Chemical Brothers

We're right in the thick of the second half of the '90s, and rave culture is at the peak of its glow. Big beat is riding the crest of the wave like the best of Kelly Slater. Someone, though, keeps calling it by what remains, deep down, its real name: chemical breaks. Yes, because behind that lightning-fast fusion of electronics, rock, dance, techno, funk and whatever else you want to throw in, there are two flesh-and-blood detonators: the Chemical Brothers. It's precisely them who decoded the ingredients of this explosive blend, starting with the release in January of the very distant 1994 of the EP "4th Century Sky" under the name Dust Brothers, containing the seminal "Chemical Beats". And it's always them who, going forward, would most consistently define the traits of this musical phenomenon (and not just that).

Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands' paths first cross in the halls of the History faculty at the University of Manchester. "Brothers" at the machines, at the console, in a recording studio or as headliners atop the massive stage of yet another electronic festival, the Chemical Brothers helped change the direction of dance music forever, walking it hand in hand to the gates of the new millennium. And they did it alongside many others (see, for different reasons, Daft Punk and Underworld), who like them believed in the possible fusion of disco and stadium-sized riffs, red-hot techno and evergreen American funk. Blends unthinkable only a few years earlier, with few forerunners acting as guiding lights, like Primal Scream under the direction of that giant Andrew Weatherhall. The tempo would mostly travel between 120 and 140 beats per minute. But it's the substance that changes. A tribal substance, as in the case of the jilted generation weaned by Prodigy in what perhaps remains the first absolute masterpiece of the genre alongside "You've Come A Long Way, Baby" by Fatboy Slim and "Electro Glide In Blue" by Apollo 440. Landmark records, arriving together with the perfect big beat album, namely "The Fat Of The Land" by the aforementioned Prodigy, driven by the inspiration of Liam Howlett.

"Dig Your Own Hole" saw the light of day on April 7, 1997. It's the Chemical Brothers' second album, following the widely acclaimed "Exit Planet Dust" and preceding the pop epiphany of "Surrender". An album that thus sits in the middle of a genuine evolution. A work that opens with the quintessential workhorse of their long career, "Block Rockin' Beats", with its unforgettable intro sampled in small part from the groove of "The Well's Gone Dry" by the American band Crusaders. An irresistible opener, a breakbeat that lodges itself in your head and moves your body whether you want it to or not. It's the manifesto track of a wave that would invade the world from the UK. A veritable tsunami of blistering riffs, unsettling polyrhythms, warning sirens announcing a new rave to be consumed in dark, disused warehouses. And an emblematic title, borrowed from graffiti on the walls next to their private studio in south London. Meanwhile the cover, with the stylized profile of a girl against a black background, would instantly become the symbol of a generation that, more than any other, lived through the transformations of dance music.

There's no letting up out of the gate, as it should be, and the following title track stirs body and soul even further with its wild changes of direction and that gait halfway between drum and bass, hugely fashionable at the time, and the looser, more playful street breakdance style, the kind pioneered by Kool Herc, so to speak. "Elektrobank" raises the bar of madness even higher, a London-style party sent into orbit for anyone, between one electro pirouette, precisely, and a powerful barrage of killer beats and riffs slammed into a noir, claustrophobic climax. An unrepeatable blast that would show huge future fleets of young manipulators the importance of always pushing beyond certain boundaries, no matter what.

Only partially halting the momentum of the opening trio is the following "Piku", which after a jittery start tends to vaguely grind to a halt in what sounds like the soundtrack to a deliberately badly sampled space video game. The following "Setting Sun", with its unmistakable "chemical" beat and the usual wavering between yet another barely-sketched siren alarm, would inaugurate, among other things, the hugely successful collaboration with Noel Gallagher, a fan of the duo from the very first hour, confirming the towering standing Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands had achieved in the upper echelons of the British star-system. The techno-leaning accelerations of "Don't Stop The Rock", along with the psychedelic ping-pong of "Lost In The K-Hole" and the soft bounce of "Where Do I Begin", featuring the splendid voice of Beth Orton, pave the way for the long final stretch: "The Private Psychedelic Reel", an ethno-breakbeat trip of almost ten minutes that turns everything and its opposite inside out within a new, radiant, vibrant and expansive fascination.

"Dig Your Own Hole" is the cornerstone record of an unforgettable movement, not just for the dance scene in its broadest and most contaminated sense, but for popular music as a whole.

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20/01/2019