Moby, Play (BMG/V2)
Moby has always been a crotchety iconoclast who refuses to be pegged into any single genre. One wouldn't expect anything less from a man who started his musical career in a hardcore band called The Vatican Commandos and spent a brief stint on vocals with the infamous Flipper before going on to kick-start 90s techno with the hit "Go." Despite the critical acclaimed piled upon 1995's Everything Is Wrong, Play is his first successful album from start to finish, giving a real sense of Moby's truly rounded personality. It begins with samples of field blues and gospel shouting from old Smithsonian field recordings, Indian-wrestling the Chemical Brothers big beat sound right into the mud. "Porcelain" and "Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?" are lush Massive Attack-ish string-driven coasts through piano-driven beauty and melancholy. "Natural Blues" continues his mix of soulful Nina Simone vocals with dancefloor beats. After an industrial driven tune ("Machete") and a catchy doo-wop pop number ("7"), Moby returns to his early 90s roots of orchestral, ambient techno. The tracks flow into each other gracefully, with sweepingly lovely, mesmerizing results. With the possible exception of Brazil's Amon Tobin, Moby has no peer in the genre that he pioneered.
