Some 4 years ago I heard the Underworld first in New Zealand's progressive BFM student radio. Since then I frequently played my tape until the cd became available here. The music is a mixture of big city romanticism in a wide atmospheric landscape of a mechanical ambience. All of their graphics and videos are done by the London based Tomato design studio, which is very closely related to Underworld.
The author/designers use words and texts until you can't read it anymore, but what appears is a true visual experience: a picture tells more than thousand words... But those thousand words ARE the picture! The book 'mmm... skyscraper i love you' seems to be filled endlessly with black and white pure nonsense. In a way I have seen it somewhere before, way back in the 50's or 60's. But nevertheless, after a while the Big Apple city sounds into you ears. Slowly but surely. Its moving crowds, its high rising constructions, the noise of cars, sirens, trains and aircraft... I wanna be there!
'mmm... skyscraper i love you', a typograhical journal of new york.
Written and designed by Karl Hyde and John Warwicker of Underworld/Tomato
Published by Booth-Clibborn editions, October 1994
Distributed worldwide by Internos Books, 12 Percy Street, London WIP 9FB, UK
ISBN 1873968 582
K. Elem.