33 rebellions per minute
"I get my kicks on channel six"
1994
Underworld, DUBNOBASSWITHMYHEADMAN
In short review, Underworld have built an entire style around Saint Etienne's FOXBASE ALPHA instrumental "Stoned To Say The Least", which I've been hoping was possible for a long time. I realize that for a latticework of sequenced, quanitized electro-blips, I should be comparing Underworld to peers like Meat Beat Manifesto and Leftfield, but I'd much rather compare them to somthing that doesn't numb and bore me, even if it's by a band that quickly evolved into a cheesy lounge-pop act.
One of the key variables in any work of what is, essentially, minimalism, is "What is the pace of change, of invention?". Your idea of what is a proper pace may not equal mine, and mine doesn't seem to reward maximal invention (DUBNOBASSWITHMYHEADMAN probably supplants Eat Static's SCIENCE OF THE GODS and D.J. Vertigo's ASYMMETRY as my favorite rave record despite being less inventive than those two). Underworld's, though, unlike too much electronica, does at least have a pace I can detect with no effort. It is layered music, so most of the sounds -- bass thumps, different bass thumps, other bass thumps different from that, mothership bleeps, the throat-clearings of waterlogged vacuum cleaners, a repeated riff on "Mmm Skyscraper I Love You" that brings to mind the human skeleton being used as a xylophone -- will play, or at least reappear regularly, for many measures at a time. Each measure will generally bring some slight modification, usually adding something to the mix. A couple of times per eight-minute song there will be a major intstumental drop-out that leaves the song in new and semi-recognizable form. While waiting for new sounds, I find myself adjusting my ears to catch all the constant little games of shifting volume, stuttered emphasis. It should be dance music, because the steadiness is perfect for that, but I find the effect more hypnotic than invigorating. Someone with objectively worse hearing would find the same songs utterly monochromatic for minutes a time. Someone with better hearing than mine, I suppose, would find interesting action even at the all-percussion slough of "Spoonman".
I suppose I seem less thrilled than I am, though. Underworld are _very good_ hypnotists, at least for me, and the way their albums place high in critics' polls and in sales (as electronica bands go) suggests I'm not alone. Maybe you don't want to be hypnotized very often, but isn't the entire point of collecting records to have at least one for every occasion? The danger, of course, is that you'll end up with only one song, inadequately, for a need that you'd been quite contently unaware of. But then, friends are like that too, and it was when Cortney put this album's "Cowgirl" and BEAUCOUPFISH ('99)'s "Moaner" on a mixtape for me that my happy ignorance was out.
Underworld do take advantage of a huge and simple advantage that these days is increasingly shunned: they use the human voice. Voices don't need to say anything, just like faces don't need to mean anything: it is a simple, demonstrable fact that any infant will look far more avidly at a human face than at anything else, and listen far more attentively to a human voice than to anything else. Some people of refined taste overcome that, but classical music was always the learned taste of an elite (who could afford the orchestras), and the rave audience is helped along immensely by drugs; otherwise, even the most convoluted, overwhelmingly noisy math-rock bands get nagged by their audience to hire a singer. Interestingly, infants can already tell a pleasant face from an ugly one (which means your very own kid will pay more attention to you, on average, if you're cute than if you ain't; life is so fair, huh?), and the same applies to voices; so it's just as well that Underworld their voices into a stylish, off-hand mechanical machismo that suits their words. It is infantile, natural, and automatic for most people to prefer a latticework of loops that does include a loop of "everything" (repeated 10 and 2/3 times) overlaid by "I'm invisible", "and a razor of luck", or "why don't you call me, I feel like flying in two" than one that doesn't.
True, "Dirty Epic", which combines the grace and melodiousness of New Order with the beat propulsion of early Depeche Mode, aims for meaning, apparently taking aim at televangelists so that Underworld's fans can whirl telegenically in the dark to scornful lines about "phone sex", "disconnection", and "I get my kicks on channel six". But those early hysterics about subliminal messages turned out to be more phony than not, and backwards masked messages aren't even mentally processed (except by people with access to a rumor mill and a backwards record player with careful tuning buttons). Similarly, social commentary in an Underworld-listening mood is so much noise anyway. It is good noise. Don't worry, be attentive, and peacefully grok the weird noises as they whoosh by you. And then, ten seconds later, slightly altered and just a little off the beat, as they whoosh by again.
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