Barking -- Some general thoughts

[King of Snake]

Originally Posted by purlieu

and the vocals are a bit samey: where are the spoken tracks, or the vocal effects?

you mean apart from the looped vocal sample in Bird 1, the vocoder In ALAF, or the pitch warble in Louisiana, the weird high-pitched background vocal in Grace, or the computer-y (spoken) voice in Moon In Water, the spoken word sample in Hamburg Hotel or the spoken bit in Scribble?

lots of stuff going on with the vocals on Barking I'd say...

[purlieu]

Originally Posted by King of Snake

you mean apart from the looped vocal sample in Bird 1, the vocoder In ALAF, or the pitch warble in Louisiana, the weird high-pitched background vocal in Grace, or the computer-y (spoken) voice in Moon In Water, the spoken word sample in Hamburg Hotel or the spoken bit in Scribble?

lots of stuff going on with the vocals on Barking I'd say...

I mean like Born Slippy, Cowgirl, Pearl's Girl, Ring Road, Beautiful Burnout, Oich Oich, Push Upstairs, King Of Snake, Moaner, Puppies, Peggy Sussed, JAL to Tokyo...
No, you're right, there are effects, but they seem more like additional touches rather than the huge variation of style and texture on the vocals before now.
To put it plainer: the vocals are all sung, clearly, and the lyrics are mostly very decipherable. Before, you'd get something like that followed by Karl ranting incoherently and sounding quite angry or something.

[purlieu]

Another thing I realised - the titles are a bit poppy in a way, aren't they? I know they've often changed song names from working titles to the finished product, but the releases have always had those strange, disjointed titles which I love. Many of the songs had more 'Underworld' titles to start with - You Do Scribble, Telematic Peal, Jumping The Cran - which were simplified or changed to titles which are a lot more 'normal' or even generic. Grace is a lot less UW than Telematic Peal.
Just a thought.

[//\/\/]

maybe i'm missing something, but this seems as far from uw as anything i've heard. it's like a band trying way too hard to be underworld.

there are some absolute stinkers here - particularly alaf - it sounds so, thin and alien - hard to believe i'm listening to uw, to be honest...

maybe i'm too old for this?!

i like bird 1,hamburg hotel and moon on water - otherwise, it feels like it's trying to do what uw have always steered clear of ie tried to play to the audience, rather than give them something new to chew on. i mean - massive eurphoric stabs of 'between stars' - no wonder karl was having a love-in with dave pearce.

lovely for the kidz maybe , but with the veryhonourable exceptions mentioned, i just can't swallow this.

sad to note; the best 2 tracks they've been doing live in recent times, 'downpipe' and 'can u feel this bass' made me very optimistic for this release - turns out they're just playing other people's grooves: and they're own ones are barking up the wrong tree.

quite a let-down - though better than ahdo by an essex country mile...

[Future Proof]

tbh I've actually found AHDO to be better than BF over time, though when AHDO first dropped I didn't think it had anything worthwhile on it. But yea, everyone's got an opinion it seems, which IMO is the majesty of UW's portfolio of works -- every last one of their albums has meant the world to someone somewhere, which is really cool.

[eturnol]

Im sorry but I hate this album. It doesn't sound like Underworld at all. What happened to their sound? Even Oblivion had the Underworld I know and love with Crocodile and Beautiful Burnout. The whole album sounds like one of tiesto's generic trance sets. I really hope Underworld doesn't go the way of BT and so many other electronic producers, catering to the popularity of trance, and lose themselves along the way.

Underworld is my favorite band and I will always love them live, but this album makes me sick. They really shouldn't collaborate with anyone ever again. They should be the leaders in electronic music, the band that sets the bar, not following the sounds of Dubfire and Paul Van Dyk. Those guys are mainstream hacks. Underworld has dabbled in Drum n Bass before, and the results of those efforts have always been better than Scribble (Pearl's Girl, Something Like a Mama, etc).

I must say I am concerned with the direction Underworld has taken with this album. I know there are others on this board who love Underworlds understated style and interwoven melodies, complex structure, and rambling vocals. None of these are present on this album. All I hear are pop trance tunes destined for another In Search of Sunrise mix. The album is cheesy and lacks heart and I hate it.

[jose m]

Originally Posted by eturnol

Im sorry but I hate this album. It doesn't sound like Underworld at all. What happened to their sound? Even Oblivion had the Underworld I know and love with Crocodile and Beautiful Burnout. The whole album sounds like one of tiesto's generic trance sets. I really hope Underworld doesn't go the way of BT and so many other electronic producers, catering to the popularity of trance, and lose themselves along the way.

Underworld is my favorite band and I will always love them live, but this album makes me sick. They really shouldn't collaborate with anyone ever again. They should be the leaders in electronic music, the band that sets the bar, not following the sounds of Dubfire and Paul Van Dyk. Those guys are mainstream hacks. Underworld has dabbled in Drum n Bass before, and the results of those efforts have always been better than Scribble (Pearl's Girl, Something Like a Mama, etc).

I must say I am concerned with the direction Underworld has taken with this album. I know there are others on this board who love Underworlds understated style and interwoven melodies, complex structure, and rambling vocals. None of these are present on this album. All I hear are pop trance tunes destined for another In Search of Sunrise mix. The album is cheesy and lacks heart and I hate it.

the band need to move on.
it may not be in a direction that everyone like's but they will never be the 90's underworld, the version many people still want them to be,again.
they're musicians and have changed their style and out put many times over the years and i'm sure they will do it again.
i'm interested 'cause i like to watch the "journey" they're on and i really enjoy it when they change course either in a commercial way (like this album) or delve deep (like river runs).
maybe for every fan they gain with the new stuff they'll lose one as well but thats the way it is if you don't sit still.

[Strawman]

Originally Posted by jose m

the band need to move on.
it may not be in a direction that everyone like's but they will never be the 90's underworld, the version many people still want them to be,again.
they're musicians and have changed their style and out put many times over the years and i'm sure they will do it again.
i'm interested 'cause i like to watch the "journey" they're on and i really enjoy it when they change course either in a commercial way (like this album) or delve deep (like river runs).
maybe for every fan they gain with the new stuff they'll lose one as well but thats the way it is if you don't sit still.

Yes I couldn't agree more.....I'm on this journey with them and as always uw keep changing their style and moving in different directions. Having said all that....

WHERE IS MY BOX SET!!!!?????? HAS ANYONE IN AUSTRALIA GOT IT YET???

[Bargo]

Originally Posted by Strawman

Yes I couldn't agree more.....I'm on this journey with them and as always uw keep changing their style and moving in different directions. Having said all that....

WHERE IS MY BOX SET!!!!?????? HAS ANYONE IN AUSTRALIA GOT IT YET???

I got mine either yesterday or today (Canberra).. yours can't be far off!

[Strawman]

Originally Posted by Bargo

I got mine either yesterday or today (Canberra).. yours can't be far off!

OK thanks mate.......EAGERLY AWAITING!!!!................