Everything But the Girl - Walking Wounded (1996)

With Walking Wounded, Everything but the Girl puts an acceptable face on trip-hop, jungle, and techno, opening up the world of experimental dance music to a new audience. At its core, Everything but the Girl is a pop group, which means it automatically abandons the free-form song structures that characterize most of trip-hop and techno. In a sense, that dilutes the impact of the music, but the duo found a way around that by seamlessly incorporating the rhythms into carefully crafted songs. They work the same ground as Massive Attack, but their songwriting is more accessible and less adventurous than the groundbreaking Bristol group. Furthermore, Everything but the Girl never approaches the tarnished glamour of Portishead, the kineticism of Björk, or the brilliantly evocative soundscapes of Tricky. Essentially, the beats are used as window dressing -- the group's music hasn't changed that much.