Underworld is back!

From a recent interview with Karl Hyde as posted on their official website:

Szigethu: Word has it that you have been working on your new record for quite a time and that it is almost finished by now. When can we listen to it?

KH: Yes, the demo material is ready. We would be the happiest if we could announce the release date as soon as possible. We will put it out sometime in the autumn but we don't have a specific date yet. We have yet to arrange a couple of things about it. But we have recorded about 100-150 new tracks. So when and how can you listen to the new record? We will play some of the new material at our gig at Sziget. If you like it, you can download it from the Internet... now that's cool.

Szigethu: What's the title?

KH: Oh we don't know that yet! (laughs) ...How I would love to decide on the title today! Sure we have given it much thought, we had a couple of ideas but none of them the right one... And we wouldn't want to be hasty so that none of these will be lost when we release the record.

Szigethu: Does the new material follow in the wake of A Hundred Days Off, your last studio release in 2002?

KH: Maybe the sound will make it feel similar. The sound design is like a huge painting... So we have already recorded the material and finished the album cover that has always been a trademark of ours. We are finished with everything but without being excessive. It's like creating an image of us in a broader sense. Since we have managed to make over a hundred tracks, we started to wonder how we could release all of them... That would truly be a unique record. Our contract with our previous record company has just expired so now we are free to make our choices. That's another reason why we are not in any hurry, we want to look around, revise our plans and we are constantly working to choose the most beautiful songs, find the best ways and that's wonderful.

Szigethu: So how do you create new songs?

KH: Do you think we have written any one new song at all? (laughs) There are many various ways a new song can come to life. We work together with Rick, we create separately and then mess with each other's compositions, make something in a hotel room on our laptops. Then together in the recording studio, but it even matters if it is live and loud in a big studio or in our home studios. We use every possible way to create: alone, together, loudly and making a big racket or with headphones in hotel rooms or on the tour bus. Someone who only knows us as a live band would find it strange how eager we are to work. We want to realise every concept possible. We don't want to miss out on any way of making music.

Szigethu: The catchphrase of the nineties was that electronic dance music, techno was the new rock music... Maybe the picture has cleared a little by 2005. Had the prediction become fulfilled?

KH: We shall see... But we have no worries if that's what you mean. I'm not sure though if you should attach tags on it. We cannot make such strict categories because musicians could easily become labelled. I think about music in a broader sense with its many genres. And they all inspire me. We have started a web radio programme and in between the bullshiting I play a lot of new music, from gipsy music to techno, to rock music, kolo or classical music. A lot of wonderful music. I'm not interested in categories and genres made up by critics, or for them. I'm interested in the music itself.

Szigethu: After your massive success in the nineties, where does Underworld stand in today's musical world?

KH: I don't know, no matter how hard I think. (laughs) ...It's a thing where people believe so many things that the media feeds to them. But what they will surely treasure in their minds is what they lived through themselves. And I know something will happen in Budapest as well. It will go very different from a show we do in Glasgow for instance. Even though we just play the music, it's nothing special. But still, something always happens within the audience everywhere, like it used to in the underground once, or sometimes even in the overground. Music makes its way everywhere. We really feel fortunate that we can play our own music to the people and that we can be a part of it through our performances. Because that's how I know what goes on in what I do. That's why I love to hear the music.


w00t!

That's good news. I loved the Hundred Days Off and I usually don't cotton to electro music too much.

Since I stole this from Remi in the first place I thought I would return the favor as my other board takes the info and expands upon it in so many ways. Cut and paste recent news of what is up with Underworld or today’s news:

karl hyde just announce on radio 1 that Underworld will release 150 songs online. for some Underworld fans, including me, this is a dream come true...

over the coming weeks, we'll be rolling out full recordings of underworld live in sophia and at benicassim earlier this year, track by track. to start with you'll find the first two tracks up there in the audio section.

in the video section we'll be doing a similar thing with the performance from sophia this summer. two video clips are up there for you now, and the rest will follow.

we've also been adding to the historic archive. in the pre-2005 video section you'll find a selection of clips from electraglide in japan (2003), the werchter festival in belgium (2003) and somerset house in london (2003).

over time, we plan to add more to the pre-2005 sections as we unearth more material in our archive.

the other section is to be home to everything else. web movies, talking heads, stop-frame movies from rehearsals, jams and broadcasts - that sort of stuff.

to start with, we've added some stop-frame movies from the dirty broadcast, john peel show, music bank jam and a smithless-in-lemonworld recording session.

-- Ned Raggett November 5th, 2005
...
-- Lukas November 9th, 2005

And NOW for that link: http://www.dirty.org/forums/showthread.php?t=1620

thanks for your patience, we know it's been annoying, we're even scared to say it but.................we're ready!

Tomorrow/today (depending on where you are) will see the release of the first new underworld material for................well, ages.......and here's the how, why and where.

we will be releasing music as a series of downloads exclusively from underworldlive.com and wanted you to be the first to know.

the downloads will consist of 5/6 different pieces interwoven, mixed, blended, whatever you want to call it into a single piece 25/30 minutes in length. the releases will sometimes follow a rough musical theme (there's a dub influenced one already in the can) sometimes they won't - but the idea is to give us the chance to stretch out into areas we have only been able to touch on with traditional album releases, and give you the listener an underworld experience over the time it takes to listen to one side of an old vinyl album.

after years of recording, promoting, touring and falling out we think it's time for us to step off the treadmill and give our time to a number of projects and ideas some of which have been kicking around for years, firstly the score to anthony minghella's new film, followed swiftly with some remixes/collaborations with some of our favourite underground dance producers/djs..............and there will be more, much, much more.

another aim of changing things is to give us the chance to respond to what's happening musically out there in the world and put an underworld spin on things more than once every three years - like the way things happened in the days of white-labels, selling records from vans and junior boys own....we hope you'll be able to hear this in the music. it will also help us refresh the live set with more new songs in a way we haven't been able to in the past, something we've wanted to do for a long time now.

none of this spells the end of traditional albums, remixes, tours, gigs it's just a way of getting music to you without the help of a multinational every time we feel inspired. expect too see underworld in the charts, on the radio, in the press and in your town again but in the meantime fill you're boots at underworldlive.com.

rick and karl
9th november 2005

I actually think that they've gotten better with each album, so naturally this is fantastic news for me.

A Hundred Days Off is so goddamn underrated.

I'm not really crazy about live material but I'll take anything I can get that's new from Underworld.


edit: Just tried registering at that website. If I can download some mp3's and they're of good quality I'll post them for everybody here.

Yeah some people on ILM are having trouble, the R post: http://ilx.wh3rd.net/thread.php?msgid=6326040

If you can’t post these I have connections and will be able to get these out to Obner…

Yes very good quality at 192 according to.

Shake That Higher:

http://s60.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2I0M5K6YJVSU03IOZ1W36VKGMZ

New Train:

http://s60.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=20XOMQRIQKL4N0MHFKQB0AL2J8

Globe:

http://s52.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=25LV4M4HIR3PY2BENTVD8B3OO7

Dammit! That's twice in one week!

...that we've had good news?!?

that we've had a Futurama tease thread, I think.

when's the wedding? and ice cream?

This is true. At least we got a Futurama picture though.

I'm fighting off a tummy full of very bad (for you) food. Give me until tomorrow, then we can eat ice cream. With or without paper.

Sorry about the tummy. I hope you feel better!
Ice cream, OK!!!

I do. Thank you. And it's tomorrow, so it's you and me and ice cream.