#25 on the 2024 Bacon Top 31 — Underworld
Strawberry Hotel by Underworld
29 years ago, two seminal events happened that changed the course of my media intake forever. 1: Trainspotting, Danny Boyle’s life-affirming film of Scottish author Irvine Welsh’s heroin-fueled novel, hit the theaters on February 23, 1996, bringing with it a phenomenal soundtrack, including a lesser-known electronic band called Underworld and their top-10 all-time song, “Born Slippy .NUXX.” 2: Underworld released their sophomore album, Second Toughest in the Infants on March 11, 1996.
Trainspotting features a handful of mid-twenties friends trying to make it through life, at a time when I myself was coming into my mid-twenties. Both the novel and the film connected with me in a way that nothing else had to date. The soundtrack features a wide variety of artists, from classic rock of the 70s in Lou Reed and Iggy Pop, through 80s brit pop in New Order, Blur, and Pulp, to 90s electronic artists like Leftfield and Underworld. I developed a love of ALL of the artists featured on the soundtrack, but Underworld were above and beyond my favorite band of my 20s.
I remember the CD shop I frequented in college, and remember the day I picked up Second Toughest there. I can picture the location, the CD in my hand, excited to bring it to my apartment and listen to it. From its opening track “Juanita” through the closing “Stagger,” it is a phenomenal album through and through.
In addition to making great music, Karl Hyde and Rick Smith — the duo that make the bulk of Underworld’s music — were part of a graphic design collective called Tomato that, along with folks like David Carson, shaped the zeitgeist of design in the 90s. Being in school and studying visual communications at that time, absorbing everything aural and visual created by the band, seared them onto my still-forming mind.
I went back in time and fell in love with their great 1994 debut, Dubnobasswithmyheadman, and continued to love them through their third album, 1999’s Beaucoup Fish. As I grew older, they kept making albums, but I started to move on. I enjoyed their 2002 album, A Hundred Days Off, but 2007’s Oblivion with Bells didn’t fit my mid-30s world. I started documenting my Top 31 in 2009, but the band’s 2010 release, Barking, didn’t make it onto that year’s Top 31. Barbara Barbara, We Face a Shining Future, from 2016, made it onto the list at #30, but reading my words about the album then make it clear they were receiving a consolation prize, a shadow of their former selves. 2019’s Drift Series 1 did not rate.
But I still found myself going back to those 90s albums — more out of reminiscing than anything else. I bought the vinyl reissue of Dubnobasswithmyheadman in the mid 10’s, and I love it. But nothing new they were creating in the 2000s was matching their 90s greatness. This is my long, circuitous route to getting to the crux of the matter: this sentiment has changed with the duo’s 2024 release, Strawberry Hotel, their 11th album. This album is a resurgence of the Underworld of old. It hits all the same notes for me, despite the fact that I am now in my 50s.
Hit play on the video above, for the opening track “Black Poppies.” Gorgeous and lush, this song creates a soundscape of warmth that hums with excitement. You can also watch an alternate version, “Black Poppies (Unplugged), performed by a six-piece string group of college students that was put together by the band. Absolutely beautiful. And the band still has a grasp on driving, thumping beats: watch the visualizer for “Techno Shinkansen” and you’ll hear what I mean.
Maybe now that I’m working on my fifth decade of living I am in a nostalgic world, trying to reclaim my youth. It’s impossible for me to not hear Underworld from that biased stance. But I do love Strawberry Hotel, and I’m energized by the fact that they (and by extension, me, too) can keep making relevant, exciting things in 2025. I hope you’ll join me in this excitement.
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