Once upon a time it was an axiom of this place that people liked a band’s “earlier stuff”. You know, being old and in the way and generally grumpy about this ‘ere modern music an’ all.
So let’s share our thoughts on this. Only TWO bands per category so it doesn’t become an endless unreadable list.
It’s very general, for example I have The Beatles as “later”, which doesn’t mean I don’t like their earlier stuff. It’s just that thinking of their overall oeuvre I prefer listening to MMT to WTB.
Here’s mine
EARLY
Frank Zappa and The Mothers Of Invention
Pink Floyd
LATE
The Beatles
ALL
Steely Dan
XTC
I agree with David Hepworth about The Beatles – early.
The fact that Noel and Liam Gallagher and their ilk lump on the later stuff merely increases my desire (a considerable desire to distance myself from them) not to.
I also agree with John Peel about Marc Bolan – early (i.e. pre-T. Rex).
And definitely Elvis, The Rolling Stones, The Kinks, The Pretty Things and The Who .
Now I come to think about it, isn’t the answer always early?
Yes if I’d agree about The Who and The Kinks. Stones would be mid-period for me – Let it Bleed, Exile.
As a matter of interest, @mousey, when is your cut-off for Frank Zappa?
I don’t reckon much to the late ’70s – early ’80s bands but I did like the ’88 tour band.
’73-’74 was the best.
@Mike_H Tend to agree. I definitely prefer earlier to later. I love the early Mothers, then the Waka Jawaka/Grand Wazoo period, then that golden mid 70s run, including what was later released as Lather (Studio Tan etc). The 80s stuff is great live, but he was misreading his audience with all the dirty songs by then, they’d actually grown up! Then Yellow Shark – if he’d lived there’d be a lot more like that which I loved
Here endeth the lesson…
Not sure what the Gallagher brothers think (or don’t think) should be a true guide to the excellence of the Beatles music. But the right answer is pretty much all of it, with 66-68 being the pinnacle.
What the Gallagher brothers think about something is EXACTLY how to gauge the worth of it.
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.
Liam Gallagher fancies something, anything, I’m outta here.
Early
XTC
Late
TRex
All
Sparks
Talking Heads
Later – XTC, Cardiacs,
Mid Period – Beatles, Talking Heads,
Early – Queen, the Band
Seems most artists I can think of did their best stuff “mid-period” after they settled-in and got into the swing of things but before they have time to get lazy and self-indulgent.
I’m going to get some stick for (some of) this…!
Sticking to the suggestion, this is preference rather than like/dislike….
Late…
Roxy Music
Simon and Garfunkle
Early…
The Rolling Stones (63 – 72)
Steely Dan
New category….Middle..
REM
U2
Early and Late but not Middle…
Bruce
All…
Beatles
Warren Zevon
Early
Iron Maiden (until Bruce Dickinson left)
AC/DC (until mid/late 80s)
Mid
Rolling Stones (67 – 74 (ish))
Kinks (similar time period)
Late
T.Rex (after they dropped the hippy dippy nonsense)
All
Beatles
Ramones
Stiff Little Fingers
How is 67-74 MID era Stones? Had they stopped in 80 I would have agreed.
Would also argue Maiden have been just as good since Bruce returned, though the eighties would be the classic years.
Mid era “worthwhile” Stones.
Some would argue that The Stones as Band stopped in 1980 and became a corporation
Well, yes. I’m with you.
Stones 64-66 5 albums
67-74 7 albums
75-present 11 albums
The Stones became a Corporation with the introduction of the tongue logo.
First used, apparently, for a European tour in (August?) 1970.
So … 1970.
I think it was designed for the first album on RS records, i.e. Sticky Fingers, which came out in 1971. The artist (John Pasche) had designed the poster for the 1970 tour (featuring a car, a liner and a Concorde, but no lips/tongue) and the band were very pleased with it, so Mick commissioned the logo.
It’s on the Brown Sugar single. Doesn’t that predate SF?
Well….possibly by a week! According to Wikipedia it was released 16th April 1971 and the album on 23rd, but the text of the BS article says it was released in May, which I think is wrong.
45s appearing on L.P.s … hmm.
There’s the Corporation kicking in right there.
Didn’t happen on Decca.
I read somewhere that the logo first appeared on that 1970 tour.
However, I’ve yet to see evidence.
Maybe it was used for one venue?
Interesting to consider why. As far as I know, Decca were only licensed the recordings to release, which implies the Stones management had control. Allen Klein had taken over, so maybe it was him. He did the same with the Beatles (Something/Come Together).
Early
Gang of Four
Elton John – though he has perked up with the last few albums
Late
The Fall?
The Beatles
All
Manu Chao/Mano Negra
Dr Feelgood, though obviously best while Wilko was in the band
Mid
Stevie Wonder (1970s)
Angelique Kidjo
ALL
Kraftwerk
Kate Bush (the alliest of all surely)
EARLY
Elvis Costello
AC/DC (if BIB still counts as early, – there are more studio albums after it than before)
MID
Rush (2112 – Signals for me)
Fleetwood Mac (strictly a civilian here)
LATE
Talk Talk (third album of 5 onwards, so that’s kind of late-ish)
EARLY
Beatles (blurring to middle)
Kate Bush
Little Feat
Led Zep
MID
Stones
Who
Van Morrison
ALL
Steely Dan
Deep Purple
Free
Boz Scaggs (excluding middle)
Emmylou Harris
What are you classifying as ‘mid’ Van? I would say that chronologically it would be 1980-2000, but to me, that period would be summed up as first decade sublime, second decade mediocre.
Quite. How can we say what his mid period is until he’s finished? There could be another twenty years of his outpourings.
Oh please no. 👀
Yes on reflection you’re right, Van is early.
Oh another ALL – Everything but the girl.
With the obvious qualification that all of these artists made some great music outside of these peaks..
Early:
Tindersticks (first four albums)
Pet Shop Boys (up to Very)
Middle:
The Fall (1982 – 92)
The Beatles (start of 1965 to end of 67)
Late:
Elliott Smith (last four albums)*
All:
The Smiths
(*I’m counting “From A Basement..” as his last album)
Very, very few artists make it past Early to Mid and virtually non make it to Late.
For example, Abbey Road and Let It Be after the magnificence of everything that preceded are pretty pedestrian stuff (scuse me while I kiss this guy and ask if I can borrow his tin helmet).
Dylan, Stones – the list is endless.
Never considered myself a Paul Simon fan (Bridge Over Troubled Water takes a lot of forgiving) but by golly I would nominate him as perhaps the only artist I can think of whose Late is as good and even better than Early/Mid
Johnny Cash?
Leonard Cohen?
Robert Plant? (Certainly if you look only at his solo work, lest the dinosaurs rise up and smite me. Funny that the exception to the rule is a song with a title that sums up his early solo career)
Agree with all those three. Ry Cooder has had a wonderful late bloom but all his stuff is great.
Cooder is deffo an All guy. Plant is so obviously an early guy is not a question.
I’m not a fan of Led Zep. In his middle to late middle age, Plant has found a new musical voice, one that blends Folk, Celtic, Indian, African, Blues and Rock elements into something universal and personal, ancient and modern, mysterious and honest, mature and experimental. The bar was set with Dreamland, an album of covers, in 2002, and has been pushed higher with successive albums through Mighty Rearranger, Raising Sand, Band Of Joy, lullaby and… The Ceaseless Roar and, most recently, Carry Fire. I’d say six great albums in a row represents an imperial phase.
Tis amazing isn’t it how our opinions differ? Six dull albums in a row from a really top notch bloke doth not make an imperial phase
O yes it does…….(Cos they ain’t dull.)
Yeh but they really is dull. I suspect this conversation might not end in agreement?
So, can we agree that Mid Ry Cooder is but worthy (ie boring)?
When was this dull mid Cooder phase? When he was playing with some of the greatest musicians across the whole of the World? A Meeting By A River and Talking Timbuktu, two of his finest ever albums, were both in the nineties.
the Cat one and the Baseball stadium and a few around there. Worthy but meh.
Listen to the Junior (which sounds like Mid-Van)
The cat one etc were late mid to early late. Late late wasn’t and still isn’t great. This years Sufjan. I like his early early to early middle better. Up to the end of the collaboratives.
Chavez Ravine is brilliant!
Muy Fifi is the polar opposite of dull.
Does Polar Opposite mean “same as”?
Arf! Well they both have caps and are very cold.
Love this one from Chavez Ravine.
Early:
Weezer
Late:
Nick Lowe
All:
Beatles
It’s not always as easy as late/middle/late/all…when it comes to Laura Marling I’ve found that I love every other album of hers!
Alas I Cannot Swim – No.
I Speak Because I Can – Yes!
A Creature I Don’t Know – No.
Once I Was An Eagle – Yes!
Short Movie – No.
Semper Femina – Yes!
Her album with Mike Lindsey as Lump was so-so, hopefully that means that her next solo outing will be wonderful… 🙂
Ah – to me she’s more of a U shape
Yes
Mmmmm
No
No
Mmmmm
Yes
(Lump I regard as non canonical.)
I tend to categorise Laura Marling albums into:
Titles in iambic pentameter – yes
Titles not in iambic pentameter – no
(Actually, I don’t really know her stuff, just that some of her titles are in iambic pentameter. Few opportunities arise to mention that fact.)
Lump coulda shoulda but was distinctly meh.
Pedant hat on: they are iambic trimeter not pentameter 🙂
And if they are like her first one, which was raved about but turned out to be bedsitter bedwetter singer songwriter in excelsis, then neither Early, Middle or Late thank you!
I believe this is officially referred to as Aztec Camera syndrome?
1. High Land Hard Rain – yes
2. Knife – no
3. Love – yes
4. Stray – no/meh!
5. Dreamland – yes
6. Frestonia – meh!
I have to confess that I’ve only heard Knife (and I certainly loved it at the time – haven’t listened to it since CDs took over…)
With the bands I followed there’s generally a perky, spunky debut and then a few of really good follow up albums (in the days when an album a year was de rigeur). Then a sort of comfortable plateau and then a decline but sometimes boosted beyond normal shelf life by non-UK success thanks to a film perhaps (Simple Minds, OMD).
Soft Cell and The Smiths had brief but brilliant lives so their whole output isn’t early or late.
Early OMD – first 4 albums, belters. Got some US success, sort of split up – reunited and pretty good again now.
Depeche Mode – All. Early stuff is triffic but patchy and so is the later stuff but there’s a smashing orangey bit in the middle 1985-1998.
Gary Numan – really early stuff terrible. But 1979 to 1981 – wonderful. Like Prince, the amount of samey material is hard to keep excited about long-term but recent stuff is really, really good.
OMITD in fact are such an early band they had an early name too.
See also The Pink Floyd.
Rather pleasingly, my favourite records by The Pink Floyd are the ones, exactly the ones, which have the lowest number of buyer reviews on Amazon.
Piper (116); Saucerful (108 – my second favourite); More (78 – my favourite – great film too); La Vallee (120); Ummagumma (145).
Can’t help feeling this could be an essential tool for future use based on the principle … and I can’t for the life of me envisage a flaw (think: daily newspapers, TV programmes, football clubs, political parties) … that if the great unwashed lump on something in 2019 it’s gotta be somewhere close to shite.
I’d never seen the Strawberry Field vid all the way to the end and therefore didn’t know that Martha is in it.
I’ll try to think of two artists/bands that I like that fit each description, rather than just trying to make my favourite ones fit.
Early – Oasis (surely the dictionary definition of the category?) & Ringo Starr (loads to love on Sentimental Journey, Beaucoups of Blues, Ringo and Goodnight Vienna, but not much to love since)
Mid – Stones & Pulp (or Jarvis Cocker’s music as a whole, to be more precise)
Late – Gary Numan (early stuff is very good mind, but his recent stuff is incredible) & Elton John (again, his early stuff is clearly very good, but my favourite albums of his are the ones from Songs From The West Coast onwards). I suppose those are two unlikely candidates for that category!
All – Beatles & Prefab Sprout
Early – Public Enemy (I’m aware that this is cheating because no hip-hop act remain good, the exception being the Beastie Boys. The BBs however disqualified for “All” as their early records are bobbins)
Mid – Grace Jones (the Compass Point albums)
Late – Muddy Waters. Yes, those Jonny Winters albums are the best stuff he did. An Indian Summer par excellence.
All – Super Furry Animals
Late Muddy Waters? FFS.
Those amped up Johnny Winter albums sound great but better than when he was at CHESS in the 50s and 60s Junior and Buddy, Otis Spann, Little Walter etc etc.
Of course Muddy should be All. Yes, even Electric Mud.
Paul Jones on some radio doc years ago: “There are no recordings of Muddy Waters’s artistic decline, because he didn’t have one”
Re: Paul Jones on some radio doc years ago: “There are no recordings of Muddy Waters’s artistic decline, because he didn’t have one”
That’s a direct quotation from Charles Shaar Murray’s obituary of Muddy in the NME!
Cripes! I’m Do-wah-Diddy-dumbfounded!
He may have read that out as a quotation, I don’t remember. It wouldn’t be like PJ to credit his sources – he can’t do a blues song on stage without giving us a detailed biography of its author and all the people who recorded it, dates, inside leg measurements etc.
Early: Pere Ubu, Pavement/Stephen Malkmus
Late: Wilco, Sleater Keaney
Pere Ubu – that should have been my middle.
I’m the only person in the world who prefers the Fontana/Roland Rat years.
Again… unless you know something we don’t, isn’t it a bit previous to talk about late Wilco?
Early – Can, Spiritualized,
Late – Swervedriver – odd choice but their last couple of records are their best.
All – Autechre – still running to catch ’em up – they *are* the Rochdale Kraftwerk – also agree on the Dusseldorf Kraftwerk – all killer no filler.
You need a Mid! For example – The Beach Boys ( hit singles notwithstanding but let’s go ‘Beach Boys Today’ to ‘Holland’)
Early – Alabama 3, Talking Heads
Mid – Elvis Costello, R.E.M.
Late – Nick Lowe, Emmylou Harris
All – Wilco, Leonard Cohen
Early – Julian Cope, Genesis (the threshold being Hackett’s departure obvs)
Mid – King Crimson, Talk Talk
Late – XTC, Martin Simpson
All – Kate and Joni, with acknowledgement to patchiness
Early – Doves, Elbow, The National, New Order, Turin Brakes, REM.
Late – Faith No More, Talk Talk, Queens of the Stone Age.
All – too many to mention, thankfully.
Early:
John Martyn (Bless the Weather – Grace & Danger)
Kinks (60’s)
The Who (everything pre Tommy)
Wilco (Being There – A Ghost is Born)
Mid
Tom Waits (Swordfishtrombones – Mule Variations)
The Stones (Beggars Banquet – Exile)
Los Lobos (How Will The Wolf Survive – Kiko)
Late
Tracy Thorn (post EBTG)
All
The Beatles
Paul Simon
R.E.M
@carabara good shout on Los Lobos – Kiko their best album.
Early: Rolling Stones
Early to mid: REM, Lambchop
Mid: Tom Waits
Early and late, not so much mid: Bowie, Kate Bush
All: Beatles, Fall, Smiths, Mercury Rev, Adam and the Ants, British Sea Power
Out of interest, what counts as ‘mid’ for Kate?
To be fair, I’m cheating a bit and saying that early is up to HOL, mid is Sensual and Red Shoes and later is Aerial onwards. Not numerically accurate but whaddyagunnado?
Gotcha, and can agree.
Early – Leonard Cohen
Dire Straits
Middle – Eels
Elbow
Late – Waterboys
Johnny Cash
Elbow usually is in the middle.
All: The La’s.
None: Cast.
Then of course, there’s option #4: None Of Their Stuff.
Quite a few of them in this thread for me, but I won’t be naming names.
I’m not a fan of the “none of their stuff” category, as I like to keep the door open to even the worst offenders – I do believe nearly everyone’s got one good tune in them and sometimes it comes quite late in a career…
I’m with Mike, too much music and not enough time to bother with “meh” even though “meh” might by some miracle have recorded a track worth listening to
As I sidle (or is that hobble) into my twilight years, there is a lot of previously-heard and rejected music. Simultaneously, there is a vast quantity of not heard at all ever stuff by artists that I have previously enjoyed, some of whom I’d forgotten about over the years. And then there are the completely-new-to-me acts whose work merits exploration.
Why waste time trawling through stuff I didn’t like before? Time I could spend discovering new things, like this?
.
Or this.
Lawks! I’m not suggesting revisiting things you know you didn’t like before.
I’m merely saying adopting the view that Take That or Steps are absolutely worthless acts merely based on several years of cack can come back and bite you on the bum when they confound you by dropping candidates for single of the year.
Perhaps a more AW appropriate analogy would be adopting the fixed view that Bowie descended into mediocrity in the 80s so that no matter how much your mates kept telling you to listen to his last album you just refused to listen…
This is a great parlour game. Generally speaking, all artists’ best work is in their early to mid years, isn’t it? But I enjoy listening to the whole sweep and then trying to find some outliers from the later years. Those that I can answer unequivocally are:
Early
Belle & Sebastian
Roxy Music
Bob Seger
The Who
Early to mid
Pink Floyd
Mid
David Bowie
Dion
Fleetwood Mac
Van Morrison
Late
Robert Plant
Marianne Faithfull
All
Teenage Fanclub
The Byrds
The Coral
Stephen Duffy
My Morning Jacket
Saint Etienne
Waterboys
Neil Young
It strikes me that the last three Roxy Music albums are underrated on this thread.
They’re OK, but not a patch on the first 5. Always struck me as being more like Byron Ferrari solo albums rather than proper Roxy – my impression is that Manzanera and Mackay were more like hired hands than fully participating band members.
Yet they got more co-writing credits than in earlier days, so how does that tally?
The Tubes – first album only. There were good tracks here and there in their later output but “The Tubes” is the only one that’s good from end to end.
(What Do You Want From Life?)