Every huge artist has their "New Jersey" - a huge event album that ultimately feels a bit hollow & signals a career decline

Kind of wondering if Ashanti's Chapter 2 counts as this

Meh, on 2nd thought, Concrete Rose did almost as well; I just dont think I can remember any solo Ashanti songs tbh

views from the six

god I hope so

so otm

don't think so im afraid

i literally heard some 20 year olds raving about it/him this morning as i bought coffee

and that anecdote can clearly be extrapolated to all 20 year olds everywhere writ large

So "Hotline Bling" is "You Could Be Mine" to Views' Use Your Illusion.

no, "Hotline Bling" is definitely his signature song...

yeah it has probably supplanted "The Motto" or whatever as the centerpiece of the Drake segment of I Love The 2010s

does it really count as a part of the album though. it's tacked on at the end & existed for a full year prior right

yea it def doesn't. it's a bonus track. views is definitely his new jersey

Probably can add Life of Pablo to this

^what i was thinking

idk i think a lot of people are stanning for Pablo as AOTY

MBDTF was already kanye's new jersey, notwithstanding the brief uptick that was the first half of yeezus

except that like everyone under the age of 22 thinks MBDTF is one of the greatest albums of all time (wtf right??)

one problem (of many) with the "every huge artist has a New Jersey" theory is that some artists are taken more seriously after their commercial peak than Bon fucking Jovi

I don't trust myself on predicting Drake decline anymore, figured NWTS was gonna be the cultural high-water mark

idk i think a lot of people are stanning for Pablo as AOTY

― flappy bird, Friday, May 13, 2016 2:53 PM

he's like Elvis Costello in the '80s: lots of people will think a new album is his latest masterpiece.

And even New Jersey did not immediately present itself as a New Jersey.

kanye breaks the mold but drake i think fits very comfortably into it, like lady gaga

yeah called it for views from the 6, I would argue that for Kanye it was Twisted Fantasy

While it's true that for people less than 25 years old MBDTF is the preferred album, they don't care about singles.

Does anyone else recall the excellent thread in which we sought various bands' equivalent of Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie? That was a high quality thread.

Geez, it seems (upon searching in earnest) that that was this very thread. Sorry, carry on.

wait, what was drake's peak? i could never make it through an entire album.

Just searched the thread to see if this had come up:

Here's one: Nelly - Sweat/Suit

― The Reverend, Thursday, August 16, 2012 6:46 AM (3 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Lmao some dude sorry my theory doesn't stand up to rigorous scientific analysis

Here's one that doesn't seem to have been mentioned: Stone Temple Pilots' "Purple." It's 6x platinum, and had several hit singles ("Big Empty," "Interstate Love Song," "Vasoline"), but all of the songs most people remember are on "Core" (8x platinum). And then "Tiny Music" was only 2x platinum.

Those STP songs from Purple are still pretty well-remembered.

more likely to hear those songs on the radio than "wicked garden" at this point imo

Ha, OK, maybe *I* just don't remember them as well!

yeah those songs got/get massive airplay

Interstate is probably their most beloved song

yeah Interstate is in some football commercial/bumper. their New Jersey is def Tiny Music.

not sure Tiny Music qualifies as an "event," though. they just had a series of reasonably-performing albums with diminishing returns from their big breakthrough.

Only Around the World in a Day is mentioned upthread vis à vis Prince, but surely Batman is his real New Jersey

no way, diamonds and pearls went double platinum and two top-five hits

also i don't think prince had a new jersey, obviously he had a decline, but i can't pinpoint one record that replicated the commercial success of the previous one by hollowly serving up more of the same.

On the grander scale of things, Love Symbol is his New Jersey - but only if you take the singles.

I think a lot of people (including me) would argue that the album tracks on LS are better than D&P, but IMO D&P's hits are more memorable. D&P was a commercial comeback in itself.

Prince was never really the BIG DEAL that he was after 1992/93 (for obviously different reasons). You could argue that there were mini-New Jerseys before (and maybe after).

Around the World in a Day to me is a classic daring "follow up a massive hit with something that doesn't sound anything like it" album, not at all a New Jersey. More like a Tusk, only not as good.

yeah agreed, the 60s psychedelia (as portrayed on the cover and the raspberry beret video) was very purposefully out of step with what was going on in pop and his previous image

xposts to scott: take care is drake's good album

just spent 90 minutes re-reading this thread (for the 3rd time, no less) rather than doing work I should be doing.

every time I discover something new to love here.

tonight it was: JovCorp

Lmao some dude sorry my theory doesn't stand up to rigorous scientific analysis

― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, May 13, 2016 8:05 PM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

my beef is not w/ the theory itself to be clear, you gave the board a beautiful dangerous gift with this idea

i should quantum leap to stop myself

1989 thread:
this will turn out to have been her New Jersey, right?

― Swag Heathen (theStalePrince), Thursday, July 14, 2016 5:48 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Are there New Jerseys where the career decline that follows has more to do with fame and trappings than outright talent/popularity of the music itself?

god there are so many wrong answers in this thing