the superlatives

There are albums that have bad, good and great songs. There are albums that have all great songs, the albums that can be listened to without having any forced listens or skipped over songs. But then there are the albums that take it to the next level and tie all the typically disparate songs together into something more cohesive. More than anything, the Auricle has an affinity for such albums. It matters less what the style of music is and more how cohesive the songs and theme are. Some albums' cohesiveness is narrative in style, while others is more conceptual. I had not actually broken these works down into these different camps until I went a-searching for those concept albums that the Auricle had neglected to inform my starving brain about. What I have discovered is that there are conceptual albums based on a thematic cohesion and then there are conceptual-narrative albums intent on telling a story, thereby cohesive. Similarly, there are song cycles and rock operas, which may not be very different at all, but I am too tired right now to figure out the distinctions. For the purposes of writing this blog, I will refer to both the thematic and narrative concept albums simply as concept albums when speaking about them generally. Here is a rather comprehensive list of concept/narrative albums. There are the greats who have helped set the standard for concept albums: Pink Floyd, David Bowie, Genesis, The Beach Boys, The Kinks, The Who, Frank Zappa, Yes, and on and on and on. Then there are the newer bands doing some solid concept album construction such as, of course, Radiohead, but also Pedro the Lion, The Flaming Lips, Neutral Milk Hotel, Smashing Pumpkins, Grandaddy, The Microphones, Sufjan Stevens, and on and on and on. And that's just rock. There's still Marvin Gaye's brilliant soul artwork. Over time, I will get to many of these artists and their concept albums since they manage to be cycled in pretty consistently.