[Jimmy Dread]

Best Ever Techno & House Album Round 1:


Leftism by Leftfield

Nominated by Gowi

[Tha1ChiefRocka]

"Promised Land" is one of THE classic house tracks, and it's surrounded by a handful of so so to excellent tracks on this album. Some may find it corny today, but there is something extremeley endearing and honest about this album. Leftism is a good album too.

[Jimmy Dread]

Leftism for me - and it's not even close.

Promised Land suffers from that age-old problem of having one absolute killer track with the rest paling in comparison. If this were a best house anthem contest, "Promised Land" itself should rightly be in the top 10 - it's perfect. The rest of the album however sounds (to me at least) dated and hackneyed. Compare that to Leftfield's tour de force, which given my 'reggae' leanings naturally ticks the right boxes. In spite of the odd mis-step (I've never got on with "Original"), you've got genuine 'hands-in-the-air' moments (the tension building in "Space Shanty" until the beat kicks in, "Afro-Left"'s tribal skank), and in "21st Century Poem" one of the most spine-tingling album closers I can think of, as well as the soundtrack to many a comedown. Oh, and that's without mentioning "Open Up"...
_________________
'Reggae' & t'ing
Folk 'n Stuff
SHAMELESS RECORD DEALER PLUG

[Tap]

I haven't really spent any time listening to these but I will spend the rest of the week getting familiar with both to make an informed vote. looks like this one is close!

[bobbyb5]

I vote for leftism, even though it's never been a favorite of mine. I could never understand how leftfield and Massive Attack ever got to be the token electronic albums of Rock Fans who don't like electronic music. I think the 3rd most popular token electronic Act would be Portishead, but that makes sense because Portishead is so far above average. But Leftfield n Massive Attack are so average and un-spectacular that I can't see how they ever got an audience outside of the electronic audience, considering all the great ones there are to choose from. Go figure.

And speaking of Promised Land, how do you nominate stuff for this tournament? Cuz I wanna nominate these from the Golden Age of drum and bass if you ever do a drum and bass competition.



Promised Land Volume Two by Fabio / Cleveland Watkiss

Or


Promised Land Volume One by LTJ Bukem Featuring MC Conrad

And


Treader by Spring Heel Jack

[Jimmy Dread]

[undefined]

ngl I'm not huge on either of these. Leftism was pretty important to me in its being something of an early entry point for my explorations of dance music about a decade ago, but it doesn't do very much for me at all now.

to echo Jim, Promised Land has the "one track is killer and the rest is a snooze" problem going on. That said, that one track is actually fantastic and its presence might be enough to give Joe my vote despite not feeling most of the rest of the album (especially when compared to many of the album's similar but far more interesting and more fun Chicago contemporaries)

[joyofdivision]

Leftism for me too, it's pretty much an encapsulation of early to mid 90's club music, and more often than not succeeds as a crossover album from a genre that was usually on the fringes of the mainstream. Promised Land is one of my favourite singles in the genre and would have made a great EP but as an album, I'm not so sure. Really can't understand why this matchup is even close?

[undefined]

I'm starting to think there might be something of a cultural disconnect in my diminished love for Leftism? Seeing as my formative years were a decade removed and a continent away from UK rave culture...