Clearly there are albums that coulda (and maybe shoulda) killed careers, but somehow didn’t. In each case one might wonder why, seeing as there have been more promising records that actually did herald the end of a career. I offer these very different examples that did not:
The Jam – This is the modern world
Lou Reed – Metal machine music
VU – Live at Max’s Kansas City
Beefheart – Blue Jeans & moonbeams
The Rolling Stones – Between the buttons
Elvis Presley – Blue Hawaii
Christina Aguilera – Bionic
Beach Boys’ party
Can – Monster movie (love it though I do)
Jethro Tull – Passion play
Led Zeppelin III
Tahir W says
There are of course other cases that are similar, but the artists were just ‘too big to fail’ by then. Any number of albums by various Beatles, Dylan, Van Morrison and Bowie fit in this category, but these were all overshadowed by the magnificence of the heroes’ earlier outputs, so no way would they do a complete tank at that point.
duco01 says
Yes, Stevie Wonder’s career recovered – at least in commercial terms – from the disaster that was “Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants”.
H.P. Saucecraft says
LZIII??? Are you out of your fr- no, never mind. Also, Beefheart’s Kareer Killer was surely Trout Mask? Or even Strictly Personal, after the more accessible first album. The Beach Boys’ Party was a top ten album both here and the in the USA (did better than the previous year’s Christmas Album). Their KK album should have been Smiley Smile, but they dragged themselves up with Wild Honey in the same year. Between The Buttons did as well as expected, top five gold album, and it was the following year’s Satanic that shoulda-coulda stiffed them, but that did just as well. I don’t think they ever had a real KK crusher of an album they had to recover from.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Any fule knows, well at least this fule, that after the magnificence of II the overblown nonsense that was Led Zeppelin III did indeed mark the end of their career. After that it was just a bunch of heavy metal rockers playing to stadiums packed full of adoring halfwits who apparently wanted nothing more than a stairway to heaven.
H.P. Saucecraft says
Led Zep III is a peerless masterpiece in their canon. Neither the grebo headbanging of the first two, nor the polished stadium rawk that followed, it is appreciated as an unassailable highpoint of rock music by connoisseurs of the genre. Blow it out your arse, Wrongness.
Tahir W says
“appreciated as an unassailable highpoint of rock music by connoisseurs of the genre”
I don’t remember being consulted about this. I would have given ‘them’ a piece of my mind, I would.
Tahir W says
I know. These are some of the facts that surprise(d) me. Exactly what I was getting at.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
“Unassailable highpoint of rock music” ? Not just laughably wrong but almost as bombastic as the music itself. Go bile yer heid, HP. (Nothing like a reasoned, intellectual discussion and this is nothing like…)
H.P. Saucecraft says
You spotted that, right? No foolin’ you, is there?
Lodestone of Wrongness says
I’m like sharp, like a rapier, won’t get fooled again.
ps you smell
RedLemon says
Indeed. LZIII, much better than LZII.
No fucking drum solos for a start.
H.P. Saucecraft says
Plus: songs.
Pessoa says
Sonic Youth’s ‘Goo’: after the sublime ‘Daydream Nation’, their first major label record was pretty disappointing and showed a loss of momentum. But in fact, they seemed to go on and build a new audience around the 1990s works; I have even met SY fans who don’t like ‘Evol’ or ‘Sister’.
Carl says
Bluejeans is my favourite Beefheart album. I know at least one other person who concurs with me.
As H.P.S. notes LZ III is a splendid album. It did pretty well, reaching No 1 here and in the US.
The Zep career killer should have been House Of the Holy.
H.P. Saucecraft says
*thumps Carl between shoulderblades* GARN MY SON!
Vincent says
Nail hit on head with hammer.
Tahir W says
I can describe my disappointment circa 1970 as being the first and maybe the worst of its kind. Other letdowns would follow. The thundering blues-rock riffs and crashing drums of LZ and LZII, amongst which even Robert Plant made sense, gave way to this. To THIS! Pseudo fucking fake folk trash. It should at least have destroyed Plant’s career for eternity. Instead he was allowed another similar go on IV with the execrable you-know-what, with lyrics like “to be a rock and not to roll”. Ha ha ha ha ha!
Lodestone of Wrongness says
See, you can say that ( more eloquently than what I did) and HP says not a word, nada. Did you know HP farts every time he gets out of his chair and says “There’s a train a-coming”?
H.P. Saucecraft says
*prrrrrrrrrap*
Neela says
But Shirley, no one listens to Led Zeppelin looking for great lyrics.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
No one listens to Led Zep.
Moose the Mooche says
Led Zep are the only one of those old bands that young folk like.
….along with The Bachelors, obvs.
Uncle Wheaty says
Don’t forget The Tremeloes…marvellous they were!
Neela says
I do. And Jimmy Page. See?
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Wow, The Bachelors – respect!
fishface says
If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow…..it’s a hedgehog.
Vulpes Vulpes says
Thanks Carl, I’m sitting on the coast on the westest part of the west coast of Ireland, the signal is patchy at the best of times, and I just had to come back to ridicule the idea that Bluejeans was somehow a shark jumper. It may have been sniffed at by the polo necked chin stroking art wank morons, but it is a fine piece for all that. You’ve saved me having to scroll down five fathoms by jumping in ahead of me to wave its flag. Salut!
Mike_H says
About ⅔ tripe and ⅓ diamonds, in my opinion. Which puts it quite a way ahead of “Unconditionally Guaranteed”, which was just dire.
Bluejeans & Moonbeams (in my opinion) contains one of the most perfectly-constructed guitar solos in the history of rock music on “Further Than We’ve Gone”, which gives it an immediate no-questions pass from me. No fast twiddly-diddly stuff, just a beautiful and inventive progression of skillfully-played notes.
Tahir W says
I’ve never been a massive Beefheart fan, although I do have a couple of his earlier albums and enjoy them from time to time. I note, however, that the really diehard Beefheart fans were disappointed by Bluejeans. When I first heard it new, my housemate’s copy, I could tell he was disappointed and thought it was a relatively meaningless piece of fluff. I don’t know if he grew to love it over time. But I never saw him wear a polo neck, although he did have a beard which he probably stroked occasionally.
Personally, I think cut I quite a good figure in a classic black polo neck and enjoy looking at artworks. But I don’t usually stoop to identity politics for all that. Then again I’m not a dumbfuck Irish cunt.
retropath2 says
And so, Tahir, how Would you describe yourself? Weave us some more of your wondrous way with words?
Tahir W says
Someone who can disagree over matters of taste, even vehemently, without resorting to ad hominem caricatures. But I can respond in kind if I have a mind to.
Black Type says
Prince And The Revolution – Around The World In A Day. Nobody saw that coming…he lost a lot of the more casual fans picked up by Purple Rain, but kept a large proportion of his audience who were along for the ride. Happened again in the TAFKAP/’slave’ period, but still hugely popular, particularly as a live act, until his untimely end.
Vincent says
Bowie’s “Let’s Dance”. Come on … REALLY forced, and not in a good way. People who say “it’s a good pop album” tend not to appreciate that good pop is liked by everyone, not just the hip 6th formers. Not mad about “Scary Monsters…” either, bar a couple of tracks. That’s even more forced – “look at me New Romantics – I’m still relevant”.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Different strokes and all that. If I had to pick but two Bowie records it would be the two you have just mentioned….
Vincent says
I’m sure there’s a lot of different configurations of what is the best Bowie. IMHO, if they say “Young Americans” and “Station to Station”, they are correct.
Tahir W says
Splittin’ hairs you guys, but both circling closely round the truth (in my favorite metaphor of the moment).
Tiggerlion says
I think you’ll find Let’s Dance sold to everyone, all around the world. Made him a global superstar, it did, rather than a *cult*.
count jim moriarty says
The actual problem he had was following it. Everyone knows that Tonight and Never Let Me Down were unspeakable turds. (Never let it be said that I cannot state the bleeding obvious…)
Tiggerlion says
Both of those sold rather well, too. Certainly a lot better than the Berlin Trilogy.
metal mickey says
Ah, the thing is that when Let’s Dance came out, we thought it was just another phase in The Rock Chameleon(TM)’s ever-changing career, it was only when Tonight and Never Let Me Down came out that we realised, oh dear, this is where he’s going to settle…
Black Type says
Aladdin Sane. It certainly killed the career of one Ziggy Stardust.
Martin Hairnet says
Macca certainly dabbled with the concept of career killing records in the mid-80s. Give My Regards to Broad Street got an absolute roasting by the critics, and deservedly so. I’m sure there was even talk of a terminal decline. That was the first album on which McCartney changed writing credits from Lennon/McCartney to McCartney/Lennon. He followed it with Press to Play, another disappointing record that sold very poorly, by Fab standards. If thumbs were even raised, they made it reluctantly to half-mast.
But he ended the decade on tour with the much improved Flowers in the Dirt album, on the cusp of a massive career revival.
dai says
Actually he changed the credits almost a decade earlier on Wings Over America, and they were even that way on Please Please Me!
Martin Hairnet says
Correct. Apologies. I’d forgotten about Wings over America.
I seem to remember that the writing credit change on GMRTBS garnered some bad press for Macca, and contributed to the general bad reviews. There was a sense that he was being overly precious about the whole thing.
Moose the Mooche says
Are you sure it wasn’t the utterly terrible, toe-curlingly embarrassing film?
Martin Hairnet says
Larry couldn’t have salvaged that turkey. So what hope was there for Bryan Brown?
Neela says
Every single solo album Ringo Starr has ever released – perhaps bar Ringo from 1973 – should have killed his career. He’s made 19 (NINETEEN) studio albums and 10 live albums.
Tahir W says
Some great tunes though. Always enjoyed the odd good Ringo vocal. Even … even … you know .. “With …”
Neela says
His best of is pretty good indeed, but 19 studio albums?
That said, Octopus’s Garden is a small wonder.
Tahir W says
I wonder who buys all those Ringo albums? I’ve never seen one in anybody’s collection before.
Martin Hairnet says
I’ve got the Ringo album. Great cover and songs and one of the best sounding solo Beatles records. I think Ringo albums are bought by many of the same folks who buy Cliff, Ken Dodd and Val Doonican albums, and especially at Christmas.
Neela says
According to Wikipedia, Ringo 2012 – a Ringo album released in 2012, folks – sold 752 copies in the UK. At least it´s more than Mike Love´s latest effort.
Moose the Mooche says
Yebbut, isn’t that enough to get you in the top 20 these days?
Neela says
Almost. It peaked at number 181.
Moose the Mooche says
Still better than the first Velvets album then.
“i’m waiting for the man who sailed to sea”
Tiggerlion says
I bought quite a few Ringo albums to provide the obligatory Ringo track on each album I put together using John, Paul and George tracks right throught to 1980.
They’re not all bad, you know. Most of his mates are good writers and great musicians.
Tahir W says
Well I’ve liked some of his singles.
duco01 says
The absolute nadir of Ringo’s career (so far) came in 1981, with “Drumming is my Madness” off the “Stop and Smell the Roses” album.
All Afterworders of a sensitive disposition should switch threads … now.
“Drumming makes me lose control,
Drumming makes me rock and roll, yeah.
Watch me now, rizz off!
Do you think i’m sexy?
Do you think i’m silly?
Try a little tenderness, too.
Drumming is my middle name,
Drumming makes me go insane.”
Martin Hairnet says
Artistically moribund, Ringo turns to the Dadaists, and découpé, for inspiration, lifting lines from an apparently random selection of songs and throwing them together into the great mixing bowl of pop. So we get ‘Do ya think I’m sexy’ from the Rodster rubbing shoulders with Bowie’s ‘Is it any wonder?’ refrain from Fame.
The only surprise here is that there’s no special guest vocal from Mike Love.
duco01 says
Re: “So we get ‘Do ya think I’m sexy’ from the Rodster rubbing shoulders with Bowie’s ‘Is it any wonder?’ refrain from Fame.”
Yeah – and “Try a Little Tenderness” from Otis Redding, too!
Neela says
Good call, but haven´t you heard Ringo The 4th? His disco album. Don´t try this at home, children. Wings was the first single. Pun intended?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W66wXkVRauo
Sewer Robot says
U2’s October
Their debut was of-the-moment Banshees/Magazine guitar lines and daft new wavy gibberish lyrics with tidy Steve Lillywhite production granted the sort of debut LP latitude that number 75 in the charts non-hits were regarded as promising real future hits to come.
Then the second album dropped and it was all about Jesus (and, is so often the case, a preoccupation with that Jewish magician revealed a messiah complex in its author) directionless piano ballads and an absence of tunes..
Rumours abounded that they were about to be dropped. Alas, we can only speculate how history might have gone had this happened..
Rigid Digit says
The Modern World was very nearly the end.
It came out quickly after In The City, and the band just didn’t have the songs. It does sound like “leftovers” plus a couple of newies (Standards being of particular note).
The “failure” affected Wellers songwriting confidence, so much so that the next of single was written and sung by Bruce Foxton.
Demoes for the next album weren’t up to much and it took producers Chris Parry and Vic Coppersmith-Heaven (the producer) to give Paul Weller “a bit of a kicking”. After that he moved back home and delivered a new batch of songs that became All Mod Cons
Uncle Wheaty says
I’ve just listened back through all of their stuff on the 5 CD Anthology “Direction Reaction Creation” on a few long driving work trips and the first two albums are pretty poor/shit. Apart from “In The City” and “Away From The Numbers” the debut is just punk thrash.
From there on it got much better and the 12 inch mix of “Precious” is a wonder!
Mike_H says
So much love for The Jam.
I’m afraid I still just don’t get it, or them, despite being around and keen to hear stuff at the time.
Nothing really BAD, but nothing particularly GOOD either. Nothing worth buying, anyway.
Same goes for Weller’s post-Jam output. So far.
In My Opinion, Which May Vary From Yours.
Tiggerlion says
Have you tried Setting Sons but starting at track two and leaving out the last one? The remains 27 minutes is a proper heavy duty album. You could flesh it out with Strange Town and When You’re Young if you wish.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Hoy you, I’ve told you before ’bout this kind of thing!
(Never quite got The Jam – one of my best mates adores them, can sing along word-perfect to every track. For me, some great singles but you can keep the rest.)
Tiggerlion says
Actually, come to think of it, Girl On The Phone and HeatWave are light relief either end of a dynamic, angry, purposeful album. Setting Sons is much more than just Eton Rifles and is The Jam’s finest 32 minutes. Give it a listen on that there Spotify you have.
duco01 says
…but Tigger, if Lodey listens to Setting Sons on Spotify, he won’t be able to see that nice back-cover photo of the dog on the beach with the Union Jack deckchair. Which would be a pity.
Tiggerlion says
True.
But, I’m just trying to get the old bugger to use his ears.
😀
Rigid Digit says
Metallica … And Justice For All.
Some good (nay, great) songs hidden among some drawn out dirge and terrible muddy production.
The Black Album resurrected them but they surely peaked with Master Of Puppets?
And then there was Lulu.
Hardwired To Self Destruct properly corrected that.
H.P. Saucecraft says
Took decades for Lulu to recover after the “It’s Lulu!” album.
Neela says
So maybe the problem is in the combo of Lu and lu.
Zanti Misfit says
The Rise & Fall – Madness. Significant change of direction, attitude, style and aesthetic for the Nutty Boys. To think the larks of Night Boat To Cairo were only two years previous but this rather sombre album gave them their signature hit, Our House. It must have baffled their skinhead following. I know, because I was one of them. I was converted after the third hearing.
Rigid Digit says
I think it’s their best album (or was until The Liberty Folgate)
Zanti Misfit says
Absolutely will always be my favourite, Folgate a close second. The Rise & Fall is quite brilliant though.
Zanti Misfit says
Fifth album ‘Blur’ by Blur was a risky tearing up the mockney rulebook as well. Again, delivered the lads their biggest hit, Song 2. This is my favourite track off it. Pure Bowie.
Moose the Mooche says
A gamble that paid off. I didn’t like all of it but I admired the hell out of it. This is indeed it’s finest moment.
Black Celebration says
Arguably “She’s so High” is the most successful Blur song due to a band that sound like The Rembrandts covering it and it being on every radio station’s playlist permanently ever since.
Moose the Mooche says
Didn’t they, and I may be misremembering court transcripts from the Hague, do the theme from Friends?
Black Celebration says
Hmm. After doing some research I now find that there are two songs of this name. Tal Bachman released She’s So High in 1999 (that’s the one that could be the theme tune to a Friends-type show) and it isn’t a cover of the early Blur song. Apologies to everyone concerned. I must have established this notion many years ago and over time it became indelible truth.
Max the Dog says
I seem to remember that Kate Bush could have made a mis-step with ‘Lionheart’ It’s a firm favourite now, but at the time it was rushed out on the success of ‘The Kick Inside’ and seemed to be made up of songs swept up off the studio floor after being excised from the debut. Luckily, ‘Wow’ was media friendly enough to keep her momentum going. Nowadays, I think it’s just as good as the first album, especially ‘Oh England…’, but she didn’t try that again, from then on taking her time to record albums.
Twang says
I always thought “Lionheart” was better actually, other than Wuthering Heights of course which is career defining.
Black Celebration says
Blondie. The Island of Lost Souls and its poo-eee album The Hunter. They obviously came back, so it didn’t end their career – but calypso?
To think that only a year earlier, they had given us Rapture.
duco01 says
I didn’t like that wig that Debbie Harry wore on the front cover of “The Hunter”. It just looked … silly.
metal mickey says
Well, they broke up for over 15 years after The Hunter, so I think “career killer” is justified… always strange when a band goes from regular chart-toppers to defunct almost overnight…
… and I can’t believe it’s almost 20 years since their comeback song, the excellent “Maria”, got to number 1 in early 1999, which in turn was 20 years after “Parallel Lines”, zeesh… ask not for whom the bells toll, and all that…
Sewer Robot says
They were away for fifteen years but have been back for twenty? Jeeziz that “time accelerated as you get older” thing is a right head f*ck!
Mike_H says
Timey-wimey stuff, I’m guessing.
Blondie were bigger on the inside.
Tahir W says
Of what?
Mike_H says
Of themselves.
Blue Boy says
Bruce Springsteen’s debut Greetings from Asbury Park should have had the record company tearing up his contract. Except he followed it up with The Wild, The Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle, and it turned out they were right after all.
Oh and HP is right about Led Zep III.