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The Best Album Of All Time - Underworld v the Beatles

Which is the better album?

  • Underworld - Second Toughest of the Infants

    Votes: 7 33.3%
  • the Beatles - Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

    Votes: 14 66.7%

  • Total voters
    21
  • Poll closed .

milo

Jack L. Jones
Second_Toughest_in_the_Infants.jpg


Second Toughest in the Infants is the fourth album by Underworld, and the second in their "MK2" line-up with Darren Emerson. With this album, Underworld expanded on their progressive palette, while developing their signature sound of abrasive beats and anthemic melodies. The unusual name of the album derives from a comment made by member Rick Smith's six-year-old nephew, Simon Prosser, when asked on his progress at infant school, the level of schooling attended by four- to seven-year-old children in the United Kingdom. Second Toughest featured the single "Pearl's Girl". The re-issue featured the band's best known single, "Born Slippy .NUXX".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Toughest_in_the_Infants

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL61F155C3EF0E3628

v

beatles-sgt-peppers-album-001.jpg


Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the eighth studio album by the English rock band the Beatles. Released on 1 June 1967, it was an immediate commercial and critical success, spending 22 weeks at the top of the albums chart in the United Kingdom and 15 weeks at number one in the United States. Time magazine declared it "a historic departure in the progress of music" and the New Statesman praised its elevation of pop to the level of fine art.[1] It won four Grammy Awards in 1968, including Album of the Year, the first rock LP to receive this honour.

In August 1966, the Beatles permanently retired from touring and began a three-month holiday from recording. During a return flight to London in November, Paul McCartney had an idea for a song involving an Edwardian era military band that would eventually form the impetus of the Sgt. Pepper concept. Sessions for the Beatles' eighth studio album began on 24 November in Abbey Road Studio Two, with the original intention to record an album of material that was to be thematically linked to their childhoods. Among the first tracks recorded for the project were "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane", but after pressure from EMI the songs were released as a double A-side single; they were not included on the album.

In February 1967, after recording "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", McCartney suggested that the Beatles should release an entire album that would represent a performance by the fictional Sgt. Pepper band. This alter ego group would give them the freedom to experiment musically. During the recording sessions, the band endeavoured to improve upon the production quality of their prior releases. Knowing they would not have to perform the tracks live, they adopted an experimental approach to composition, writing songs such as "With a Little Help from My Friends", "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "A Day in the Life". The producer George Martin's innovative recording of the album included the liberal application of sound shaping signal processing and the use of a 40-piece orchestra performing aleatoric crescendos. Recording was completed on 21 April 1967. The cover, depicting the band posing in front of a collage of celebrities and historical figures, was designed by the English pop artists Peter Blake and Jann Haworth based on a sketch by McCartney.

Sgt. Pepper is regarded by musicologists as an early concept album that advanced the use of extended form in popular music while continuing the artistic maturation seen on the Beatles' preceding releases. It has been described as one of the first art rock LPs, aiding the development of progressive rock, and credited with marking the beginning of the Album Era. An important work of British psychedelia, the multigenre album incorporates diverse stylistic influences, including vaudeville, circus, music hall, avant-garde, and Western and Indian classical music. In 2003 the Library of Congress placed Sgt. Pepper in the National Recording Registry, honouring the work as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[2] That same year Rolling Stone magazine ranked it number one in its list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. As of 2014 it has sold more than 30 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best selling albums of all time. The music scholar David Scott Kastan described it as "the most important and influential rock and roll album ever recorded".[3]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sgt._Pepper's_Lonely_Hearts_Club_Band

[video=youtube;1T5fqLBhZgo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T5fqLBhZgo[/video]
 
This one's not even going to be close but I am a huge Underworld fan so they're getting my vote (I actually like their live "Everything, Everything" album more tbh).
 
Horrific choice. Both fantastic.

I actually don't think I can vote.

Sgt Peppers is one of the greatest albums of all-time, Second Toughest…was a religious experience for me…


If a casting vote is needed I'll develop a pair of balls and make a choice…
 
Sgt Peppers for me. It's the same as with the Michael Jackson v Foo Fighters thread. They are both excellent but Sgt Peppers is just that step ahead.
 
It shames me to say that I've never really 'got' the whole Beatles thing. Preferred the Stones and the Doors.

I listen to Underworld and it's like I've jumped into a time machine to the 90s.
 
I remember quite enjoying underworld, but this is the beatles, not my favourite beatles album, but I understand why it is for a lot of people
 
Not even close to being the Beatles best album, but sold the most and as a result is always referenced as their best. Often described as a psychedelic masterpiece, it is a blemish on the genre.

Still got my vote though...
 
Not even close to being the Beatles best album, but sold the most and as a result is always referenced as their best. Often described as a psychedelic masterpiece, it is a blemish on the genre.

Still got my vote though...

Me too. Magical Mystery Tour for me. Has Strawberry Fields Forever, Magical Mystery Tour, Penny lane, I am The Walrus, Hello Goodbye, Baby I'm a Rich man etc. Was planned to be a double combined with Pepper, but marketing a double was deemed to be too hard.That is why the original release had a gate fold, despite it being a single album. Instead Mystery Tour was released as an EP and the much anticipated double was delayed until the White Album. A pity because so many songs from Mystery Tour fit with Pepper. I have played around with a combined running list and it is awesome.
 
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Me too. Magical Mystery Tour for me. Has Strawberry Fields Forever, Magical Mystery Tour, Penny lane, I am The Walrus, Hello Goodbye, Baby I'm a Rich man etc. Was planned to be a double combined with Pepper, but marketing a double was deemed to be too hard. Instead Mystery Tour was released as an EP and the much anticipated double was delayed until the White Album. A pity because so many songs from Mystery Tour fit with Pepper. I have played around with a combined running list and it is awesome.

My favourite is Rubber Soul, the turning point for when they were no longer the One Direction of their day, and as George Harrison said 'the pot album'. I think their best work is Revolver though.

I've never messed around with combined running lists but it's something I might give a go
 
Not even close to being the Beatles best album, but sold the most and as a result is always referenced as their best. Often described as a psychedelic masterpiece, it is a blemish on the genre.

Still got my vote though...

I think that you are being a bit harsh on Sgt Peppers there. I think that the two albums that preceded it are better but Sgt Peppers is still a great piece of work.
 
Anyone but the Beatles.

Never liked pop music - don't like old pop music any more than I like new pop music.
 
It shames me to say that I've never really 'got' the whole Beatles thing. Preferred the Stones and the Doors.

I listen to Underworld and it's like I've jumped into a time machine to the 90s.

There's no shame in that. It's like preferring Nirvana to Hanson.
 
There's no shame in that. It's like preferring Nirvana to Hanson.

I think that is an unfair comparison. Without the Beatles there may never have been the Rolling Stones or Doors.

Personally, I can take or leave Jim Morrison's six form poetry.
 
I think that is an unfair comparison. Without the Beatles there may never have been the Rolling Stones or Doors.

Personally, I can take or leave Jim Morrison's six form poetry.

I'm not a massive Doors fan either, but the Stones are something entirely different.

I think the Stones would have been a lot less famous without the Beatles - they made British bands a global phenomenon. I'm not sure the music of the Stones would have suffered from that though.

Other than that, I really don't believe the Beatles added anything to music. After all, Take That and One Direction are famous around the world and make a lot of girls scream too.
 
I'm not a massive Doors fan either, but the Stones are something entirely different.

I think the Stones would have been a lot less famous without the Beatles - they made British bands a global phenomenon. I'm not sure the music of the Stones would have suffered from that though.

Other than that, I really don't believe the Beatles added anything to music. After all, Take That and One Direction are famous around the world and make a lot of girls scream too.

I don't get the comparison between the Beatles and modern teeny bop bands. They were a product of the time and need to be viewed through that prism.

If you look at British (or international ) artists in the charts before and after the Beatles there is a huge difference. Before the Beatles the charts were basically full of variety artists years older than the average age of the record buying public. The Beatles smashed all of that away and wrote some bloody good songs whilst they were at it. By breaking through that, they cleared the way for the bands that we now associate the 60's with.

Where all artists that had teenage girls screaming at them worthless? Wasn't a lot if the appeal of the Stones (particularly early on) down to the looks of Jagger and Jones?
 
I don't get the comparison between the Beatles and modern teeny bop bands. They were a product of the time and need to be viewed through that prism.

If you look at British (or international ) artists in the charts before and after the Beatles there is a huge difference. Before the Beatles the charts were basically full of variety artists years older than the average age of the record buying public. The Beatles smashed all of that away and wrote some bloody good songs whilst they were at it. By breaking through that, they cleared the way for the bands that we now associate the 60's with.

Where all artists that had teenage girls screaming at them worthless? Wasn't a lot if the appeal of the Stones (particularly early on) down to the looks of Jagger and Jones?

I agree that the Beatles changed things, I just don't believe they changed them for the better. We can agree that they were massively influential, I just don't like the monster they created.

Continuing the Stones comparison (although I know that could get a little tired), take away their fame and the Stones are still the same band - music still stands the test of time, quality is still there. Take away the fame from the Beatles and they're just another pop band.
 
I'm not a massive Doors fan either, but the Stones are something entirely different.

I think the Stones would have been a lot less famous without the Beatles - they made British bands a global phenomenon. I'm not sure the music of the Stones would have suffered from that though.

Other than that, I really don't believe the Beatles added anything to music. After all, Take That and One Direction are famous around the world and make a lot of girls scream too.

Beatles played their own instruments and wrote their own songs though. Their sound is different from Nirvana, but the music is much closer than you'd like to think.
 
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