11. UnderworldBeaucoup Fish
I’ve always been a dance music fan. It really was the music I grew up with. My teenage years revolved around the dancefloor and I’d spend most of my nights ‘stomping’ to house music. Thing is, the electronic artists I loved didn’t make albums I cherished, they made singles and apart from some obvious exceptions like KLF – The White Room, I didn’t really own many dance albums. My tastes moved on to hip-hop and it wasn’t until 1999 when Aaron arrived home with this Underworld record on double vinyl that I finally came to know and appreciate a full and complete dance music album. Finally here was a set of songs that flowed seamlessly together over pure beats with incredible synth lines. I couldn’t get enough. In fact the level I became obsessed with this record at that time put it by far and away in the lead of albums that influenced the first Liars record. We tried to tell journalists this but all they wanted to imagine was that we mainlined Gang Of Four and PiL every day which really couldn’t have been further from the truth. Anyway, I digress. Beaucoup Fish still has a big influence on me musically and I’d be remiss to point out that it helped to inform the way some of the more up-tempo dance songs on our new album, Mess came together.
I’m particularly a fan of the use of voice samples in spots throughout the record. One of the highlights being the beginning of the track ‘Jumbo’ – "…there’s a little sale on uh vests at uh, Walmart – nine dollar, eight something, yeah, nice little vest… light". I always found this so interesting and perplexing. Yes the words themselves are great but the sample itself created such a strange impression in my mind. This is a British group, with a French album title and they have a sample of some Yank guy talking about Walmart? It just kind of threw out any sense of where or how this music was created. I liked that. I’ve always felt that was one of the greatest things about dance music. It just seems kind of borderless and universal. Unlike other genres of music that gets so steeped in the culture and environment where its created, electronic dance music speaks all languages and moves beyond its temporal scope into a more limitless functionality.
