The Big Jump reminds me of Daft Punk in general - I can't put my finger on it.



It's just a fun light-hearted house number! :D

The thing is, i'm not hearing any simularities, just chems.

The big jump does remind me a little of daft punk, nothing to do with the lyrics

Well I've only listened to PTB for like five times, but I have to say this. At the moment, I really don't feel too euphoric about it. I wish I did, but do not. :'(



First of all, I really appreciate that the chems really made a new album, none of the tracks are something that I would have heard before.



Galvanize is cool. (I just don't like the string hook in the chorus.) I really like the songs from The Boxer to Hold Tight London. Come Inside breaks the good mood, I think the live version sounded somehow better. I don't get The Big Jump. Left Right has potential, I have to listen to it some more. Close Your Eyes is nice. Shake Break Bounce feels like a failed experiment to me. Marvo Ging is something I also have to listen to some more. Surface to Air is nice, a little weird ending however, and the quiet bassline doesn't fit.



I think this album lacks melodies, a lot of time there's just some beats going on and then some weird sound test type of stuff on top of it. Nothing wrong with this, but when it goes on and on I'm really longing for some melodies. Too progressive for my mainstream tastes, eh? :?



When I think of putting this record on my record player, I'm anticipating The Boxer, Believe, Hold Tight London and Surface to Air but don't really care for the other songs.



About people praising the quality of the production and how it sounds great even when played on various volumes: When I'm listening to it, I'm constantly thinking the songs would sound more filling if I turned the volume up, but with the occasional very loud beats or bleeps I don't want to do that. It's like the beats cover up anything else. Well, this doesn't happen on all of the tracks.



Not very positive, eh? I don't know, I'm reading this topic and people say they are absolutely nuts about the record. I would really like to be a part of this. Maybe I can be. You can be sure I'm going to listen to the record for several months and then say what I really think of it. Just don't say that it's a grower, I think there is a really thin line between forcing yourself to like the record when it becomes more familiar and calling the record a grower.

Shake Break Bounce is a failed attempt at creating a Timbaland song.

soundertow Escribi�:

When I think of putting this record on my record player, I'm anticipating The Boxer, Believe, Hold Tight London and Surface to Air but don't really care for the other songs.

Heh, that was me two weeks ago. :)



Stick with it, it gets better and better.

When you listen first time it does seem like certain tracks are alot stronger.

I love push the button, this is now my fave chems record. All the tracks fit together incredibly well. The Boxer is excellent and there are some strange incomprehensible voice samples near the end (extremely hard to understand them and their not Tim's singing). The Big Jump is a really strange track but very good, especially because of the transition from Come Inside (the nice solo drumbeat). I love Shake Break Bounce because it's so barmy, especially the parts where it goes really quiet with one noise, the voice samples sound similar to the Galaxy Bounce samples in style but are more natural. Then there's those weird bubbly noises mixed with the ending of Galaxy Bounce. My favourite track is Marvo Ging, it's so feel good, it's the song you need to hear when you're on the way to work/uni/school, it makes you think 'life isn't so bad after all'. I love the strange voice sample at the beginning of surface to air too 8).

hey everyone,



long time no see! i hope your all doing well. seemed to have attracted a lot of valuable new members these days ;)



re PTB. im not sure im feeling it yet. to me it just doesnt feel right. and i do not say these words lightly! i have loved the chems for many years and i REALLY want to like this album, but im just not into it yet......



hopefully its just a slow burner - i wasnt that into galvanize at first, but now i reckon its pretty ace.



anyhow, will let you know more thoughts as an when they come.



take care y'all



mips



ps - Iggy for Moderator!!!

mippio Escribi�:

long time no see! i hope your all doing well. seemed to have attracted a lot of valuable new members these days ;)

ah the joy of irony!!! hows it going gezzer, nice artical in future music btw

iguanapunk Escribi�:

The thing is, i'm not hearing any simularities, just chems.

This is what i want to hear! Yeah, definately chems. :D

by the way, i've changed my mind concerning the comparison of the albums. I take each record as it's own... (just what i feel in this case)

whirlygirl Escribi�:

JacksRevenge Escribi�:

I hate this thread.

:( I take it you don't have your copy yet!

:( Nope, not yet.

But I'm told by my Virgin friend I shall have it in my hands by 6pm today evenin! Every minute is killin me!! :(

JacksRevenge Escribi�:

whirlygirl Escribi�:

JacksRevenge Escribi�:

I hate this thread.

:( I take it you don't have your copy yet!

:( Nope, not yet.

But I'm told by my Virgin friend I shall have it in my hands by 6pm today evenin! Every minute is killin me!! :(

Your virgin friend?

I think it's a reference to Virgin Records, which Astralwerks has a distribution deal with, or the Virgin Megastore.



Here's Popmatters Review of PTB



The Chemical Brothers: Push the Button



Rating - 8



By Tim O' Neil



If it is easy to conclude -- in hindsight -- that 2001's Come With Us was something of a disappointment, it is a great relief to report that Push the Button represents a triumphant return to form for the Chemical Brothers. The same flabby mid-career languor that has marred the recent output of important artists like the Prodigy, Massive Attack and the Orb seems to have bypassed our boys. Rather, Push the Button seems to represent both a return to form and a bold reinvention, if such a thing is possible, effortlessly evoking the Brothers' greatest achievements while simultaneously striking out into tantalizing new directions.



Since the release of 1995's Exit Planet Dust, the Chemical Brothers -- Tom Roland and Ed Simons -- have stood at the forefront of musical innovation. If this fact has been sometimes obscured by the loud and brassy nature of their singles, those who have listened with an open ear have come to recognize the Chems as perhaps the single most dexterous chameleons in modern music, in addition to being two of the most consistently underrated songwriters in any field of pop. The fact that neither of them sing and that their music has only sporadic relations with conventional instrumentation only makes it easier for trend-setting chauvinists to dismiss them.



But if electronic music seems slightly gauche in the year 2005, it's no fault of the music itself. The Chemical Brothers stand as a solitary force in contemporary music, regardless of the vicissitudes of fashion.



The problem with Come With Us was not that it lacked a handful of truly great tracks -- "Star Guitar", "It Began in Afrika" and "The Test" were all instant classics. The problem was that the rest of the album, the parts that fell between the driving singles, was somewhat unfocused. Whereas in the past every Chemical Brothers album had seemed to be an organic whole, Come With Us seemed strangely diffused, torn between strong dancefloor numbers and relatively emaciated stabs at more melodic material. Push the Button seems to have resolved this conflict merely through eliminating the stomping dancefloor hits that have defined so much of their past output. The overarching mood of this album -- notwithstanding two hip-hop numbers -- is melodic, and those who come looking for the same kind of monstrously powerful percussion that fueled "Afrika", "Hey Boy Hey Girl", and of course "Block Rockin' Beats" might be slightly disappointed.



Which is not to say that the driving beats and powerful basslines are gone, merely that they have changed along with the Chems overall sound. More than anything else, the development of the Chems' sound has been the gradual refinement of a basic template. They're still making the same type of music they were a decade ago, still creating powerful pop music out of the intersections between disparate genres, but their frame of reference has seen geometric growth.



In the beginning, the Chemical Brothers' most obvious influences, besides the acid house of their college years, were Public Enemy and Meat Beat Manifesto. This is how they defined their early "Big Beat" sound, by applying the techniques of musical collage, which had been refined by the production work of the Bomb Squad and Jack Dangers, to dance music. Sampling had been used in dance music since the very beginning, but never on such a wholesale basis. Half the fun of their early material came through in the interaction of multiple diffuse elements to create a kind of postmodern musical synthesis: a handful of eclectic noises artfully combined in order to create something much greater than the mere sum of its parts.



But as their sound changed and grew, it also grew more streamlined. If 1997's Dig Your Own Hole was still clearly a product of synthesizers and samplers, 1999's Surrender was the first step towards something entirely different. The music was still electronic, the beats still heavy, but the end result was strangely organic. The Chems were still musical magpies, but their appropriation became increasingly subtle to the point of invisibility. What is more, they became interested in turning their malleable sound to the service of a series of remarkably canny musical pastiches. "Out of Control", featuring Bernard Sumner on vocals, sounded more like New Order than New Order had in quite some time. In a similar fashion, "Asleep From Day", with Hope Sandoval, was a better Mazzy Star track than the majority of Mazzy Star tracks had been.



As enjoyable as these collaborations were, they also pointed to a potential Achilles heel in the Chems' admirably holistic approach. After the excellent Surrender, it would have been easy to imagine the pair becoming increasingly indebted to their collaborations, at the expense of their own unique style. Thankfully, Come With Us was surprisingly light on collaborations. But if their fourth album continued the trend towards an increasingly lean and organic sound, it also betrayed a startling indecisiveness.



The album's singles were great, but the rest of the album seemed uncharacteristically undercooked. Beth Orton, whose career was practically built on the strength of her vocal cameos on the Chems' first two discs, turned in a limpid performance on "The State We're In". The psychedelic terrain of "Denmark" and "Pioneer Skies" seemed almost an afterthought: whereas these tracks could have served as the centerpieces of any past Chems album, they just weren't long enough to register as convincingly as they should have. The whole thing seemed slightly emaciated, as if it would have benefited from another 10 minutes of fat (how many albums can you say that about?).



Push the Button is rounded and accomplished where Come With Us was uneven and tentative. This is the same Chemical Brothers that almost single-handedly bridged the gap between rock and dance back in the heady days of the "electronica" explosion. If you were worried that an unfocused fourth album was the beginning of diminishing returns for the pair, their fifth album serves as a reminder that the Chemical Brothers should never be underestimated.



The album begins with "Galvanize", still not my favorite track, but definitely far more palatable in the context of the rest of the album than as a stand-alone single (my review of which can be found here). I think that a part of my initial disappointment might have stemmed from the fact that it was an unorthodox choice for a first single -- but having heard the complete album, I realize that the disc isn't about the kind of floor-filling DJ anthems that have historically been their bread-and-butter. Those impulses seem to have been shunted, for the time being, into their prodigious B-side output (as shown by the awesome slab of acid that is "Electronic Battle Weapon #7").



This album features more vocals than any previous Chems album, but the preponderance of vocal elements hardy detracts. Whereas in the past vocalists were utilized to evoke specific stylistic antecedents, such as New Order, Mazzy Star, and the Beatles, for the first time they seem to be utilizing vocals for their own purposes instead of merely in the service of well-crafted pastiche. Therefore "Galvanize" is the farthest thing from merely an A Tribe Called Quest homage: with it's deep bass hits and powerful drums, it doesn't really have any precedent in modern hip-hop.



Tim Burgess returns on "The Boxer", having last worked with the duo on Exit Planet Dust's "Life Is Sweet". It's an odd track built on a ramshackle, slightly off-tempo piano sample set above a loping mid-tempo rhythm. It doesn't really sound like anything I've ever heard before: it's strangely syncopated and slightly light-headed. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the next single, because its not the kind of track you forget. "Believe" is the first of two tracks which seem to be at least partially indebted to late '70s/early '80s funk, featuring greasy guitar riffs over a floor-rattling house beat. Kele Okereke's repetitive vocal, in addition to the stomping beat, mark this as another possible single, and one of the album's best chances for dancefloor success.



"Hold Tight London" is an early favorite, and a singular example of the Chems' unique approach to melodic songwriting. The track is built on a shuffling Soca-influenced house beat, with additional percussion provided by Jon Brookes of The Charlatans UK. The minor-key melody sneaks in as a syncopated element of the beat, building in complexity until the song's entire movement reveals itself in the mellow crackle of an electric guitar. Anne-Lynne Williams provides the voice, providing an already melancholy track with a truly affecting heart and soul.



"Come Inside" is the album's second funk-influenced number, with a bass-heavy rhythm that seems at least partially influenced by Liquid Liquid's oft-sampled "Cavern". This track has one of the most pummeling beats the duo have ever recorded, offset against the preternaturally funky baseline. Those who may by now be wondering where the duo's traditional "Big Beats" are hiding need look no further than "The Big Jump", a slightly goofy guitar-driven rock track strongly reminiscent of Death in Vegas' "Dirt".



The album's second hip-hop track is "Left Right", featuring Anwar Superstar (who is, incidentally, Mod Def's brother). Surprisingly, given the apolitical nature of the Chems's oeuvre to date, its touches on recent politics and international affairs. It also seems slightly influenced by late '90s Southern-style "bounce" hip-hop, particularly the jagged synthetic percussion of early Cash Money and mid-era No Limit. I don't think that Anwar is probably anywhere near as talented as his brother, at least based on the evidence of this track, but he does offer an interesting, forcefully rhythmical style that serves as a fierce counterpoint to Q-Tip's smooth flow. However, Anwar's repetitious usage of the hoary "ghetto soldier" metaphor adds unfortunate weight to the unlikely Master P comparison.



"Close Your Eyes" is another highlight. The Chems here present a new British group, The Magic Numbers, for our consideration, and I must say this is certainly an impressive debut. It would seem that working with the Flaming Lips on 2003's "The Golden Path" (off their Singles 1993-2003 compilation) inspired the Chems to attempt a bit of their own indie-rock psychedelia. They've succeeded, as this is certainly the best Flaming Lips track that the Flaming Lips never recorded, with perhaps a bit of Mercury Rev's resplendent melancholy thrown in for good measure. It's easy to imagine quite a few indie rockers being surprised by this track. It's beautifully melodic, effortlessly catchy and perfect for college-radio mix CD's: if you needed more proof that the Chemical Brothers are still one of the most diverse and ambitious pop groups around, here it is.



"Shake Break Bounce" is another welcome flashback, a funky breakbeat track that brings to mind the Chems good friend Norman Cook, AKA Fatboy Slim. There's a frenetic bongo beat set against a softly strumming Spanish guitar, and effect which produces an oddly anxious mood. It acts as something of a palette cleanser before the album's final movement, beginning with "Marvo Ging". The track starts with a backwards steel-guitar loop, gradually giving way to a mid-tempo rock beat and gentle glockenspiel. It reminds me a lot of the title track to Surrender, another unique hybrid of acoustic instrumentation and electronic rhythms. "Ging" eventually gives way to "Surface to Air", which serves as a fitting climax to a stridently peripatetic album. It is almost reminiscent of Orbital, building slowly from a quiet synthesizer pulse, gradually adding extra additional elements until it reaches an irresistible crescendo. The song is built around a numinous guitar melody which could have been cribbed directly off Power, Corruption & Lie -- but while the track is perhaps informed by half-a-dozen influences, it is steadfastly unique, the kind of multi-faceted and trancsendant musical narrative that the Chemical Brothers create so effortlessly.



The Chems have always made a habit of taking the best bits from the music that inspired them and making them their own, synthesizing new forms from seemingly antithetical paradigms such as acid house and Brit-pop, or hip-hop and indie-rock. Although they've gotten better at streamlining this synthesis, they still betray their hand occasionally, such as their proclivity towards Sgt. Pepper-esque psychedelic crescendos which marks tracks like "Marvo Ging" and "Surface to Air".



Push the Button reaffirms the Chemical Brothers' status as the premiere group in electronic music. They weren't the first electronic group to consistently record indelible albums, and certainly there are any number of acts currently recording who possess enough raw talent to go measure-for-measure with Tom and Ed any day of the week -- the Basement Jaxx, Underworld, DJ Shadow, Orbital (before they retired). But the Chemical Brothers possess a kind of understated gravitas that can only come with a strident disregard for the vagaries of fashion. There are few genres as slavishly devoted to fashion as electronic music, and it is to their credit that while the Chems' may occasionally reference the sound of the moment, they remain diligently apart from the mainstream. They are now, as they have always been, sui generis, resolutely unique and consistently innovative.



The Chemical Brothers have overcome whatever temporary malaise they suffered on 2002's Come With Us and have successfully redefined their sound for a new era. Although its not a perfect album, the understated diversity of Push the Button has the potential to open up the group to an entirely new generation of fans. Although it may have seemed unlikely in 1997, the Chemical Brothers have crafted an album whose melodies are for more memorable than its beats. Its a natural progression, just another step in the Brothers' ongoing evolution, an incremental process which has hopefully just begun.



? 28 January 2005

And here's the new review from Stylus Magazine



The Chemical Brothers

Push The Button

Astralwerks / Virgin

2005

B-



In the mid-90s it looked as if dance music was on the verge of total crossover into the rock-oriented mainstream, and for a while I guess it did, and massively so in the UK. Orbital, Underworld, Leftfield, and Prodigy all had major hit singles, developed reputations for awesome live performances, and released albums which were hailed as classics by rock critics and dance fans alike; while Ibiza became as important a musical pilgrimage for the UK as Glastonbury and drum ?n bass was co-opted as soundtrack music for any television program wishing to capture ?youthful energy.?



The Dust Chemical Brothers were always the act whose CDs sat most readily next to the likes of Blur in rock-dominated record collections, the nerdy white guys who probably went to the same gigs as you and who made dance music that had about as much to do with Robert Miles as Motorhead do. They even, *gasp*, nearly broke America (whatever the fuck that means) with Dig Your Own Hole, finding heavy rotation on MTV with a couple of singles, and big beat looked set to find favour in the US where countless other waves of Euro-centric dance music had failed.



Fast-forward a decade. Something went wrong somewhere. Prodigy?s last album was lacklustre to say the least, Orbital committed revisionist hari-kari with Blue Album after the woeful Altogether, Underworld have slowly dissolved, Leftfield split, and guitars are back on the agenda with a vengeance. Come With Us, title track and a couple of singles aside, was a major dip for The Chemical Brothers, and came at a time when dance music was already floundering in the water in the face of technologically-advanced, dancefloor-oriented pop music and increasingly ecstasy-friendly hip-hop. The best dance album of 2001 was arguably Missy Elliott?s Miss E? So Addictive, proof, perhaps, that America wasn?t taking to Euro-centric dance music because it already had its own, and had it all along. Big Beat semi-succeeded where others failed perhaps because of its direct proximity to hip-hop, meaning it was more accessible to a US audience from the get-go. But anyway, who wants another fucking history lesson?



And so to Push the Button, The Chemical Brothers? fifth album in 12 years, and their best since the one before the last one, assuming you think the one before the last one was good. Which I do. It might, perhaps, herald the return of ?the dance album,? especially when taken in the context of other forthcoming releases like Daft Punk and LCD Soundsystem. It might also herald the point at which dance music consumes rock in order to assure its own survival, being as it is a more song-oriented affair than Come With Us, which seems in hindsight to try too hard to fill floors and not hard enough to maintain our attention as listeners. Or it might herald nothing.



Lead single and album opener ?Galvanise? finds Tom and Ed doing what they should have done ages ago; hooking up with a fucking great MC (Jason Warfield doesn?t count). Why it?s taken them until now to make such an obvious step is a mystery. Of course, as a creative entity they?ve always done more than just amp-up old Grandmaster Flash breaks and stick a 303 and/or a siren and/or a corrupted guitar riff on top, dipping into house and electro and various other sub-species of beat when they?ve felt like it, and generally doing so with aplomb, but what became known as Big Beat is still the sound most associated with them.



Q Tip?s effectiveness on ?Galvanise? (?If you think about it too much / You might stumble / Trip up / On your face? being one of my favourite radio moments of 2005 so far) is proof that they need to stop placing emphasis on using asthmatic indie ?singers? as vocalists. It worked well with Tim Burgess the first time, because he rode a fantastic piece of sun-drenched techno-pop, and Noel Gallagher?s flippantly Beatles-ripping pastiches were good fun just because, you know, they were a million miles better than his day job at the time, but Burgess yelping ?I?m a tiger? like a 12-year old girl in drama class on ?The Boxer,? Push the Button?s most aimless track, is poor. Much better is Kele Okereke from Bloc Party, who barely registers as a presence on ?Believe,? which is the correct way to go about it. Anwar Superstar?s politically-correct presence on ?Left Right? is a squirm-moment at first, but grows in power with repeated exposure. (It could have been Bobby Gillespie, for fuck?s sake. But it could also have been Eminem, which would be the greatest thing ever, and provable as such by science.)



Elsewhere we get ?Marvo Ging,? which would be a great name for a pet gecko, and is also a fabulously obvious backwards-streaming cod-Asiatic piece of white funk that makes me twitch when it flips up on my iPod. ?Hold Tight London? is pretty to the point of incandescence, ?Shake Break Bounce? is like Basement Jaxx on Ritalin, and ?Surface to Air? is their best album closer since ?The Private Psychedelic Reel,? all motorik rhythms and hints towards transcendence. In fact it?s so good that it imbalances perception of Push the Button as a whole, making it seem better than it is because it eradicates memory of what went on in the previous 55 minutes, meaning you go away from the record with a heady rush of ?brilliant!? rather than just ?quite good??



Why do I love The Chemical Brothers? Ignore the fact that they can fill a dancefloor and ride a break until it takes the back of your head off in a rush of near-orgasmic fucktitude; I listen to them most when I?m moving. Back in the summer of 1997 it was pure joy to be riding around in a mate?s car blasting Dig Your Own Hole and their awesome remixes of Primal Scream and Spiritualized, and for almost the first time since then (Surrender coming out post-mate?s car and pre-iPod) they?ve added some glide to my stride when I?ve been listening to them as I amble through town. I?m not sure that there?s anything as great as the New Order-in-space of ?Out of Control? or the delirious dance nostalgia-qua-neophilia of ?The Sunshine Underground,? and it certainly doesn?t stand up to Dig Your Own Hole or half of Exit Planet Dust, but Push the Button is much better than I?d hoped it would be a few months ago.



It?s ten years since we turned off at Planet Dust and that little subgenre we call dance music is in a totally different state to what it once was. The question isn?t whether The Chemical Brothers are still relevant or ground-breaking or even life-affirming (dancing is almost always life-affirming, poseur), it?s whether they?re good to dance to, to listen to.



They are.

ah the joy of irony!!! hows it going gezzer, nice artical in future music btw

sneaks! hows it going man, got yer mix in the post a while back, very good work sir, now currently nestling on my nu i-pod 8) :D



re the FM, cheers very much, they even managed ot get a pic of the chems in there as well!! me ma was dead chuffed, kind of actually made her think i was doing something worthwhile :-// X-D



as for PTB - yep, its a grower, im really starting to dig this now.



i am a huge chems fan. and when i got this album at first my initial feeling was dissapointment, it just seemd they got the weedy stuff off come with us and made an album out of it.



BUT - the more ive listened to it the more ive got into it. it has the chems feel - but listening to it its actually a really radical departure - theres maybe 2 or 3 dancefloor tracks and there not the high point of the album at all - in fact believe (track 3) is the worst on there imo...)



but the rest are cool, its really fresh sounding and innovative, a lot more melodic - even (shock) - proggy!!



if this album wasnt by the chems id be saying yeah, this is pretty groovy i like this - but because its the chems the expectations weigjh so heavily you almosty end up being over critical (well for me anyway) and going well, its not as good as blah blah (insert earlier work here) - which is something i dont want to do but cant help doing.



for me its def gaining approval. thumbs up etc etc. and im very happy with it now. :D



bring on may 27th!! brixton here i come!!



cheers



mips

BUT - the more ive listened to it the more ive got into it. it has the chems feel - but listening to it its actually a really radical departure - theres maybe 2 or 3 dancefloor tracks and there not the high point of the album at all - in fact believe (track 3) is the worst on there imo...)

but the rest are cool, its really fresh sounding and innovative, a lot more melodic - even (shock) - proggy!!



if this album wasnt by the chems id be saying yeah, this is pretty groovy i like this - but because its the chems the expectations weigjh so heavily you almosty end up being over critical (well for me anyway) and going well, its not as good as blah blah (insert earlier work here) - which is something i dont want to do but cant help doing.

at first i thought that too but i've listen a bit closer and it doen't sound that bad, it's not my fave but it's nice as well, could need a little more variation

mippio Escribi�:

BUT - the more ive listened to it the more ive got into it. it has the chems feel - but listening to it its actually a really radical departure - theres maybe 2 or 3 dancefloor tracks and there not the high point of the album at all - in fact believe (track 3) is the worst on there imo...)

It's definitely a grower, as you say, and I think you'll find yourself liking all the tracks in time. I've had it for a couple of weeks now and it's fascinating to see people starting of with pretty much the same first impressions, having the same likes and dislikes at different stages, then getting to like the whole album. All the hallmarks of a classic.

hmm, im guna get beaten now but...



was anyone disapointed with the end of the album? it just stopped after a brilliant last track. reminded me of the atrocity encountered on AONO.



other thoughts please.. i feel so dis loyal :'(