Surface Detail was Banks at his most excessive, but the first 3 books are also pretty ripe, as are a number of his other non-M efforts (Canal Dreams was my firs

Surface Detail was Banks at his most excessive, but the first 3 books are also pretty ripe, as are a number of his other non-M efforts (Canal Dreams was my first glimpse of Banks' willingness to go Full Schlocktard, and Complicity isn't much better). Most of these (and some of his other efforts) predate the (IMO putrid) Altered Carbon by a decade.