Review Summary: Accelerating towards greatness so quickly that most people were left in the dust and only caught up with the second effort.
The early 90s were an interesting time in music: rap showed no signs of slowing down, trip-hop was becoming a thing, shoegaze was peaking, extreme metal saw an upsurge in creative songwriting, some dudes in Seattle were made into rockstars against their will, the list goes on... But really it was electronic dance music that saw the biggest and fastest developments, with subgenres popping up like mushrooms after the summer rain. Still it was a scene primarily dominated by vinyl singles, DJ sets, raves and parties of varying legality, back when home internet was but a dream for a few people and "dafooksthatmate?" for everyone else. This has led to a bit of a pickle, because the pasty millennial tastemakers that rule Pitchfork and RYM today have never set foot in that scene, while the people who have would hardly care to engage in such environments today (assuming they even remember anything after all the acid). So it came to be that Lifeforms was arbitrarily designated "that important Future Sound of London album" and gradually solidified its position as cult classic - and to be perfectly clear, an undeserving album that one is not. But the internet being as the internet does, other things of quality have been left overlooked gathering dust.
Garry Cobain and Brian Dougans, better known as The Future Sound of London, started making waves with their 1991 hit single "Papua New Guinea". Their debut LP Accelerator should have accompanied it but was held back some nine months by the record label, and is ultimately largely remembered as "that album with Papua New Guinea on it". The single in question is a dance classic no doubt, but perhaps therein lies the problem, it's not ostensibly "intelligent" enough. Regardless, with bassline sampled from
Meat Beat Manifesto's Radio Babylon and vocals from
Dead Can Dance's Dawn of the Iconoclast, fitted and reworked into the same kind of lush atmospheric trip as something like
808 State's Pacific State, it was a deservedly big deal, influential, even getting remixed by Graham Massey of 808 State himself, as well as
Andrew Weatherall of
Two Lone Swordsmen among others.
In order to make the strongest possible case that Accelerator deserves more love, we need to look at everything other than Papua New Guinea. The opener "Expander" does a great job of setting expectations: ambient layers and tame 303 acid squelches give way to a driving bassline that is quickly joined by a solid breakbeat and we're off to the races! But there's no time for monotony to set in thanks to well timed breakdowns, careful addition of more layers of samples for atmosphere, and even a delirious sounding lead melody. "Stolen Documents" is a comparatively much more straightforward and understated house tune, arguably dated by its 808 claves and rims as well as plenty of other iconic sounds of the day. Yet it too speaks to Cobain and Dougans' ability, showcasing not only a complete mastery over the basics of what makes a good dance tune but also how effective use of samples and subtle layers at just the right time never leaves the listener feeling bored.
To some degree this may be the duo's biggest strength on Accelerator, and part of what has allowed the material here to become overlooked: it isn't visionary music by way of eschewing formulas and coming up with new structures, it's taking some of the common forms of its time and intricately crafting memorable arrangements that are both immediately enjoyable but still reward repeated listening thanks to all the small details woven in. Of course it's not just attention to detail for detail's sake but a genuine focus on atmosphere, ensuring every track has a sense of mood of its own. To dissect how this is achieved would not necessarily be enlightening for anyone; yes it's a combination of synth pads and samples with reverb and maybe delay effects added as needed. But the magic is of course in choosing exactly the bells and whistles that fit the mood you're trying to convey, the sounds that will feel appropriately evocative.
And Accelerator nails that. There's the ominous quasi-industrial feel of "It's Not My Problem" and the aptly titled "Central Industrial" (which even samples
Throbbing Gristle's What A Day - so really they knew exactly what they were doing); there's the dark urban feel of "1 in 8" which is likely to transport your mind and arse straight to Detroit; there's the haunting vocals on "While Others Cry" (sampled from Yargo - Carrying Mine) that give the track a fairly melancholic vibe overall. And then there's both "Calcium" and "Moscow" keeping things fresh by playing around with how they approach percussion, both even featuring some very tasteful and equally tasty hand drum samples.
I've said at the beginning that the early 90s were a time of rapid changes for electronic dance music, but many specific subgenres and niches being carved in parallel throughout warehouses and dance floors is only half the story really. The other half is that of the acts that did choose to treat us to full length albums, very few of the notable ones were content to just stay in one niche. This applies not only to The Future Sound of London but also to
The Orb,
Underworld,
Orbital,
Aphex Twin and more. Of course to ignorant wankers it's all "ambient techno", and to the worst of ignorant wankers it's not even worth trying unless you can convince them it's "ambient techno". In reality part of what made these acts so special was that they came from the underground, fed on the ideas of the underground, and combined them freely in their own unique ways while at the same time allowing this kind of music to break through to a space in our consciousness where it can be seen as equally suitable for home listening. But most important of all, the melding of these ideas came not from a desire to incite debate on what is ambient techno and what is house and what is progressive breaks, nor did it come from a desire to kowtow to any outside authority and try to prove that dance music can be "intelligent" whatever that means; no, in all cases it came from a place of passion and love for the scene they were part of and music in general really, when you consider the sources of some of the samples used. The passion is made clear both by the care with which the music is crafted as well as the ambition of treating genres less like rules and more like a Swedish buffet of sorts, and ultimately that very passion is what deserves to be celebrated.
