Underworld Live
Everything, Everything
(JBO)
This
is a tour document of Underworld’s recent globetrotting effort in support of the
studio album Beaucoup Fish. And just
to make sure that everyone knows the music on Everything, Everything was performed
live, the UK electronica trio have rechristened themselves Underworld Live for
the release, and audience hysteria is annoyingly overemphasized for the FIrst
full minute. Still, this release captures Underworld’s stadium techno in all its
incandescent glory, highlighting the band’s knack for amalgamating various forms
of electronic music into a galvanized, undulating mix. The FIrst track,
“Juanita/Kiteless,” cackles with a “Tubular Bells”–like nirvana; the odd piano
tinkles in “Push Upstairs” and “Shudder/King of Snake” playfully refer to house
music even as the latter pulsates with the frigid disco of the Moroder/Summer
classic “I Feel Love”; the skittish beats of “Pearls Girl” conjure the
militaristic menace of drum ’n’ bass. Spastic vocalist/gyrater Karl
Hyde sounds like a carnival barker as played by Jack Kerouac, shouting
nonsensical phrases into a megaphone — though the techno balled “Jumbo” provides
an oddly affecting diversion as Hyde’s whispers cascade over a tender synth-funk
bass line and a demure rhythm. Everything is also a swan song of sorts
for the trio: Darren Emerson, under the mistaken impression that the world needs
another trance techno DJ, has since departed the group.
-- Patrick Bryant
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