Underworld (1)

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V2000 (Chelmsford) 2000

Saturday 19th to Sunday 20th August 2000
Hylands Park, Chelmsford, Essex, CM2 8WQ, England MAP
weekend around £75 (with camping)

The arena was packed and late comers were unable to get in due to strict crowd controls in this tent, but for us inside this set was awesome. The crowd all around me seemed well up for it and a huge roar went up as Karl Hyde and Rick Smith arrived on stage.

They began with 'Push' from their last album, which got everyone bouncing around and then into a soaring new number with undertones of 'crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy' which seemed to run through the whole set.

This was a seamless masterly mix of some of their best tunes, gently teasing us with snippets of well known sounds and then giving us the full blown tunes such as 'to dream of love' with the She said lyrics from their second album.


The applause was massive when they did have a short pause and then, early in the set, they played 'Born Slippy' which of course had the whole arena going wild. The light show looked good too with lots of green, or red and purple lighting and strobes flashing madly. 'King of Snake' was another big tune in which Karl took the opportunity to demonstrate his lyrical talents singing without backing for a while.

All the tracks were mixed in an individual but recognisable way and the whole show seemed to flow very nicely indeed. I'm not sure if it was planned but they seemed to be about to finish several times but then carried on with more which helped to keep the excitement at a maximum. They actually finished with a full on version of 'Cowgirl' from their first album which, having blown the roof off, then faded out perfectly and they left the stage. The crowd roared. We had had a good dose of Underworld at its finest, even without Darren Emerson.