Why nobody likes conseptual LPs

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Most of my collegues hates conseptual albums. If they hear any LP of any young arty band, with introduction, story, decline and grande finale, they`ll write very bad reviews quite automatically. It seems they love primitive collections of songs with some hits + other crap. That`s enough for them.
Why? I love LPs I can hear like books or films. I think a LP have to be a piece of art, not a bunch of usual songs.
The B-side of Beatles` "Abbey Road" is one of the finest moments of rock.

― Margus Kiis, estonian rock critic (Margus Kiis, estonian rock cri), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:20 (twenty-two years ago)

I've found that most people who hate conceptual albums can't spell.

― maria b (maria b), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:23 (twenty-two years ago)

But then again, there are those that love them who can't as well.

― maria b (maria b), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:24 (twenty-two years ago)

err. nevermind.

― maria b (maria b), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:25 (twenty-two years ago)

I only like consensual LPs.

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:26 (twenty-two years ago)

I love albums that are centered around a theme or even a story, but if the narrative's super-liner (opens at the beginning of the action, moves predicably through to a [usually] grand climax or touching sum-up) then that's kinda dull since it compares (usually unfavorably) to novels, which have bigger arsenals. The right way to do a conceptual LP is to get the story right in your head and then put it through a shredder.

― J0hn Darn1elle (J0hn Darn1elle), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:28 (twenty-two years ago)

and have very cryptic liner notes and half blurred photoss in the glossy booklet that accompanies the cd.

― gaz (gaz), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:39 (twenty-two years ago)

Of Montreal to thread

― James Blount (James Blount), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:40 (twenty-two years ago)

i have the butterfly's ball album. it's about moles who eat worms.

― scott seward, Monday, 16 June 2003 22:41 (twenty-two years ago)

very funny gaz

― J0hn Darn1elle (J0hn Darn1elle), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:46 (twenty-two years ago)

sorry, the lamb lies down on broadway has scarred me.

― gaz (gaz), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:48 (twenty-two years ago)

― J0hn Darn1elle (J0hn Darn1elle), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:48 (twenty-two years ago)

john, didnt you get the internal memo about how you have to sing in elf-speak now?

― jess (dubplatestyle), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Search: The Intergalactic Touring Band featuring members of The London Symphony Orchestra, Rod Argent, Arthur Brown, Annie Haslam, Ben E.King, Status Quo, and Meatloaf. Play the songs "Robot Salesman", "Space Commando" and "Universal Zoo". Then throw the album in the trash and say to yourself, "Jesus, I really DO hate conseptual albums. Thanks for nothing, Scott."

― Scott Seward, Monday, 16 June 2003 22:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I prefer thematic LPs to conceptual ones, usually.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 16 June 2003 22:55 (twenty-two years ago)

Aren't all symphonies essentially concept albums?
Also search Carl Craig's "Landcruising."

Whenever possible I try to put a little narrative in my mind to the music on an album. Right now I am writing a little Dr. Who episode in my head based on James Chance & The Contortions' Off White. It's hot. Dr. Who is Benicio Del Toro.

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Maybe the reason certain folks disapprove of concept albums is because we'd rather come up with our own stories to go with each song or section of an album, rather than have the artist tell us what's supposed to be going on. It kind of limits the fun you can have with a piece of music if you're stuck with a preconceived idea of what it means.

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:01 (twenty-two years ago)

also the stories are usually pretty gay

― James Blount (James Blount), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:04 (twenty-two years ago)

I think Millar's about three-quarters right - I don't think people instinctively mind concept albums. It's that most people making them feel driven to SPELL OUT WHAT THE CONCEPT IS in EVERY SINGLE SONG ON THE RECORD, and occasionally to mount riotously great (in retrospect) but intolerably awful (at the time) spectacles like the Styx Kilroy tour, which I'd just like to remind everybody was the single greatest thing ever to happen in the entire history of the human race

― J0hn Darn1elle (J0hn Darn1elle), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Right now I'm on "Stained Sheets" (track 3) and the discordant organ is telling me that it's time for the villain played RuPaul by to turn into his/her true form, a winged lizard, see, and fly to his hidden torture chamber where he has all these anorexic british actresses strung up in sequined green bikinis

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:09 (twenty-two years ago)

all of my band's releases have been "conceptual" pieces. On the other hand, we are widely despised.

You do the math.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Monday, 16 June 2003 23:10 (twenty-two years ago)

when making our first EP, my band realized we had used references to fire ("Hot Shit Inc."), air ("Skycar") and water ("Swimming Away") so we named the last song "Dirty Dog" and called it "All The Elements." I'd like to hope other people come across their concept LPs assbackwards too.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:14 (twenty-two years ago)

track 4 "Tropical Heat Wave" - Benicio Del Who and his assistant Pilar (Monica Bellucci) have escaped RuPaul's half-man half-IKEA minions by sneaking into a smoky nightclub, where a woman made out of lasers is singing on stage. Who is trying to score drinks from the bar by using jelly babies as barter while Pilar looks about frantically and is approached by a rough-looking couple of galactic hooligans.

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:16 (twenty-two years ago)

5. "Almost Black Part 1" Pilar alerts the Doctor to her predicament and he decides to throw the ruffians a curveball by inviting one of them to dance

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:17 (twenty-two years ago)

aw millar, i always play that record to the wizard of oz. now you've changed everything

― gaz (gaz), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:19 (twenty-two years ago)

6. "White Savages" - that didn't last long. Who & Pilar take off out the back door with help from one of the house musicians, an insect man with disco balls for eyes. Once outside they are confronted with RuPaul's henchmen yet again. Between a rock and a hard place, they are knocked out with invisible beams and taken to the fortress of evil, along with the innocent insect man.

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:21 (twenty-two years ago)

7. "Off Black": Pilar awakens to find herself strung up alongside RuPaul's other female subjects wearing an identical green sequined space bikini. RuPaul, in full purple-yellow-red-black regalia (and back in ostensibly human form) takes the opportunity to expound on the virtues of using young healthy women as test material for a series of experiments to turn people into flying-lizard shapeshifters. It appears that RuPaul is the last of his/her race and despite being a hermaphrodite is unable to reproduce alone. RuPaul injects Pilar with something blue and transparent. Cut to Doctor Del Toro, who is awakening alongside the insect man ("Bazz", played by Vas Blackwood) in a featureless grey cell.

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:29 (twenty-two years ago)

8. "Almost Black Part 2" through 11. "Christmas With Satan": as in all Dr. Who episodes and James Chance albums the latter third is almost entirely predictable - Dr. Who escapes from confinement using cleverness, his assistant is freed from the clutches of evil, cured of whatever's been done to her, and the villain is either converted into a gas or reduced to a tiny speck or drained of energy. Then everybody gets back in the Tardis and James Chance continues to wail as his backing band proves once again that it is capable of playing the same pattern without alteration for 192 straight measures or more.

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:34 (twenty-two years ago)

That's why nobody likes conceptual albums, the ending is always so fuckin' predictable

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:35 (twenty-two years ago)

TARKUS owns this (and every other) thread.

― Andy K (Andy K), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:40 (twenty-two years ago)

the ending is always so fuckin' predictable

they lez up?

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Monday, 16 June 2003 23:43 (twenty-two years ago)

you should always watch the wizard of oz when listening to Meco's wizard of oz concept album. it's scarier that way.

― scott seward, Tuesday, 17 June 2003 00:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Meco made a wizard of oz record? Oh, shit.

― Millar (Millar), Tuesday, 17 June 2003 01:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Heh, everyobody seems having terrible memorys with prog-rock. Sorry. I hope you`ll not see nightmares.

― Margus Kiis, estonian rock critic (Margus Kiis, estonian rock cri), Tuesday, 17 June 2003 03:25 (twenty-two years ago)

every album's a concept album

― s.r.w. (s.r.w.), Tuesday, 17 June 2003 06:12 (twenty-two years ago)

i had a great idea for a concept album but Francis McDonald did it first :(

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Tuesday, 17 June 2003 06:13 (twenty-two years ago)

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