs

i have the dark & long cd singles too

Second Toughest is an absolute game changer in terms of my music taste, they've done lots of other good stuff but fuck giving my vote to anything else tbh

That record beat most of the drum 'n bass guys at their own game IMO.

3CD Live in Tokyo 25th November 2005 set

would very much like to hear this

second toughest is my pick as well, i bought that during a road trip between ny and chicago and listened to it multiple times en route, i associate it most with driving through the steel mills in gary, IN at about 2am.

Underworld are up there with Kraftwerk as music for travelling. My major association with Beaucoup Fish when it first came out is travelling by bus through Malaysia and Thailand.

Second Toughest is an absolute game changer in terms of my music taste

Seconded - it destroyed my narrow minded duh, alt rock punk/schmindie listening monopoly.

I'd probably go with BFish though.

They were one of the best bands I've ever seen live too .Thank fuck Ian Brown can't sing and we went to the tent instead . Reading - mid/late 90s?

Can't decide between Second Toughest and Beaucoup Fish, may cheat and vote EE as way to get BF tracks and still have Pearls Girl

Tomorrow in London

http://www.serpentinegallery.org/2009/06/poetry_marathonsaturday_and_su_1.html -> Sunday 18 October: (...) Brian Eno & Karl Hyde (...)

everything everything may be my favourite 'live' album, but 2ndTitI (as all the kids call it) *was* everything to me at the time as an entire album

Can't decide between Second Toughest and Beaucoup Fish, may cheat and vote EE as way to get BF tracks and still have Pearls Girl Juanita/Kiteless

Second Toughest. I am apparently alone in thinking Everything, Everything sounds terrible.

That record beat most of the drum 'n bass guys at their own game IMO.

It's a great record but this kind of claim is almost always bullshit.

ha, i tried to ignore that comment. besides bits of pearl's girl, there is no drum and bass on that record

"Banstyle/Sappy's Curry" too I guess.

Drum'n'bass in 1996 was much more interesting than what Underworld was doing on TSTITI. I guess they might've served as a gateway drug for indie rock fans, but despite the (boring, in my opinion) indie vocals, there's nothing that spectacular going on in the beat department. I think their trancey stuff was more interesting than whatever attempts they made at doing d'n'b.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QwzkaHekn4

I mean, if you listen stuff like this, no way did Underworld "beat them at their own game".

That doesn't sound a fucking thing like Underworld!!

second toughest sounds the freshest out of any of their albums to me

No, it doesn't. But this was what drum'n'bass was like back then, and no way were Underworld outshining D&B producers in "their own game". Their drum'n'bassy tunes had basic sped-up breaks, no special beat science or anything.

(x-post)

My point was, that whatever their game was, it was something not that close drum'n'bass, and the d'n'b elements they incorporated into their music around 1995/96 were hardly their strongest point.

i prefer karl hyde in whispery/conspiratorial/vocoder robot mode, not as much a fan of him in shouting/dance anthem mode. which is maybe why 2nd toughest is my #1 by some distance.

I forgot about Bootleg Babies, <3ing it all over again

http://rtsr.rowla.com/#projects (only link that still works there = artwork)

and a recently still working download link :

http://boogah.org/k

Okay, since I've been called on my drum 'n bass claim, I should qualify it: the fairly limited range of d 'n b that came my way around that time was bettered, I think, by what Underworld were doing on Second Toughest.... Feel free to suggest some other good d 'n b from that time, but I don't want to derail this thread!

Yeah, sorry, I didn't mean to sound so harsh. I'm sure you could get the sort of things out of Underworld that you couldn't get out of d'n'b of the era, because Underworld were never really d'n'b... But when you said that they "beat most of the drum 'n bass guys at their own game" I felt you were implying that they were also better than most d'n'b producers own their own field(s) of specialty (such as constructing breakbeats), which sounds patently untrue.

Poor old Bruce Lee. Loved it when it was a single, not my favourite track on the album now but it's still good to hear it.

keep in mind dan is the rare 2d hater

live versions of those tracks are still pretty good tho

so if you saw them live today, playing those songs, you would thing it has aged well

*think

2nd is great but dubnobass is the masterpiece.

The live versions of Best Mamgu Ever and Peach Tree were pretty spectacular. I love new Underworld as much as the old stuff. They're still making great music. Check out Strumpet, Between Stars and Diamond Jigsaw from the recent tour.

i think beautiful burnout was an amazing single

so if you saw them live today, playing those songs, you would thing it has aged well

I would think, as I've always thought, that those songs come across much much better in a live setting than on a studio recording. In the context of live performance, yeah I'd probably say they've aged well; that still doesn't make me like the studio album all that much.

Only 2 votes for Oblivion With Bells is surprising. I'd think a lot of ILXors would dig that one.

I like it but I think it's a couple steps below 'a hundred days off' and a few below the 'dubnobass'/'second toughest'/'beaucoup fish' trio. Surprised it got two votes tbh!

Beaucoup > dubno > Barking > A Hundred Years > Everything > Oblivion > 2nd Toughest imo

2nd Toughest is your LEAST favourite? Woah.

lol, have you never discussed Underworld with me before? I feel like that is what I am known for

Sure I've been on Underworld threads with you before. My brain must've suppressed this disturbing fact.

2nd toughest is def the least underworldly of all underworld v 2.0 albums but it remains my favorite, maybe because i really like Hyde when he's a little more mumbly or buried in the mix a tad more, like early stipe. Not because it's good to hide him but I think it was just particularly effective there.

I like it but I think it's a couple steps below 'a hundred days off' and a few below the 'dubnobass'/'second toughest'/'beaucoup fish' trio. Surprised it got two votes tbh!

IMO it's a lot better than AHDO. It sounds like a deliberate step forward, or at least a step sideways - it doesn't follow any of the prior albums, a lot of the songs are brand new things, not stuff like "Dino Adventure 3D" which felt a bit like a rehash of things they did well before. It's also an incredibly deep album - how many little bits are there in "Best Mamgu Ever" that gets squirreled away?

the big problem with OWB is that "Ring Road" is a worse momentum killer than "Bruce Lee"

i like both those tunes!

I love Ring Road. Killer 12" artwork too.

Yeah, DJP on 2nd Toughest is legendary (also, legendarily wrong).

Toughest > Beaucoup > dubnobass > AHDO > the rest of the stuff I don't really care about that much

Have you listened to Barking, Eric? Four or five killer tunes.

2 or 3, iirc

Oh, and ...

DJP : Second Toughest :: me : Everything, Everything

Though on the whole it sounds less nuanced and detailed than their earlier stuff.

re Barking

I mean, sure, "Always Loved a Film" is maybe the best thing they've done since 2002 apart from "JAL to Tokyo."

Barking rules super hard

Always Loved a film is great, but for me Between Stars is the superior house stomper on the record.

Too much EDM residue on that one for my taste.

Don't think I even knew what EDM was when it came out, so doesn't bother me.

DJP : Second Toughest :: me : Everything, Everything

booooooooooooo

Though on the whole it sounds less nuanced and detailed than their earlier stuff.

i feel like this is the entire point of barking and i love it for that

What is with the weird ass ops 4 u in this thread.

2nd toughest>beaucoup>dubnobass>EE>AHDO>barking>obv

Karl's best start to finish story is in Bird 1 (aka Strumpet).

'a moped started up, sounded like a chainsaw, tiny firecrackers'

and he smelled time again

first 3 tracks on barking are insane, love them. The rest is fun but nothing that hits me.

a fly came in along a shaft of sunlight
coming through the open door
he watched it cross the room and get
halfway and then it
turned around and left
he laughed

I recommend going back to "Grace" and "Between Stars", they are really great (esp "Grace", which IMO gets better as it ages)

The only thing that I don't like about Barking is that the second disc (which I was hoping would be what Barking would sound like without outside producers) really sounds like the unfinished demos instead of the more nuanced stuff like the version of "Moon in Water" they played on their radio broadcast. A full studio version of "You Do Scribble" with vocals hasn't come out yet. Nor an official take on "Silver Boots", which totally rules.

oblivion with bells is always incredible while i'm revisiting it and then i forget most of it. "glam bucket" tho

Yeah Bird 1 is amazing, it doesn't really sound like anything they'd done before.

I'll rep for "Diamond Jigsaw". First time I heard it, it was on some bootleg, the guitar was barely even in the song, instead it was these big goofy Van Halen synths. Sounded awesome. The Barking version rules though I feel like Paul Van Dyk botched the flow of it by kinda blowing the chord changes before the chorus. Plus he leaves the wrong drum setting on for a measure. Still it's a corker.

Urgh, it's the once song I really don't get.

full disclosure: I love the albums they did as Freur. And "Diamond Jigsaw" (at least in its original form) sounds a lot like the goofier, stupidly addictive stuff that Freur did. So I'm in!!

"diamond jigsaw" is so bright and dumb and lovely

exactly. its the kind of song I never thought UW would have been doing in 2010 (or even 2000!)

It threw me as an Underworld song at first (I guess a few tracks on the album did), but now I really dig it.

But strangely, the track I keep going back to is "Moon in Water". Every now and then an artist hits this loop that's super compelling to me, can't explain why. That song has it.