chemical brothers

  On 2/25/2012 at 3:10 AM, vamos scorcho said:

the breakdown on the track "Dig Your Own Hole" is just inconceivable to me. i don't understand how they came up with something so abstract and huge. it's positively alien, the whole album, in part just from the energy and the creativity and disregard for all things conventional. listening to it with a rational mind I imagine being in their studio while they recorded it, what the fuck were these guys on? seriously, are they fucking insane? people who write this off as Big Beat are missing the fact that this is some borderline spiritual music, there really is no reference for it when you get down to brass tax and really listen to the music. can you really imagine making this? maybe on a plastic level if you think it's all just 'loops' as a friend of mine said, but on the level of the soul that is behind the sounds, no!

I love how hyped up the guy at the start of "Electrobank" gets me, even though I can't understand half of what he's saying. Masterfully executed, there. "It Doesn't Matter" is definitely something else. Actual "trance" music. That whole album is a total head trip, for sure.

I've always taken it for granted that the Brothers did a lot of acid and actually got a spiritual experience out of it, because it definitely comes through in the music. A lot of people who do a lot of drugs don't really get much enlightenment from it, but you can tell when people have. That's why it's always annoyed me that they're somewhat dismissively labeled as "big beat," which makes them sound like they make some kind of stupid bro music.

  On 2/25/2012 at 3:10 AM, vamos scorcho said:

the breakdown on the track "Dig Your Own Hole" is just inconceivable to me. i don't understand how they came up with something so abstract and huge. it's positively alien, the whole album, in part just from the energy and the creativity and disregard for all things conventional. listening to it with a rational mind I imagine being in their studio while they recorded it, what the fuck were these guys on? seriously, are they fucking insane? people who write this off as Big Beat are missing the fact that this is some borderline spiritual music, there really is no reference for it when you get down to brass tax and really listen to the music. can you really imagine making this? maybe on a plastic level if you think it's all just 'loops' as a friend of mine said, but on the level of the soul that is behind the sounds, no!

i agree. they say they are influenced by how music sounded to them when they were on drugs at early raves. sounds about right with that album...

elektrobank

i remember mopping the floors and blowing the pa i hooked my cd player up

when everybody was gone i'd sing to this song, singing

'scream i'm alive'

  On 2/25/2012 at 3:54 AM, yek said:

  On 2/25/2012 at 3:10 AM, vamos scorcho said:

the breakdown on the track "Dig Your Own Hole" is just inconceivable to me. i don't understand how they came up with something so abstract and huge. it's positively alien, the whole album, in part just from the energy and the creativity and disregard for all things conventional. listening to it with a rational mind I imagine being in their studio while they recorded it, what the fuck were these guys on? seriously, are they fucking insane? people who write this off as Big Beat are missing the fact that this is some borderline spiritual music, there really is no reference for it when you get down to brass tax and really listen to the music. can you really imagine making this? maybe on a plastic level if you think it's all just 'loops' as a friend of mine said, but on the level of the soul that is behind the sounds, no!

hey do a pretty good job at albu.on th

 

i agree. they say they are influenced by how music sounded to them when they were on drugs at early raves. sounds about right with that album...

Ever listen to their first mix CD? Fucking off the hook. This kind of mixing puts most modern DJs to shame. You can also hear how they harnessed their influences from hip-hop and rave.

Fatboy Slim also had an excellent mix around the same time. Proto "big beat" in a way, both of these albums have a lot of breakbeat and old hip-hop with stuff like acid house thrown in. I love You've Come A Long Way, Baby but this mix is probably my favorite Norman Cook release.

The reason I bring this up is because both Norman Cook and Ed and Tom had the same inspiration and influences. Cook's older but all of them were deeply connected with rave and were avid record collectors. Yet Cook has always embraced gimmicks and pure fun in his music, and that's great as a DJ but seems to wear off in a bad way when you're making albums. Only a handful of his songs are really moving emotionally. That and other big -beat artists suffered the same short-lived novelty.

You're dead on about how "spiritual" yet alien there music is. I know that "Temptation" by New Order and "Tomorrow Never Knows" are two songs they love, that they're fans of 80s and 90s psychedic rock like Mercury Rev and Flaming Lips, and that they followed Manchester bands as kids. Maybe that's what they channeled with their more "epic" songs. Even now that I know the drum and melodic samples the Chem's used, and the equipment they use live and in studio and all that, there's still such a novel sound and atmosphere on their first albums when I hear them, and that carried on to many tracks on Surrender and Come With Us too. I have no idea how they recorded Dig Your Own Hole though, and I'd love to know more about how it was made. Their early singles were sample based dance tracks. I know more recently (at least on We Are The Night) they often hash out hundreds, even thousands of sounds and bits before selecting what they like for the final tracks, but keep the loops for their live set.

  On 2/25/2012 at 4:42 AM, joshuatxuk said:

  On 2/25/2012 at 3:54 AM, yek said:

  On 2/25/2012 at 3:10 AM, vamos scorcho said:

the breakdown on the track "Dig Your Own Hole" is just inconceivable to me. i don't understand how they came up with something so abstract and huge. it's positively alien, the whole album, in part just from the energy and the creativity and disregard for all things conventional. listening to it with a rational mind I imagine being in their studio while they recorded it, what the fuck were these guys on? seriously, are they fucking insane? people who write this off as Big Beat are missing the fact that this is some borderline spiritual music, there really is no reference for it when you get down to brass tax and really listen to the music. can you really imagine making this? maybe on a plastic level if you think it's all just 'loops' as a friend of mine said, but on the level of the soul that is behind the sounds, no!

hey do a pretty good job at albu.on th

 

i agree. they say they are influenced by how music sounded to them when they were on drugs at early raves. sounds about right with that album...

 

Ever listen to their first mix CD? Fucking off the hook. This kind of mixing puts most modern DJs to shame. You can also hear how they harnessed their influences from hip-hop and rave.

 

 

Fatboy Slim also had an excellent mix around the same time. Proto "big beat" in a way, both of these albums have a lot of breakbeat and old hip-hop with stuff like acid house thrown in. I love You've Come A Long Way, Baby but this mix is probably my favorite Norman Cook release.

 

 

The reason I bring this up is because both Norman Cook and Ed and Tom had the same inspiration and influences. Cook's older but all of them were deeply connected with rave and were avid record collectors. Yet Cook has always embraced gimmicks and pure fun in his music, and that's great as a DJ but seems to wear off in a bad way when you're making albums. Only a handful of his songs are really moving emotionally. That and other big -beat artists suffered the same short-lived novelty.

 

You're dead on about how "spiritual" yet alien there music is. I know that "Temptation" by New Order and "Tomorrow Never Knows" are two songs they love, that they're fans of 80s and 90s psychedic rock like Mercury Rev and Flaming Lips, and that they followed Manchester bands as kids. Maybe that's what they channeled with their more "epic" songs. Even now that I know the drum and melodic samples the Chem's used, and the equipment they use live and in studio and all that, there's still such a novel sound and atmosphere on their first albums when I hear them, and that carried on to many tracks on Surrender and Come With Us too. I have no idea how they recorded Dig Your Own Hole though, and I'd love to know more about how it was made. Their early singles were sample based dance tracks. I know more recently (at least on We Are The Night) they often hash out hundreds, even thousands of sounds and bits before selecting what they like for the final tracks, but keep the loops for their live set.

i have that fatboy slim mix cd, it is a good mix indeed. don't know if i 've heard the chem bros.mix. i have the brothers gonna work it out mix which is quite good

  On 2/25/2012 at 4:42 AM, joshuatxuk said:

Ever listen to their first mix CD? Fucking off the hook. This kind of mixing puts most modern DJs to shame. You can also hear how they harnessed their influences from hip-hop and rave.

 

woah. I hadn't heard that one nor heard of it. I need to check it out.

Yeah it's definitely a rougher mix, but a fun listen. Here's a good allmusic.com review. I love finding these kind of mixes from what seems like ages ago. Fun little timecapsules.

I will never forget the night I was shown the chemical brothers. There was many chemicals involved, but I was fascinated by electronic music from that night on. They have some amazing work in their albums and made some amazing songs, but ever since 'we are the night' its been a little lame to me.

+1 to appreciation thread. Thanks Tom & Ed.

My love for early Chemical Brothers is equal to my disappointment with 'current generation' Chemical Brothers. Nowadays their sound is just so clean that the tracks end up sounding like a demo for some new Native Instruments product. For me Surrender was their transition album between styles and the last one I really cared for. The first two albums however are (obviously IMO!) by far their best works - just pure unrelenting raw energy.

I would write more, but I forgot what a pain in the ass it is to post on here with my phone!

  On 2/25/2012 at 9:21 PM, vamos scorcho said:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW9l_7u6UcY

Used that in a mix I made years ago, wish I still had a copy of it still. Actually made a pretty sweet transitition where he goes "we came to get down..." by speeding up that part to drop a track of a higher tempo. That singer on the track went on to be the singer in She Wants Revenge

The first chemical brothers track I heard was "Saturate" it got me hooked on electronic music and the brothers as well. Always have respect for Tom and Ed.

Respect to these dudes. I didn't get into electronic music through them like many here, but I did get a healthy dose of exposure to a bunch of good stuff via this CD, bought on a whim in a used CD store bin:

[youtubehd]SbcorX0Gsuw[/youtubehd]

Killer mix!

Also, Star Guitar FTW.

Edit: Not sure if this is correct, or even common knowledge, but I always wondered if the "Star" in Star Guitar was in fact taken from this (check the acoustic guitar chords at the very start):

[youtubehd]7AqWRB0wmSI[/youtubehd]

Edit2: Apparently it's well known fact and is on the Wikipedia page. Doh.

  On 2/27/2012 at 9:42 AM, Mellow U said:

Respect to these dudes. I didn't get into electronic music through them like many here, but I did get a healthy dose of exposure to a bunch of good stuff via this CD, bought on a whim in a used CD store bin:

 

[youtubehd]SbcorX0Gsuw[/youtubehd]

 

Killer mix!

 

Also, Star Guitar FTW.

 

Edit: Not sure if this is correct, or even common knowledge, but I always wondered if the "Star" in Star Guitar was in fact taken from this (check the acoustic guitar chords at the very start):

 

[youtubehd]7AqWRB0wmSI[/youtubehd]

 

Edit2: Apparently it's well known fact and is on the Wikipedia page. Doh.

I did not know that until a couple of weeks ago actually! They incorporate samples insanely well. Thanks to the internet there are very few samples that remain unknown to me, I even found out the drum used in The Orb's classic "Fluffy Little Clouds" recently.

i found out about this one the other night. really interesting. sample at 36 seconds.

Although I went to see Orbital DJ under a giant metal spider thing every video I watch of The Chemical Brothers performing at Glastonbury 2011 makes me think that I may have picked the wrong act to watch.

  On 2/27/2012 at 6:46 PM, vamos scorcho said:

i found out about this one the other night. really interesting. sample at 36 seconds. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zZrLjcMFw4

I've read that, but it's the first time I've been able to listen to the whole song. Awesome sample thanks for posting.

  On 3/2/2012 at 12:52 AM, xxx said:

Whenever I forget to load my mp3 player for the commute, I'll pass through the basement in the dark, grab a CD out of my old racks without looking, palm the CD so I can't see it and let the audio surprise me. Yesterday, it was "Loops of Fury" and, yeah, everything in this thread. Respek basically. Still astonished at what 1996-1997 hath wrought. After a few spins, I started to lament the fact that overt sampling is largely dead. Like someone else said, they make exclusively bland and clean music now...just like everybody else. There was a time that the challenge of dance music was to see what your sampler could throw up after whatever feast you loaded in. By this measure, Tri-Repetae-->Chiastic Slide Autechre could objectively be called a championship winner because they did things with found sound that still boggle the mind. I think I'll put away the VST's this weekend and "dig n' slice" instead, cheers Tom and Ed

Yeah there's very few sample-heavy artists that still have the effect on me. Madlib and Dilla comes close though.

I love these live mixes and mash-ups too, back when I heard this I had idea what samplers were or how any electronic/hip-hop production work, especially live. The Elektrobank one is awesome, even though it lacks the DJ Herc vocal bit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itRmPqdrMjk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lriN5IWeP0k

fuck yeah

anyone that hates on the chems can suck a bag of dicks. I don't care what they do until they die, the first 4 albums were top notch raving, fucking adrenaline pumping awesomeness without being overtly cheesy.....to me they are like the Thomas Bangalter/Daft Punk of big beat/breakbeat scenes....after Come With Us I sorta fell off....that was a great album but nowhere near as solid as Surrender or the earlier stuff.

That's not to say they aren't still making some amazing tunes.

Have any of you heard the Boys Noise Swoon remix? fuckingfantastic club tune...I would lose my shit if I heard this playing somewhere.

Will always have respect for the Chem. Bros....them and AFX turned me on to electronic music.

[youtubehd]5KvAPq9Rphc[/youtubehd]

was talking with my dad tonight about 1998 and hearing Chemical Brothers for the first time. He's the one that played them for me initially, hearing "It Doesn't Matter" and on and on into whatever happens on "Get Up on it like this" - the turning point in my life from mindless childhood drone to musical obsessive... the point from which music was simply something other people took care of to something I actively wanted to hear. I think part of what made my dad sick of those electronic acts was me begging him to turn off whatever he had on so we could listen to them... C Bros, Music for the Jilted Generation, even Hello Nasty would suffice... after all the C Bros named themselves initially after the producers that made that album.

I never can get him to admit that Dig Your Own Hole was brilliant but we were talking about it tonight and he was remembering the first time he heard it and bought it as well. Then he pulled out this fucking guitar tab book he bought me for Christmas back in... maybe 2004 or something? It's a fucking guitar tab book full of Chemical Brothers songs. There is a guitar riff for that acid line in "Chemical Beats" and so on... it's ridiculously stupid. But still awesome.

  On 3/7/2012 at 6:48 AM, vamos scorcho said:

even Hello Nasty would suffice... after all the C Bros named themselves initially after the producers that made that album.

Not sure that the Dust Brothers had anything to do with that one. Paul's Boutique is the one they're known for.

  On 3/7/2012 at 6:48 AM, vamos scorcho said:

Then he pulled out this fucking guitar tab book he bought me for Christmas back in... maybe 2004 or something? It's a fucking guitar tab book full of Chemical Brothers songs. There is a guitar riff for that acid line in "Chemical Beats" and so on... it's ridiculously stupid. But still awesome.

The whole "arena" aspect of their career is funny to think about. Like you said, stupid but awesome. Another other big beat or EDM act with guitar tabs for their songs would just be stupid.

  On 3/7/2012 at 8:51 PM, joshuatxuk said:

The whole "arena" aspect of their career is funny to think about. Like you said, stupid but awesome. Another other big beat or EDM act with guitar tabs for their songs would just be stupid.

http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/tabs/aphex_twin_tabs.htm

elektrobank is.... *up there* with the best tracks of the 90s. 

My 6th grade science teacher introduced me to the Chemical Brothers in 1996. I bought 'Dig Your Own Hole' in '97 and wore it the fuck out. 'Elektrobank' is an awesome track and the video is pretty neat too.

For some reason (possibly dr lopez's necrobump) I recently looked at the credits for Surrender and was surprised how little was actually written by the two of them. Aside from Under The Influence, Orange Wedge & Surrender it looks like all the other tracks were written by other folks (was even more suprised that Missy Eliott was a co-writer) of Music:Response

https://www.discogs.com/The-Chemical-Brothers-Surrender/release/136452

p.s. I could've sworn the first time I heard Under The Influence on the radio they gave it another name, like just numbers or something.... unless it was an Electronic Battle Weapon maybe ?