"Play" 10 Years Later: Moby's Track by Track Guide to 1999's Global Smash

"South Side"
"South Side" oddly enough is my least favorite song on the record. I just don't think it's all that interesting. My favorite thing about "South Side" is the subject matter. It's essentially a song about abject amorality. I love that it's a happy sing-along pop song about kids that become so inured to violence and become so desensitized that nothing gets through to them. It's about people who have become so over-exposed to stimuli that nothing matters to them anymore. I like the idea of having subtle, very disturbing lyrics hidden in a happy-friendly pop song. And I also like the fact that no one stopped to listen to the lyrics — which is fine with me.

Gwen Stefani came into the studio while I was recording Play. And this was when the first No Doubt record was doing really well. So I couldn't figure out why she'd want to go into the studio with me. She was a big rock star and I was a has-been. She came into the studio, she recorded the vocals and she did a great job. But my mixing skills are limited. I couldn't get a mix with her vocals that worked. I tried and I tried. So the first album version didn't have her vocals on it. I went back to it a year later and handed it off to a friend who was a good mixer, and he was able to actually do a mix with her vocals that worked. So, that's why there's two versions.

"Rushing"
Those first five songs — they're OK. None of those first five songs, which all went on to be fairly successful in some country, I think they're all OK. But "Rushing" is one of my favorite songs on the record. This is why I should never be allowed to be an A&R person. I remember when I was listening to the demos of the album, "Rushing" was the only song I felt confident about. And I really didn't change it much from the demo to the finished version.

"Bodyrock"
"Bodyrock" was the song both of my managers tried to get me to take off the record. They thought it was really tacky. They thought it sounded like a Fatboy Slim ripoff — which I guess it kind of did. I like it because the hip-hop sample was off the first mixtape I ever got, maybe in 1981, off of the Mr. Magic Show on WBLS. The guitar is directly inspired by "What We All Want" by Gang of Four. And I thought it was kind of funny to have an orchestral chorus on what is essentially a hip-hip song.

"Natural Blues"
Of all the successful singles on the record, "Natural Blues" is my favorite. It's quite ethereal and mournful. It almost didn't make it on the record. I had some friends over and I was playing them songs off the record and they thought it was too weird. I couldn't get a good mix of it. This guy in England, 1 Giant Leap, he mixed that song and did a really great job so I was able to include it on the record.