18

Is it possible for Moby to actually produce a cohesive and generally good album of bangers?

I ask that question as someone who has dipped in and out of Mr Hall's discography over the years and been left generally unenthused by what is produced, at least for the albums.

Moby is great it seems at creating singles, and they are genuine masterpieces which are also often universally loved. Some of those tracks exist here such as "In This World", "In My Heart" and "Extreme Ways". There's a few other tracks that people would likely enjoy, such as "We Are All Made of Stars", "Sunday (The Day Before My Birthday)" and "One of These Mornings".

So then what's the issue. Well its the filler, which is definitely not killer. The album comes in at a hefty 1 hour 11 minutes of playtime, overshooting the general agreement that 30 minutes for an album is perfectly acceptable. The issue with these longer albums is that the artists often seem to struggle to find something to fill the other 30 minutes, and so generally churn out a lot of... well, filler. Tracks like "Fireworks", "Great Escape" and "Look Back In" leave no lasting impression, certainly in the shadows of the bigger hits present.

18 is certainly a good album, and is usually recommended behind picking up arguably Moby's best record Play (even though in my opinion Play has the exact same issues as 18).

Pick it up if it's cheap, or maybe opt for a greatest hits compilation like "Go: The Very Best of Moby" from 2006.