Favorite albums by bands/artists that you don't like very much?

I'm with you on "The Joshua Tree" - it was the first one that came to mind when I read your post. I love it, but can't listen to any of their other albums.

Others, going back a bit, Black Sabbath - "Vol 4" being the only one I can listen to.

Or Yes, with "Close to the Edge" being the only one I like.

Similarly Meat Loaf - I love the original "Bat out of Hell" album. The rest of his output? Meh.

This pretty much goes against my nature. If I don't like a band, why would I bother ever listening to their album?

Shadow_Ferret, I can understand. I'm the type of person who discovered a band and grabs their entire discography. But, sometimes that spark didn't carry through the entire body.

I love all of Blue Sky Black Death's instrumental stuff, but as soon as they collaborate with a rapper, I'm out (and I do love me some hip-hop).

"And the Glass Handed Kites" by Mew. Love the album, can't find the same spark in their other albums.

"Baby" by Tribes. Love it. "Wish to scream" was their sophomore album, and describes my reaction for it well.

"Nevermind" by Nirvana. Same thing with Mew, just can't find the same spark with the other albums (other than their selftitled/greatest hits).

John Mayer... It stopped at Continuum. Love everything before that, hate everything afterward.

"In the Aeroplane Over the Sea," by Neutral Milk Hotel. I think I'm spoiled, as all the other albums just don't seem... as complete, as perfect, as good, and because of that I just can't find anything that I like about them.

"Outside" by O'Death. Love it, can't stand their other albums.

"Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots," and "Soft Bulletin" by The Flaming Lips. Everything outside of those are great albums, but I just can't enjoy them as much.

"Endtroducing..." by DJ Shadow. I think a lot of people can back me up on this. It's a brilliant album, but was IMO his only one.

Ted Nugent - Free-for-All

Shadow_Ferret said:

This pretty much goes against my nature. If I don't like a band, why would I bother ever listening to their album?

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I will often buy an album based on liking one song. If I like the album I'll try to check out back catalogue. It's not all that unusual to, at that point, find I don't like anything else they've done.

A few of mine:

At The Drive-In - I love Relationship Of Command, just can't get into their other stuff.

Editors - their first album, The Back Room, is all kinds of awesome, but everything else they've done just leaves me cold.

Guns N' Roses - they could have broken up after Appetite For Destruction and that would have been fine by me.

Idlewild - I really like The Remote Part, but again, I just can't get into their other stuff.

Definitely Maybe by Oasis. They had the odd OK tune after but this was their real masterpiece

williemeikle said:

Others, going back a bit, Black Sabbath - "Vol 4" being the only one I can listen to.

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Not even Paranoid?

One record immediately comes to mind:

Chris deBurgh: Spanish Train and Other Stories. I'm not so hot on Chris deBurgh; I bought this record because I once listened to a best-of album and found that almost all the songs I liked were from this one. Haven't regretted it since. The best known song from that album is probably "A Spaceman Came Travelling"; it's most definitely not my favourite (though I do like it).

There are probably others, but I can't think of any right now. One of the problems I have is that - often - I'm just not familiar with much of the rest of the band's/artist's opus. An example would be:

The record Deep Purple, by Deep Purple. I've sampled other stuff of the band, but couldn't really get into their music. Similarly, Kiss's The Elder. But I can't really tell how much I'd like their other stuff. Those might just be standout albums for me (like, say, Alice Cooper's Welcome to My Nightmare, or Genesis' Nursery Crymes), if I were to listen to those bands in depth.

so basically, by my definition, your not really talking about bands you hate but more or less "one hit wonders." That's how I'd describe Nirvana's "Nevermind" or Guns'n'Roses "Appetite for Destruction." They threw their best material into those albums and didn't have much left over. Boston was like that. Their first album was perfect, but the rest, though not bad, were just a rehash of the first. But I still liked those bands, just was disappointed with most of their subsequent stuff. Again, if I didn't like the band, I wouldn't own anything by them.

(As far as Alice Cooper, he had several decent albums. "Killer" and "Billion Dollar Babies" were pretty consistent. His earlier stuff was hit and miss but they still had some really good songs that rarely got airplay. To me, as a then hardcore fan, "Nightmare" was the beginning of his slide downward toward commercialism and an almost corporate formulaic Hollywood sound.)

Your definition can be whatever you want it to be.

I presume that the distinction here is something like this:
- A "band I don't like" is a band whose quality and integrity in music I respect, but whose music just doesn't appeal to me. For me, that might be, say, Queen.

- A "one-hit wonder" is a band that, well, you've already described that well enough. For me, that might be Steve Miller.

"One Night in NYC" is the only release by The Horrorist that I find redeeming in any way. His other songs did not live up to the artist name, oddly enough.

I'll come back with others when I think about it. Maybe "Emerge" by Fischerspooner.

oh! Oh! I've always loathed disco but I own Santa Esmeralda's "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" because of the amazing Spanish guitar and Latinesque rhythms in it. Does that count?

Shadow_Ferret said:

(As far as Alice Cooper, he had several decent albums. "Killer" and "Billion Dollar Babies" were pretty consistent. His earlier stuff was hit and miss but they still had some really good songs that rarely got airplay. To me, as a then hardcore fan, "Nightmare" was the beginning of his slide downward toward commercialism and an almost corporate formulaic Hollywood sound.)

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I can certainly see what you say about Nightmare. It doesn't have the raw quality of some of the earlier stuff, and neither does it have the quirkiness of the rest. It's a pretty straightforward album, with occasionally cheesy arrangements. But I love it from the first track to the penultimate one (not too fond of "Escape"). I especially love the Steven-trilogy Years Ago/Steven/Awakening near the end.

Can't remember which one Killer is. Is it the one with "Under My Wheels", and "Desparado"? Billion Dollar Babies is great. (I'm also partial to Pretties For You, which has a strange sort of charm, but nobody ever talks about it.)

But I do like Nightmare the most. I feel that none of his albums I know is as focussed. (I don't have too many after that, so I don't know how good they are.)

I like some of the Rolling Stones but they never moved me like, say, the Beatles. Their most recent thing in the last year or two sounds a lot like, and even has the same guitar tones as they used in the early 70s in the "Brown Sugar" era. I was thinking they haven't changed or grown musically a bit in all that time, but they DID make some different music way back when. Surely their most daring and interesting album was in 1967, the year of psychedelic music:
Their Satanic Majesties Request
But it's kinda like progressive rock, it may be an "acquired taste."

Shadow_Ferret said:

This pretty much goes against my nature. If I don't like a band, why would I bother ever listening to their album?

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Well, perhaps it's their first album you like, and they hook you with it but you don't much like the later ones.

That happened to me with Heart. "Dreamboat Annie" was easily their best album.