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In late 2000, when DJ Darren Emerson departed from Underworld, no one really knew quite what to expect from the remaining duo, Karl Hyde and Rick Smith. Would they really continue making music without the man who, as John Digweed once told Choler, brought the group its trademark tough beats and true dance floor sensibility? If so, it might be a shame … great groups seldom recover from the departure of a lynchpin member.
Still, Underworld had a past pre-Emerson, and Hyde and Smith seemed content to be mysterious and let people wonder about the group's future; nothing much was heard from them after Emerson's departure until a couple of months ago, when word of a new album appeared on the Dirty / Underworld Web site. Now it's out, the silence has been broken, and the big question has been answered: Smith and Hyde do just fine on their own, thank you. In fact, better than fine. A Hundred Days Off continues Underworld's streak of instant dance music classics, making the group something like the Cal Ripken Jr. of its field. It's an uneven success - the album overreaches in spots as Smith and Hyde attempt to round out their profiles by tackling something other than uptempo numbers - but even in its failure, the group can be applauded for experimenting. That's the kind of charmed life Underworld lives: success always. If the song sucks, at least it's got vibe.
The album's first single, "Two Months Off," is already a smash, having wormed its way onto summer party set lists as a white label long before its official release - and with good reason. An ecstatic progressive anthem, it celebrates everything Underworld does well: the irresistible four-on-the-floor beats that build into a hypnotic, not-quite thundering rhythm; the synthesizer reverie that drifts into play and buoys the song to head-spinning heights; Karl Hyde's impossibly cheerful stream-of-conscious lyrics (really, the true trademark of any Underworld track). Once it really gets moving, surging into the dramatic stop-start fireworks and Brazilian rhythms that pepper its latter half, the song starts drilling a message into your brain: Underworld is back. We'll forgive you for ever thinking they'd gone away.
When the band sticks to this formula, the message continues transmitting. "Mo' Move" (the album's first track), "Little Speaker," and the amusingly titled "Dinosaur Adventure 3D" all propel A Hundred Days Off further into the dance floor stratosphere. The whole thing climaxes with "Dinosaur" really, a frenetic show-stopper that charges forward with the same hardcore mentality that drove earlier Underworld tracks, like Beaucoup Fish's "Moaner" and "Kittens." When Smith and Hyde stretch out, however, the results are less compelling, if still entertaining. A growing fascination with Latin rhythmic structures (do we have Basement Jaxx to thank / blame for this? Ian Pooley? Give me names and numbers) takes some of the downtempo tracks in previously unplumbed directions, but too often the finished product sounds a little forced and unfinished. Underworld have never been about minimalism, but here, many of the songs are stripped back to basic grooves, using melody only as a garnish and dragging the band back to its Dubnobasswithmyheadman days. Which isn't entirely bad - but, as tracks like "" and "" reveal, it's just a tad too close to the Aquanet daze of "Doot Doot" for anyone to feel entirely comfortable.
On the whole though, this is a record to cheer for. How it translates to a live setting, without Emerson to help shoulder deck duties, remains to be seen. But if the band can pull of on stage what it just pulled off on record, the transformation will be complete: Underworld - a two-man job, a hundred days off, and an undeniable impulse to just keep on dancing.
Sean Flinn | Setpember 29, 2002
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