Great consecutive album releases

[rousseau]

I was explaining the phenomenon of Radiohead to my partner the other day, and it got me to thinking about when they released Ok Computer, and then Kid A three years later. In retrospect releasing these two albums in sequence was a phenomenal move for the band. First they release a groundbreaking album which sounded like nothing anyone had heard before, then instead of capitalizing on their success and becoming more commercial, they became even weirder and released a dark, electronic album.

The sound of Radiohead definitely isn't for everybody, but it's hard for me to think of many well known artists in recent, or even distant memory who didn't start out strong but then succumb to a more popular 'radio' sound to keep the cash flowing in. It may have been more common prior to the 00s, but the only true artists I've come across since then still releasing music basically just don't sell records at all, and instead make most of their money performing live. I can think of a small number of exceptions.

So can you think of other great consecutive album releases, or strings of album releases that were consistent, interesting, and also well known? Any genre, any era?

 

[hyzer]

Okay, this is on so many lists, Beatles Rubber Soul (1965) followed by Revolver (1966).

But for me, all time best one/two, REM Out of Time (1991) followed by Automatic for the People (1992). Not a throw away on either album. I could take these two to the desert island.

 

[ideologyhunter]

All of the truly great recording artists have a hot streak where they just can't go wrong; where they hit on their essential themes with definitive statements. My favorites, off hand:
The Band: Music from Big Pink '68/ The Band '69
Dylan: '65-'67: Bringing It All Back Home/Highway 61 Revisited/Blonde on Blonde/John Wesley Harding. (Most mind-blowing: by the time of John Wesley Harding, he'd privately recorded The Basement Tapes, which by themselves would've made his legend, and which he wouldn't release 'til 1975, and then only in fragmentary form.)
Otis Redding in '65-'66: Otis Blue/The Soul Album/ Dictionary of Soul -- 3 masterworks of Memphis soul
Grateful Dead: Workingman's Dead and American Beauty, both in '70, packed with songs they would play for a quarter century
Van Morrison from '70 to '72: Moondance/His Band and the Street Choir/Tupelo Honey/St. Dominic's Preview
Graham Parker and the Rumour: Howlin' Wind and Heat Treatment (both 1976 -- his two finest albums -- a complete picture of the artist, brimming with passion and songwriting of great wit and concision)
Joni Mitchell -- truly riding with her muse from '71 to '74: Blue/For the Roses/Court and Spark -- intoxicating melodies, lyrics, with virtuoso musicianship

That's long enough, although Aretha deserves a rundown, and Creedence, and Coltrane, and God knows, from the pre-album days, no one was hotter than Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five/Seven in 1925-28. Potato Head Blues, anyone?

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Yes, after releasing The Yes Album where they have identified their craft, provide us with Fragile, Close to the Edge, Relayer, and Going for the One. The remarkable thing is that the drummer and keyboardist changes in this run, the keyboardist twice (but among just two people). Fragile would be the last of the only short track albums until a lesser good Tormato. Fragile is a bit odd as you'd guess the transition of The Yes Album to Close to the Edge would be more logical as you have Perpetual Change and Yours is no Disgrace long tracks.
Close to the Edge is one of the best albums of all time. It might not get as much love from the rest of the rock world, but the Close to the Edge track to me is musical perfection. Relayer gives us prog-rock-jazz and Gates of Delirium is Yes's second best track. Going for the One isn't respected as much, despite the album not having a weak track at all, where the band returns to shorter tracks, but this one include's Yes's last epic for a while, Awaken, which again is a 'religious' like experience.

Stevem Wilson had a mind blowing run from Grace for Drowning -> The Raven That Refused to Sing -> Hand Cannot Erase. Each one grew on the significance of the last. Grace for Drowning was technically his second solo release and the design was incredible. Then Raven comes out and that was just incredible, a handful of ghost stories that were immaculate. Then Hand Cannot Erase comes out and that is Dark Side of the Moon epic.

 

[TSwizzle]

The Proclaimers first two albums were brilliant. “This Is The Story” was their debut album which was very raw. The follow up album “Sunshine On Leith” was a bit more polished but was still down to earth.

I think U2 produce quality albums more consistently than any other artist I listen to. But in my opinion their best back to back releases were “All That You Can’t Leave Behind” and “How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb”.

Talking Heads “Remain In Light” followed by “Speaking in Tongues” were two strong back to back albums.

Roxy Music put out three great albums on the trot. “Manifesto”, “Flesh and Blood” and “Avalon”.

 

[prideandfall]

nine inch nails has an astounding run from 1989 to 1999: pretty hate machine > broken > the downward spiral > the fragile - was just an amazing sequence of the best music ever produced by human kind, and while they all have similar bones to their sound, they're all quite different.
(sadly after that changes to trent reznor's personal life meant all the creative juice drained out and since 1999 he's only managed to create 1 good song across 6 more albums, and everything else he puts out now is crap)

smashing pumpkins from gish > siamese dream > mellon collie and the infinite sadness > adore had a significant change in their sound, but each was great in its own way.

marilyn manson: portrait of the an american family > smells like children > anti-christ superstar - every album is totally different tonally and sonically but each is very interesting in its own way.

VNV nation: praise the fallen > burning empires > empires - pretty much solid gold awesome all the way through.

they might be giants: debut > lincoln > flood > apollo 18 > john henry

 

[rousseau]

Joni Mitchell -- truly riding with her muse from '71 to '74: Blue/For the Roses/Court and Spark -- intoxicating melodies, lyrics, with virtuoso musicianship

I'm as big of a Mitchell fan as they come, but somehow I've never been able to jive with her albums post-Blue, up until Hejira. There's something too rambling and unfocused about them for me. Give me her songs with a strong pop element, or where she's doing something a bit strange like with Don Juan's Reckless Daughter, or Mingus. Oddly enough that's about where I fall off again up until Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm, and Night Ride Home.

But in truth, Blue is such a phenomenal album that I likely haven't given the brunt of her discography as much attention as I should have by now. The only other record of hers that I've given significant attention to outside of Blue is Night Ride Home, after that likely Chalk Mark, and Mingus.

 

[ideologyhunter]

For the Roses is the one that astounds me -- it even has a strong pop contender (You Turn Me On I'm a Radio). Banquet I find poignant (and the one time I heard it live, she had her band play it as a metal ballad. Sheesh!!) Barangrill has so much observation and attitude ("Ah, her mind's on her boyfriend and eggs over easy"). You get to Let the Wind Carry Me, with its delicate layers of instrumentation, and it's just ridiculous, she's crafting songs like no one else on the scene. To me, it's such a perfect album that I don't play it much, because you can't let it play and, say, cook dinner or straighten a room. You've got to enter each of those songs and experience what Joni put into it. Even the numbers that sound like 'art songs' (Let the Wind Carry Me, Cold Blue Steel, Lesson in Survival, Electricity) have a vitality in the word play and accompaniment that keeps them from sterility. There's only one track I don't care for, and it's the final cut, the one about Beethoven. There, I think she overreached, and it comes off like graduate student poesy.

 

[ruby sparks]

I was explaining the phenomenon of Radiohead to my partner the other day, and it got me to thinking about when they released Ok Computer, and then Kid A three years later. In retrospect releasing these two albums in sequence was a phenomenal move for the band. First they release a groundbreaking album which sounded like nothing anyone had heard before, then instead of capitalizing on their success and becoming more commercial, they became even weirder and released a dark, electronic album.

The sound of Radiohead definitely isn't for everybody, but it's hard for me to think of many well known artists in recent, or even distant memory who didn't start out strong but then succumb to a more popular 'radio' sound to keep the cash flowing in. It may have been more common prior to the 00s, but the only true artists I've come across since then still releasing music basically just don't sell records at all, and instead make most of their money performing live. I can think of a small number of exceptions.

So can you think of other great consecutive album releases, or strings of album releases that were consistent, interesting, and also well known? Any genre, any era?

I'm struggling.

It would be one thing to offer what the OP title suggests (consecutive great albums) and another to offer what the OP text seeks, which would be not only consecutive great albums, but a change of style, and one that is apparently not done in order to be as or more commercial than before.

I myself can't yet think of a better (or even another) example than the one you offered (OK Computer to Kid A) which I agree is a good example.

It may be that some others have offered examples which are intended to be all those things and I have misunderstood (or am not familiar with the artists).

 

[ruby sparks]

Wasn't there a bit of an outcry from folk fans when Bob Dylan went electric?

Van Morrison is well known for shimmying through quite a few styles while apparently not caring too much about how the segues were received.

Does 'Rubber Soul' to 'Revolver' count (as has been suggested) or even 'Revolver' to 'Sgt Pepper'?

How about Pink Floyd for 'pre-Dark Side of the Moon' ('Meddle' or 'Obscured by Clouds') to 'Dark Side of the Moon' (or was that a move towards being more commercial)?

 

[rousseau]

For the Roses is the one that astounds me -- it even has a strong pop contender (You Turn Me On I'm a Radio). Banquet I find poignant (and the one time I heard it live, she had her band play it as a metal ballad. Sheesh!!) Barangrill has so much observation and attitude ("Ah, her mind's on her boyfriend and eggs over easy"). You get to Let the Wind Carry Me, with its delicate layers of instrumentation, and it's just ridiculous, she's crafting songs like no one else on the scene. To me, it's such a perfect album that I don't play it much, because you can't let it play and, say, cook dinner or straighten a room. You've got to enter each of those songs and experience what Joni put into it. Even the numbers that sound like 'art songs' (Let the Wind Carry Me, Cold Blue Steel, Lesson in Survival, Electricity) have a vitality in the word play and accompaniment that keeps them from sterility. There's only one track I don't care for, and it's the final cut, the one about Beethoven. There, I think she overreached, and it comes off like graduate student poesy.

It definitely took skill to produce the album, but to me it comes across as trying a bit too hard, she lost all of the fun elements of Blue, and her prior albums. But to her credit, how are you supposed to follow up from Blue? Which is one of the best albums of the twentieth century. You Turn Me On, I'm a Radio sounds like a joke to me - look, I can produce all of these complex songs, but here's some fodder for you too, which I'm going to name 'I'm a radio'.

To each their own. If nothing else she did something un-matchable with Blue, even by herself.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Wasn't there a bit of an outcry from folk fans when Bob Dylan went electric?

Van Morrison is well known for shimmying through quite a few styles while apparently not caring too much about how the segues were received.

Does 'Rubber Soul' to 'Revolver' count (as has been suggested) or even 'Revolver' to 'Sgt Pepper'?

How about Pink Floyd for 'pre-Dark Side of the Moon' ('Meddle' or 'Obscured by Clouds') to 'Dark Side of the Moon' (or was that a move towards being more commercial)?

I though the Record company was nervous about Dark Side of the Moon as it lacked popular appeal. They really wanted to try and make Money into something popular.

 

[ronburgundy]

How about Pink Floyd for 'pre-Dark Side of the Moon' ('Meddle' or 'Obscured by Clouds') to 'Dark Side of the Moon' (or was that a move towards being more commercial)?

I was gonna say Dark Side, Wish You Were Here, Animals, and The Wall are an amazing string of 4 well known quality albums that have and will stand the test of time.

I also do love Meddle, but it's much lesser known. The notable change Floyd made between Meddle and Dark Side that lead their major success in the 4 above albums was to have more lyrics and shorter songs. But it's still wasn't main stream at the time and I don't think it was about striving to be "commercial", so much as about Roger Waters taking more creative control and wanting to express his philosophical/political views.

BTW, all Floyd fans should watch Live at Pompeii. In addition to great visuals of them playing most of Meddle to an empty ancient amphitheater overlaid with volcanic imagery, there are scenes where Roger is writing Dark Side on the piano. Plus hilarious Spinal Tap moments. This video has some funny clips, especially minute 1:35 to 3:45.

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqTH7w1b0qI[/YOUTUBE]

 

[rousseau]

I was explaining the phenomenon of Radiohead to my partner the other day, and it got me to thinking about when they released Ok Computer, and then Kid A three years later. In retrospect releasing these two albums in sequence was a phenomenal move for the band. First they release a groundbreaking album which sounded like nothing anyone had heard before, then instead of capitalizing on their success and becoming more commercial, they became even weirder and released a dark, electronic album.

The sound of Radiohead definitely isn't for everybody, but it's hard for me to think of many well known artists in recent, or even distant memory who didn't start out strong but then succumb to a more popular 'radio' sound to keep the cash flowing in. It may have been more common prior to the 00s, but the only true artists I've come across since then still releasing music basically just don't sell records at all, and instead make most of their money performing live. I can think of a small number of exceptions.

So can you think of other great consecutive album releases, or strings of album releases that were consistent, interesting, and also well known? Any genre, any era?

I'm struggling.

It would be one thing to offer what the OP title suggests (consecutive great albums) and another to offer what the OP text seeks, which would be not only consecutive great albums, but a change of style, and one that is apparently not done in order to be as or more commercial than before.

I myself can't yet think of a better (or even another) example than the one you offered (OK Computer to Kid A) which I agree is a good example.

It may be that some others have offered examples which are intended to be all those things and I have misunderstood (or am not familiar with the artists).

Radiohead's run is a particularly good example, but I'm open to people defining their own reasons why a run is good.

I single out OKC/Kid A primarily because they're so divergent, AND also both so groundbreaking. Not just good albums, but both groundbreaking in sequence. I can't think of many similar one, two punches.