The beats are fun, lively, and bouncy. The lyrics are true poetry. The samples are hilarious. Most of it is has a happy, light feel to it.

Beyond that, this does not merely combine genre, it transcends them; while most of the techo family (including "jungle," etc.) are differentiated by beats and seem like different song of one style, rather than truely different "genre," this is different. This "techo-pop" (as DJ often called it) has the diversity and fuzzy consistency advantange of traditional genere, like pop, rock, or country, in which beat an instruments very: there is a lot of variety in beets, tempos, and sound, but you alway know this is information society.

Bottom line, this is fun, feel-good album that I still like after year.

The beginning of the end, unfortunately.
With the release of 1990's Hack, synthpop group Information Society failed to recapture the magic of their infectious, lively debut. This is due, for the most part, to the musical indulgences taken with the album. Where the debut featured straightforward dancepop with great vocals, here the band seeks out new sounds with a techno and industrial tone, moving further and further away from the blueprint that made "Walking Away" and "What's On Your Mind?" Top 10 hits.

This, of course, would be entirely excusable if these musical dalliances were superior to the more commercial fare offered in the album. Unfortunately, the band chose to drown the shining, magnificent singles "Think" and "How Long" into a moat of experimentation, leaving little doubt that the album would be a confused matter at best. Information Society was at its best working with high energy, latin-tinged dance pop, and in the search for a more aggressive sound, they lost a large part of their audience. The pop sensability, the sense of excitement and urgency is missing - and so were the gold records of the debut.

The 80s were known for a lot of flash in the pan artists; some who deserved it and some not. Information Society had a little longer shelf-life than the countless other faceless 80s dancepop acts, but in the end the result was essentially the same. What should have been a critical and commercial breakthrough for the emerging popstars instead plays like an early 80s AOR album, pushed to the breaking point with bloated filler. It's a shame, since on a stronger album and in a more just world, singles as catchy and memorable as "Think" would have vaulted them into the top 10, and perhaps given them another chance of writing the next "What's On Your Mind".

Absurdly lovable overkill techno-pop.
Would you expect any less from Information Society, a band that should more appropriately be named Information Overload? This was actually the first Info Soc. album I owned and I still enjoy the over-the-top samples and bizarre noises mixed in with pop sensability. The great tracks here include "How Long", "Knife & A Fork...", "Mirrorshades", "Come With Me", and "...T.V. Addicts". This album so exemplifies the late 80's early 90's techno/industrial/dance sound-even more so than much better known albums such as NIN's PRETTYHATEMACHINE. Not that Info Soc. is nearly as self-absorbed or nihilistic as NIN or MINISTRY-bands that have a much more prominent metal edge. Info Soc. is more about dancing and evoking images of Mike Myers Saturday Night Live "SPROCKETS" sketch with Deiter than anything else. And the album doesn't really 'flow' in the traditional sense. It is more of a collage of dance beats, melodies, and computer-aided sampling with a distinct KRAFTWERK and DEVO flair. Far from perfect, but quite interesting. It never quite breaks out of the 'coldness' that is inherant in techno/dance music. What saves the album is that it is fun to listen to; it's not a repetitive dance album like so many others and it's not filled with self-important 'life stinks' diatribes. Info Soc. seem to have grasped the idea that most people would rather have a catchy melody along with their dance beats, as opposed to a monolithic, lumbering assemblage of casio-keyboard-produced dance loops or walls of distorted guitar and loads of existential angst. Music is supposed to be FUN.

A Brilliant Mess...
This album really confused me when I bought it on tape in 1990, but looking back 12 years later and listening on CD I know that INSOC were true pioneers, they were well "ahead of the curve" than other USA synth/dance/techno groups about computer technology. Who knew what a "Hack" was in 1990 in the southwest?

What made these guys so better than other groups was that they wrote great songs. Not just taking a sample or catchy riff and ramming it into the ground for 4-7 minutes. You can hear traces of ABBA, Duran Duran, and other early 80's "New Wave" MTV groups but theres also a good sense of how a pop song should work in a modern hi-tech autmosphere. Most of the dance pop creators of the 90s owe these guys a big debt!

HACK has a few bum and annoying tracks that sound like they were having "too much fun" in the studio with sampled sound effects but the whole album holds up fine and still sounds very up to date and modern (though "Hack 1" should have been mixed with a lot more "thump for the trunk").

Best Information Society Album Yet.....
I really like these guys and believe that they are very good at the type of work they put out, considering the fact that they from Minnesota and not Europe like most synth-pop bands. HACK happens to be my favorate of all their albums. Songs like "How Long", "Think", "Now That I Have You", "Fire Tonight", "Can't Slow Down/T.V. Addicts", "Move Out", "Mirrorshades/We Don't Take", "Come With Me", and "Slipping Away" are just fantastic and similar to the debut album. Other songs are more experimental and techno based. A MUST HAVE FROM THESE GUYS....