Monday's Long Song

Underworld's latest single came out last week, an eight minute epic that contains everything that is good about them, a song that sounds like classic Underworld, more of the same perhaps but when your same is this good why not give more of it? Denver Luna opens with warm and wobbly synths and Karl's voice, layered and FXed declaring 'strawberry jam girl'. There's a pause, an inhalation of breath maybe and then a kick drum kicks in... and we're off. 

What follows is brightly coloured forward momentum, a psychedelic blur of synths, drums, rushing, whooshing sounds and Karl's endless lists and non- sequiturs, occasional breakdowns and re- entries and the sound of a duo who haven't given up but are moving onwards. The Drift project seemed to re- energise them, find a new way to be Underworld and now they are right back in the groove. I sometimes think of their music as being like a train, one of those Japanese bullet trains, speeding through the night, lights flashing past in the blackness of the windows, speed and progression, rushing forth and going somewhere, very linear music. This is all of that and more. The acapella section in the fifth minute, Karl's multi- tracked voices symphonic, on the borderland between melancholy and euphoria, is superb. 

'Sleeping girl/ Kiss the animal... siren siren... stonewashed jean man... pizza sermon... the satellite is coming... reflection flection inflection connection...'

Saturday Live

I keep coming back to Underworld, one way or another they've kept reappearing in my musical orbit over the last year. Not that they often went far away previously. They seemed like prime candidates for this regular Saturday series, an electronic/ dance music act who have been blowing away live audiences for the best part of three decades. Back in the 90s when dance music started to play live and some of those acts quickly grew to become festival size- Orbital, The Chemical Brothers, Prodigy, Leftfield, The Orb among them- but none more capable of moving a crowd than Underworld. They've kept that up, even after the departure of Darren Emerson in 2000 (who played a massive part in giving them the sound and rhythms that connected with a bigger audience following the release of dubnobasswithmyheadman... in 1994) and in recent years they've filmed and recorded a huge number of their live shows. Back in 2000, following the triple whammy of 90s Underworld albums- dubnobass..., Second Toughest In The Infants and Beaucoup Fish- they released a live CD/ DVD, a recording of a show in Brussels in May 1999, titled Everything Everything. It is a superb document of them at that point, seamless dance music, crunching beats, Underworld's gliding metronomic rhythms, Karl's stream of consciousness lyrics, a  massive light show and visuals, the crowd feeding off the energy on stage and Underworld feeding off that energy in front of them. 

After the ambient, building intro they segue into Juanita and then Cups, Push Upstairs, Pearl's Girl, Jumbo, King Of Snake, the inevitable Born Slippy NUXX, Rez/ Cowgirl (the source of the album's title) and finishing with Moaner, ninety minutes of breathless, thumping trancey progressive house. The show in Brussels was Darren Emerson's last with Underworld. It's a fitting finale. 

Underworld have been in the habit of giving all sorts of goodies away via their website. At the very start of this year they made a live track available as a free download, Eight Ball, recorded live in Tokyo in 2022. I shared it earlier this year but am reposting it here, a song that has survived its appearance on the soundtrack to The Beach to become one of their best songs, a long drawn out, shimmering opening section, a dull four four kick drum, gentle wash of FX and Karl's soft singing voice, some guitar, layers of sounds gathering and pulsing, a long drawn out glide of a song. 

Eight Ball (Live In Tokyo, 2022)

Forty Minutes Of Depeche Mode

I recently watched 101, D.A. Pennebaker's documentary film from 1989 that showed the group preparing to play the 101st gig and final leg of their world tour the year before. It was good fun, a time capsule peak into the world of 1988, with a van of radio competition winners travelling to the Rose Bowl in Pasadena to see DM with live snippets of the group interspersed. 

It's fair to say that I'm a fan of some of Depeche Mode's songs rather than an outright fan of the band. Their story is interesting, electro- pop boys from Basildon who survive the departure of their songwriter becoming a pop sensation and then a stadium size electronic rock group. The death of Andy Fletcher last year showed a fairly unique aspect of the group too- Fletcher was the man who made the group work but whose contributions weren't predominantly musical. For the mix below I've concentrated on the late 80s/ early 90s era of the group, mainly singles with some remixes. I seem to have omitted Personal Jesus which is an error on my part. 

Forty Minutes Of Depeche Mode

• Happiest Girl (Orbital Mix)
• Never Let Me Down Again (Tsangarides Mix)
• I Feel You (7" version)
• Enjoy The Silence (Rich Lane A&E Cotton Dub)
• Blasphemous Rumours
• Barrel Of A Gun (Underworld Soft Mix)

From 1990 The Orb's remix of Happiest Girl confusingly titled as the Orbital Mix (how both The Orb and Orbital mist have wished the other had chosen a different name). The remix is typically Orb- like, downtempo ambient house with Dave Gahan's words on top. As well as a 12" single in 1990, it came out on The Orb's compilation of their own remixes in 1996, alongside a welter of other remixes- Pop Will Eat Itself, Erasure, Killing Joke, Primal Scream, Yello, Innersphere and Wir all feature. 

Never Let Me Down is a throbbing, growling, druggy electro- rock single from 1987 and from their Music For The Masses album. The Tsangarides mix is from the 12", a remix by Chris Tsangarides. My favourite DM song, one that has worked its way into my musical world in recent years. 

I Feel You was a 1993 single, screeching tyres, glitter stomp and blues guitar riff. 

Enjoy The Silence was a 1990 single and from their massive 1991 album Violator. Synths, monochrome gloom, a lush darkness made for those sunset moments in stadia round the world- along with Personal Jesus it's the 90s Mode in excelsis. The version here is a re- edit by Stoke- on - Trent's Rich Lane, a man who knows his way round a re- edit better than most. 

Blasphemous Rumours came out in 1984, a song about suicide, survival and religion that baited the religious, including those in the band. The crunchy synth sound and industrial drums show the way ahead. 

Barrel Of A Gun was a single in 1997, the lead song for their Ultra album. Underworld's remixes, three of them, showed the two sides of late 90s Underworld- the Hard Mix is nine minutes of thumping, hard and fast drums that don't let up. The Soft mix (included here) is Underworld in dreamy, floaty mode and proof that Underworld were still capable of great remixes and of creating some lovely, low key, intimate moments.

On And On

This is newly out, On And On (Again), a collaboration between Daniel Avery and Confidence Man, five minutes of bouncy techno/ rave pop which sounds tailor made for summer, a track that will light up everything from barbecues to festivals. 

Last year Daniel remixed Confidence Man's Feels Like A Different Thing, a chunky breakbeat driven track with sirens and distorted synth sounds and one fragment of vocal looped up, 'You know I love it'- an altogether heavier, slightly darker affair. 

Feels Like A Different Thing (Daniel Avery Remix)

In a similar area Underworld have a new single out too, a full on thumper from Karl and Rick, Karl intoning, 'And the colour red', as the drums kick up a storm, the bass pumps away and the synth squiggles flicker in and out. 

Forty Minutes Of One Dove

After last week's Dot Allison mix I thought I should go back to the source and do a One Dove mix. One Dove's album Morning Dove White was finally released in October 1993 after a year of hold ups and wranglings about whose mixes and which versions should be on the final record, Stephen Hague's radio friendly sheen or Andrew Weatherall's lengthy dubby productions. We all know what history tells us about those kind of arguments. I bought it and played it a lot, an album that can transport me back to the flat I lived in then with a friend and the times we spent listening to it, the smell and hum of the gas fire, the ashtray filling up with cigarette butts. It sound-tracked our post- club arrivals back home, the winter of 1993- 94, a couple of break ups, us making our way into adult jobs, all that kind of stuff. I've listened to it ever since, an album that continues to give alternately shivers and a warm glow. Weatherall's production, on the back of Screamadelica, is expansive, restless, superbly chilled out but warped too and oddly timeless. The moody/ elegiac songs of Dot Allison, Jim McKinven and Ian Carmichael were clearly good to start with but once Weatherall and Hugo Nicolson got into the studio and began working on them they went somewhere else, sprinkled with the magic dust of the early 90s. Stephen Hague's mixes are possibly a little too shiny in places (and kept mainly for the CD version) but the vinyl is an album to rank alongside the best of the 90s. I once said here, many years ago, that it was brilliant but felt slightly flawed, like there was something missing. I'm not sure what that was or what I meant now. The album's cast included Weatherall's Sabres Of Paradise mates Gary Burns and Jagz Kooner, Jah Wobble's bass on There Goes The Cure, Phil Mossman (Sabres guitarist and future member of LCD Soundsystem) and Primal Scream's Andrew Innes. It's never been re- issued on vinyl. Copies on Discogs are currently starting at £80. Mine is most definitely not for sale. 

Putting together a One Dove mix without just sequencing a bunch of songs from Morning Dove White pointed me towards the remixes and B-sides. I couldn't find room on this mix for either Weatherall's majestic dubbed out odyssey, Breakdown (Squire Black Dove Rides Out) or their spaced out cover of Jolene- a second forty minute mix should happen at some point- and there are several Sabres remixes of Transient Truth not included below, the mighty Old Toys and Old Toys Dub are both stunners. The ten minute Guitar Paradise version of White Love looks like a glaring omission too. And if Fallen feels little like it was just tacked onto the end, then that's because it was. I just couldn't not include it in one version or another.

Forty Minutes Of One Dove

• Why Don't You Take Me
• Skanga
• Transient Truth (Squelch Mix)
• Transient Truth (Death Of A Disco Dancer)
• Why Don't You Take Me (Underworld Remix)
• Fallen (Nancy And Lee Mix) 7" Edit

Why Don't You Take Me is from Morning Dove White and was a single in December 1993, the now London Records owned Boy's Own label putting it out as the third single from the album and hoping for a hit. The Glaswegian dub reggae of Skanga was a B-side (along with Jolene, not included here). 

Transient Truth was also from Morning Dove White and released as an official 12" (with the Old Toys mixes) and a white label promo, both in 1992. The white label contained four Sabres Of Paradise remixes of the song, the two included here plus the Paradise Mix and the Sabres Fuzz Dub. I've no idea if the Death Of A Disco Dancer remix is a reference to The Smiths song of the same name. 

Underworld's remixes of Why Don't You Take Me are both up there with their best from the period, released on double blue vinyl along with a Secret Knowledge remix. Underworld's Up  2 Down remix is a long thumper. The one I've included here is dubbed out Underworld style and is magnificent. 

Fallen is where the One Dove story starts, Dot's breathless vocal and the ambient/ dub/ acid house music initially built around a Supertramp sample which led to legal action and the offending harmonica  being removed. Weatherall's remix for the 12" came with the title Nancy And Lee Mix, which sent many of us scurrying back to our parent's record collections looking for Sinatra and Hazlewood albums and singles. The version here is an edited one from a  February1992 7" single and I include just because it's such a great song it can even survive having four minutes chopped off it. 

Looking at all of the tracks I've left off this I think part two may have to come sooner rather than later. 

Water

John Medd is the author of the Are We There Yet?, a blog I have been visiting for years, a treasure trove of music, photography, art, reports on travels and adventures and slices of life. John has set himself the target of using the first post of each month in 2023 to set himself a photography challenge. On 1st January he went for numbers and posted three photos all depicting the number one (here). He sent me a message to ask if I'd like to join in and I said I would. February's theme is water. The water above is the reservoir at Rivington Pike, part of the West Pennine Moors near Bolton and Chorley (although it could easily in that picture be part of a Scandi- noir or gothic horror. Don't go into the woods. Or near the reservoir). 

Despite being inland we're blessed with water round here although it's fairly industrial in nature. I thought for John's water themed first of the month post I'd give you a short tour of the waterways we have near us. The Manchester ship canal runs from not far north of here to meet the Mersey and then onto Liverpool, the gateway to the world during the Industrial Revolution. Again to the north of us, a short walk away, is one of Manchester's three rivers, the Mersey. We can walk along the Mersey in either direction. Heading east the river runs to its source in Stockport, disappearing under the Mersey shopping centre. The point shown here is under the M60 near Northenden. 

Manchester's other two great rivers are the Irwell and the Medlock. This is the Medlock as it runs through the southern edge of the city centre, the dirty old town of legend caught on camera. 

This is the Irwell running past Peel Park in Salford, behind the university, a point where the river is wide and slow. Historically it marks the boundary between Manchester and Salford. It runs west where it feeds into the ship canal. The picture here was taken last September, when everything was a bit greener than it is now.

Half a mile to our east we have the Bridgewater Canal, an extension of the first canal in the world (which can be found at Worsley) built by the Duke of Bridgewater to transport his coal to Castlefield to sell. The Industrial Revolution was born there, Manchester's entire reason for being kick started by coal (and then cotton). Today the canal seems pretty clean and is used by narrow boats. When I walk down the towpath I often wonder about the pleasures and drawbacks of living on a narrow boat (storing thousands of records and books being the chief drawback). This photo is also from last summer. 

Today's water theme gives me a chance to extend my recent immersion into the world of Underworld in the 90s. In 1993 they remixed William Orbit's Water From A Vine Leaf, an epic track even before Darren Emerson got his hands on it. Part 1 is twelve minutes long, massive chunky drums and a synth horn sample, the bassline coming to the fore at points and then the piano riff leading the way. In the second half the piano becomes a tinkling topline, Beth Orton's vocal appears and it's all very much perfect 90s progressive house. 

Water From A Vine Leaf (Underwater Mix Part 1)

Part 2 starts out slow, Beth's voice chopped up and a stuttering synth part dropping in and out. Gradually it slips into a groove, the elements building up in layers, Karl Hyde's guitar on top, but it's a very chilled and dubbed out affair

Water From A Vine Leaf (Underwater Mix Part 2)

Back In The Underworld

Back to Underworld after last week's run of posts. I can't get enough at the moment, their music soundtracking my daily commute. In 1992 this pair of Underworld/ Darren Emerson remixes were released, long progressive house thumpers, some trademark Underworld sounds and styles pulsing through the grooves. 

108 Grand were Ben Chapman and Dee Vaz. Darren remixed Te Quiro twice, this one being the longer of the pair coming in at a shade under ten minutes, powerful, driving proto- trance that builds and builds, a proper dancing track with a funked up bassline and full on piano/ synth repeating topline.

Te Quiero (Darren Emerson Underworld Remix)

Eagle's Prey were John Kennedy, Lee Grainge and Paul Coleman. Darren's remix of Tonto's Drum is in a similar vein, chunky drums, a sampled squeak at the top end, moody synth bass and a male voice intoning, give it to them... give it to them', the sort of combination of sounds that in a dark room filled with dry ice caused shivers down spines. Karl Hyde's clipped guitar chords and the female vocal add to the tension. The track (as above) builds and builds, breaking down partly at four minutes forty with the drums then crashing back in. The piano house breakdown at six fifty gives a pause for breath, an arms in the air moment and then Darren starts to bring it back, everything more intense and on it goes, nine minutes, ten minutes, eleven... 

Tonto's Drum (Darren Emerson Remix)

Black Sky

I've fallen deep into an Underworld wormhole this week. Apologies to anyone coming here for variety but I'm sticking with Underworld today but in remix rather than original form. In 1992 they remixed Shakespear's Sister not once but twice. The remixes appeared on two different CD singles (Hello and Goodbye Cruel World) and on vinyl (two 12" promos, both  currently expensive second hand). 

Black Sky (Dub Extravaganza Pt. 1) is relatively short by Underworld remix standards, clocking in at under six minutes and keeps some of the song (although clearly aimed at clubs), Marcella Detroit's vocal largely intact, with disco synth strings stabs to the fore. The rhythm's chunky and gets chunkier, and the last couple of minutes go pretty wonky. 

Black Sky (Dub Extravanga Pt. 1)

Dub Extravanga Pt. 2 is where the real action is, Darren Emerson's thumping drums kicking in and building for several minutes, gradually bringing in other elements- rising synths, a heavy clang, a squeak, whooshing noises, eventually a fragment of vocal- before hitting a juddering breakdown at five and a half minutes, and then rebuilding as we head over the ten minute mark. Darren and Rick Smith were all over this kind of thing back in the early/ mid 90s, their remixes purpose built for nights in clubs were six minute intros and ten minute long dark, tranced out, progressive house/ techno was exactly what the doctor ordered as the smoke belched and the strobe flickered. 

Black Sky (Dub Extravanga Pt. 2)

Skyscraper...

Back to Monday's postees Underworld. Mmm... Skyscraper I Love You is a standout track on dubnobasswithmyheadman, the second track in riding in on thumping tom toms, the sounds pulling you in as if descending from the clouds and then Karl takes the vocal reins with his found fragments of conversation, 'thirty thousand feet above the earth/ It's a beautiful thing'. The track goes on, rolling and tumbling, thirteen minutes of progressive dance music with stream of consciousness poetry, Elvis, porn dogs sniffing the wind, Jesus, Chris on crutches, whipped cream and God on the phone. Epic is a word often used with Underworld and it is entirely appropriate- but there's a darkness coupled with a beautiful melodicism in their epic sound constructions, all welded to the dancefloor by Darren Emerson's rhythms. 

The 12" of Mmm... Skyscraper I Love You came with two different versions. Jam Scraper has fewer vocals, and is more acid house, with a bleepy intro, long synth chords, and some of Karl's guitar lines further forward. One of those Underworld tracks where everything happens slowly but at pace. It was originally intended to be the one on dubnobasswithmyheadman and it's clear to see why they reverted to the original version, it's more song oriented, more of an album track, but Jam Scraper is a fine version, a flight in of its own right and a track to lose yourself in. 

Mmm... Skyscraper I Love You (Jam Scraper)

The enigmatic song title it turns out was staring us in the face for years. A while back a friend pointed it out to me. In 1981 Pennie Smith published a book of photographs she took while on tour with The Clash, The Clash: Before And After. It is the stuff rock 'n' roll dreams are made of. And on the wall in the photo of Mick Jones below, bequiffed and smoking while tuning his Les Paul, is some graffiti... 

Monday's Long Song

I'm a big fan of Underworld. Their 1993 third album dubnobasswithmyheadman... was on the stereo constantly during that year and rarely been less than interesting or great ever since. They changed following the departure of Darren Emerson in 2001 and occasionally dipped off my radar but 2016's Barbara Barbara, We Face A Shining Future album and then especially the year long Drift project, a track a week for a year during 2018- 2019, brought me back on board. The Drift Series 1 Sampler Edition album is as good an Underworld album as any they've released since their 90s heyday of dubnobass, Second Toughest In The Infants and Beaucoup Fish. Their remixes are a story in themselves, thundering, ten minute techno/ dance reworks of Bjork, One Dove, Shakespeare's Sister, Saint Etienne, Orbital, William Orbit, Spooky, Dreadzone and Massive Attack. 

In 2000 they had a track on the soundtrack to the Leonardo di Caprio film The Beach, a film based on Alex Garland's novel about trouble in paradise. Alongside an All Saints/ William Orbit classic, a new one from the then recently reformed New Order (the song, Brutal, is nothing much to get excited about if truth be told), a Leftfield track that led to an expensive lawsuit over an OMD sample and an original score by Angelo Badalamenti (who sadly died last year). Underworld's 8 Ball is a minor classic, one of the last Underworld songs to be written and recorded with Darren Emerson still part of the group. It's a step away from the banging techno of Born Slippy NUXX that brought them international fame on the soundtrack of Trainspotting. 

8 Ball has some chilled out guitar, a niggling Geiger counter rhythm, a warm bassline and Karl Hyde singing about people he's seen on the street- a man using a whiskey flask as a walkie talkie, a man with a flaming 8 ball tattoo. Karl's guitar solo at just under five minutes is a moment of gorgeousness. The rhythm comes back in, there's some piano, and then a man throws his arms around him and they laugh, happy while waiting for a train into the city.

8 Ball

This live version was made available through the Underworld website at the start of the year, from a gig at Tokyo Garden Theatre. 

8 Ball (Live in Tokyo)

An Hour Of Björk

A month ago Khayem did a fairly definitive recreation of a Björk mixtape centred around her 1993 solo debut Debut. I'd been planning on doing a Björk Sunday mix here for some time and almost shelved the idea but a few days ago decided to go ahead. Debut and its surrounding singles and remixes are massively important songs and records for me, so resonant of a time in my life where it seems looking back like it was perpetual weekend. In Big Time Sensuality she sings, 'I don't know my future after this weekend/ And I don't want to', a line summing up how life felt. Almost everywhere we went Björk's songs were being played, stitched into the fabric of mid- 90s nightlife. When my then flatmate brought Debut home we played it constantly, the album seeping into our every day life. If I had to draw up a list of the albums which mean the most to me, Debut would be on it. It's hugely innovative too, Björk and producer Nellee Hooper inspired by the previous few years changes and freedoms, the sounds and rhythms, creating something self contained, optimistic, joyous and life affirming, a record in love with itself and with endless possibility. 

I've expanded the mix below beyond Debut but there's nothing post- 1997, it's all 20th century Björk. Her output from the 21st century can be obtuse and bewildering at times (and incredible at others), and it needs a mix of its own. My Sunday mixes have tended to be between thirty and forty five minutes long, the ideal length for a trip out (or one side of a tape, subconsciously maybe). Once I started this one it just kept getting longer and having reached the forty minute mark I couldn't leave off Underworld's marathon remix of Human Behaviour so what we have here is an hour of Björk Guðmundsdóttir, her unique vision and singing accompanied by a cast of like minded collaborators- the production of Nellee Hooper is an essential part of Debut and Graham Massey of 808 State played a pivotal role in her solo adventures beyond the Sugarcubes as the 80s became the 90s. Listening back to this last night I was struck by how good everything here still sounds, from the giddy skipping pop- acid house of Big Time Sensuality to the dislocating oddness of The Black Dog's version of The Anchor Song. She's brilliant and we're lucky to have her.  

An Hour Of  Björk

• One Day (Sabres of Paradise Endorphin Mix)
• Ooops
• Big Time Sensuality (Fluke Minimix)
• Violently Happy (Fluke Well Tempered Mix)
• There's More To Life Than This (Recorded Live In The Milk Bar Toilets)
• Hyperballad
• Venus As A Boy (7" Dream Mix)
• Army Of Me
• The Anchor Song (The Black Dog Mix)
• QMart
• Human Behaviour (Underworld Remix 110BPM)
• You've Been Flirting Again (Icelandic Version)

One Day was remixed not once but three times by Andrew Weatherall's Sabres Of Paradise. All three are superb, increasing in length, intensity and tempo. There was a 10" single with two of the remixes, the Endorphin Mix and the Springs Eternal Mix titled Björk Cut By Sabres, and then a six track compilation in 1994 called The Best Mixes From The Debut Album For People Who Don't Buy White Labels which rounded up all three Sabres remixes, the twelve minute Underworld monster and the two Black Dog remixes. I included The Black Dog's remix of The Anchor Song here too although it could easily have been the one of Come To Me. Such is the embarrassment of riches of Björk all six remixes could have/ should have been included here.

In 1991 808 State released ex:el, one of the period's  best dance albums although it tends to get a bit overlooked now. Björk's co- wrote and sang on two songs, the magnificent, slow burning sex- techno of Ooops and QMart. This sparked a long running song- writing partnership with 808's Graham Massey. Björk had loved 808 State's 1989 album 90 and phoned them up out of the blue looking for some help with drum programming. She flew to Manchester the next day. The 808 State boys showed Björk round the sights and clubs of Manchester and wrote and recorded at various studios in the area. 

Big Time Sensuality is off Debut, a song about being in love with going out and dancing, the sheer giddiness and delight evident in her vocal. The video, filmed in black and white on the back of a flatbed truck with Björk in a long silver dress is so of the time too. This song as much as any reminds me of 1993/4- it was played constantly in the flat I lived in, the remixes played in every club around town and me and Lou pretty much met on the dancefloor while it was being spun at Paradise Factory in Manchester. The Fluke Minimix is the version for me but there are some other remixes that hit the spot too, not least Justin Robertson's (not included here). Fluke also remixed Violently Happy (two versions) another single from Debut. 

Two more songs from Debut are on the mix- There's More To Life Than This is an astonishing song from an album full of them, full of manic Björk energy, and the jaw dropping moment she records the sound of the Milk Bar, running from the dance floor to the toilets, closing the door and then coming out again. I also love the way she sings 'ghetto blaster'. Venus As A Boy, the second single from Debut, is absurdly good, marrying post- club ambient sounds with tabla. The version here is the 7" Dream Mix, a mix by Mick Hucknall and Gota Yashiki. This marks the only appearance of the Simply Red singer at this blog. 

Hyperballad is from her second solo album Post, released in 1995, an exhilarating fusion of folk, acid house and synth pop. Hyperballad swoops in and out, as if the song is dropping from a height and shooting then back up again, head spinning production and vision. Post has several such moments- Possibly Maybe should possibly, maybe, also have been included on this mix.

Army Of Me came out in 1995, the lead single from Post. It's her most streamed song on Spotify which suggests its her most popular song. Björk and Graham Massey wrote Army Of Me in a terraced house in Gatley that belonged to a mate of Massey's and had a home studio set up. Gatley's not that far from here, I pass through often on my bike. The idea of Björk popping out from one of the houses to nip to the shop in the mid- 90s in a break from writing is bizarre and amusing. From such humble, suburban beginnings does great music appear- Army Of Me is a force of nature, the bassline alone more a landslide than a musical element and the pulverising industrial drums contain a sample from Led Zeppelin's John Bonham. The final song on this mix, You've Been Flirting Again (Icelandic Version) was on the Army Of Me CD single, the orchestral strings bringing things to a dramatic conclusion. 

Tak Tent Mix Pour Lundi

No long song today, a mix instead. Tak Tent Radio is an internet radio station broadcasting out of Scotland with mixes and shows from an array of contributors and regular guests. Some time ago I was asked if I'd like to provide an hour of music for Tak Tent and have since been back four times. The latest Bagging Area Tak Tent mix went up on Saturday and can be found here. More ambient, instrumental and Balearic sounds segued together in a way that I hope is pleasing and semi- competent. I've posted quite a few of the tracks in the mix here in recent times. 

• Underworld: Dark & Long (Most ‘Ospitable Mix)
• David Holmes and Jon Hopkins featuring Stephen Rea: Elsewhere Anchises
• William Alfred Sergeant: Circles
• Chris Carter: Poptone
• William Orbit: Wordsworth
• Sonic Boom/ Spectrum: True Love Will Find You In The End
• Steve Cobby: 45ft. Tide
• Gabriel Yared: C’est Le Vent, Betty
• Andy Bell: When The Lights Go Down
• The Vendetta Suite: Purple Haze, Yellow Sunrise (David Holmes Remix)
• Projections: Original Cell (Coyote Deep State Remix)
• Coyote: The Outsider

For some reason while putting it together the Gabriel Yared track suggested itself to me- I have no idea why. C'est Le Vent, Betty is from the soundtrack to the film Betty Blue. I'm sure you remember Betty Blue...

Betty Blue was released in 1988, directed by Jean- Jacques Beineix and starring Beatrice Dalle as Betty and Jean- Hugues Anglade as Zorg. Zorg lives in a beach house on the coast, making a living as a handyman while trying to become a writer. Betty arrives and turns his life upside down, setting fire to a beach house, stabbing a customer at a pizzeria with a fork and a sharp, painful descent into depression and hospitalisation. The film's first half, all young love and impulsiveness, sex and bohemian lifestyle, contrast sharply with the horrors of the second half. According to the director the film's two stars became very much intertwined, a relationship that went beyond acting. 'We didn't know if they were in the movie anymore', he said. Which puts the film's opening scene, a lengthy sex scene, in a different light. The soundtrack was by Gabriel Yared, a Lebanese composer and pianist and works as a listen in its own right. As well as the track on my mix above, this pair are a good way to start the week. 

Betty Et Zorg

37.2 le Matin

Monday's Long Song

Underworld released a new and free 2021 mix of their 1994 track Dark And Long. Ever since its first appearance back in 1994 Dark And Long has been mixed and remixed and played about with, a track that survives endless reinterpretation as long as that chugging techno rhythm keeps gliding forwards. They've reworked Dark Train (and Dark And Long) many, many times but still, it is what it is, ten minutes of transportation from Underworld for the first Monday in November. 

Dark And Long (Drift 2 Dark Train)

Karl Hyde wrote the lyrics for the version that appeared on dubnobasswithmyheadman whilst travelling through the prairies of Minnesota with thunder clouds rolling in from miles away- 'thunder, thunder, lightning ahead/ Now I kiss you dark and long'. He was in the practice of noting down things he'd overheard on trains and on the streets which is where these lines must have come from- 'Me, I'm just a waitress she said/ I went 'and bought a new head she said/ I look at you I believe in you she said' and 'What a laugh/ You was done up there mate'. They work perfectly against the drama of thunder and lightning. Stream of consciousness poetry with sleek dub techno. This was the future made real in 1994. 

Dark And Long (album version)

21st Century Pop

Back in 2018 Iggy Pop met Underworld in a hotel room. Rick Smith and Karl Hyde had got all their kit set up and some tracks worked up and ready to go and decided to see if Iggy fancied recording some vocals. The four track EP that followed, Teatime Dub Encounters, came out a bit like that sounds, fully realised backing tracks and Iggy improvising. On the lead song, Bells & Circles, Iggy went into a extended spoken word reverie about boarding a flight sometime in the 1970s, taking a gramme of coke, chatting up the stewardess but losing her number, being able to smoke on airplanes and the death of liberal democracy. A polished Underworld throbbed away behind him, Born Slippy reborn, Karl coming in on backing vocals. On Trapped Iggy has a pop at Johnny who has a mortgage. On I'll See Big he looks back at his inability to make friends, his falling into and out of bands, and making friends with other people who had few friends. The music on I'll See Big is low key and subtle. Iggy being reflective is a product of aging and surviving. 

I'll See Big

Two years earlier Iggy released what looked like his last testament, the Josh Homme produced Post- Pop Depression. Like all Iggy Pop albums since The Idiot and Lust For Life it's got at least one real stinker but it's also got several late period Iggy gems and that aging thing again, Iggy being reflective, looking back at a life lived and the seeing what's left. Gardenia is a genuine Iggy classic, Homme and the band finding a really good groove, none of the expected heavy rock but a really well crafted and sympathetically played song with Iggy recounting the days of his youth and an evening in a club with Allen Ginsberg. Equally good was Break Into Your Heart, an overloaded, smoky blues with Iggy examining his past tendency to woo women but then back out when he's asked for more. 

Break Into Your Heart

Schmoo

In the early 90s Underworld's remixes were as essential as their own material, the group producing a slew of long, tribal, dub techno remixes that were monumental trips in their own right. Between 1992 and 1995 their remixes of Bjork, William Orbit, The Drum Club, One Dove, Orbital, Saint Etienne, Leftfield, Front 242 and Shakespeare's Sister are all superb work and as was standard at the time, they often produced two or three mixes, making what amounted to mini- albums and great value for money on 12" or CD single. In 1993 they remixed Spooky, one of the era's omnipresent progressive house outfits (and still at it today), turning in a nine minute thumper with dancing topline piano melodies, a pair of disembodied voices (one a female 'ooh' and 'yeah' and the other sounding like a foreign radio station or platform announcement), bleeps, a huge bassline and a crashing rhythm- what more do you want? Or need? 

Schmoo (Underworld Mix) 

Concord

Back in 2014 Underworld released a deluxe anniversary edition of 1994's dubnobasswithmyheadman album, a double CD, the original album coupled with a disc of extras. dubnobass... was one of the 1990s greatest albums, possibly its greatest- a visionary, triumphant, darkly euphoric ride, dance music's rhythms, space and production (and the DJ nous of recently arrived member Darren Emerson) hitched to what was left of Karl Hyde's guitar playing and Karl's cut up vocals. Melodic streamlined techno. The sleeve suggested what was within, words typed and repeated, overlaid, copied and pasted in layers of black and white, a computer having some kind of breakdown. 

The extras disc is a brilliant alternative eighty minutes to the album, a collection of earlier releases, standalone singles and off cuts from the album. It opens with the stellar Eclipse and includes Dirty (both from the Lemon Interrupt 12"), Rez, a standalone 12" and maybe their single greatest moment (without doubt one of the weirdest moments of the 2012 Olympic Games opening ceremony was when it suddenly became clear that the athletes of the world were parading round the Olympic stadium to Rez), Spikee (a 1993 12" single), the sinuous, epic Dark Train version of Dark And Long and three tracks that were recorded at the same time as dubnobass... but which didn't make the final cut. Of these three extras- Concord, Can You Feel Me? and Birdstar- Concord sounds like one which could easily have sneaked on if running time had allowed. It opens with a distorted voice, unclear and smothered in echo, before a familiar thumping, heartbeat rhythm glides in and Karl's spoken voice starts out with one of those stream of consciousness vocals, lines from notebooks and overheard conversations, 'I'm delighted/ I'm higher than Concord'. A moment later then he seems to be switching through the news channels, 'it's an honour for the home team... rebel forces massing in Georgia... huge fat prices... here comes  Moscow... Mother Theresa's ready... It's an all time low... higher than Concord...'. On and on it goes, the thump of the drums, the warm fat bass and Karl flicking through the news and reporting back, beautifully disorienting. 

Concord

Monday's Long Song

 Last week Underworld released a new remix of Cowgirl, one of the brain melting standouts from their 1994 dubnobasswithmyheadman album, one of those albums I can play, know every single moment of and still find fresh. Cowgirl Remix id2 A1804 is/was available as a free download (for five days only), as a limited edition 12" single (sold out) and limited edition t-shirts, sweatshirts, hoodie, tote bag and lithograph (all still available at the time of writing, here). The remix is seventeen minutes long, stretched out and wigged out building to buzzing climax around twelve minutes thirty before the squiggling acid part re- enters, and while it seems to be a fairly close relation of the Irish Pub In Kyoto Mix from 1994, it's pretty exciting to hear it rejigged again for 2021.  

The five day free download has expired it seems. 

Cowgirl Remix id2 A1804

Thunder Thunder Lightning Ahead

This song seems perfectly placed to illustrate the flipside of this week's heatwave and the truly spectacular lightning displays we've had, the rumbles of thunder and the sudden cracks directly overhead. Opening their 1994 album, dubnobasswithmyheadman, Underworld's Dark And Long is a masterpiece of dub- techno, slowly building tension, ghostly backing vocals and Karl Hyde's stream of consciousness/ overheard on the last train lyrics. The single came with various versions over the different formats. This one, remixed by JBO label boss Steve Hall, ins't too different from the album mix.

Dark And Long Hall's Mix

This one is a five minute ambient version, very pleasant, all bubbles, bleeps and whispers, and long drawn out synth sounds.

Dark And Long Most 'Ospitable

I always thought the genius of Karl Hyde's words was his ability to stitch together some very different ideas and lines. The opening lines 'thunder thunder, lightning ahead/ now I kiss you dark and long', repeated, set the song off in one direction and then he suddenly drops in this

"Me I'm just a waitress" she said
"I went and bought a new head" she said
"I look at you, I believe in you" she said
Screaming into the eye of the lens'

Later on we get a snatch of cockney, 'what a laugh, you was done up there mate', before the menace of 'thunder thunder lightning ahead...' comes back. A much under appreciated lyricist, especially in the setting of 90s dub- techno, made for dancing. 

Isolation Mix Eight

An hour and five minutes of lockdown vibes and an attempt to lift the spirits and up the tempo a bit this week. This one is a global trawl of tunes taking in Dubwood Allstars and their splicing together of King Tubby, Dylan Thomas and Richard Burton, a classic 70s Lee Perry production from the Black Ark in Kingston, Jamaica, Moon Duo doing Black Sabbath in very laid back style, groove- based melodic noise from Scotland (Mogwai) and Norway (Mythologen), some funky 80s crossover dance pop from NYC, Natasha Khan and Toy as Sexwitch, Paris duo Acid Arab and South London's Rude Audio, all on a Middle Eastern tip, and early 90s Balearic dub house majesty from Sheer Taft (Glasgow) and Underworld (Essex). Bank holiday weekend. Take it easy. Stay safe.

Dubwood Allstars: Under Dubwood

Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and Zap- Pow: Riverstone

Moon Duo: Planet Caravan

Mogwai: The Sun Smells Too Loud

Mythologen: Trust

Tom Tom Club: Wordy Rappinghood

Sexwitch: Ha Howa Ha Howa

Acid Arab: Club DZ

Rude Audio: Rumble On Arab Street

Sheer Taft: Cascades (Hypnotone Mix)

Underworld: M.E.

Random Selections From The Shelves

On Boxing Day night sitting in the room with all the records in it we played the game where someone pulls a record at random from the shelves and we play it. First to go was my daughter, who had already said she didn't like what my brother- in- law were listening to when she came in- 'it's not music, it's just noises' (Richard Norris' Abstractions Vol. 2). She was given the first go and pulled out St Etienne's 1994 12" single Pale Movie.

Pale Movie is off Tiger Bay, the sleeve with a tiger on both front and back. I photographed the tiger above at Port Lympne safari park in Kent a few years ago. I don't think keeping tigers in cages is a good idea (apart from the obvious conservation arguments) but the tigers at Lympne had a lot of room and seeing one close up and hearing it roar was pretty exciting. I digress. We played the single version of Pale Movie from the choice of four mixes on the single. Pale Movie is classic mid- 90s St Etienne, equal parts Eurobeat, Spanish guitar and Sarah singing lyrics about a boy and girl ('he is so dark and moody/she is the sunshine girl'). Pete, Bob and Sarah went to Nerja in Spain to shoot the video.



I went back to the 12" afterwards to re- listen to the other three mixes, all of which were worth giving a spin. Mark 'Spike' Stent, the man who mixed the song (and Hug My Soul from Tiger Bay as well), did the Stentorian Dub, a straightforward but effective clubby remix- plenty to enjoy in it with its bleepy synths and chunky drums.

Pale Movie (Stentorian Dub)

The longest remix was ten minutes from Kris Needs in his Secret Knowledge guise. It starts with an extended intro which builds into the first of several peaks. The Secret Knowledge Trouser Assassin mix goes pretty trancey with pummelling drums and Sarah's vocals dropped in along with the kitchen sink. Kris Needs was a master of this kind of thing in the mid 90s.

Pale Movie (Secret Knowledge Trouser Assassin Mix)

Finally a remix by Underworld (credited solely to Rick Smith), the Lemonentry Mix, one that clocks in at just over four minutes, very short for Underworld at the time. Rick worked on Tiger Bay too, mixing and programming Like A Motorway, Cool Kids Of Death and Urban Clearway. The Underworld remix of Cool Kids Of Death is one I'll come back to when I do a follow up to the Underworld remixes post from a week or two ago. The Lemonentry Mix is a slowed down, dubby affair, darker and moodier than the rest, with Sara's vocal intact.

Pale Movie (Lemonentry Mix)

Just to show how random the following selections from the shelves were my niece followed St Etienne with Gnod and a song from their Just Say No To The Psycho Right Wing Capitalist Fascist Industrial Death Machine album. We played the opening song, Bodies For Money, a glorious piece of feedback guitar led noise, every instrument recorded with the needle tipping into the red and Gnod raging against late period capitalism.



Mrs Swiss then pulled out a six track maxi- single The House Sound Of Chicago and as Gnod's noise dissolved we had Farley 'Jackmaster' Funk's 1986 song Love Can't Turn Around, featuring the sublime vocals of Daryl Pandy, a song that was the first US house track to hit the UK charts. It still sounds huge, crashing pianos, 808s and 303s. Magical.

Love Can't Turn Around

Fun for all the family as I'm sure you can see.