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Event Albums

Started by TheMonk, November 04, 2021, 12:37:03 PM

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kngen

Aye, fair play. Although I was 15 when AJFA came out, and as exciting as that was, I did wonder why I couldn't hear any bloody bass on it.

peanutbutter

St Anger was a bit of a transitory point, I think? I know a couple of people who claimed to like it a lot directly at release but it was very very quickly being compared negatively to their 80s stuff, and this was amongst 13-15 year olds. Feel like pre-internet that kind of big new release wouldn't have been able to be compared so directly negatively to older albums by people who had no access to anything beyond what labels were pushing at that point.

chveik

My lifestyle determines my death style

H-O-W-L

If it helps I'm a youngin', and my family was mad for Metallica but didn't bother with St. Anger when it came out, to the point I have no recollection of its release, and we just kept listening to the older albums over and over until we all grew up.

Spiteface

Quote from: purlieu on November 04, 2021, 02:23:47 PM
Be Here Now comes to mind for this kind of thing, the hype around that was ridiculous. I also remember This is My Truth Tell Me Yours feeling like a bit of a 'moment'.

Definitely with Be Here Now. Whether you liked Oasis or not, you fucking knew that was coming out.

This is My Truth felt that way for me, as it was the first new Manics album that I came to as a newly-minted fan.

Psmith

Revolver. They sounded even better but different.

sardines

Anything with a listening party.
A shame that these are not done more often.
I remember being at The Cluny in Newcastle for Radiohead (i think Kid A) . The anticipation and slight confusion.
Warp used to be good at this stuff. Aphex Twin had a few for his last album.

Video Game Fan 2000

Oasis had a try for Dig Out Your Soul, lots of guerilla marketing. But the single wasn't up to much and they'd already done practically the same for a best of the previous year.

Glebe

Quote from: chveik on November 05, 2021, 03:35:13 PMMy lifestyle determines my death style

Still not as bad as Megadeth's 'liars anagram is lairs'.

Shaky

Yeah, as a 24-year-old Metallica fanatic I remember St Anger got a massive slagging at the time. All sorts of ridiculous pre-release hype too, claiming it sounded like RATM, Meshuggah, SOAD, "classic" Metallica and lots of other things.

I still maintain that if they'd released the best (ie: only half-way decent) songs as an EP - and not taken fucking six years - it would've been much better received. It is getting something of a reappraisal these days, though.

The main hype I remember was "Metallica are finally heavy again, with long songs", which made it seem like a return to their 80s sound, rather than another commercial release in the Load/Reload style. That felt like an event until everyone heard the quality of the album, although I remember immediate reviews being positive, at least in Kerrang and on Teletext's Planet Sound page.

Magnum Valentino

Quote from: thecuriousorange on November 07, 2021, 05:53:18 AM
The main hype I remember was "Metallica are finally heavy again, with long songs", which made it seem like a return to their 80s sound, rather than another commercial release in the Load/Reload style. That felt like an event until everyone heard the quality of the album, although I remember immediate reviews being positive, at least in Kerrang and on Teletext's Planet Sound page.

Yeah that's what I'm on about, the combination of Kerrang and Metal Hammer both giving it full marks (5 and 10 respectively) and my pals blasting it all summer equates to it having a positive initial reception. The idea that it was instantly and universally hated is one of those internet era myths.

kngen

Quote from: Magnum Valentino on November 07, 2021, 07:22:33 AM
Kerrang and Metal Hammer both giving it full marks (5 and 10 respectively)

I wonder how much time they got to listen to it. When Death Magnetic was available to review, I had to go to their PR's office and listen to it on headphones after booking a slot with them (I think I had about 90 minutes, which was enough time to listen to it once through while making notes and maybe go back and revisit a couple of tracks that I might want to focus on). I thought it sounded pretty bloody good at the time (a lot better than St Anger, that's for sure) and gave it a fairly glowing writeup. When I got sent a promo copy a couple of weeks later (after the review had been published, of course) my heart sank a bit, as it really was a big, bloated load of nothing with the facade of 'classic' Metallic draped over the top. I can imagine St Anger reviewers had similarly limited access, or - even more likely - they had a 'review party', where you get flown somewhere nice to hear it, and there's enough distractions of the booze and class A variety that you don't really concentrate on the music that much (and you certainly don't want to jeapordise the chance of equally fun blags in the future).

I remember a lot of my mates wanking over Death Magnetic at the time, "FINALLY THEY'RE BACK!" was the general feeling, but they're all massive Metallica fans compared to me and much less critical of what they do generally. I thought it was boring as fuck, just like ..And Justice but I kept my opinion to myself as I didn't feel like disturbing their reveries.

Magnum Valentino

I reckon it was the novelty of them being heavy again (after two albums and a movie single of being really conservatively remodeled) and the adrenaline earned from the first two or three songs taking a while to wear off.

Probably a performative aspect to those more high profile reviews, too. I can very easily picture Jo Unwin's Ironic Review squad deciding how and what they were going to say about it.

Generally, I do think it's better than its (unfairly unchallenged) reputation suggests. Young metal fans who have opinions about it are largely parroting them from older generations. It's an extension of the complaints about Justice's bass sound - the majority of people who complain about it have heard someone else complain about it, and will never espouse another opinion about album production in their lives. Still, life's hard, fit in where you can. :-)

For older fans, Metallica's reputation had already taken a battering by the early 2000s. But there was also a large generation of new rock fans, after nu metal, who revered Metallica like elder statesmen. They would be a lot more forgiving of an iffy new album, especially as it's existence meant said "legendary" band were active and would be available to see on tour soon.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

Quote from: TheMonk on November 04, 2021, 12:37:03 PM
ABBA's Voyage is about to drop and it feels like a proper old fashioned event album.
Looking forward to sitting down and enjoying it.

Keenly awaited album's seem a bit of a thing of the past but what good memories do you have of buying and putting on one?

Couldn't give a fuck mate

peanutbutter

St Anger probably felt like the time to give Metallica a bit of a positive reappraisal, between the 90s albums and all the Napster stuff there was probably a bit of a sense they had hit rock bottom and the whole back to basics push of it all basically always works regardless of the quality (see also that terrible REM album that came out after Around the Sun)


The next Kendrick Lamar album will probably be a bit of an event. Damn came out so soon after Untitled Unmastered and TPAB that it kind of just felt like a mainstream victory lap and it does seem to have been brushed aside a bit already. With the right build the next one could easily feel like the proper follow up to TPAB.

Glebe

Quote from: Nice Relaxing Poo on November 07, 2021, 12:12:43 PMI remember a lot of my mates wanking over Death Magnetic at the time, "FINALLY THEY'RE BACK

RECYCLING AND JUSTICE FOR ALL RIFFS!"

GoblinAhFuckScary

Quote from: Video Game Fan 2000 on November 04, 2021, 06:54:40 PM
m b v

was gonna say this one. i remember refreshing forum pages at like 11pm for the leak to come out. it was ok

i mean i like mbv but i'm not a huge fan, but it was nice to be part of something 'exciting' collectively

purlieu

On the topic of m b v, there was a similar, if smaller, hype around Slowdive's self-titled, and that was another that seemed to disappear into the collective ether about a fortnight after it was released. Heard a song in my mate's car a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it, should actually listen to it at some point I suppose.

GoblinAhFuckScary

Quote from: purlieu on November 07, 2021, 07:30:49 PM
disappear into the collective ether

v on brand for slowdive

Video Game Fan 2000

Quote from: GoblinAhFuckScary on November 07, 2021, 03:56:04 PM
was gonna say this one. i remember refreshing forum pages at like 11pm for the leak to come out. it was ok

i mean i like mbv but i'm not a huge fan, but it was nice to be part of something 'exciting' collectively

I was not much into MBV and it was exciting, and two of the tracks - the jungle one and the pop one, were great. Went back and listened to MBV more than I had previously after that.

GoblinAhFuckScary

Quote from: Video Game Fan 2000 on November 07, 2021, 08:33:30 PM
I was not much into MBV and it was exciting, and two of the tracks - the jungle one and the pop one, were great. Went back and listened to MBV more than I had previously after that.

new you is good

Quote from: GoblinAhFuckScary on November 07, 2021, 08:45:26 PM
new you is good

m b v is fucking excellent, up there with Loveless.

Waking Life

I'm genuinely surprised St Anger was positively received at the time by the media, although that goes to show how little I engaged with it at the time. We were around 17ish and it was certainly wasn't an Internet myth that it was poorly received amongst fans at the time; older Metallica fans didn't think it a patch on previous stuff and the nu-metallers thought it crap compared to other contemporary albums. I guess it's all individual experience from social groups, but the video single from the album was always a reason to change channel.

I can see it did get rave reviews now and that's surprised me more than anything.

Certain publications also would have to keep the Metallica camp on side, if they want access for features/photoshoots, to put them on the cover and sell lots of mags. The "Event" of the album made it too big to fail, like it should have

Magnum Valentino

Quote from: thecuriousorange on November 08, 2021, 01:00:31 PM
Certain publications also would have to keep the Metallica camp on side, if they want access for features/photoshoots, to put them on the cover and sell lots of mags.

Probably the same reason no big film ever got less than 3 stars in Empire (when I was still reading) and video game magazines only seem to score based on how well the game plays even if the story is complete dogshit.

GoblinAhFuckScary

Quote from: Magnum Valentino on November 08, 2021, 01:04:10 PM
Probably the same reason no big film ever got less than 3 stars in Empire (when I was still reading) and video game magazines only seem to score based on how well the game plays even if the story is complete dogshit.

it's amazing how fucked up the standard of videogame reviews are. like how things less than 8 (or even things under 9) are considered shit. like, thinking of movies i like so many i could rate 6.5-7, considering their flaws, lack of balance, whilst still liking more than than i dislike etc