Every hardcore Underworld fan knows about Freur, the one-hit wonder which eventually turned into the greatest electronic group on the planet. But a few weeks ago I ran into a real unicorn; a hardcore Freur fan who did not know about Underworld. I mean he knew *of* the group, but never actually listened to their music. We talked a bit about the band and then he said, “man, it’s too bad Karl Hyde passed away, I really liked that guy”. That was news to me. I puzzled over that on the drive home; why did he think Karl Hyde was dead? And it suddenly hit me – he was thinking of Keith Flint! So, partial credit for knowing something about Underworld, or at least who they were tangentially related to.
Despite the fact that he momentarily scared the shit out of me, I really did enjoy listening to this guy tell me about how much he loved Doot-Doot; not the song, but the entire album. It was, apparently, the album of his college years. He said he loved every song on it and played the LP so much he’d worn it out. I guess he didn’t love the band enough to know that Freur actually did a 2nd album, not to mention everything Rick & Karl did since…but tastes change quickly in college. Amusingly, I myself was really into this album in college as well. See, I knew about the old Underworld stuff, but I didn’t know there was a band before that. I nabbed the album off a filesharing service and wound up liking it way more than I expected to.
Why didn’t I expect to like it? Well, it’s got “regrettable 80’s” written all over it. I mean, for God’s sake, look at the hairstyles these lads were rocking back then. And I did have the Underneath the Radar CD, which I found to be a fun guilty pleasure but little more. But it turns out that Freur are quite the curiosity, whose oddness might be a lot more appreciated if they hadn’t morphed into an electronica powerhouse a decade later. Their original name was just a squiggle, something that sort of resembles a cartoon elephant head; they came up with “Freur” because you can’t index a doodle (it’s been speculated that this is where Prince got the idea from). They dressed like they were in the circus and their performances would often feature at least one member juggling invisible balls or doing weird mime shit in the corner. Their drummer was a man who’s signature move was to bash his head against the crash cymbal until he bled out on the floor. I am not sure if there was some grand artistic vision behind all this or if they just wanted to be different.
They were pretty different though. Sure, on one hand they fit into the template of overdramatic windswept 80’s crooners, whose ridiculousness is diffused singlehandedly by at least one really catchy tune. On the other hand when you see videos of them they look like they’re having a little too much fun. Karl Hyde can’t really pull off that “lonely guy on the mountaintop just thinking about things” look because he’s too much of a goof. They kinda have that Sparks vibe where they resemble a band that was made up for some weird TV show. They do have some markers of bad 80’s pop music – a bit o’ sax here, some fretless bass there – but by and large their sound is marked by blazing, astral synth noises, the sort which you don’t hear on a lot of contemporary records. Maybe they had different equipment than everyone else. Oh, and there’s reverb, lots and lots of reverb, with big gated Phil Collins drums cracking off all over the place.
None of it works without Hyde, whose lower register saves the day several times (“Tender Surrender”, “Whispering”). He can pull off a great chorus (“Runaway”, “Riders in the Night”) and has a good sense of drama when needed (“All Too Much”). He also has a lot of vocal fills which come in handy when the music is practically bare. Granted he overdoes it a lot and can’t really pull off sexiness when he needs to (“Steam Machine”) but that’s the sort of thing that makes this record so intriguing.
And what of the hit? Well, it’s the best thing on here, though I have a hard time explaining why – it’s structurally odd and makes little sense (what exactly does it mean to “go doot”?), but Karl manages to carry the load, at least until the final third when everything really comes together. Unlike most 80’s one-hit wonders, it’s not really upbeat at all, and is only catchy in a sort of roundabout way. But it’s very memorable, in fact I would imagine there’s a legion of folks who still have this song still bouncing around somewhere in their brains with no idea who it actually is. I mean, it’s not exactly easy to just Google the lyrics when you can’t remember what any of them are.
It was enough to get them a second album. And then a later stint as Underworld with roughly the same band. None of this did particularly well, but when they found themselves at an inflection point, they delivered. Hearing those early Underworld albums you may wonder how they did it, but if you go back to Freur you’ll find a band that, if nothing else, was remarkably creative. Looking up their stuff on YouTube or even RYM you’ll occasionally run into comments describing what it was like to discover them as a teenager in the 80’s; a lot of “I don’t know what it was exactly, but there was something about those boys…”. Their songs were catchy enough that people would give them a shot, but odd enough that they’d remember them four decades later. It’s not exactly a great album, but it’s an easy one to fall in love with.
Critter Jams 
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