Ten Must-Have Electronic Albums: In Sides by Orbital

By Steve Henderson on Dec 25, 2007 filed under Music | Comments

This is the second of ten posts listing what I believe to be essential electronic albums to own in anyones collection. The last post started us off with Aphex Twin and his rambunctious ways. This post introduces the album In Sides by Orbital. They also represented on MTV Amp, with one of their videos, “The Box”, completely captivating me. To hear more about this awesome album, watch some old videos, or just stream some samples, read on (or just click here for those of you who can’t wait).

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The Ten Must-Have Electronic Albums

#10 Come To Daddy EP by Aphex Twin

#9 In Sides by Orbital

While there may be objections to having this album in the top ten, as opposed to Orbital’s many other qualified albums, this, in my opinion, is their more polished, mature and complex one. Well, alright, it just kicks ass and I wanted it here… and it’s my post. You may have heard Orbital on MTV Amp (”The Box”), or for the video-game-turned-movie lovers, the end scene of Mortal Kombat (”Halcyon+On+On”). For those that feel left out, check out the videos below.
portrait of orbital

Orbital’s previous albums were definitely club worthy, while this album is a little more, well, subtle. Don’t get me wrong, they still have the club sound, it’s just a lot more interesting. They seem to have created a rave like atmosphere in this album that includes hints of trip-hop and drum-n-bass, but in my opinion succeeding in keeping their music from becoming monotonous. The inclusion of trip-hop and drum-n-bass is none more evident than in their extended version of “The Box” on the bonus disc - but don’t count on finding it easily. The first release of In Sides (songs listed below) lasted only about a year. Once the movie The Saint came out, and since Orbital had a song for the movie, they re-released In Sides with a new-but-not-necessarily-improved bonus disc. So, alas, the awesome 28 minute version of The Box has become a hard-to-find treasure. But fear not! You can at least take a listen to it in its entirety here. For those that want to listen to all songs from the rare bonus disc, click here.

It would be unfortunate to not mention the undertones of “Save The Planet” going on in this album, so anyone interested should go to the always informative wikipedia. Hopefully you’ll be back, at least for the videos below.