YES. Metallica has to pull their heads back above water with their next album, or take a very big risk of going back to playing the hocky rinks, and then the 2500 seat theaters. It’s been 7 YEARS!! since they had an album with two radio hits from it.
St. Anger is an abomination. I honestly don’t know anyone who likes it. Bob Rock should be spanked for letting that out the door.
I’d also love to hear the fawning rationalizations the record company A&R people came up with to sound positive when talking to the band. You know they couldn’t bring themselves to tell them it sucked.
I must defend S&M. It’s a great album! You are right, however, that Load, Re-load, and Garage Days Revisited are quite forgettable. St. Anger is memorable, but only because it’s so appallingly bad.
For Metallica, I’d have to say that everything after the Black Album has been a slow decline. They spiked back up with S&M, but then took a nosedive with St. Anger.
At this point, I’m convinced that it’s time for them to start working on their “greatest hits” compilation.
Are you serious? While Amnesiac and Hail To The Thief didn’t quite reach the heights of Ok Computer or Kid A, they are spectacular albums that I have no trouble placing in a top ten of each’s year of release. Radiohead are currently on a 5-great-album streak, and I see no signs of that ending any time soon.
All true. What prompted the question for me, though, was this morbid fascination I have for bands who follow up a brilliant, absolutely inspired album with something you wouldn’t wipe your dog’s ass with. When the muse just picks up says, “I’m attah here, biotches!” Granted, there probably aren’t manifold examples of this in rock history, but the phenomenon occurs.
Someone made the mistake of mentioning Satanic Majesties Request. That’s gotta be one of the most unjustly maligned albums in the entire cosmos.
Radiohead produced one of the greatest albums of all time in OK Computer, then followed it up with a more esoteric and moody album (Kid A) that, while quite good, fails to connect with this listener like the previous album.
Then came Amnesiac, which started at Kid A and went even further away from conventional mainstream music. For my money, their worst album after Pablo Honey. While some (Gex Gex included) would take issue with calling this less successful, I think it can be said that this resulted in a less satisfying and frustrating listen.
With Hail to the Thief, Radiohead, I think, tried to move back towards the mainstream, but is still unable to recapture the essence of what made OK Computer so successful, a melding of thoughtful, eerie lyrics, with thoughtful, eerie music.
As for another good band, Wilco seems to be getting better and better with every release.
Also, I have not included individuals for no good reason, so I would not include the Beatle’s solo careers.
I can see that some people may not like their post Kid A material (I think there’s nothing to choose between Kid A and OKC - they are perfect complete musical statements, unable to be faulted), but I can’t see it as a decline. Their more recent work may not be palatable to the mainstream, but it certainly isn’t a significant drop off in quality.