After the promising but uneven Green album, Orbital seemed to just get better and better with each release, deepening their themes, increasing the complexity of the layering of their melodies and beats. Yet their work remained suprisingly minimal; every element of a track was essential, and introduced for a reason. Despite the careful construction, Orbital's music wasn't sterile or academic like much electronic music. It's hard to make a machine bleed emotion, but Orbital could. And in a way that seemed effortless.

Sadly, effort, even desperation is evident on The Altogether. As with its predecessor, the aptly titled Middle of Nowhere, Orbital seem confused and directionless. The tunes are internally fractured and needlessly busy, and the album sustains no coherent theme. They attempt to turn the latter deficiency into a virtue--"hey, it's eclectic, man!"--but the fact remains that sampling random musical styles is no substitute for concept. Track times are shorter than ever, but unlike before, when Orbital could sustain a 12 minute track so successfully that you couldn't imagine it any other way, these bite-sized songs grow tiresome before they hit the three minute mark. Most depressing of all, it seems the Hartnoll bros realize their diminished ability, and are trying to compensate by being "deliriously silly" and self-referential. At least when Aphex Twin or Autechre start navel-gazing the results are often interesting. This is not.

I lay some of the blame on the shoulders of producer Mickey Mann. He produced this album, Middle of Nowhere, and the Brown Album (which, though brilliant, sounds overproduced to my ears). Many tracks on this album--Funny Break, Pay Per View, Shadows, Meltdown--would sound better given a different treatment. But I can't escape the feeling that no matter what the production, these tracks just don't contain a fraction of the emotion and care that went into earlier Orbital work.

Mock Tudor, Doctor Lookout! and Beelzebeat off of the bonus disk are OK. Still not reason enough to buy the double disk. Don't let this review dissuade you from picking up In Sides or Snivilization, though, as they represent the pinnacle of electronic music.

7 of 7 found the following review helpful:


Disappointing  May 16, 2001
To be fair, Orbital may be doomed to be forever judged against In Sides and Snivilization - two unfairly high benchmarks. That caveat spoken, The Altogether is wholly disappointing. Yes it's imaginative; yes it proves again how far the brothers have come from the (great in its own right) Green Album. Nevertheless, this album lacks the energy or emotion of the Hartnoll's high water marks. Although parts of this disc are unquestionably beautiful, it lacks any sort of coherent flow and is thus unable to really captivate listeners the way those two great discs did.

Up through In Sides, Orbital seemed to be on a wonderful trajectory - moving from imaginative and energizing techno to a brilliant blend of IDM and trance. However, Middle of Nowhere seemed to be a step back away from that formula, instead moving towards more mindless, poppy sounds. It pains me to say that, given this, The Altogether seems to be more of the same, indicating that Orbital have since In Sides decided to embark on a new direction. I say unfortunately because, as with MoN, the tracks here just don't seem to spark the intellect or the emotions the way Are We Here? or Out there Somewhere? can. Consequently, this disc leaves me feeling flat and wanting more because, though the music seems capable of it, it never gets to the apogees I sense and hope it might. The sounds just kind of roll along somewhat repetitively, again (like MoN) relying too heavily on vocal samples and not enough on the mixture of tempos, keys, and layers that drive Orbital's best works.

Anyone who likes Orbital will surely like this as the Hartnolls seem incapable of producing inferior music, but only those for whom MoN was their favorite release will truly love this disc. For all those for whom this is not the case, I fear you will be similarly disappointed as I, and left with the feeling that, sadly, Orbital has forsaken their most effective and emotive formulas for something less satisfying.

12 of 14 found the following review helpful:


Orbital In The 21st Century  Sep 04, 2001 By Tracher
Orbital has something new to tell us. Can you hear them - they are trying something different. But how many people are prepared to listen? Not many, to bad. Well, got some news for you. This isn't bad. It's actually good, very good. Sure, some people are dissapointed, i know i was when i first heard it. But, let's see why it's different.

This USA edition is a double-disc release of The Altogether with added 11 tracks of bonus material and remixes. The first CD is the same as the UK edition of the album.

"Illuminate", a vocal collaboration featuring David Gray is the track everyone thinks it's a big mistake, but i think it's quite good - it's strange but interesting.

"Meltdown" is probably the best track. With it's 10 minutes it's the longest on the album (the rest are five or six minutes long).It feels as if this one jumped of "In Sides" 'cause it has that famous Orbital feel from their best days.

"Doctor?" (the long waited, one of the highlights of their shows) and "Funny Break" are the best songs, also with "Meltdown" (not that the rest are bad, it's just that these three stick in your head after the first time). The rest may need a little time.

"Altogether" doesn't have the strenght like the "Brown", or the emotions that "In-Sides" had. What it does have is the experimental approach like no other Orbital album (well maybe "Snivilisation") and song structures first heard here, on the "Altogether". The songs are short, the brothers are using more samples than usual and a lot vocal inputs.

Like i said, the first time i heard it i was dissapointed. But as i continued to listen to it i started to like it more and more. I suggest you do the same thing. Give it a little time,have an open mind, be patient and soon you'll see that this is another good Orbital album.

All in all, not a bad move. A very brave one, and i'm sure it will pay off.
Not a classic, but very good electronic music.

4 of 4 found the following review helpful:


The extra disc is the key!  Sep 12, 2001 By Christian Bradford "greychr"
As much of a fan of Orbital as I am, I feel justified in waiting to buy The Altogether until its US release because I had not purchased any of their singles between the last album, Middle of Nowhere, and this one. So, you end up ahead, saving money by getting two discs for the price of one - much better than if you were to buy the import singles. However, when you get this (and you should), listen to the second disc first. It provides the necessary bridge from the last album. Orbital's sound may have grown and matured over the course of their six albums and many EPs, and but, previously, the progression between albums always seemed to be consistent in increment. This release seems to jump forward (or some other direction) farther than most fans expect and could alienate some. Listening to the second disc will ease the transition, mainly because most of the tracks are remixes from Middle of Nowhere. In that regard, the only album tracks that sound "familiar" are "Funny Break" and "Meltdown", the rest sounding Orbital-esque, but much more shorter and dancy than previous albums' epic, emotive cuts, lacking a sense of cohesion. Three-stars for the album proper and five-stars for the second disc. The song "Doctor Look Out" is particularly good.

4 of 4 found the following review helpful:


Between 3 Or 4 Stars!  May 14, 2001 By Ian Creamer
It's been a two year wait for fans of this duo and unfortunately I found that this new c.d. while still very good is just not as good as their previous offering "Middle Of Nowhere".Much of the overall sound is the same but you just get the impression that on this new offering Orbital are tending to try appeal to fans of Moby and the forces of commercialism in the same way that Moby's songs seemed to be on every ad-break on t.v.The most notable way this manifests itself is the way that all the tunes bar the last one now seem to be 2/3 minutes shorter than the tracks on their previous albums.And yes while these tracks are good,they just seem to lack a slight cutting edge that made their previous offerings so good.

The first song is vintage Orbital-it's a really manic techno tune and it's a great start to the c.d.Track two sees one of the changes on this album in that it's the first of two full vocal songs.The song is sung and co-written by Naomi Bedford and I have to say it's a really great song.It isn't traditional Orbital at all-this isn't cutting edge techno at all,but more of song you'd imagine groups like Lucid doing-in fact the synths are pretty much drowned out by the vocals.The next track "Oi!" is sort of an homage to Ian Dury in that it contains samples from his most famous track and that infamous dual sax solo.Once again this is a really great track-the bass and rhtyhms rumble alomg furiously-you just can't help but nod your head,tap your toe or shake whatever!Three songs in and this is proving to be excellent,very different.The next threesome of instrumental tracks are nothing exceptional and as I said earlier seem to lack that raw cutting edge to them.

The next interesting track is 7 "Doctor"-which is a really fun re-working of the old Doctor Who theme tune.I also love the next track Shadows-with it's almost pseudo Japanese Y.M.O. feel to it,all backed up and driven by furiously paced drum machines.Track 9 sounds really like something Moby would do-complete with it's acoustic guitars and almost blues feel to it-yeah it's a very good track,just not what you'd expect from this group at all.I suppose they have to be complimented in being so experimental.Track 10 see's them collaborating with David Gray.As fans of both artists I absolutely adore this track-but I have to say it's far closer to what you may expect to hear from david Gray's next album then a track from an Orbital c.d. The last track is a stunning closing track and is much more like older Orbital of say the "Brown Album" era-pure unadulterated electronica,techno which raves on for ten minutes plus.So there we have it 63 minutes of always very interesting,sometimes riveting and then sometimes just a little too commercial music from one of dance musics most innovative and creative duo's.This c.d. probably will be seen as a slight let down for real die hard Orbital fans,but at the same time it may as a result gain them exposure to a whole new audience.

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