Acts whose debut album is an afterthought in their overall discography

Guys I need your help. We have to come up with a list of artists whose debut album is basically ignored by the vast majority of their fans.

No hits. Nothing played live. Hated/discounted by the general listening public. Even better if most fans don't even know its existence.

1. Ride The Tiger - Yo La Tengo

2. Björk - Björk

3. This Is Your Bloody Valentine - My Bloody Valentine

4. Kraftwerk - Kraftwerk

5. Tori Amos - Y Kant Tori Read

6. The Nits - S/T

7. Ministry - With Sympathy

8. Pantera - Metal Magic

9. Mobb Deep - Juvenile Hell

10. Billy Joel - Attila

11. American Music Club - The Restless Stranger

12. Pulp - It

13. David Bowie - David Bowie

14. The Red Hot Chili Peppers - The Red Hot Chili Peppers

15. Lana Del Ray - Lana Del Ray

blur / leisure

*alright there's one hit on it. and i guess they do play it live.

Underworld's first two albums might fit into this category.

Hey I enjoyed Kraftwerk's !&2: low-budget Space Age bachelor pad music with jazzy breezes, often enough.

1&2, that is.

Genesis - From Genesis to Revelation

Prince

I mean it had a hit, but no one listens to our talks about that album in comparison to what followed.

Bad Religion's second album
Japan's first 2.8 albums

Grimes. I didn't even know her latest wasn't her first album although I loved it. Her fans may be aware (and like it ?), though.

Janet Jackson

Genius - Words from the Genius (aka the debut album from the rapper later known as GZA)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1a/Alanis1991cover.gif

Van Der Graaf Generator - The Aerosol Grey Machine
http://www.vandergraafgenerator.co.uk/pawnhearts/aerosol_mercury_front.jpg
(One of my fave songs is on this album)

Was gonna say that but expected objections

Wouldn't Fairport Convention's debut be a perfect choice for this?

Red Red Meat - S/T

TV On the Radio - OK Calculator

Supposedly the Rush debut but fans are generally so unenthusiastic about it, I cant be bothered checking if theyre right.

Lucinda Williams - Ramblin'

of Montreal - Cherry Peel

Bob Dylan - Bob Dylan

Lou Reed - Lou Reed
Neil Young - Neil Young

(last 3 debatable)

First Canned Heat album perhaps.

Girls Against Boys - Tropic of Scorpio

The first work of some of the tropicalistas, maybe:

Gilberto Gil - Louvação
Gal Costa and Caetano Veloso - Domingo

surely dylan is more known as the songwriter he'd become than a folk covers artist he began as xxxp

Oneida - A Place Called El Shaddai's

Al Greene - Back Up Train

Joni Mitchell - Songs To A Seagull

Hüsker Dü - Land Speed Record

Emmylou Harris - Gliding Bird
Billy Joel - Cold Spring Harbor
Juana Molina - Rara

Eminem — Infinite
Parliament — Osmium
Fleetwood Mac — Fleetwood Mac

Sly and the Family Stone - A Whole New Thing

(though I believe it underwent a major reevaluation/rediscovery in the mid-90s)

Another one I almost posted

10. Billy Joel - Attila
Billy Joel - Cold Spring Harbor

how many debuts does this guy have?

Isaac Hayes - Presenting Isaac Hayes

It may be just me but I don't care much about Bruce Springsteen's first album

10. Billy Joel - Attila
Billy Joel - Cold Spring Harbor

how many debuts does this guy have?

the Hassles' 1967 s/t album might also qualify as his debut (although he didn't sing on it). dude is the king of false starts.

Thin Lizzy - Thin Lizzy
Gentle Giant - Gentle Giant
Jethro Tull - This Was

The Divine Comedy - Fanfare For The Comic Muse

Sleater-Kinney: s/t

It may be just me but I don't care much about Bruce Springsteen's first album

Lots of people do, plus it has Blinded By the Light which was a huge hit for Manfred Mann.

John Cougar - Chestnut Street Incident

The Boo Radleys - Ichabod & I

Carly Rae Jepsen - Tug of War

Fuck Buttons - Street Horrrsing

All the fans who latched on to FB after Tarot Sport wouldn't even recognize this.

Van Der Graaf Generator - The Aerosol Grey Machine

"Afterwards" is quite often played live by PH at solo gigs. Otherwise this would be a good call.

Came here to post From Genesis to Revelation and Fanfare for the Comic Muse, both good shouts.

Robyn - Robyn is here

but Robyn Is Here spawned at least two international hits and is quite possibly her bestselling album to date! just because P4K didn't review it doesn't m

Wouldn't Fairport Convention's debut be a perfect choice for this?

― Mark G, Sunday, May 10, 2015 11:21 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Isn't the biggest thing people have against this one the absence of Sandy Denny? Because otherwise the signature style is there, albeit with more of a west coast psych influence.

A similar case could be made for Jefferson Airplane Takes Off, as the famous female singer hasn't shown up, and the repertory is cover-heavy.

Built To Spill - Ultimate Alternative Wavers

Dinosaur s/t

Sonic Youth s/t EP though I guess Confusion Is Sex would be true for general public if not hardcore fans

Disagree on Jethro Tull's This Was. It has a different sound then their following work, and is not a peak album, but it's not exactly an ignominious and hated record. It was reasonably successful and songs from it still show up in their set lists.

The National s/t

Meat Pups

Afghan Whigs

Fuck Buttons - Street Horrrsing

Really? I thought SH was fairly well received/known?

What about

Eminem - Infinite

oh we had it

Cowboy Junkies - Whites Off Earth Now
10,000 Maniacs - Secrets of the I Ching

warren zevon -- wanted dead or alive
garland jefferys -- grinder's switch, or "garland jeffreys," whichever you consider his debut
andy pratt -- records are like life

good rats -- good rats

miranda lambert -- miranda lambert
ashley monroe -- satisfied

jim croce -- facets, and/or jim and ingrid croce

moody blues -- the magnificent moodies

doobie brothers -- the doobie brothers

Saw Autre ne Veut two years back, and he didn't play a single track from the debut :(

OK, then how about:

Ministry: With Sympathy (Arista)

Billy Joel & Atilla - two different acts.

already had Ministry, but you can add 50 Cent, 2Pac, NWA, Lil Wayne, Ice-T and Macklemore.

First couple of Yes albums maybe. I love the band, and I had no idea what was on them.

Aw, and I did look carefully.

elton john - empty sky

2. Björk - Björk

― olly, Sunday

madness

first Darkthrone, Immortal, Bathory, Anthrax and Sepultura albums too.

john lennon - two virgins
george harrison - wonderwall music

Max Tundra -Some Best Friend You Turned Out to Be

Bob Dylan was a daringly unusual major label folk debut for the early 60s, when "folk" hits were mostly corny as hell. he showed up with deep blues drama and a few equally scruffy, wry-to-sad originals, and made it all fit. Didn't sell anything then, and I don't know how many people love it now, but it's good. As somebody said on the main Joni Mitchell thread, "the first ten seconds of Songs To A Seagull" basically gives you her whole thing. Parliament's Osmmium is transitional, speculative, but worth checking out for sure. Some good tracks on Springsteen's Greetings From Asbury Park, even got a sense of humor, not so evident after The Wild, The Innocent & The E-Street Shuffle.

Some good tracks on Springsteen's Greetings From Asbury Park

not to mention several tracks that remain live staples 40-plus years later.

<i>Bathory</i>

Wait what?

The debut was an enjoyable slice of Motorhead derived energy but The Return and the four albums after that are pretty much the Bathory canon.

Spoon - Telephono

(also happens to be my favorite or second favorite of theirs)

the grateful dead

Emmylou Harris - Gliding Bird

have long wanted to hear that^

though with the dead album, some of the covers were played live a lot.

2. Björk - Björk

― olly, Sunday

madness

You realise he wrote "Björk" and not "Debut"?

Doesn't truly fit this category, but for a lot of music writers, Section.80 must qualify, based on how many times I've seen To Pimp a Butterfly referred to as a sophomore record.

2. Björk - Björk

― olly, Sunday

madness

You realise he wrote "Björk" and not "Debut"?

― ( who ALSO my boss and his sister!) (sic),

I did; my smart phone didn't.

Eurythmics - In the Garden

"The debut was an enjoyable slice of Motorhead derived energy but The Return and the four albums after that are pretty much the Bathory canon."

Well they are all better, sure, but I'd say the debut is as influential as any of them.

I have heard lots of raving about that Eurythmics debut.

yes, it's great—yet i'll bet largely ignored by most of their fans? it's the only one i like.

Cat Power - Dear Sir

Godspeed You! Black Emperor cassette tape
Father John Misty's first 7 albums as J. Tillman

(disagree w Kraftwerk, 2Pac and Bob Dylan)

Randy Newman - Randy Newman

Failure - Comfort

Carole King - Writer

http://i220.photobucket.com/albums/dd107/music13luvr/nicholas_jonas_--06__lg.jpg

disagree w Kraftwerk

those albums and the third have been out of print for decades and are excluded from the numbering with which Kraftwerk advertise their public appearances of the last several years

I mean, I love early Kraftwerk, but

The Kraftwerk debut is sounding more intense and avant than I remembered, and even more to original point: that it shouldn't be neglected (just because its parents disowned it).

Ditto very early live workouts/freakouts, which are or were on YouTube.

OP says is, not should

gbv - Devil Between My Toes

Pablo Honey woulda counted if not for "Creep" (though really that song stands on its own, outside of that album).

Judas Priest - "Rocka Rolla" (they actually played a song live from it in 2009 but mostly that album's been ignored - and isn't well regarded outside of trolly ILX polls)

katy perry - "katy hudson"

Green Day - 1039 Smoothed Out Slappy Hours & Kerplunk

Wasn't the first UFO album somewhat, um, different

I was going to say that Eurythmics one which is very different to the rest of their catalogue. Think it has its own fans possibly. I was very glad to get the remaster a few years ago cos previous cds were really tinny sounding. Not sure if the band was a permanent line up elsewhere, here it's members of Blondie & Can among others.

I think both Pink Floyd's PATGOD and New Order's Movement are seen as at least anomolous exploring directions not really explored elsewhere. PATGOD is probably pretty popular but stands alone from the rest of Floyd doesnt it. Not sure how many people into their later, established stuff would be aware of it. Probably not automatic thought that this is the same band as did The Wall or whatever for a large number of people.

I've also heard that R.e.o. Speedwagon's 1st 2lps are decent almost stoner hard rock.
Oh & Journey started out good as a non-latinate Santana offshoot playing good almost psychy jazz-rock.

Green Day - 1039 Smoothed Out Slappy Hours & Kerplunk

― LimbsKing, Monday, May 11, 2015 4:08 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this doesn't fulfil a single one of the original criteria, good work

idk his narrative that well at all but isn't Alice Cooper's first album really totally different/not usually talked about?

Al Stewart – Bedsitter Images

Chrome - The Visitation

That album that Refused did before The Shape Of Punk To Come

rihanna - music of the sun

Noooooo that's still one of my favourites.

Supposedly the Rush debut but fans are generally so unenthusiastic about it, I cant be bothered checking if theyre right.

There are two radio staples on this + they played "Working Man" live when I saw them in 2002.

(I can't remember another song from it aside from "In the Mood" and "Working Man", though.)

Scorpions - Lonesome Crow

Faith No More - we care a lot?

Supposedly the Rush debut but fans are generally so unenthusiastic about it, I cant be bothered checking if theyre right.

- Robert Adam Gilmour

There are two radio staples on this + they played "Working Man" live when I saw them in 2002.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Monday, 11 May 2015 12:55

(I can't remember another song from it aside from "In the Mood" and "Working Man", though.)

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Monday, 11 May 2015 13:01

Come to think of it I don't much like Fly By Night apart from the lovely title track.

Slipknot - Mate Feed Kill Repeat
Beth Orton - Superpinkymandy

Does that first Feist album fit the bill?

Stoney & Meatloaf

The Offspring - The Offspring

would Peter Gabriel's first count? He never recorded another song with "moribund" in it again.

rihanna - music of the sun

― lex pretend, Monday, May 11, 2015 10:08 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Noooooo that's still one of my favourites.

― Tim F, Monday, May 11, 2015 10:17 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it's one of my favourite rihanna albums but popular and critical consensus - wrongly! - holds that she became important with GGGB

John Martyn – London Conversation

The Flaming Lips – Hear It Is

Peter Gabriel debut had Solsbury Hill

Huey Lewis and the News

ZZ Top--ZZ Top,s First Album

Replacements

The Who "My Generation"

I know, but ignore the single(s) and mm, how many tracks have anything to do with the band they became?

Don't see it listed but first thought of:
Paul Simon- Paul Simon Songbook (1965)

Sufjan Stevens - A Sun Came maybe? Don't know if he ever played any of those songs live and besides "it's kinda decent" I've never heard anyone speak well of it.

Glass Hammer - Journey of the Dunadan, an almost infamously awful concept album about Lord of the Rings that embodies everything lolworthy about prog in 70+ minutes. And it doesn't do it in a way that's actually somewhat awesome, the way a lot of their later albums would...lots "Synth Fanfare 2"-type melodies and hilariously terrible vocals.

Fluke - Techno Rose of Blighty - dunno if the fans dislike this one, but it's kind of a bad take on Madchester, it's nothing like what they'd get famous for, and most of their better material didn't even make the album (which I believe was only like 6 tracks/30 minutes on its first release?)

Robert Wyatt - End of an Ear, do people like this one at all?

Also - how about those first two Primal Scream albums?

Otherwise it's really easy to come up with albums that meet some of those criteria; prog rock in general has a ton of "false start" albums, but I think they're all enjoyable to some degree (especially the VdGG and Yes ones)

End of an Ear is a p solid Brit free improv rec

ZZ Top's First Record has Brown Sugar, which shows up on best-of's and they played in concert on a recent tour. And though it's not their best work, it's definitely good and all the components of their early 70s aesthetic are basically there.

I feel like there's a distinction to be made between that type of album, where the band is not quite firing on all cylinders and a few years away from a great record, and the first 10 or so mentioned on the thread, where the albums are viewed as actual embarrassments (Y Tori Kant Read) or not officially the start of their discography (like the album Bjork made when she was 12).

Like I don't think any ZZ Top fan is going to listen to the first album and think, "It was a mistake to release this, I bet they regret this youthful indiscretion," or "Wow, this is an like a whole other band that is totally underdeveloped and it's weird to think of them putting this out."

Same goes for The Who, and maybe the Green Day examples above.

also, great thread idea, kornrulez6969

The Who "My Generation"

I know, but ignore the single(s) and mm, how many tracks have anything to do with the band they became?

― Mark G, Monday, May 11, 2015 11:05 AM (22 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I was going to mention this too, mainly because it's not served well by oldies/"classic rock" radio, and non-fanatics generally aren't aware of it.

But in addition to the title song and "The Kids Are Alright," I think every song here (except maybe "I Don't Mind" and "Please Please Please") was a blueprint for what they became. Until Moon died, they never strayed from the basic approach on this record, and continually expanded on it. "In a Hand or a Face" is a more knowing "La-La-La-Lies," "Who Are You" is an older, grizzled "Circles," and "Cut My Hair" is "Out In The Street" from a different perspective. For that matter, Quadrophenia is really just "My Generation" expanded to 2 LPs.

Neil Young - s/t
Lou Reed - s/t
Rush - s/t

^
|
|

Sometimes it feels like Bleach is silo'd away from the rest of Nirvana's discography, all of which feels of a piece to me, or has a narrative at least, and yet while it's got some classics and no Nirvana fan would be without it, the line-up is different and it's still the sound of a band finding its identity (to me at least).

Hoobastank - They Sure Don't Make Basketball Shorts Like They Used To

Already mentioned upthread, but just look at this young man:

http://i.imgur.com/7pMB19v.jpg

Everlast - Forever Everlasting
Kid Rock - Grits Sandwiches for Breakfast
Fastball - Make Your Mama Proud
Blink 182 - Buddha
Finger Eleven (as The Rainbow Butt Monkeys) - Letters From Chutney

My mind keeps thinking of acts who got big in the late 90s.

Not sure about Neil Young, I think it's too strong to be here.

Lycia - Wake. It does have a few great tracks though.

Liars probably.

But I wouldn't quite count Sugar Ray or No Doubt in this category.

al green(e) -- back up train

Warren Zevon
Boomtown Rats
(U.K.) Squeeze
Swans (EP)
Zac Brown Band (first few)
Old Crow Medicine Show (first few)
John Hiatt (first couple, at least)

Mekons (maybe their first few, but almost definitely their first)

i feel like sixties california has more than their fair share of these (the utterly forgettable tim buckley debut hasn't been mentioned yet, for instance). to generalize, it seems like seventies punk bands when the scene started up didn't get to record albums, sixties hippie bands did get to record albums, but they were unrepresentative and generally awful.

also, great thread idea, kornrulez6969

Thanks. And I take back the first ZZ Top record, I just didnt recognize any songs and according to wikipedia it didn't chart. But it takes more than that to qualify for this thread.

I will, however, stand by the first Huey Lewis album as a near perfect example.

i feel like we've got two separate beasts in this thread - the modest debut, ie Neil Young and Rihanna, where they didn't have their defining aesthetic nailed quite yet, but still featured some hits people still care about now ("The Loner," "Pon De Replay" respectively). And then there's the straight up FORGOTTEN debut, like Randy Newman and Warren Zevon, where zero fucks are given by anyone but the most hungry-for-juvenalia fan.

oh yeah that huey one is perfect

Faith No More - we care a lot?

― StanM, Monday, May 11, 2015 1:41 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Not sure if this one qualifies - the title track gets played live a lot still (and is fairly well remembered by fans, even those that hated the Mosley era) and the Mosley era does have a lot of champions, even if it is more for Introduce Yourself.

Mike Patton even re-recorded "As the Worm Turns" from the first one.

Guess Who (first few)
Golden Earring(s) (first few)
Billy Ocean (first few)
Blackfoot (first couple +)
Whitesnake (first few)
Rick Springfield (first few, though his actual debut a little less so)
K.C. and the Sunshine Band
(Ambrose) Slade

i feel like we've got two separate beasts in this thread - the modest debut, ie Neil Young and Rihanna, where they didn't have their defining aesthetic nailed quite yet, but still featured some hits people still care about now ("The Loner," "Pon De Replay" respectively). And then there's the straight up FORGOTTEN debut, like Randy Newman and Warren Zevon, where zero fucks are given by anyone but the most hungry-for-juvenalia fan.

There's also the notoriously embarrassing debut (Ministry, Tori Amos, Pantera). I don't know the Newman and Zevon records, maybe they qualify for that.

Sylvester (first couple w/ Hot Band)

Tori also wasn't a solo act but in a band. Ministry's a funny one where the debut is an afterthought for sure in terms of aesthetic, but it actually charted higher than any later Ministry album until Psalm 69.

i'm hesitant to bring up groups that were kinda unknown and unimportant for a long while (ie Pantera) - the ones where they got it at least HALF right on the second album are the most fun - but I'd just like to note that on the Goo Goo Dolls self-titled debut, all the songs are sung by Robby Takac. Johnny Rzeznik wouldn't take a lead until the second.

Hawkwind

Pantera - Metal Magic
Prince - For You
Michael Bolton - Michael Bolotin

lol croup I thought of bringing up that Goo Goo Dolls album. it's funny because even on the second he only sings about two songs, didn't even get a 50/50 share of lead vocals until Hold Me Up, really.

oooooh Hawkwind is a good one

i just love when, rather than a gradual build to where they were going, the group just has this one really gawky thing at the top of an otherwise polished discography. Like a UK Squeeze thing.

like if Elvis Costello had a self-titled album from 1974 where he's got a moptop and no glasses

Judas Priest

like that BA Robertson album? Xpost

ABBA perhaps ?

Girl Talk - Secret Diary

UK Squeeze had "Take Me I'm Yours" on it, which I think still makes the comps and all that (though, wasn't it recorded separate from the rest?)

ABBA perhaps ?

totally get the logic for this, but i kinda wish some continental european would get really mad about it. "Ring Ring was a #2 hit (in Austria)!"

fair enough .. never knew of it until i got the boxset last week.

tis ace ..

yeah see there you go, i didn't realize uk squeeze had a top 20 hit on it. i just know it as a two star asterisk kinda thing

Styx debut (and arguably a few of the surprisingly hard rocking Wooden Nickel ones that followed, though the second one did have "Lady.")
Also seems like Bob Seger deserves an asterisk on this thread at least (not so much for his debut as for a couple of his later early ones).

...and for the non-album singles before his debut, too.

Sonic Youth s/t EP though I guess Confusion Is Sex would be true for general public if not hardcore fans

They played "Burning Spear" when I saw them in 2000.

is there an afterthought definition? because Sorry Ma cuts get played on tour to this day for the Replacements.

It's neat to see Underworld and Kraftwerk mentioned in succession, because both those are examples of bands that started as something clearly something different than what they got famous for. I mean the "original" Underworld was basically an entirely different band, a five-piece whose direction seemed to be 100% controlled by the record company, though plans from a scrapped third album DID make its way to the more famous version of the group ("M.E." and a few of the dubnobasswithmyheadman-era tunes that didn't make the album originated from the early band). Anyway, that seems like a different thread

another good example would be Yasutaka Nakata's group Capsule, whose first album was a P5-style Shibuya-kei thing that has almost nothing to do with any of their other albums

Age Of Chance are kind of like that, too. And Onyx. But neither of their early versions put out more than a single or two.

Also, though only country people even know her:

Pam Tillis -- Above And Beyond The Doll Of Cutey (from 1983, a sort of fake new wavish thing 8 years before her country debut)

Also there's that '70s Roches album with only two of them.

And David Banner had an album or two before he hit (plus one with Crooked Lettaz), but with rappers you probably start to get into grey areas thanks to mixtapes etc. and who knows how that affects the rules here.

Also the first couple Rapture EPs when they were doing a sort of quasi Gang Of Four thing (one of which gets considered an album I think -- though EPs might be another grey area. And I really have no idea if people care about the Rapture at all anymore anyway.) (Unlike, uh, Blackfoot and Age Of Chance, who I mentioned above and who clearly still get talked about all the time.)

And oh yeah, duh.

k.d. lang & the reclines - angel with a lariat (and one even before that, apparently.)

(Okay, now I'm starting to remember why I stopped posting here. I get too obsessive about this stuff.)

is there an afterthought definition? because Sorry Ma cuts get played on tour to this day for the Replacements.

Not sure Sorry Ma fits the criteria for this thread.

Early Glass Candy and Chromatics albums before they went synthy.

First two Supertramp albums?

Lou Reed's s/t debut certainly has its awkward moments---sometimes the writing, sometimes the drumming, sometimes both at once---but certainly has its keepers too, like "I Can't Stand It," the jangle-pop x Bo Diddly beats of "Love Makes You Feel," and especially "Wild Child"--did he ever do that live? Just so VU Lou, in a Loaded way.
Somebody mentioned Garland Jeffreys' s/t debut in passing: didn't get the (deserved) hype of Ghost Writer(which he'll be performing at Highland in NYC 5/30), but, as with the xpost Joni debut, musical sensibilities seem fully, distinctively formed (though both artists got more topical & varied the arrangements later on).
His phrasing is fluid, alert and adaptable, like he's found a good spot for busking, while keeping an eye on those creeps coming up out of the subway. Kind of a Dion vibe, although doesn't literally sound that much like Dion.
Da Croupier, there's a set of tracks (maybe an album) by Flip City, Costello's pre-Stiff band. Dunno what he looked like or how it sounds (posted here and there), but originally saw it referred to as bluegrass...

Queen

'Keep Yourself Alive' didn't even make it onto Greatest Hits, if I remember. I guess 'Great King Rat' and 'Liar' are fan favourites, but casual listeners probably would know very few tracks on it. The band seemed to approach the material on this album very rarely, if ever, after the mid '70s.

idk his narrative that well at all but isn't Alice Cooper's first album really totally different/not usually talked about?

― soyrev, Monday, May 11, 2015 8:09 AM (13 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yes, and this goes for their second album too. Both Pretties For You and Easy Action are generally seen as early curios really, by pretty much everyone. I think Love It To Death is generally considered their debut even if it isn't.

I actually almost mentioned Glass Candy and Chromatics up there with the Rapture, I swear. (Then decided that with '00s indie acts, for all I know, their career trajectories might not even be all that unusual, and wasn't sure if anybody else even knew them. Was probably wrong on both counts.)

Somebody mentioned Miranda Lambert above, and it occurs to me that starting with CDBaby or whatever, this probably isn't rare at all in country -- Kacey Musgraves even self-released a couple albums as a teenager, to sell at shows or serve as demos. And she's far from alone in that. Jamey Johnson put out a self-relased album, then one called The Dollar with an actual top 20 country single before he got the idea to dress up more like an outlaw. That got him a whole different audience that might barely even know The Dollar existed, much less the first one.

Also, Shania Twain put out a flop self-titled album nobody remembers before hooking up with Mutt Lange -- And if you don't have hits in mainstream country, you might as well not exist.

Alanis.

Happy that you brought up Queen, Turrican. I was too chickenshit because I didn't know what the extent of "Keep Yourself Alive" was, hit-wise, and I knew some might harp on "Seven Seas of Rhye"'s original version (sans vocals) being on it.

but yeah, I think it fits perfectly. It's very quaint compared to the material that came later, and maybe not a 'forgotten' album but certainly kind of a dull thud of an introduction.

a gold record can qualify for this imo

can't qualify imo

it's definitely a soft opening but it's hardly a WHOOPS, LET'S TRY THAT AGAIN

I dunno, the band have always been incredibly critical of the production on Queen. For what it's worth, I like a lot of the material on the album.

If we're looking for "WHOOPS, LET'S TRY THAT AGAIN" albums, then Life In A Day by Simple Minds is definitely one of those. They rushed to get the second album out because they were dissatisfied with the debut.

More country qualifiers: Definitely first three Dixie Chicks, probably first five Shelby Lynnes (all of which placed low on the country chart before the album that won her a Best New Artist Grammy!)

Cat Stevens, Mathew and Son.

genesis: from genesis to revelation

kansas debut.

Bataclan tape..

"This next song is called Wild Child. It's about a Wild Child, funnily enough"

John Hiatt? Actually it took him a number of albums to hit his stride, but I don't think anybody talks about Hanging Around The Observatory.

I'm with croup on this, even albums that sell well due to later success (Bleach, the aforementioned Shania s/t, etc.) shouldn't qualify based on the criteria at the top of the thread. If an album sells half a million copies, it seems pretty well "accepted" as part of the discography.

The three pre-Natalie Maines Dixie Chicks records are a good example of "afterthought," in that they never charted or even went gold. This band has two diamond records and the first three releases are supremely ignored.

Okay, yeah, I hadn't realized that Shania debut subsequently went platinum (which is no surprise, I guess). Pretty sure I've never heard anything from it on the radio, but I agree, if it sold that much it doesn't belong.

Don't think I've ever even seen those first two mid '70s John Hiatt albums. Starting with Slug Line in 1979, at least he had new wavers who wanted an American Costello backing him up.

Yeah, that Shania was a staple of mid-price bins after she blew up.

(Pre-Natalie Maines Dixie Chicks albums were okay, as I dimly recall, but Maines brought the charisma. Those first albums were *not* reissued despite diamond sales of the later sets; figure it was a Chicks command, maybe especially from the firing/hiring foresisters, Emily and Martie, both with many marital surnames.)

I got a promo of Ashley Monroe's Satisfied like ten years ago (think she was 17), immediately got involved w several tracks and repelled by others; seemed like the "grown-ups" were practicing musical abuse, with schlock-shop cliches next to striking originals. Release date kept getting pushed back, then publicist finally said it was getting withdrawn from the schedule, for "reworking." She did some singles etc with other performers, established herself as a co-writer, then the thing finally came out, and it still seemed fucked-with (I don't know how much control she had at that point; who knows what kind of contract she signed all those years ago). But it's still worth checking, and personally (minority report) I still find some of it more compelling than her more professional, more detached Like A Rose. Which also has its keepers, but nowadays I like her best as a Pistol Annnie.

Sunny Sweeney has said that she "didn't know what I was doing" when she recorded Heartbreaker's Hall of Fame, but it's another erratic grabber; she sometimes sounds like an alt-universe Natalie Maines, pissed off about still spinnin' her wheels (real hard) in Big Woods Texas.

Marvin Gaye - The Soulful Moods Of Marvin Gaye

an album primarily of standards released a year before Stubborn Kind of Fellow

While Hall & Oates' Whole Oats has no hits, didn't chart, songs from it got covered by other people and the same people all worked on the hit follow-up a year later. But apparently the first single was initially credited to Whole Oats, as they were thinking about call themselves that. So i'd say it's like 2/3rds a qualifer.

Lana Del Rey

Fall Out Boy's Evening Out With Your Girlfriend

a debut album that has been demoted to EP on the band's wikipedia page

The Wailing Wailers

I think sometimes you get this with solo albums when they're still in the band, then when the breakup happens, the solo albums feel different. Peter Hammill's first album is okay but he really put everything into the second album after VDGG broke up

Pete Townshend - Who Came First

Giorgio Moroder's definitely fits the bill here:

That's Bubble Gum – That's Giorgio

Hell, his next five records are also just as obscure. Wouldn't most fans consider his Knights in White Satin LP to be his "debut"?

I've got his Son Of My Father from 1972 (title track from which went #46 in the U.S.); didn't even know he had any before that 'til now.

So...does Beck qualify? What do the referees say? First album was apparently initially cassette-only; second, Stereopathic Soulmanure, is up to 146,000 copies sold so far, according to Wiki. Doubt the vast majority of his fans have ever heard it, though.

That's a tough one! Part of me feels like the fact that these works are totally invisible to even his fans means they qualify.

But on the other hand, I feel like a major part of Beck's success in the early 90s was his slacker weirdo persona--the fact that he seemed like the type of goofball who probably released a couple of random tapes of noise and fell ass-backwards into a hit. I am undecided.

Golden Feelings definitely feels completely ignored by the majority of fans & i doubt most know it exists, but surprisingly he's played tracks from it live as recently as 2012.

Sufjan Stevens - A Sun Came is a another one

Lightning Bolt - Lightning Bolt

Silly Hat vs. Egale Hat and Meetle Mice by Dan Deacon, even though they're fucking great and have some of his best songs ("My Own Face is F Word," "The House I Was Isnt My Girlfriends Porsche," "Song for Dina," "I Will Always Have Juice Today," "Shit Slowly Applied on Cock Parts," "It's Not as It's Going Downtown").

Jimmy Eat World - S/T

Songs of Faith - Aretha Franklin (and all her subsequent pre-Atlantic albs)

Ween - Synthetic Socks

The s/t Incredible String Band which is straighter folk done by a 3 piece.

Ein Produkt Der and possibly Die Kleinen und Die Bosen by Deutsch Americanisch Freundschaft both cut by the band as a group not a duo. First one is largely instrumental, an imaginary film soundtrack. 2nd is like funky electronic drenched hardcore. Not sure how well known it is. I love it.

I think I've seen an Original Album series or equivalent for Alice Cooper that has the 1st 5lps in it including the Straight ones. So maybe they're becoming more accepted.

Earth, Wind & Fire's 1st lp and maybe the next few. Could be they have now been discovered by a different audience, whatever Rare Groove is called these days but it is pretty different to what they went onto once they became really famous. More psychy funk than Nilotic fantasy disco. &their first work was backing Melvin van Peebles on Sweet Sweetback's Badass Song. which I have on cd but am not sure if it got a release prior to it coming with the book about the film.

"Chicago Transit Authority"

'Free Form Guitar' is the highpoint of their discography!

Rick Wakeman - Piano Vibrations. It's a covers album.

Miranda Sex Garden debut is all A Capella folk songs, poems. I'm not sure if they were originally going to stay in that mode. I think fans probably like it too much for it to be considered an afterthought though.

Dinosaur- ST

This one's weird, but I know a lot of people who think "Severed Lips" is Mascis' best song

Oh & Journey started out good as a non-latinate Santana offshoot playing good almost psychy jazz-rock.

I'd assume the first three records, made before Steve Perry joined, are pretty much written out of memory, but who knows, maybe they still play a song or two live.

Todd Rundgren is a weird one. His official solo debut is the great Runt: The Ballad of Todd Rundgren but a year earlier he released a pretty much forgotten album also called Runt, which iirc was meant to be the debut of a new band called Runt, but which is now credited to Todd.

Dan Hartman's first couple of albums were more aligned to his Edgar Winter Group beginnings than his disco stuff from album three onwards.

"Chicago Transit Authority"

― Mark G, Tuesday, May 12, 2015 5:36 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

'Free Form Guitar' is the highpoint of their discography!

― sʌxihɔːl (Ward Fowler), Tuesday, May 12, 2015 5:41 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

And "Does Anybody Know What Time It Is?" and "Beginnings" are all over oldies radio.

Pete Townshend - Who Came First

― WilliamC, Monday, May 11, 2015 9:19 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Thought about posting this, though he's revisited the material live a few times, both solo and with the Who (even "Sheraton Gibson," played once on a 1996 Who show).

It's disregarded because its "Chicago Transit Authority" as a title, and the band has no name.

Well, that's what it sort-of says on my copy..

Sarah McLachlan - Touch

Ween - Synthetic Socks

Silly Hat vs. Egale Hat and Meetle Mice by Dan Deacon

I'm wondering how much these actually should count since they weren't really distributed nor were they intended to be; if we're counting stuff like this then I would think that all sorts of early demo-ish stuff would be in this thread as well

Giorgio Moroder's definitely fits the bill here:

That's Bubble Gum – That's Giorgio

Hell, his next five records are also just as obscure. Wouldn't most fans consider his Knights in White Satin LP to be his "debut"?

I always thought Son of my Father was his debut, and that one's pretty damn good really. Never heard this one, but judging by that comp of early tracks that came out a few years back I would bet it qualifies.

Todd Rundgren is a weird one. His official solo debut is the great Runt: The Ballad of Todd Rundgren but a year earlier he released a pretty much forgotten album also called Runt, which iirc was meant to be the debut of a new band called Runt, but which is now credited to Todd.

Either way it's got "We Gotta Get You a Woman" which was his first solo hit

Tangerine Dream – Electronic Meditation

not that TD ever had hits exactly, but like the first three Kraftwerk albums, this one stands apart from the rest of their discography

"Some of my best friends are songs" - Richard D. James

oooh good one - Klaus Schulze and Conrad Schnitzler were on that one!!

Dinosaur- ST
This one's weird, but I know a lot of people who think "Severed Lips" is Mascis' best song

I always thought they went downhill off of the "Repulsion" 45 off this myself (and thought of nominating it yesterday anyway.)

"...went downhill after "Replusion"....I meant

"Some of my best friends are songs" - Richard D. James

What is this?

tiptoes away...

did someone already say Kraftwerk?

i always think of the first simple minds album. which, like the first japan album, has that glammy ultravox/roxy thing going on. it's good, but i never play it and i doubt many people remember it much. (needless to say, the 6 albums after that are some of my fave 80's records...)

(also weird is their second album came out the same year as their first album and the second album is way better...)

The Knife, self-titled

(some tracks, IIRC, are played live, albeit in heavily reworked form, that said I would be surprised if a lot of fans knew it existed)

I think Mark G meant to put that in the Syro thread

"Earth, Wind & Fire's 1st lp and maybe the next few."

there are tons of examples of pre-fame soul/r&b albums that fit this bill.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VouLLPvoS3M

Adam And the Ants!

Also maybe Human League? (Scott should know.)

Gary Numan/Tubeway Army

No, no and no!

feel like these post-punk debuts by acts that became early 80s pop stars are generally too popular with fans/music nerds to really count as afterthoughts anymore.

A Product Of... (Participation) by Thompson Twins is another one of these that still maybe seems kind of forgotten?

take away the song "tell me" and the rolling stones' debut would come damn close to qualifying.

yeah, i was just gonna say that first thompson twins record....nobody listens to that one. midnight oil would be another one. unless you are australian.

xxpost:

Not so much that, but none of those artists have really had a bad word to say about any of those albums. Even though the first Ants album is a different line up to the Kings Of The Wild Frontier version of the Ants, and The Human League is a different line up to the Dare line up, and Tubeway Army's debut is more guitar heavy, I don't think any of those artists have ever written off those albums, and fans generally cherish 'em.

Japan and Simple Minds have definitely had some unkind words to say about their debuts, though.

"Also maybe Human League? (Scott should know.)"

it gets different love though. hepcat post-punk people love early human league.

What Scott said, although fans of the early Human League generally love Dare as well, but go no further than that.

take away the song "tell me" and the rolling stones' debut would come damn close to qualifying.

ditto The Kinks and "You Really Got Me"

Ultravox are a weird one, because it depends on who you speak to.

midnight oil would be another one. unless you are australian.

The debut wasn't released outside of Australia until years later (didn't come out in the US until 1990), so yeah, it's far more likely that Australians had heard/heard of it.

i always think of the first simple minds album. which, like the first japan album, has that glammy ultravox/roxy thing going on. it's good, but i never play it and i doubt many people remember it much. (needless to say, the 6 albums after that are some of my fave 80's records...)

(also weird is their second album came out the same year as their first album and the second album is way better...)

― scott seward, Tuesday, May 12, 2015 5:43 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Scott OTM about their second album being streets ahead of the debut. Some days I think it's my favourite Simple Minds record overall.

Scritti Politti even less eligible than Human League, since their Wanna Buy A Bridgey stuff was pre-album, right?(Just making sure.)

I'm not so sure "bands writing the album off" should be a requirement either way, though.

i bought songs to remember by scritti politti because i liked cupid & psyche - so around 1985 - and boy was i in for a surprise.

Also, don't the Shoes have a couple albums pre-Black Vinyl Shoes that were self-released in the mid '70s with only copies for their immediate families or something? Remember reading that in a Trouser Press guide once. Think one was called One In Versailles or something; not sure about the other(s) (though it'd be easy enough to check.)

Okay, yeah -- Wiki is listing 3 "private releases" (one cassette only, one only 4 acetate copies!)

Mew's pre-Frengers albums did quite well in Denmark, but people outside of DK don't care.

country has it's fair share of forgotten first records.

https://jensenbrazil.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/frontblog681.jpg

haha, i don't even know why i thought of reba. sometimes i just see records around the store and they look forgotten.

never forget...

http://www.rockofages.uk.com/stock/14502.jpg

http://cdn.discogs.com/l8FASc3zEfxxKDHyXu8wj36Y-aE=/fit-in/300x300/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb()/discogs-images/R-2588694-1291932830.jpeg.jpg

the first two jennifer warnes albums are my faves by her and mostly forgotten.

http://eil.com/images/main/Jennifer-Warnes-I-Can-Remember-Ev-488458.jpg

http://www.bsnpubs.com/london/parrot/34.jpg

Didn't Chris Gaines release a couple of things using another name?

eurythmics

Was gonna suggest Sigur Ros's Von, but it looks like they still play Hafsól live.

There's an interesting divide in this thread between bands with strange/obscure/uncharacteristic/unsuccessful debuts, and bands who had two distinct career phases (Human League, Journey) where the second one far exceeds the other in popularity.

blasters' debut didn't get out to too many people.

true about the blasters, but it included two signature songs, and eventually got a wider release.

Wait, are you guys talking their actual debut American Music (which I've never seen, and which I think perfectly fits this thread) or The Blasters (which repeated a couple songs from the previous, really obscure one)?

Before Runt, Rundgren was in a 60s blooze band, Woody's Truck Stop, and then Nazz, who made three albums, incl. the original version of "Hello, It's Me" and psych-pop "Open My Eyes." Dunno how those albums are, but "Open My Eyes" was always cool--with phasing, that "psychedelic Bromo-Seltzer," as Beefheart called it. (The Bangles did a killer cover a few years ago.) The re-recorded version of "Hello, It's Me" sounded Carole King as hell, although not as good as her best, but he did that in her heyday, so smart move, I guess.
A power-pop collector told me that the Shoes may have done as many as five albums before Black Vinyl Shoes, but I haven't tried to verify. Think some of those songs turned up on later, non-self-released albums.

re the Shoes, afaik there were 3 albums before Black Vinyl Shoes - Head or Tails, One in Versailles and Bazooka. The last 2 have been reissued on CD & vinyl over the years. I only know of the 1st one because it's listed on discogs, that's the only place I've seen mention of it.

i was talking about american music. i think it's readily available these days though.

those early Nazz albums are pretty good, though I'd argue that the third one doesn't really count, it's more a pile of leftovers released after Todd's solo career got off the ground. don't sleep on the opener of Nazz II, "Forget All About It", which is about as perfect as "Open My Eyes" was

"Dunno how those albums are, but "Open My Eyes" was always cool"

wow, really, you've never heard the nazz records? you really should.

i was talking about american music. i think it's readily available these days though.

as was i. uber obscure for a long time, but now available indeed. it's even on spotify.

So did anybody mention Robin Scott of M "Pop Muzik" fame's 1969 singer songwriter album yet?

http://www.discogs.com/Robin-Scott-Woman-From-The-Warm-Grass/master/313526

Or Pete Shelley's first album (recorded in 1974, self-released in 1980 -- then reissued a couple years back, which might disqualify for some folks)?

http://www.discogs.com/artist/28754-Pete-Shelley

Oops, for Shelley this one obviously.

http://www.discogs.com/Pete-Shelley-Sky-Yen/master/393053

Also the first two Quiet Riot albums w/ Randy Rhoads that only came out in Japan?

99% of bands fit into one of three categories:

1. Debut album is the best.
2. Debut album is overlooked/non-canonical/crap.
3. They only made one album.

I guess there's Milkwood (Rick Ocasek and Ben Orr), though I don't know if it's fair to count other bands, even if it is the two main guys. How they got from that to The Cars is a mystery though.

Tempted to say the Beatles. I mean, it doesn't get a great deal of attention anymore compared to the middle-period album, or even to the White Album or Abbey Road. And agree with Neil Young definitely.

I don't know, that seems more like a less successful but still well-regarded component of a remarkably popular/beloved discography, don't know if that (or the Rolling Stones or Kinks examples above) really fit the criteria from the top of the thread.

LIke, if you told a Beatles fan that Please Please Me doesn't count, and With the Beatles is actually their first record, I think you'd mostly get confused looks, or accusations of challops

Maybe if it was like, a shitty skiffle record they recorded in 1960 where Stu Sutcliffe sang all the songs, and they never reissued it and distanced themselves from it.

But it has Twist and Shout on it! Among many other oldies staples!

Clemenza, as a Shoes fan in long standing, have you ever heard any of those almost-unknown pre-Black Vinyl albums?

Stabbing Westward - "Ungod"

Any album with enduring hits (say, first Beatles or first Who) seems weird to include.

So try The Rolling Stones. Featuring one Jagger/Richards composition, and nothing anybody ever hears on the radio.

White Zombie - Soulcrusher. sure, there's a lot of people who stan for it, but the majority of the fanbase know them as originating on La Sexorcisto. and Rob was going by "Rob Straker" back then!

I have Bazooka, Chuck--if you like the Shoes, it's quite good. I wouldn't call it afterthought, though; it wasn't released until years after the fact, though (unless it was out there as a bootleg), and to me that's a different dynamic.

I was mistakenly thinking of With the Beatles as their debut--you're right, it's Please Please Me. But I do think both are kind of an afterthought...in terms of things like message-board discussions and such.

One too many "though"s...

good thread!

i'd nominate the first rosanne cash album

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosanne_Cash_%28album%29

only released in europe, no hits whatsoever.

The three songs from Bazooka on your comp are three of my favorites - best sound of the Shoes discography based on my limited listening

How the albums that kicked off apocalyptic screaming Beatlemania could be afterthoughts in the career, come on.

and scott, i'd love to hear those jennifer warnes albums!

the first one i know well is the third album, which is a very nice kind of arty (john cale produced) singer-songwriter cover album. and even that album is pretty well forgotten, i'm pretty sure it's out of print and was maybe released on CD only in japan or something. but it's a really pretty record. it has this on it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqk7gorwWAo

(xpost) I mean afterthoughts now, not then. Quick example: my guess is that every Beatles album past a certain point (Help!?) has been polled on here. I did a quick check on the first two and found nothing--that kind of thing. If they have been polled, call me Emily Litella.

Fair enough, one of the problems with polling is the huge differences between the British & US versions of all their albums before Sgt. Pepper.

I'm pretty comfortable saying "Please Please Me" and "She Loves You" and probably some early others still rank with my favorite Beatles songs anyway.

it wasn't released until years after the fact, though (unless it was out there as a bootleg)

According to wikipedia it was self-released on cassette in 1976. No idea if that's true or not though.

The one I was really wondering about was One In Versailles, which as I say above I remember reading about in one of those old Trouser Press new wave guides from the '80s (which I believe mentioned at least one of the other two, too.)

wasn't one in versailles an EP... or something? man, i do not have a good grasp on the Shoes discography.

for a long time i just assumed "black vinyl shoes" was the debut, b/c it was the first to make a splash (such as it was), and it would certainly be a good story to come out of the gate with something so formally perfect.

Absolutely, individual songs are still loved and talked about and the rest. I meant only the albums--which is partly a function of pop albums just generally not being taken as seriously till '65 or '66. (I do see Please Please Me was #39 on Rolling Stone's Top 500, so that may or may not disprove my point.)

According to wikipedia it was self-released on cassette in 1976.

Didn't know that. Guessing very, very few copies--maybe mostly a rumour until it was officially released? Don't have Versailles, no.

it's just silly to bring up please please me when we're talking about Randy Newman and Writer

"Acts whose debut album is an afterthought in their overall discography." You disagree. Wonderful.

No hits. Nothing played live. Hated/discounted by the general listening public. Even better if most fans don't even know its existence.

1. Ride The Tiger - Yo La Tengo

― kornrulez6969, Sunday, May 10, 2015 2:34 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

first post

the hitless, unrevisited, hated, almost entirely unknown album with "i saw her standing there" on it

I didn't read the first post, just the thread title. Pointed such things out without the "silly" attached works too.

"Pointing..." But then you wouldn't be you, would you?

I get hung up more on the "nothing played live" part because I know it's not absolute and nothing is disqualified cos Jimmy Marvin and the Cleveland Steamer Five decided to pull out some rarities 47 years into their career...

but I find some bands I don't know enough about what songs survived in their setlist years later to know for sure did the album outright vanish or is there still a crowd favorite that gets played from it. though setlist.fm is kinda helpful with that.

(not a criticism, it's actually made the thread more interesting)

i do think calling Please Please Me/Meet The Beatles an "afterthought" is silly, especially considering where the bar's been generally set on this thread, but i'm sorry if it really upset you to hear that - that wasn't my intent

I'm always open to being corrected if I've missed something like an opening post--just hate when there's derision attached, in the form of an "um" or theatrical disbelief or anything like that. It serves no purpose whatsoever.

i will say if you hate people mocking your addition to a thread - especially if the word "silly" used to describe the addition (not you, the addition) is enough to get you mad, you might want to read the thread

Jeez, I don't want to be part of this now, somebody jump on me instead relative to my Rolling Stones debut statement - or do you agree?

Maybe. I'd instead say that's the difference between the two of us on here. I'd simply point out to the person that they'd missed some clarification earlier in the thread. "Silly" isn't the first word I start throwing around.

i will concede you're nicer than me on ilx if you will let it go

ha i almost put that up but then saw it was big on the Uk chart as was "not fade away"

the "ha" being re: stones first album

http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/3/JPG_400/MI0002/083/MI0002083889.jpg?partner=allrovi.com

did anyone mention this one yet?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wanted_Dead_or_Alive_%28Warren_Zevon_album%29

7 full years before the self-titled album everyone knows, released to almost total non-reception.

per wikipedia:

Once Zevon reached stardom, Wanted Dead or Alive ended up as an all-but-forgotten relic of his early career.

i always think that first my bloody valentine album is kind of the perfect example. something even some fans pretend doesn't exist. does anyone listen to the first primal scream album? underworld another good example given what they became.

Anyway, everybody but me seems to be way past this by now, but discogs says One In Versailles had 12 songs (so, probably a full album) and the even earlier Heads Or Tails had 10, albeit on 10-inch vinyl in the latter's case.

Do you mean "You Made Me Realize", the EP?

i kind of like the early primal scream better than the stuff that made them famous

matthew sweet columbia and a&m albums another good example. girlfriend is ground zero for most of the world.

wait never mind I looked at wikipedia, "this is your bloody valentine" 1985, never heard of it before

Hey, how about the first Aretha Franklin records? Except that gospel album probably has some traction, right?

no, this MBV thing. though i guess it's more of an EP.

http://www.discogs.com/My-Bloody-Valentine-This-Is-Your-Bloody-Valentine/master/5969

x-post...

xpost

in terms of currently radio play, etc. aretha franklin's entire tenure on columbia records is kind of forgotten/an afterthought. but it's nowhere near as obscure as some of the other examples on this thread.

the band's definitely revisited it live (they just did "box full of letters" at their last show!), and it's not a total embarrassment by any means, but kinda surprised Wilco's AM hasn't come up just for being so gestative, especially considering it's in grissos screen name.

I've got one - Giles Giles & Fripp for Robert Fripp.

woah i'd honestly never even heard of that

she's not really that famous or anything, but i don't know how many people have listened to the first lisa germano album. she didn't really have her thing down at that time. still decompressing from the mellencamp years...

http://www.discogs.com/Lisa-Germano-On-The-Way-Down-From-The-Moon-Palace/master/268055

ok, here's another one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wailing_Wailers

the first wailers album, five years (i think) before "soul rebels." jamaican music at that time was very /not/ album-oriented, and most people probably don't even know that the wailers put out a LP this early.

of course, it's more of a compilation of previously-released singles than an LP, so this might need an asterisk.

I've got one - Giles Giles & Fripp for Robert Fripp.

― Vic Perry, Tuesday, May 12, 2015 8:11 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

good one! that said, i've been fucking w/ that album since the mid 90s.

re: germano i read about that album in rolling stone and lived in bloomington, indiana at the time, but even the progressive station in town didn't get on board until album two (the capitol mix)

and speaking of cougar..

http://www.discogs.com/Johnny-Cougar-Chestnut-Street-Incident/master/210401

i bought that capitol version of happiness back then just because i loved the album so much. the 4ad version anyway. played it once or twice. and i never played the first album much either.

David Bowie's David Bowie has to be the most notorious example of this, right? With "The Laughing Gnome" going top ten years later and Bowie having to cancel the interactive part of his Sound + Vision because of a prank campaign to make him include it? Are there other cases where the awkward debut was used to beat them with later?

MBV's definitely comes up as a "lol" for sure

but still, that pales to the gnome's fame

does john mellencamp still play any songs live from the first two johnny cougar albums? THAT is the question.

The second has "I Need A Lover" - though it got big in the US on the third, I think

the laughing gnome isn't actually on the first david bowie album. i really like that first album! but it is kind of a before and after thing with him.

also where worlds collide - there's an outtake for coug's first album of him covering "man who sold the world"! thank you, tony defries!

ah, didn't realize "laughing gnome" was one of the uk singles slapped onto us re-releases. those always trip me up.

i mean the album is that same kinda twee time style. but as far as that style goes, the first album is a cool artifact.

just remembered another case where someone's uncool past wound up haunting him later - Dr Dre's World Class Wreckin' Cru

http://techfaster.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/dre-1.jpg

though iirc dj shadow specifically thanks dre for their track "surgery" in the endtroducing liners

is Giles Giles Fripp any good?

By the way, I'm really sorry that Judy Dyble, singer on candidate lp Fairport Convention debut, didn't sing on the real first King Crimson record. I like her version of this a lot more than Greg Lake's, but according to her own note in the youtube contents:

Ian McD and I were looking for other musicians to work with, we advertised, and met up with Peter and Mike Giles and Robert Fripp, This song was one of the many that we recorded together in the front room of the flat GG& F were renting to see what we sounded like together and to get a feel for each other's music. For various reasons,I decided not to continue, and later Peter Giles bowed out. Then they added Greg, not as a replacement for me or as a substitute, but as bass-playing vocalist and lo! KC was born. I am so proud to have been a part of this process. Judy Dyble

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfqXh5s4t4k

i prefer johnny thunders-ish GG to what came later. not that i listen to what came later, but the first album has a kind of naive charm:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRLr_FrfVpo

renaissance s/t debut from 1969? never actually heard any of the later ones, though.

first renaissance album a really different thing from later albums. different people. keith and jane relf and jim mccarty were gone after the first two island albums.

Is the first Incredible String Band that different from the others? Maybe a bit more straightforwardly folky I guess, but it's a matter of degrees. I actually listen to it more often than the others. There's a lot of good stuff on it.

Sly's A Whole New Thing is probably my favorite albums that by most measures qualifies for this thread

it's so good! but no hits, didn't chart, and i'd be shocked any sly-adjacent touring act would bother with anything from it

Los Lobos - Del Este De Los Angeles (1978)

I was just going to mention them! Though discogs claims they had one even two years earlier than that, which I'd never even heard of before. Also had no idea they were (one of) the main artist(s) on the Eating Raoul soundtrack in 1982 (assuming this is right.)

http://www.discogs.com/artist/173717-Los-Lobos

First couple Dr. John albums might qualify, they were really trippy and weird, though I guess Gris-Gris (his second,, supposedly?) always had its cult and has been reissued several times -- and his recent albums have harked back to that period, in a way.

http://www.discogs.com/artist/15152-Dr-John

First couple David Allan Coe LPs, too, before he went country. First one, more a blues record about prison, got reissued a decade ago. Second one is supposedly spoken word with musical backing; never heard of it before today.

http://www.discogs.com/artist/619909-David-Allan-Coe

except almost all of those albums have cult reputations; i think there are plenty of people who know the first two dr. john albums as well as any of his others!

i mean, they are from before his period of biggest fame, but you could say that of a lot of debut albums.

I believe that Giles Giles and Fripp album is pretty well-regarded, at least among those who have heard it. Certainly it's somewhat well-known now thanks to the King Crimson connection but I think it sold only like 500 copies on first release. It's quite a curious and fun little album, outside of the last two tracks (which do sort of point the way to what Crimson would do) you'd never think Fripp was on it at all. It's actually sort of a comedy album, not just because of the 'skits' that run between songs but because of the somewhat droll and often funny subject matter. Favorite song from the band is Sinfield's "Under the Sky", which didn't even place on the original, and is really different from everything else, but it's a real gorgeous tune.

Renaissance is a pretty good one, though I think it's kind of a weird situation, as mentioned none of those members made it to even the 3rd album, back then they were known more as a Yardbirds knockoff. They do get credit for being one of the first bands to use really overt classical influences in their music, almost similar to The Nice. Their second album I think fits those criteria better, as it was written and recorded as members were leaving, and by all accounts seems to be unfinished.

I guess my thing with cult albums like those Dr. John ones (wiki says Gris-Gris came before Babylon) not after btw), is sometimes their cult is people outside of the artist's usual fan base -- i.e., some people are just plain fans of cult albums or weird music, period. And I don't get the idea Penitentiary Blues was released, necessarily, with David Allan Coe's usual fans in mind. Seemed like more a hipster item. Something similar might apply to the early Human League stuff, for instance, which most Dare fans might still be oblivious to. I dunno. I could be wrong. Maybe should be a consideration, maybe not. (And I was kind of ambivalent about the Dr. John ones when mentioning them above anyway -- maybe all his fans do love Gris-Gris, for all I know. And looks like Rolling Stone ranked it pretty high on their all-time album list, which I guess should disqualify it. And their early record guides gave it 5 stars! But it's not just that his later albums sold more; it's that he completely switched up his style, seems like.) (And had before doing the Night Tripper thing, too, of course when he put out more conventional early singles back to the '50s as Mac Rebennack.)

Also I figure every album mentioned on here is a cult album to somebody, and all these bands have their crazy completist collectors somewhere! So it's just a matter of where you draw the line...

“midnight oil would be another one. unless you are australian.”

The debut wasn't released outside of Australia until years later (didn't come out in the US until 1990), so yeah, it's far more likely that Australians had heard/heard of it.

So do people think Head Injuries is the first or


I didn't read the first post, just the thread title.

It’s really silly to take umbrage if you don’t bother to read the thread btw

Blimey, that really GG Allin?

wikipedia says that, after his success, Luther Vandross bought the rights to the two albums released by his band Luther to stop them being re-released, is this a common thing?

I think Mac Rebbenack went into the studio for Gris Gris thinking that he would get somebody else in to do vocals and use the name Dr John but both wound up falling to him. I thought Babylon was at least a year later.
I also thought Walk On Gilded Splinters was a hit, or was that just for other people?
Certainly one of my all time favourite lps anyway.

Marsha Hunt, I think.

The Beta Band

the band's definitely revisited it live (they just did "box full of letters" at their last show!), and it's not a total embarrassment by any means, but kinda surprised Wilco's AM hasn't come up just for being so gestative, especially considering it's in grissos screen name.

― da croupier, Tuesday, May 12, 2015 8:10 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

As you point out, this one hasn't been orphaned like some of the other candidates on thread. I wanna say the band played the whole album live awile back when they were doing a run of album concerts. And like the Shania debut, this one became a staple of mid-price CD bins when Wilco got buzzy around '99.

I do think that Alice Cooper's "Pretties For You" is the front-runner here.

Current 93's "Lashtal" kind of fits, except that it was a 12" rather than a full album.

Jane's Addiction.

has 'Jane Says' on it, disqualified

i do think calling Please Please Me/Meet The Beatles an "afterthought" is silly, especially considering where the bar's been generally set on this thread, but i'm sorry if it really upset you to hear that - that wasn't my intent

― da croupier, Tuesday, May 12, 2015 8:41 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

fwiw, Meet wasn't their US debut; it was Introducing...the Beatles on Vee-Jay, which shared its tracklisting with Please, Please Me (minus "Please, Please Me" and "Ask Me Why" on initial pressings).

xp yeah but tbh I've never heard that album, the one everyone knows is the Nothing's Shocking version isn't it?

Jane's Addiction always played a few songs from that first record live though, even on the recent tours

does anyone listen to the first guided by voices album? it ain't no bee thousand and it was even put out by Sony in the U.K. Sony is not very lo-fi!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6fhnHu6d6I

to heck with the who, r.e.m. rule!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsPa7hnm1ss

The first "James" album?

It's not "Sit Down" and other anthems...

john lennon - two virgins
george harrison - wonderwall music

― fact checking cuz, Sunday, May 10, 2015 5:32 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and arguably - paul mccartney - the family way OST (1965)

also:

Nilsson - Spotlight on Nilsson
Neutral Milk Hotel - On Avery Island
Bee Gees - The Bee Gees Sing and Play 14 Barry Gibb Songs
Stevie Wonder - The Jazz Soul of Little Stevie

What about: everyone who started out by self-releasing tapes for friends/family like Banco De Gaia and Boards Of Canada?

Explosions In The Sky - How Strange, Innocence

Future Sound of London - Accelerator (ok ok, there's a second release with that Papua New Dead Can Dance thing on it)

Nomeansno - Mama

what about: everyone whose career had an upwards commercial arc of any kind at all

does anyone listen to the first guided by voices album? it ain't no bee thousand and it was even put out by Sony in the U.K. Sony is not very lo-fi!

no one listens to any of the first four gbv albums!

and if that first one was ever put out by sony, that would have been a reissue many years later. sony was not interested in gbv when they put that record out. nor was anybody else.

all of them, however, were collected in gbv's first box set, box, which probably disqualifies the whole lot per the rules of this thread.

i'm just going by this:

http://www.discogs.com/Guided-By-Voices-Devil-Between-My-Toes/release/6583697

but maybe it doesn't exist. i dunno...i was just surprised to see that when i looked up the title. (couldn't actually remember the title of the first GBV album...)

hmmm, yeah, that does not seem even remotely feasible.

anyway, the real gbv afterthought is the ep forever since breakfast, which was the first actual thing they put out and which they themselves seem to hate.

some scruffy the cat vibes on forever since breakfast...

yeah i can buy that. i've always heard some uncomfortably close rem vibes.

The Stone Roses - s/t

Metallica's long forgotten debut "Sloughing Through the Muddy Banks of the Petaluma River in Search of My Tennis Racket"

The Stone Roses - s/t

this is a joke right

Neutral Milk Hotel - On Avery Island

This feels like a different category--the solid debut that is ultimately a warm-up for great second album. Although maybe it does fit the "basically ignored by the vast majority of their fans" criteria.

does anyone listen to the first guided by voices album?

Yup!

The Stone Roses are a strange one, because they made an album with Martin Hannett in 1985 which wasn't released until 1996 against the wishes of the band. Two tracks were put out as a single at the time though: 'So Young'/'Tell Me'. A lot has been written about Second Coming over the years, but I believe even less people enjoy Garage Flower.

So try The Rolling Stones. Featuring one Jagger/Richards composition, and nothing anybody ever hears on the radio.

― Vic Perry, Wednesday, May 13, 2015 12:06 AM (18 hours ago)

this fits the thread perfectly and it's why i prob listen to this more than any other stones album these days. no overplayed songs, nothing i've ever had a chance to get sick of, but everything still sounds wonderful.

i wouldn't say a critically-acclaimed album that hit #1 in the UK and featured a Top 5 single that made their '95 stadium setlist perfectly fits the thread

they also did "route 66" in 2012, "I Just Want To Make Love To You" in the '00s, etc

there might be ten beach albums you'd buy before Surfin' Safari but damn Surfin' Safari is still a big part of the story

Accelerator is a great album IMO. When Children Cry gets frequent plays at my house. The whole album is a slightly leftfield take on progressive house and early uk electronic styles. Anyway, it is probably forgotten by most fans so it fits in with the thread, just had to rep for it.

beach boys albums, i mean xpost

If debut EPs count, I'd add Ratt, the Bangles (who were still called the Bangs then I think), and White Zombie.

moody blues -- the magnificent moodies

― Thus Sang Freud, Sunday, 10 May 2015 20:55 (3 days ago) Permalink

methinks inclusion of a #1 hit ("Go Now") is a disqualifier

shit, what didn't hit #1 back then?

Although a much-maligned band after the mid '90s, the first Ocean Colour Scene album from 1992 surely fits the bill here? No big hits, nothing played live, hated/discounted by the general listening public, ignored by fans, ignored by the band, suddenly re-appeared in shops (albeit as a cut-price budget release) after the success of a second album in 1996 which pretty much everyone considers their "real" debut and band, fans and general listening public alike still continued to be indifferent towards it.

Does anyone from her existing fanbase care about any of the pre-2005 Robyn records? I've not heard them, but the impression I got was that she effectively hit the reset button on her career at that point.

Kraftwerk is obviously the best answer to this question though.

yeah, but the singer of "go now" left the band after that lp, and as far as i know they didn't make a habit of performing anything from their first album after his departure. and their current audience would be surprised that that's a moody blues song. and they totally changed their sound with days of futures past. but you know all that. whatevs.

does the album suck, though? I was gonna name it and totally forgot that "Go Now" was #1, but I haven't heard it, can't imagine it's very good

doesn't suck if you're into merseybeat type stuff.

for that matter cat steven's first lp and single were uk hits, just not here in the states.

stevens'

xp first Moodies album doesn't sound much like "Go Now" either - it's mostly R&B type stuff

the Days of Futures Past lineup did play "Go Now" live for the first year or so. It's been played on the radio enough (and included in compilations) that I think most fans are familiar with it.

first albums that sound nothing like any that followed due to a different band lineup are their own category, like this one or Pink Floyd or Pulp.

yeah and considering how many people stan for those early Kraftwerk albums I think they belong there

The early Pulp albums sound like Pulp, albeit a not very good Pulp.

Does anyone from her existing fanbase care about any of the pre-2005 Robyn records? I've not heard them, but the impression I got was that she effectively hit the reset button on her career at that point.

"Show Me Love" from her first album was an international Top 10 (by comparison, none of her post-2005 songs have made the Hot 100 in the US) and she still plays it live so it's definitely not a hated, ignored, unknown afterthought

though she probably has plenty of younger fans with no context for it, i'm sure

i hope at least once a true-blue '90s pop fan wandered into a Robyn gig expecting a retro show and was like WHUUUUUH

Do Notwist fans care about the self-titled punk album they debuted with in 1991? (I like their next few myself, though I get the idea their American fanbase, inasmuch as it exists, doesn't care much about anything before Neon Golden in 2002.)

https://bekoob.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/shakira-magia.jpg

http://eil.com/images/main/Celine-Dion-La-Voix-Du-Bon-Di-261703.jpg

(although Celine's did have a couple of Quebec region hits on it)

First several Miami Sound Machine LPs, too:

http://www.discogs.com/artist/48245-Miami-Sound-Machine

Doesn't look like they got any U.S. Latin chart action early on, either. "Dr. Beat" off 1984's Eyes Of Innocence was finally a top 10 hit in Europe and Australia, apparently, but I get the idea even that one's been way downplayed over time, and it was way into their career, either way.

does this count?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Angel_%28Blue_Angel_album%29

cyndi lauper's band, before "she's so unusual." album went nowhere fast. wasn't even reissued on CD (outside of japan, naturally) for many years.

not a bad album btw!

Seems like if you include that (which I used to have a copy of, ages ago), you have to include Debbie Harry's first band, too:

http://www.discogs.com/Wind-In-The-Willows-The-Wind-In-The-Willows/master/213789

But I kind of think "bands people were in before they were famous" is a whole different category, myself.

what about rufus's self-titled, extremely low charting debut, the only one they made before they officially became "rufus featuring chaka khan"?

yeah going back upthread Show Me Love was HUGE, I remember seeing it on MTV as a kid and digging it. the album that it's on is fantastic too.

But I kind of think "bands people were in before they were famous" is a whole different category, myself.

yeah, true.

Oh speaking of early Sly, that 2014 Light In The Attic comp, I'm Just Like You: Sly's Stone Flower, has a lot of good stuff, ditto the 2013 box, Higher!, although there's some overlap I think.

the stone flower comp is great! it's very simple to an earlier comp on ace records, but the sony comp has better sound IMO.

cyndi lauper's band, before "she's so unusual." album went nowhere fast.

o it's already been broughten

Lauper was the lead singer of Blue Angel, so would be a different category as noted above, re Debbie Harry in pre-Blondie band The Wind In The Willows (also as noted, the album by Blue Angel is good, with Lauper's 50s-80s belting in a no-frills club rock setting).
Haven't heard Alice Cooper's xpost Pretties For You, but used to play Easy Action and thought it was pretty okay: a bit demo-y, but Vince's vocals really go for the gusto, as they used to say in that beer commercial he probably relished.

Did anybody mention these cobbled-together collections that can come out soon after the first proper albums hit it big, like Hendrix on sessions of Curtis Knight, Little Richard, the Isley Brothers (got some of the first two, would love to get the remixed tracks, with guitar highlighted, that the isleys bought out on their label: really good reviews, OOP forever, prob 100s of dollars on eBay)

since somebody mentioned it...

http://www.willardswormholes.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/cover1-293x300.jpg

Inquire within:
http://www.willardswormholes.com/archives/468

does the Jefferson Airplane debut count?

no, but the first Jefferson Starship album (Blows Against the Empire) almost does....

Jefferson Airplane Takes Off is a solid debut, and neither fans nor the band distanced themselves from it. I think of it like the first Fairport Convention album (which sounds surprisingly similar, and is also very good); each was made with a fine female vocalist who left after the first album and are unfairly maligned because they're not Grace Slick/Sandy Denny, and weren't as popular or quite as good as what followed.

Gerry Rafferty's Can I Get My Money Back? (1971) is a weird one. Tucked in between the three Humblebums albums that proceded it and the three Stealers Wheel albums that followed, it was ignored upon its release and still (undeservedly) gets little attention now. It would be another seven years before City to City, which topped the charts in the US and many probably think is his solo debut.

John Cale's Vintage Violence fits doesn't it?
Think it's his first, stylistically different etc. VU were still obscure when he left.
Not sure what's on it though, so he may have reworked songs live.

First Little Big Town album (Monument 2002) also fits.

Did Dead Can Dance get a mention already?

First two Sparks albums? No hits on either of them, recorded with a different band to the "classic" era, and I guess most people assume their recording career started with "Kimono My House".

What about Mark Everett's pre-Eels solo records? I guess "Bad Dude In Love" probably doesn't count as it was self-released and obscure to the point of being an urban legend, but "A Man Called E" and "Broken Toy Shop" must do.

Yeah did think of those, they're a more pop version of himself..

Suave House released an album Rick Ross recorded back in 2002-04 ("Rise to Power") after he dropped Port of Miami.

"Genesis - From Genesis to Revelation"

def

Charli XCX - 14

https://i.discogs.com/dYbChyQJv6a0ZwPGD5vd8XkIuRZcMyuRkNc7qRIBvis/rs:fit/g:sm/q:90/h:600/w:600/czM6Ly9kaXNjb2dz/LWRhdGFiYXNlLWlt/YWdlcy9SLTQ0ODY4/ODktMTM2NjQ2MDM2/Ni01NjQ2LmpwZWc.jpeg

Indigo Girls - Strange Fire(?)

Several songs also appear on the their 2nd album (the one everyone knows), so I’m sure it doesn’t fit the “Nothing played live” category…

Simon & Garfunkel - Wednesday Morning 3 A.M.

7 covers, 4 all-but-forgotten Paul Simon songs, and oh yeah, the non-hit original acoustic version of Sounds of Silence.

Adrianne Lenker - stages of the sun

Sabrina Carpenter - Eyes Wide Open

The Frogs - The Frogs

I'm pretty sure L7's debut self-titled album (the one that came out on Epitaph before Dee joined) is dead to them

yeah looks like they v occasionally play Uncle Bob but that's about it

The Frogs - The Frogs

i do not disagree but it was the first one of theirs i owned and i've always had a soft spot for it.

It doesnt really fit the criteria, but I'm always surprised no one ever talks about the Velvet Underground's "Loop", a 7-minute noise piece released on flexi prior to the banana album

Did Dead Can Dance get a mention already?
― Sebastian (Royal Mermaid Mover), Saturday, May 16, 2015 3:37 PM (nine years ago) bookmarkflaglink

They definitely improved and their first is not hailed as their best, but I thought plenty of fans appreciated the first two Dead Can Dance records. Ocean and Musica Eternal are haunting pieces, and there's a great tribal / goth atmosphere on the post-punk numbers sung by Brendan Perry.

xp Wasn't that basically a Cale solo joint (under the Velvets name)?

A few of the albums in this thread fall under "withdrawn from circulation / actively suppressed," which is sort of an interesting sub-category of its own.

phil ochs falls into the category of “first release disowned but it was released under another name”. it’s an amusing story, he anonymously recorded an album of children’s campfire songs under the name “the campers” two years before his proper debut. the album was unknown until a family member told a journalist about it 25 years after ochs’ death.

GG Allin – Always Was, Is And Always Shall Be

His debut. More like Inxs (not that I've heard it)

INXS? It's more like Stooges, Richard Hell, etc.

Popol Vuh, Affenstunde

an uneven Moog experiment; their classic sound didn't emerge until Hosianna Mantra and the later synth-free albums

not sure that one really qualifies. It has a lot of champions--'Julian Cope described it as "a debut album of incredible sounds and sensations that were unlike anything prior to its existence".'

There's Moog on the next album, Hosianna Mantra is their third album.

Didn't read the whole thread but I kinda feel like nobody pays much attention to Motörhead's self-titled album, they all come on board with Overkill and Ace of Spades.

Partly because the debut was on another label than the subsequent few, and also because it shares a number of songs with the even more primitive "demo album" On Parole, which probably adds to the impression they didn't quite have it together yet.

...an impression also reinforced by Lemmy re-recording the songs he'd written for Hawkwind over the previous few years.

I agree that both Affenstunde and In Den Garten Pharoahs have not much to do with PV's later sound but I think they have a few albums that use recordings from 1970-1971 so idk if it really counts. Aguirre and Nosferatu in particular. Though I suppose it depends what version of those you have.

AC/DC's first Australian album was more in the vein of Slade or suchlike than their subsequent material. Confusingly it was called High Voltage, even though only 2 of the tracks made it onto the international release of the same name that came out a year later. Anyway no-one ever mentions the likes of Love Song (Oh Jene) or Baby, Please Don't Go, and for good reason.

This clip tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyJFcsn8B08

Confusingly it was called High Voltage, even though only 2 of the tracks made it onto the international release of the same name that came out a year later.

The US/international version of High Voltage was mostly composed of tracks from their second Australian album, T.N.T.

AC/DC's discography is a mess. Powerage, their sixth album overall, was the first one to be released with the same track listing in all territories.

Affenstunde rules, fwiw.

I like Affenstunde too, but it sounds more like Kluster or very early Tangerine Dream than the Popul Vuh of the later albums and soundtracks.

yeah the first two popol vuh albums don't much sound like the bulk of the rest of their work but neither are ignored.

sigur ros, von. maybe more people like it than I expect but it was an import only forever and hard to find and I don't recall anyone caring about it that much.

LOL at that Charli XCX cover art.

All the early, Indie Kacey Musgraves and Gary Clark Jr. albums.

all the early Sam Phillips albums when she was Leslie Phillips

The Paperboys - January
The cassette Show of Hands albums ('87-'91)
Peatbog Faeries - The Great Ceilidh Swindle
Wolfstone - Wolfstone (and Wolfstone II)

AC/DC's discography is a mess. Powerage, their sixth album overall, was the first one to be released with the same track listing in all territories.

maybe they were inspired by the beatles catalog

like that BA Robertson album? Xpost

― Mark G, Monday, 11 May 2015 19:01 (nine years ago) bookmarkflaglink

Sad to have been beaten re this one

Still there is the 1969 Robin Scott album

It was reissued a few times, but the 1982 Sonic Youth EP is very different from even what they were doing on their first full length.

the first Simple Minds album is different from even the other post-punk Minds albums before they transitioned into new wave heroes ('different' in that it's not very good, IMO)

In some ways they went full circle to its relative mediocrity

Modest Mouse - This is a Long Drive for Someone With Nothing to Think About

important to their discography when they were truly an indie sensation and only had 2-3 proper albums amidst all their EPs, but I feel like now even fans of this period essentially would start the story with Lonesome Crowded West and/or Building Nothing Out of Something.

the first Porcupine Tree album (on the sunday of life) is either rubbish home recordings of nonsense or the best thing they ever did, depending on who you talk to.

xp disagree with Modest Mouse. This through Building Nothing is my MM sweet spot.

I disagree too, mainly because I bought it upon release and it’s always felt pretty “core” to me; but I admit I don’t know how it’s perceived by fans at large

It was reissued a few times, but the 1982 Sonic Youth EP is very different from even what they were doing on their first full length.

Yeah, part of me has always wondered what might have happened if Richard Edson (yes, the actor) had stuck around on drums — maybe they'd have just been a slightly clangy Downtown dance-punk act.

The Boo Radleys - Ichabod & I

― Kitchen Person, Sunday, May 10, 2015

This was only released on vinyl in the UK, almost impossible to find and not on streaming service's.

The Frogs - The Frogs

i do not disagree but it was the first one of theirs i owned and i've always had a soft spot for it.

Me too, I think I heard that one before their funny ones. Somehow it makes the roughness of the funny stuff funnier knowing what they were going for at first.

Also Starjob isn't all that representative, but I really like that one too.

sonic youth considered the s/t an album not an ep or castaway. it fits into a lineage of punk mini-lps that are typically debuts but i think they specifically did say "it's our first album". and it does have the song that lends the band their name which was the final track on their geffen bestof screaming fields. it's canon for sure. and to my ears not that different from songs like kill yr idols and nature scene.

i respectfully submit to the thread a 4th criterion to the op 3 rules:

no hits
nothing played live
hated or unknown to most fans
-no tracks excerpted for compilations

idk if it's still this way today, but when i was getting into samla mammas manna nobody mentioned their first s/t album, from before their guitarist joined. i know samla mammas manna aren't like super-famous or anything, but they do have fans and i'm one of them... i only knew they had an album before Måltid because of, well, i think he lurks here actually haha, hi johan if you're reading this :)

Michael Jackson
Pink Floyd

Tempted to say Steely Dan but scared of the FP's I'll accumulate. Aside from the singles, it really is a lesser, outcast album and I say that as a David Palmer fan.

fits the thread title, maybe, but not the criteria in the OP, I'd say.

y'all may be right about the Mouse! they're a tricky one anyway because of the "indie band that later got really huge" aspect... those of us who were listening before the crossover may never have a really accurate picture of what their career/discography looks like to the great majority of their listenership.

it really is a lesser, outcast album

How dare you.

I think I've heard the 2 big hits more often on classic rock/oldies stations than any of the subsequent hits.

y’all may be right about the Mouse! they’re a tricky one anyway because of the “indie band that later got really huge” aspect… those of us who were listening before the crossover may never have a really accurate picture of what their career/discography looks like to the great majority of their listenership.

To a lot of people, they’re the “Float On” band and even The Moon and Antartica (on a major in the US, but Matador in Europe) was not on their radars.

They’re just a similar case to like Goo Goo Dolls or Lemonheads, who also had a number of indie albums before jumping to a major and blowing up. They have fans who prefer the indie albums and fans who have never heard the indie albums.

I knew lots of REM 'fans' who thought out of time was their first album but some others who had no idea there was anything before Green *after* they found out it wasn't their first.

Modest Mouse's debut notable for being produced by Seasick Steve

Pulp mentioned way upthread, I reckon the average non-fan reckons they began in 1994

It always amazes me the amount of people who I've met over the years that have a few Oasis albums but not the debut. The million selling debut album that even the brothers themselves say they never surpassed.

There was a time when Definitely Maybe and Heathen Chemistry were the only ones in this house (i.e. between 2002 and 05) (apparently Morning Glory was bought in the mid-90s, but where it ended up is a mystery).

Modest Mouse's debut notable for being produced by Seasick Steve

Never knew this. The sleeve looks like one of his own too.

I'm surprised not to see Van Morrison's Blowin' Your Mind mentioned with the one disqualifying detail that it contained a massive hit single that you still hear everywhere.

Wow, I had never heard of that one…

xp I think that's a good example actually... that album was assembled without VM's consent (after the fact of the big hit) and it has always been somewhat obscure in his discography, similar to Bowie's debut.

Japan's first couple albums?

The Boo Radleys - Ichabod & I
― Kitchen Person, Sunday, May 10, 2015

This was only released on vinyl in the UK, almost impossible to find and not on streaming service's.

― Bee OK, Saturday, 15 March 2025 01:47 (sixteen hours ago)

As one of the few people that bought it back in the day, I'd say it fits the bill. Relative to everything that came afterwards it's almost unlistenable because of the production (though the original version of 'Kaleidoscope' is great).

I don't really know if Modest Mouse counts, "Dramamine" in particular sounds a lot like Mouse as we know them (at least in the 90s) and it's definitely a fan favorite, I mean if it's bolded on RYM I think it probably shouldn't qualify here

Jean-Michel Jarre on the other hand...his first two albums definitely bit the bill. They're called Deserted Palace and Les Granges Brûlées and most people don't even know they exist. neither are very good (though Deserted Palace is pretty wild for 1972 - it sounds a bit proto-Zuckerzeit), I am guessing none of it was ever played live, it's not until the 4xLP Planet Jarre release and any of these tracks were even released on a compilation.

Giorgio Moroder

https://www.giorgiomoroder.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/giorgio-moroder-giorgio-thats-bubble-gum-thats-giorgio.jpg

Donna Summer, "Lady of the Night", for that matter.

Al Green(e)

https://lpcoverlover.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/04.resized/452b_3.JPG

Send Me a Lullaby by the Go-Betweens feels like a bunch of hastily-recorded demos compared to everything that came after it.

hah, I was gonna mention "Son of my Father", didn't know Giorgio had one that was released even before that

xps nice yawnsomely literal cover

Maybe this has been mentioned but The Bee Gees’ first two albums were juvenile efforts released only in Australia, and then they had the nerve to call their third album Bee Gees 1st.

“Those were actually mixtapes”

Björk called her third solo album Debut in direct homage to the Bee Gees.

(*probably* not true.)

Back Up Train is good though

Blowin' Your Mind is bolstered by this totally false marketing with the cover being so aggressively psychedelic against the wishes of the artist- perfect candidate

The Carpenters' Offering (later "Ticket to Ride") is a bit like this. Richard sings almost as much as Karen and it's largely original compositions played largely by themselves plus strings. It didn't sell terribly well and only the Beatles cover tends to appear on compilations (and even that tends to be a re-recording IIRC!)

<i>Blowin' Your Mind is bolstered by this totally false marketing with the cover being so aggressively psychedelic against the wishes of the artist- perfect candidate</i>

Except, it <i>did</i> have a pretty big hit... though "not played live" criteria totally applies, save for "T.B. Sheets" being played in some early shows

oops forgot about blockquotes

oops bbcode not blockquotes. Having a bad day.