Album of the Week #6: Moby - Play
This is Album of the Week #6 ~ This week's album is Moby - Play
Year of Release: 1999
Genre(s): Downtempo
Country: United States
Length: 63 minutes
Album.Link
Excerpt from The Quietus:
Abandoned by a fickle and uncaring industry, Play was conceived as Moby’s swansong, a final gesture of creative surrender before sinking back into obscurity. And yet it’s precisely that sense of abandon which helped it eventually shift 12 million copies. Listening to the album through that personal lens, it becomes clear that this is not mere chill-out fodder, but a wistful and valedictory piece of work, a eulogy to opportunities squandered and a life (or one chapter of it) about to end.
Discussion points:
Have you heard this artist/album before? Is this your first time hearing?
Do you enjoy this genre? Is this an album you would have chosen?
Does this album remind you of something you've heard before?
What were the album's strengths or weaknesses?
Was there a standout track for you?
How did you hear the album? Where were you? What was your setup?
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This is an album I strongly associate with my childhood, and was a strong part of my discovery and love of music.
I remember, as an 8 year old boy, declaring 'Porcelain' my favourite song, listening to it on loop on my 256mb mp3 player. Not such a bad choice for an 8 year old! It's maybe the defining moment of 'Play' and still sounds lush today. It's a more simple song that I recall as a boy, but I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
'Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad' and 'Natural Blues' are the other highlights, and are the songs I most often come back to in 2023. I remember being a little obsessed with them as a child - these sad songs that make you want to dance, using these repeated voices of people you couldn't know. I hadn't heard anything like it.
A large part of this album's history is its licensing, and a lot of this album was inescapable in the early 2000s, used as background music in electronic stores or for documentaries on terrestrial TV. I remember adoring 'Honey' back in the day, but it's a little grating to get through the whole thing on a re-listen.
I come back to 'Play' from time to time, rarely ever making it all the way through. It's a difficult album to get excited about listening to. The album pretty much peters out, like it's surprised you're still listening.
For every iconic moment on this album there's at least one or two tracks that struggle to graduate to anything beyond background listening. It's a dull 60+ minutes to work through. 'South Side' is the weakest moment here - a weird Primal Scream dance-rock imitation that has some of the weakest produced guitars I've heard, and a strangely jolly chorus that Moby can't quite muster any enthusiasm for while singing. Can't quite believe the same person who wrote Porcelain finished this song and placed it right next to some of his best work.
I love downtempo music, I love a good blues song and I really appreciate some nice, mellow instrumental tracks.
But I could never understand the hype for Moby.
To me, it is the most boring, uninspired music of it's respective genres and era.
The more popular songs from this record in particular, "Natural Blues," "Bodyrock," and "Honey" are repetitive and pretentious in my opinion.
I always got the impression that Moby's music was so surface level that other people who just barely broke from the mainstream would dig it, but more hardcore music heads would just look past it.
1999 was a vastly different time in music and music discovery, my daughter was born this year, and I finally got to see deeper into the world of music thanks to Napster etc., but to this day, I roll my eyes when I hear anything Moby.
I'm sorry, I know this sounds shitty, and that's not my intention, I promise. I'm glad we all like different stuff, but I just can't wrap my head around the hype for this particular artist.
What are some of your favourite Downtempo songs/albums?
I went to Moby’s page on Apple Music and… couldn’t find this album?
It was a weird feeling. This is the thing that Moby is known for, but instead I was seeing lots of other albums I had no idea existed, but no Play.
Turns out Apple Music (edit: in the US) only has it under compilations, with a release that combines Play and Play: The B Sides into a daunting 29 track, 2 hour behemoth.
I listened to it in parts. I was surprised at how much I recognized despite not ever actively listening to Moby. All I knew of him1 was that I downloaded and loved “Flower” (from The B Sides) way back in the day from Napster/KaZaA/Soulseek/Limewire/eDonkey2000/DC++ (I legitimately can’t remember which one was which at this point). The song still holds up, and fits in with the other tracks on the album with compelling vocal samples. Those were the highlights for me — a lot of the other stuff felt pleasant but forgettable.
On the whole I genuinely liked the album, but I thought both halves of it were too long on their own and definitely way too long together. The first half is definitely the stronger half. The B Sides felt exactly like B Sides, though the opener (“Flower”) and closer (“The Sun Never Stops Setting”) felt special.
The album won’t get added to my library, but I enjoyed the listen while it happened. I grooved in some places, and it made for good background music in others.
I was reminded in places of Fatboy Slim’s You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby, which was released a year earlier. It’s also sample-heavy and does similar things to what Moby does here, though I find its songs have a bit more dynamism and journey to them, whereas Moby is content to stick to one particular idea in a song and play narrowly around that.
Also, on a meta note, thank you for running Album of the Week, @TooFewColours! This is the first time I’ve posted in it, but I’ve been listening to the albums since you started this and look forward to the new pick each week. Most weeks I don’t really have anything of substance to say and thus don’t post, but know that I’m still following along diligently!
1. There’s actually one more reference I have for Moby, but I can’t find it anymore and the specifics have fallen out of my memory.
I’m pretty sure in the mid-to-late 00s there was a fledgling viral internet video that I think was a public service announcement. It implored you to do something and threatened you with Moby if you didn’t. I distinctly remember the phrase “Don’t make Moby tackle you” from the video, but searching that up gives me nothing.
If anyone knows what this is, let me know so I can satisfy my curiosity and replace the hole in my memory!
That’s odd, on my Apple Music it’s the most prominent album under “Essential Album”.
Here is just Play, if it’s helpful after the fact:
https://music.apple.com/au/album/play/1193810754
That’s what I expected to see! I was genuinely surprised when I didn’t.
When I click your link, I get a message from Apple Music that it is not currently available in the United States. Must be a licensing issue.
I did a Google of the phrase which returned this article
I did some searches for Moby videos from moveon.org, and while there's definitely videos of him being involved, I couldn't find that sketch. Seems this is a clip!
Thanks for digging that up! Weird that it didn’t pop up for me. I even tried Kagi, DDG, and Google.
If you were alive in 99, as I was, you certainly know many of the songs on this album. For a while Moby really ruled the airwaves. I didn’t like him then (and still don’t like him as a person now) but there are some truly beautiful and brilliant songs on this album. It’s unfortunate that there are also some real duds; it’s not a “perfect album”, for me - i.e. one I’d listen to front to back without skipping any. In the spirit of doing this thing properly, however, I have done a full front to back listen this time.
This album shines where Moby really leans in to the blues influence imo. My highlights: porcelain; why does my heart feel so bad; natural blues; if things were perfect; everlong; guitar flute & string; my weakness.
Recommend listening to "Extreme Ways (Reprise Version)". The original wasn't on Play, but on the following album, but it's quite a nice alternative version.
Thanks for the rec, another beautiful song!
I loved this album. I believe I bought it after hearing "Flower" as used in Gone in 60 Seconds, and went on a bit of a Moby discovery. I ended up with pretty much everything he ever released. "Go", "Hymn", and "All That I Need Is To Be Loved" being some of my favorite tracks, though they weren't on Play.
I did however enjoy every track on Play, which doesn't seem to be the case for others in this thread. I listened to it from start to finish on multiple occasions. We had a JVC head unit in our car that would play .mp3 files from a CDR, and Moby's Play was one of the first albums I bought and ripped myself. 18 and Hotel I bought on release and also got plenty of reply value.
Here is the original track sampled in Flower, just for funsies.