Beaucoup Fish

Underworld

Product Details

• Audio CD (April 13, 1999)
• Original Release Date: April 13, 1999
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: V2 North America
• ASIN: B00000IFTF
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (172 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #40,842 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com's Best of 1999

The much-anticipated return of Underworld after 1996's landmark recording Second Toughest in the Infants, Beaucoup Fish is infused with subtle, lean rhythms, memorable hooks, and a youthful, sensuous energy. Alternately sinister and sweet, the endless DJ creativity on display is an ecstatic revelation. --Matthew Cooke

Amazon.com

A stunning album of smart, dance-pop craft, Beaucoup Fish blends stomping beats and meandering, binary dream worlds into a cohesive and heavenly revelation. It's another work filled with Karl Hyde's singsong talk-vocals ("Push Downstairs") floating over DJ Darren Emerson's sinewy, house-style rave-ups ("King of Snake"), a sound that has distinguished them since 1993's Dubnobasswithmyheadman. On Beaucoup Fish, however, that sound slips around tracks that do more than patiently await the next thick coat of rhythm, building simple songs into a digitized, epic whole. There are eruptions of ecstatic melody on songs such as "Jumbo," while jerky dance tracks such as "Bruce Lee" open whole new avenues for bursting layers of rhythmic ambience. Underworld are doomed to be haunted forever by "Born Slippy" (popularized via the Trainspotting soundtrack), the world's first international rave anthem, yet Beaucoup Fish goes well beyond such timely phenomena, and works instead to free electronic music from its computer-age constraints. --Matthew Cooke

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bravo Beaucoup, January 8, 2000

By	Rusty Pipes (San Pedro, CA) - See all my reviews

Beaucoup Fish came out during the summer and it keeps popping up on my player when I'm looking for a pure cutting edge listening experience.

Underworld is Darren Emerson, Karl Hyde, and Rick Smith, who've been rave faves for years. I first heard Underworld on the Trainspotting soundtrack a couple years ago, which featured a nine minute drum and bass cut called Born Slippy. That was good but I liked Dark and Long on Trainspotting II more. Beaucoup Fish is more like Dark and Long.

Fish is danceable in some places but it's much more an album to have around for just listening. Starting off with the monumental work Cups, easily my favorite among several strong cuts, Underworld sounds like what 10cc might have been doing if they had survived into the late 90's. It's cool electronic music, with vocals processed on a vocoder to be down and subliminal, almost subversive. No sample rip-offs, real vocals, with a touch of Euro-rap. Approaching ambient, Underworld's style is more like blue electronic jazz.

Push Upstairs is more upbeat than Cups, but the tempo goes down again for Jumbo. Another favorite, Skym, sounds as if Greg Lake is doing the vocals, then there's Push Downstairs, a spacier counterpoint to the earlier track. Kittens has lovely bridge in the middle that is a great test for your stereo. On some systems I've played it on, especially at low volume, the synth parts in the background sound as if a wad of lint has gotten stuck on the stylus. But of course we're listening to a CD here. It's actually a deceivingly multi-layered section that really blossoms on a good system at high volume. Maybe I can leverage that psuedo-distortion to get my wife's permission to upgrade my car's stereo, what do you think?

Trip-hop, techno-ambient, electro-jazz, it doesn't matter what you label it. Beaucoup Fish is one of the best albums I've heard this year.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Beaucoup Fun, June 8, 2000

By	Robert Stribley (NY, NY) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Beaucoup Fish kinda strays from Underworld's previous two albums, the highly-appreciated dubnobasswithmyhead and Second Toughest in the Infants. It's still definitely an Underworld album, replete as it is with guitars, sultry dance beats, and Karl Hyde's insistent, stream-of-consciousness vocals; in fact, if there's any difference, it lies in the tracks being a little closer to the mainstream--shorter in length, catchier. But not too mainstream, thank god. Don't worry Britney won't be doing Underworld covers any time soon.

"Push Upstairs" with its driving, repetitive piano sample is an instant highlight. That song's followed by the lovely, almost elegant "Jumbo," which glides along like a treat: "I need sugar; I need a little water, sugar" the song begins (well, after a short treatise on a vest on sale at Walmart) and later on we're listening to a coupla guys in a boat: "I've never fished here; but I caught beaucoup fish in Reverend Lake," one of 'em says. What these disparate elements have to do with one another, who can tell, but if you've ever seen the video, it manages to tie everything together quite nicely.

"Shudder/King of Snake" continues the album, again incorporating some kooky, yet entertaining sound-bites and a sample from a Donna Summer song.

Certain fans of Underworld from the early days are gonna hate the herky-jerky "Bruce Lee," no doubt, but it's a lot of fun nonentheless. Sure, it may stray further into hip-hop territory--but not that far and the lyrics are still dictinctively Hydeian.

"Cups," "Push Downstairs" and "Moaner" are all loads of fun, too, with the snazzy, jazzy "Cups" really living up to the epic hype it's been given here. And "Kittens" I'd probably like even better if I were deeper into Drum and Bass. It's all good.

Overall, Fans of Underworld's previous work should enjoy the progression on Beaucoup Fish; and newcomers to their work may actually find this album more accessible than the previous two.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Jumbo Bliss, April 3, 2000

By	Jason Zzyzx (USA) - See all my reviews

I was lucky enough to buy this album as an import and hear it a month before it came to the States. Since then, it's never anywhere I'm not. "Cups" is not only a great song, it's also a great epic song. (The remix is on the "Bruce Lee" single and pushes it to a more disco-flavored direction) "Push Upstairs" is just a heavy piano riff, and Karl Hyde's lyrics going in all different directions. "Jumbo" is one of those songs that puts you on air (The remixes also do justice to the original). "King Of Snake" is a pure dance-floor shaker. Only Underworld could have taken that Donna Summer-riff and raised it to a whole other level. "Bruce Lee" is about as pop as you'll get from Underworld, but they still understand that you won't want to recite their lyrics out loud. "Kittens" however, is a pure hardcore masterpiece. One continous rumble, thick snare drums and then the greatest use of gospel organ I've ever heard. PERFECT! Then "Moaner" comes in, builds faster and faster, shakes you to your knees as Karl screams at you until your head explodes and then you realize you have to put the album on repeat. Repeatedly. Underworld are GODS.