The last is the best (music)

Cafe Society
1

Which of a band or artist’s last album do you consider their best?

Back in the '90s there was a band, Sugartooth, that had a song called Sold My Fortune featured on Beavis & Butthead. They were a better-than-average alternative/grunge type band and the exposure catapulted them into regularly opening for bands like Slayer, Soundgarden and Stone Temple Pilots.

Before they went into the studio to record their second album they worked with the Dust Brothers on a track for the Howard Stern biopic Private Parts and then brought the DB in to produce their 2nd album.

The Sounds of Solid was released in 1996, sold at least one copy (to me) and the band promptly called it quits.

That album was a huge change in sound from their first: tighter, more raucous and more refined and much, much more consistently groovy. I just wrote a review for AMG, noting that 25 years on, every track has remained in my rotation and every track still sounds fresh, invigorating and fun.

↓ NSFW Dolomite sample! ↓

So I started thinking and I realized that this was a fairly rare thing: that an musical artist’s final product is also their pinnacle. Why stop just when you’ve found your spot in the sun, after all. But clearly it does happen.

So I thought maybe it’d be fun to read about other people’s experience with this.

Post-humous or post-breakup releases put together by 3rd parties, like Greatest Hits compilations and demo releases, don’t count but post-humous works that the artist intended before death are fair game.

For instance: Pop Smoke’s debut album was released 5 months after his death. This counts because the artist’s intention was there.

But Prince’s Piano and a Microphone and Originals don’t count because they weren’t intended as album releases by Prince.

One-off projects don’t count either, altho a single solo album does.

So what are some examples, in your opinion, of a time when the last thing a music artist or group produced was also their greatest accomplishment?

2

The two that immediately spring to mind are:

Abbey Road by The Beatles
Synchronicity by The Police

3

American IV: The Man Comes Around by Johnny Cash.

4

In Utero by Nirvana

Similarly, Closer by Joy Division. And Pink Moon by Nick Drake. Rather depressing list there, given the outcomes of the singers.

I’m racking my brain for something a bit more non-obvious, but I’m coming up short.

5

Obvious is fine, I think this is a fascinating topic (and something I would’ve expected myself to have thought about before… but I didn’t).

6

How many albums does a band need for it to count?

I would say Relationship of Command from At The Drive-In is their best work.

7

The last album by Jimi Hendrix, while I wouldn’t say it’s widely considered his best, has only grown in critical opinion and influence over time, and hinted at a deeper and more complex musical direction he may have taken had he lived longer.

8

Lately I’ve been seeing Abbey Road mentioned as the Beatles last album. I know it was the last one recorded but that wasn’t the way fans at the time experienced it. It feels like revisionist history to me.

9

Calling Abbey Road the Beatles’ best album is also a relatively recent development. Until about twenty years ago, that honor was mostly reserved for Sgt. Pepper or Revolver.

10

I’ve definitely known people through the years that considered it their best album.

11

Different people have different opinions about which Beatles album is the best. I thought it fit the thread because (a) it’s my personal favorite, and (b) a significant number of people put it at #1. The OP did say “in your opinion,” after all.

12

I’m not objecting to that opinion at all, just noting that for most of the years since Abbey Road was released it was eclipsed by two other Beatles albums that were probably more innovative at the time but less enduring than Abbey Road. It probably is considered by most people to be the best Beatles album now.

13

Oddly, Abbey Road was my favorite in the late 90s, when I first had what I could call a somewhat informed opinion of their work. These days, though, it’d be a little farther down on my list, with Revolver at the top.

14

Interestingly, of the bands I consider favorites, rare is the one I would say their last album was even good, let alone their best.

Stones? Are you kidding
Zeppelin? No way
The Who? Even they don’t like their last album
BOC? Rush? Queen? AC/DC? Kansas? The Doors? Not a one.
Pink Floyd? Not even if you consider The Wall the last “Floyd” album. Definitely not The Final Cut or The Division Bell or The Endless River.

And Sgt Pepper is better than Shabby Road. :slight_smile:

15

It depends. Bands that only ever produced one album prolly don’t count unless the breakup was unanticipated. So a one-off project that only released one album, that was only ever intended to release one album, wouldn’t count IMO.

It’s something we can discuss and reach a rough consensus on a case-by-case basis, I think. :smiley:

See, we’ve already got stuff that is debatable :smiley: :

IMO American VI: Ain’t No Grave is Johnny Cash’s last album. He worked on it as an album; so did his collaborators. It just didn’t get released for some years after his death. But the intent was there, as was the effort.

/shrug

Now, if you wanna take the stance that the whole American Recordings are his best work… well, I wouldn’t quibble. They are a stunning body of work all on their own and IMO capture the best essence of Johnny Cash that could possibly be caught.

OTOH, Out Among the Stars could be considered his last album, too. Despite the 40 years between recording and release, the songs were also recorded to be an album. Personally, tho, I take that 40 year gap as indicative that the songs weren’t that good and so it was more of a demo that finally was distributed.

16

The Twelve Dreams of Doctor Sardonicus by Spirit.

Their first three previous albums were all good, but the group knew they were breaking up as they recorded it and wanted to make a statement. The result is a masterpiece from start to finish.

17

I had to think about it a bit, but then I thought of another band of the Grunge era: The Screaming Trees’ “Dust”. I think this band only found their real voice with the album before that, 1992’s “Sweet Oblivion”, and “Dust” rounds it all up with a majesty that formerly was lacking in the band’s sound. Here’s “Sworn And Broken” with the best harpsichord solo since “In My Life” (yeah, I know that that was a sped up piano, and I’m not sure if it’s a real harpsichord on “Sworn And Broken” either).

18

I won’t go so far as to rank Abbey Road #1(I still think Pepper), but it is probably #2 for me. They did go out very well in my opinion.

The original Guns 'N Roses we all knew went out with Use Your Illusions, which I think is probably their best stuff. Chinese Democracy throws that all off if you count it, of course.

I would agree with In Utero as stated up thread. I have a deep love for Nevermind, but after In Utero, I was ready to hear this band for the rest of my life. Alas, not so.

19

I also never listened to the Beatles until the late 90’s. I was over 20 and I have to admit, Abbey Road just is very listenable to a newcomer.

20

Johnny Cash is the outlier here - not to quibble about a particular album - because he was someone who, at the end of a very long career, produced work of a stunning quality. Not sure we’ll find a better example. It’s a lot easier to think of examples who died young; and on that note -

Amy Winehouse

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