FFWD Weekly
Copyright © 1999. All Rights Reserved
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CD Review
by Red Eye UNDERWORLD • The long-awaited follow-up to 1996’s Second Toughest In The Infants. • If you’re lookin’ for someone screamin’ about lager, lager, lager, head down to the pub ’cos they aren’t here. Fate? Savvy marketing? Dumb luck? There’s no logical reason why "Born Slippy" turned into such a gargantuan tune. Right place at the right time is about as close an explanation as you’re going to get. It just happened to be the best song for the times and captured the zeitgeist perfectly. The problem for Underworld (Rick Smith, Karl Hyde and Darren Emerson) is that because of this one track, they will seemingly be perpetually afflicted with the sophomore jinx. So what is a band to do? Well, the answer Underworld gives here is "who cares?" They just do what they do and we’re treated to another album much in the same vein as Second Toughest In The Infants. There’s the epic opening track "Cups," an 11-minute drift through trance blues, the stomping single "Push Upstairs," as well as their ode to Donna Summer and Giorgio Moroder, "King Of Snake." From there things get a little boring, with attempts at downtempo ("Bruce Lee) and ambient trance ("Push Downstairs") missing the mark. Things pick up for the closer, "Moaner," a hard techno track highlighted by Karl Hyde’s stream-of-consciousness lyrics, which also closed out last summer’s Love Parade in Berlin to the delight of millions of screaming techno fanatics. That’s the thing about them, they’re damn good at being Underworld, and if you love ’em, you’ll love this. If you’re still lookin’ for "Born Slippy Pt. II," this ain’t the album for you. 3/5 |
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