Discographies with a similar shape

Reading through the Which band has the best discography? thread again reminded me of question that's been brewing in my mind in this age of streaming deep dives.

What discographies have a similar shape? That is, they provide parallel listening experiences. When Bowie and Prince died, there was lots of talk about the similarity of the careers -- good but not yet remarkable preludes, then a decade run of culture defining albums, then a long afterlife of enjoyable post-imperial dicking about. Of course there's differences and we'll never get the closing statement album from Prince, but diving in to either artist is a pretty similar experience. There's no easily definable best album. There's provocations and innovations across genres. There's lots of important associated acts too.

Another one that comes to mind is The Fall and Thee Ohsees. Ridiculous productivity, cantankerous, always different always the same, jumbled references to the past, and if you like the first five or six records you're pointed towards, you probably would find something in every outing. I get the sense Guided by Voices is like that, but I haven't really enjoyed the five or six records I've tried.

What are clusters of artist where time spent delivers similar payoffs?

always thought Jean-Michel Jarre and Mike Oldfield had pretty similar catalogues, massive success with their first album (yes I know Oxygene wasn't technically Jarre's first but it's effectively been retconned as such), some success with follow up albums, none of which used actual song titles...diminishing returns from there and they try to go pop and incorporate new sounds (and actual track titles), bit of a 90's resurgence, mostly crap in the 00's, including sequel albums to their initial successes, which they're still doing today

I always think Lodger and Lovesexy hook up especially well in the Bowie-Prince analogy

that's exactly what I'm looking for. I went through a Jarre phase as a kid, but never got to Oldfield and now I want to dip in.

The Beatles followed The Rutles' career path to a frankly embarrassing degree

Blur and Radiohead, maybe

First album is usually considered the weakest and too derivative of whatever was a/the big thing in indie/altrock, but crucially it provided their big breakthrough single, and some textural shoegazey things that foresee-by-some-years later day plethora of atmosphere-focused tunes blah de blah. Followed by punky non-album single with 'pop' in the name that was an attack on the music biz or something. It underperformed. Nonetheless the second album two years on is regarded as a huge leap in quality, even if it takes a while to sell, and the point at which their reputation as stylistic ambulance chasers subsides. By the time of album three, they've got more than enough grease to debut at number one in Britain and attract pretty much unanimous critical laudation, doing so with an album that is still 90s canon fodder now.

Then it becomes less an album by album thing except to say generally they began looking in similar places (cool electronic music, krautrock, avant-jazz) for stylistic top-ups. And their final UK Top 5 single was in spring 2003, ahead of their final EMI albums.

The Cure and Depeche Mode

Despite breezy sound and boyish looks early on, a period that to this day provides one of their top three or four most famous songs (Boys Don't Cry/Just Can't Get Enough), the gloom with which they are associated sets in soon enough, as do album sales home and abroad. The band's sounds and ideas become more expansive. Rep reliables in the middle positions of the UK singles chart. Mid-80s singles compilation endears the group further in territories they hadn't been all that considered in before. By 1987 they can reach no. 35 in the US with my favourite album they ever did. Critical reaction to the band had always been erratic but by this point they are beginning to be taken very seriously. This crests at the turn of the decade with Disintegration/Violator, the best-seller, fan and critical fav, loaded with hits. They can't really get any bigger or more 'happening'. Except in a single sales week, so the next album, 92/93's Wish/SOFAD is able to debut at number one. Huge tour does nothing to hold the band together and key members leave thereafter. Wish/SOFAD were somewhat less successful than their predecessors in the longrun and this continues with 96/97's WMS/Ultra, the sound of bands that had only ever been on the rise suddenly feeling their age. Some new ideas come and go, famous producers are hired to bring out different aspects of their sound, but the 00s are the legacy years and none of these albums are generally held up as classics. Since 92/93 they take four years to release an album and this continues throughout the 2000s.

Van Halen and Devo, initially

1. Amazing 1978 debut album on Warner Bros. label
2. Follow-up 1979 album is pretty solid bc it's culled from the same batch of original material as the debut
3. Further albums in 1980-1984, while none perhaps as brilliant as the debut, contain some great stuff which cements the band's legacy/forms their canon

They both had surprisingly decent comebacks too

Both replaced original singer with Sammy Hagar

The Cars and Van Halen. Big 1978 debut from under the Warner auspices, similar 1979 album that's almost as liked, a few early 80s ones that try a new things and are mostly 'for the fans' territory today, then a big 1984 commercial comeback album with a synthpop radio staple with a single-word, motion-based command for a title.

I was working on a Funkadelic-Gentle Giant comparison but it started to unravel around 1977, so back to the drawing board.

XTC and Kate Bush also tasted their biggest US success in the mid-80s with a song with 'God' in the title, both having come a long way since each issuing their first two albums in 1978, the second of which - recorded quickly after the debut - remains a popular choice for their worst album overall, necessitating a change in production and a meeting with this man Hugh Padgham. Ofc after all that, they released an album in 1989 and another a few years later but then they were gone for years.

Funny I should mention Nonsuch though, given that it wasn't the only ambitious, hour+ single-CD double-LP 1992 album with a single-word title by a former UK post-punk act to become increasingly ornate and pagan over the years to feature a gold outline of a historic British structure on its wonky serif-lettered sleeve, charting very briefly inside the UK Top 40 before quickly falling off the chart and becoming their final record for a major label before their public and very acrimonious departure from that label. Y'know, given the existence of Julian Cope's Jehovakill as well.

Maybe Pere Ubu and Devo are closer. Many early years of home recordings, art events and confrontational gigs with a Zappa/Beefheart/NY Dolls vibe. Finally work it out with a couple of zeitgeisty albums after punk arrives, then trying to mess with pop from the inside- with mixed results, leading to semi-retirement and pursuit of other artistic or business ventures, but never completely going away, eventually a perrenial favourite but no need to pay attention to their new songs.

Weirdly The Beat/English Beat and The Sundays are the first ones that popped into my head.

Perfect debuts
Disappointing follow-ups with a few standouts
Third albums that should have been classed as return to forms, but were slept on critically

i came up with a pretty tight comparison for the EARLY portion of two similar bands' careers. it was very close. you could probably keep going with steve miller and joe walsh and their massive later-70s presence and on into the new wave 80s but i am not going to.

The James Gang - 16 Greatest Hits (ABC-1973) -VS- Steve Miller Band - Anthology (Capitol-1972)

-Individual Head-To-Head Competition Scores-
1. "Walk Away" (JG) 9.0
"I Love You" (SMB) 7.0

2. "Funk #49" (JG) 9.0
"Going To The Country" (SMB) 8.0

3. "Midnight Man" (JG) 7.5
"Baby's House" (SMB) 7.0

4. "The Bomber" (JG) 8.0
"Kow Kow Calqulator" (SMB) 7.5

5. "Yadig?" (JG) 6.5
"Your Saving Grace" (SMB) 7.5

6. "Stop" (JG) 7.0
"Going To Mexico" (SMB) 8.0

7. "Thanks" (JG) 6.5
"Space Cowboy" (SMB) 9.0

8. "White Man - Black Man" (JG) 8.0
"Living In The U.S.A." (SMB) 9.5

9. "Woman" (JG) 7.5
"Journey From Eden" (SMB) 9.0

10. "Again" (JG) 8.0
"Seasons" (SMB) 8.5

11. "Take A Look Around" (JG) 8.0
"Motherless Children" (SMB) 9.0

12. "Funk #48" (JG) 8.0
"Never Kill Another Man" (SMB) 7.5

13. "Tend My Garden" (JG) 8.5
"Don't Let Nobody Turn You Around" (SMB) 8.5

14. "There I Go Again" (JG) 7.5
"Little Girl" (SMB) 8.0

15. "Ashes, The Rain & I" (JG) 9.0
"Celebration Song" (SMB) 8.0

16. "Collage" (JG) 9.5
"My Dark Hour" (SMB) 8.5

-Combined Rating-

James Gang - 127.5

Steve Miller Band - 130.5

xps And both are from Ohio and referred to their sounds as 'industrial' in some sense

I think of R.E.M. and Sonic Youth a bit this way. Both put out debut EPs in '82, were lauded indie acts who signed to majors at about the same time, had about the same number of "official" albums per decade over three decades, and broke up at about the same time. Each was perhaps most vital in their first decade, most successful in their second, and least relevant (for lack of a better word) in their last (though SY maintained better quality, while R.E.M. had made more great records in the '80s).

I also compare these two bands because they're the only acts I followed through the '90s (basically my teens). I still listen regularly to SY but to REM only occasionally, and I think the perceived superfluousness of REM post-2000 has a lot to do with it. R.E.M. had a "universal" reach that seems a little anachronistic now, while SY's record-collector cultishness endures for big slices of niche. Maybe that's kind of sad.

Yes! Also the records set the archetypical “indie rock” and “loud indie” styles.

while R.E.M. had made more great records in the '80s

I would change this to "REM made more records in the 80s" because Sister and Daydream are better than anything REM did.

Orbital and Underworld: each band's first 4 albums are excellent, genre defining and in a couple of cases masterpieces (for me Snivilisation and Second Toughest... but take your pick), followed by much noodling around, collaborations, periods of hiatus and group albums that capture past glories to greater or lesser extents.

also they both continue to be much-loved live acts that continue to play a wide temporal range of material as well as the classics

Idk I think that breaks down after 2002 or so, Orbital have always stuck to a pretty rigid Orbital sound while Underworld have kinda been all over the place, hence why they have a 6 hour long album and Orbital doesn’t :)

yeah fair enough, I guess there's more to be said than "settled into a comfortable middle-aged techno dad role" but OTOH I think we are talking in general terms here

I can't really explain my argument for this, but I'll just say: Take two strips of paper, construct a timeline of Leonard Cohen's albums on one and a timeline of the band Spoon's albums on the other, and slide them back and forth next to each other until you "get it."

Prince and Bowie is a good one. Not only in their careers but how they presented themselves as these fashion-forward, androgynous and hyper-sexual rock icons at their peak and matured into more classy, polished looks in their older years.

D’angelo and Portishead

Both have debut albums that became blueprints in new genres (neo-soul / trip hop), layed low for a few years before releasing a second album that further solidified their importance within those genres. Then they didn’t release anything for more than a decade and came back with a third critically acclaimed album that serves as a perfect capstone to their massively influential careers and brings a more expansive style to their sound that doesn’t really belong in the genres they helped define previously and are more connected to their influences.

And another decade+ later there’s still no sign of a fourth album from either of them.

Oh yeah and they also released a classic live album in between (Roseland NYC live, Live at Jazz Cafe London).

These are great.

This one seems obvious to me now, not sure why it didn't occur to me right away: Joy Division and Nirvana. Two primary albums, but even more early raw, live and EP stuff, and the elegiac final song before the legend is set. If you are exposed at the right age, the pathos hits so hard you wear the tshirt for years.

Dinosaur Jr. and A Tribe Called Quest

Debut albums with some good stuff but generally underwhelming

Second albums are certified classics

Third albums very similar to second. Some fans prefer them even.

Fourth albums a bit of a let down. Listenable but something is missing. Line-up changes (Barlow leaves, Consequence joins)

Five album--another let-down, though the singles are good.

At this point the groups diverge a bit, as Tribe breaks up but DJ puts out two more unmemorable albums.

But after this the main members do solo albums until a reunion.

I considered mentioning Portishead because of the Verve

Both released albums on 29 September 1997, which debuted at numbers one (Verve) and two (Portishead) in the UK charts. Neither band was heard of again until 2008, when Portishead released their logically-titled third album Third, and the Verve released their logically-titled fourth album Forth. Again, the Verve go all the way and Portishead stop at number two. Though only one of the bands has split up, neither band has released an album since.

The debut albums from Terence Trent D'arby and Maxwell remain some of the most famous and more celebrated soul albums of their time, but then they released a second album that some critics chastised for apparently being too cerebral and art rock and self-indulgent. They're both classic though really. Subsequent albums have smaller legacies than those first two LPs despite some (in D'arby's case) or quite a lot (in Maxwell's case) success.

Galaxie 500 and Bedhead

3 albums on independent labels with singles preceding/around the first record, then some beloved EPs mixed in there which include a Joy Division cover. Broke up as they were still on the rise. Box set years later on revered reissue labels, with a live album concurrently released. Never to get back together, though some of the members still work with each other in new bands.

Another one that comes to mind is The Fall and Thee Ohsees. Ridiculous productivity, cantankerous, always different always the same, jumbled references to the past, and if you like the first five or six records you're pointed towards, you probably would find something in every outing. I get the sense Guided by Voices is like that, but I haven't really enjoyed the five or six records I've tried.

This describes Motörhead, too... an album every year during the early "classic" era, then every two years until Lemmy's death. (A million live albums, too.) Every album has at least three or four awesome songs, and the rest are good enough.

Motorhead reminds me more of the Ramones discography

The Galaxie 500 and Bedhead one seems to apply equally well to Codeine, right down to the archival box set and concurrent live album.

This one seems obvious to me now, not sure why it didn't occur to me right away: Joy Division and Nirvana. Two primary albums, but even more early raw, live and EP stuff, and the elegiac final song before the legend is set. If you are exposed at the right age, the pathos hits so hard you wear the tshirt for years.

Also, the lead singers killed themselves, and in both cases another band member went on to front hugely successful bands responsible for some truly terrible lyrics.

nelvana had 3 albums

I was thinking, in the legacy way people listen to the bands, Warsaw = Bleach. Not quite the sound we associate with the acts, but still key to hear the early raw form. But, my thinking around this concept is discographies which provide a similar experience, more than perfect correspondences.

Talking Heads and XTC? Both start in the late 70s sparse and twitchy and neurotic, smooth out that sound for a few records (more for XTC), create a sonically astonishing mid-period release that doesn’t really sound like what came before (Remain in Light vs. Skylarking) then kinda bland out in the late 80s

Both hooked up with a famous producer for their arguably best record (Eno/Rundgren)

Both had quirky/interesting side projects emphasising particular aspects of the "main" bands' sounds (Tom Tom Club, Eno & Byrne/Dukes of Stratosphear)

The heads went much further into antithetical territory... a band of buttoned up nerds do afrobeat and p-funk. I think the proper comparison is probably johnny rotten. Intriguing early singles, underwhelming first lp, great transitional 2nd lp with a new collaborator and sound, completely unexpected rhythmic and existential apotheosis for two out there classic albums with that key collaborator, collaborator departs, retreat to a sort of bizarre pop for some decent chart success for a few albums, then increasing irrelevance.

Taylor Swift has seemed to me to be following a similar arc to Bruce Springsteen - early albums heavy on the storytelling, then Red kind of lines up with Born to Run as the big mainstream breakout album with some elements of the early work, things get a little out of order with 1989, but then Reputation lines up with Darkness on the Edge of Town as the "angry" album, Lover lines up with The River (double album, pop grab bag with some dark/reflective songs that gesture toward what is to come), then I don't think Folklore is much of a Nebraska but lots of ppl do so there you go, and now she's doing her Born in the USA tour, right on time.

The xtc quality arc is unusual, a slightly above average new wave band does three ok lps and one incredible single, then two amazing lps, then two mediocre lps, then a few incredible ones including their masterpiece (skylarking and the dukes records), then a few more lps that some people rate highly... maybe split enz/crowded house mirrors this best for me. I got you is their nigel, Time and tide is their black sea, crowded house debut is skylarking quality, weather with you is their peter pumpkinhead (cheesy biggest hit) and four seasons in one day is their world wrapped in grey (elegaic and possibly best song).

good thread

Can totally see things quieting down a notch for Swift, and a soundtrack smash like “Secret Garden” a decade hence.