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Artists whose large, rich and storied back catalogue has now been reduced to a single album

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Firstly, who is it whose ‘classic’ album prompted the above post.

Yes that’s right it’s Lou Reed. creator of 22 studio albums. Yet in rock history and popular consciousness (‘civilian land’) it surely has been reduced to Transformer. Produced by Bowie and Ronson. 5 monsters (Vicious/Perfect Day/WOTWS/Sat of Love/NY Tel Conversation) and not a bad track on it. Perfect Day broke out to a new generation with the beeb version. That cover (who would want say the New Sensations cover on a t-shirt). More or less a perfect rock album. Transformer is currently at no 918 in Amazon’s Cd and Vinyl sales. Berlin is 32,000, Coney Island Baby 64,000.

I am partial to Rock and Roll Heart, Songs for Drella and Magic and Loss (131,000 – presumably the sales at this point are like the R number) but this is not really civilian land. Surely only Transformer, and the songs on it, now has real wider currency.

So other artists whose multi-album career is now more or less reduced to a single album. Any raise on Lou? And yes, Peter Frampton is an answer but I think we can agree Lou is possibly a more significant artist.The ratio we » Continue Reading.

Double A side singles

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I was listening to a Word podcast recently about Dylan Jones’ book about ‘Wichita Linesman’ (link below) which is worth a listen. During the podcast Mark Ellen and David Hepworth mention ‘Walk on the wild side’ and say that Herbie Flowers bass line makes the record and it wouldn’t stand without it “it would be just a moan”. I’m not sure about that although it is an outstanding bass line. I decided to have another look into the background of the song. I was surprised to find out the single was a double A-side with ‘Perfect day’. Now I know there are a lot of Beatles fans on this site who might disagree but I think that this is the best double a-side that has ever been released. I bought the album ‘Transformer’ but never bought any singles from it. Looking on youtube ‘Walk on the wild side’ has been streamed about 30 million times and ‘Perfect day’ approx’ 75 million. There have been 38 double a-sides which have made no1 in the UK charts. Lou Reed’s hasn’t made it yet(it is a bit of a slow burner though!). What are your fav’ double a-sides?