Albums that you don't "get" until years later

in my youthful arrogance i took a anti-smiths stance (i loved Woodentops and so had to make a choice) .. now of course i realise the errors of my ways.

Bought it in high school, way too weird for me then. Now I think it's a work of genius.

note that my selections were chosen under the notion that "get" means understand, as opposed to albums that i at first just simply didn't get in to (or rather, "like")

I hated Slanted & Enchanted when I first heard it, right after it came out. I actually saw Pavement live three times (always with other bands) before I really got into them, right before they broke up.

I still have lots of records that I buy because they've gotten lots of favorable word-of-mouth or are otherwise considered classics but I don't necessarily like. I almost always end up 'getting' them some day.

Posts like this are why ILM nauseates me sometimes.

That is, until I listened to the album a couple years later and realised that it was really great.

Also, for a long time I had problems seeing why "Hunky Dory" was considered among Bowie's best work. To me it sounded like a rather ordinary singer/songwriter effort, until it really started to grow on me after 2-3 years. I now easily understand why it is part of the canon.

I pretty much ignored the ambient stuff until recently. Drifted in through atmospheric things like Eno/Wobble's Spinner and more recently Boards of Canada, etc. stuff. None of which is really ambient, per se, but led me to much more appreciation of "less is more" aesthetic. I "like" the ambient stuff now, but I only listen to it in a purely background way -- e.g., when I'm concentrating on work at the computer, or trying to go to sleep.

I wonder if that'll happen with Human After All.

Anyone ever noticed how much the Beatles can offer when you 'get'them, and how long it takes to 'get'them?

At first I couldn't stand it. Eventually it grew on me..Now it's hard to imagine me having lived without it.

What's your opinion on Bon Scott, Geir? (Assuming you've listened to AC/DC's pre-Mutt Lange stuff...)

i love album that you have to struggle because sounds impenetrable ,and becomes your favorite after: Bitches Brew, Daydream Nation, Ummagumma, Abba....

... still not getting Twin Infinitives, and i love Royal Trux other albums!

But Very Well Organized by Fuxa is a perfect example. i bought it after listening to two songs, which happened to be the only two peop songs on the entire album, the rest being kind of out there stuff. Now. . .I absolutely love it!

Explain yerself, squire.

"Wow, this is amazing! Oh, wait, I think I HAVE this..."

I mean ones you did a complete 180 on, not just that you came around to liking a few songs.

For me it's Lil Wayne -- I Am Not a Human Being II and Eminem -- Relapse. I bought into the negative career-low talk on the first and the washed-up retread/stupid accents criticism on the second, but I dunno man, for whatever reason now I think both contain some of their best work.

Lil Wayne -- I Am Not a Human Being II (AKA his no fucks given album, with sick flows/beats. Not really that old though lol, I know.)
Eminem -- Relapse (I got issues maan even if they're not the same as Eminem's. I also don't hate women/let one bad experience taint my perception but regardless album is dope & the accents allow him to go crazy with bending the rhymes)

sorry for double post, still new to this ilxor contraption clearly

for me this was cupid and psyche

I'm still working on that one.

when it finally transitions from "wow this kinda signifies as pop music but sounds bolted together in a laboratory" to "this is the best music i've ever heard in my life," man

Marquee Moon sounded shaky and tenuous (!?), on cursory listens--i got a weak impression from it. came back to it after a year, after absorbing Murray Street, and it opened up for me. The sonic youth album is mild, almost pedestrian in comparison.

A few pop albums for me. Not talking about Beatles or Prince or Michael Jackson or Kate Bush or that sort of pop. I'm talking the 90s/00s RnB influenced pop like Mariah Carrey and TLC and and Beyonce and Justin Timberlake.

Thought most of them were shit, like Timberlake, Annie's Anniemall, Gwen Stefani and all those 00's albums that popists raved about. Liked some of the singles but had always thought of pop music as a singles format not an album format. I still do for the most part (it's one of the genres with most filler tracks particularly from the 90's onward) but I've learned to appreciate a couple of classic albums that 18 year old me would have been annoyed at.

^FutureSex/LoveSounds is the album that turned me into a semi-popist. Still kinda funny thinking about how me & friends in middle school were on the "OMG boy bands are gay duude" kick & exclusively listened to nu-metal lol. I like Limp Bizkit tho so I guess we got at least part of it right

when it finally transitions from "wow this kinda signifies as pop music but sounds bolted together in a laboratory" to "this is the best music i've ever heard in my life," man

doesn't a lot of pop music sound bolted together in a laboratory? it's a good album but I don't see what's so special about it in terms of production techniques or whatever.

I didn't start seriously listening to The Beatles until the 2009 remasters came out & I could hear the drums/bass better, I'm evil. srs though even though I realize it's the melodies that make 'em as great as they are the remasters really are way better, but then that makes sense when you consider the original CDs dropped in '87

Deeply embarrassed but I used to not rank Junior Murvin's Police and Thieves--perhaps bcz I was listening to it not in the context of other reggae albums but instead along with stuff like Metal Box, Cut, and Y--but recently I gave it another spin. I haven't been this bowled over by a re-listen in years.

Fleetwood Mac - Rumours, from total loathing to total love after c.30 years.

Elliott Smith. Didn't click until I heard "A Fond Farewell" and read the oral history on p4k on the tenth anniversary of his death.

On first exposure to both Sonic Youth (Sister) and Kate Bush (The Dreaming), I thought "I don't get this, but I have a feeling I'm gonna love it in 3 years."

It really took me a long time to get beyond Brix-era Fall. That stuff (which was my intro to the band) raised certain expectation. Actually very similar to experience with Fleetwood Mac.

The other big one is Band of Susans, who I kept trying to hear in terms of Sonic Youth, and didn't really get until I realized they weren't trying to do anything remotely like that.

doesn't a lot of pop music sound bolted together in a laboratory? it's a good album but I don't see what's so special about it in terms of production techniques or whatever.

....

i mean idk i even think the chord transitions in cupid & psyche sound really bizarre

i also don't think a lot of pop music sounds bolted together in a laboratory

I remember when Cupid & Psyche appeared in '85 it sounded like nothing else out there - except maybe for what the folks at ZTT were doing. It's one of the great masterpieces of sampling/sequencer technology in pop as well as being a beast in the songwriting dept.

Queen - Hot Space

I bought Spirit of Eden when I was 14 or 15 because I loved Talk Talk's singles up till then and didn't know what the hell they were playing at. I wanted synth-pop, not jazzy meditations. Half the record label probably felt the same. Changed my mind later, obviously.

For all its sheen and pop precision, Cupid & Psyche (a lifetime favourite since '85) sounds way better to me on a non-digital format. I'm not sure whether this is just because the CD master is poor (though it does have an inferior version of Perfect Way, for sure) or whether it's actually a record that should be heard at high volume (some of the drums and cymbal crashes such as Wood Beez' intro are clearly meant to sound epic; Absolute sounds to me as if it should be experienced at a club like the one in the video) and the minor compression/distortion lent by an inexpensive record or cassette player replicates that.

Provision has always been my favourite Scritti record, I don't know if it's partly because it's maybe more of an album to hear to on CD via headphones, and that's usually how I've listened to it

Yes, would agree that Provision sounds good on CD and doesn't need to be cranked. My C&P post reminds me of when I first 'got' Led Zeppelin - in a record shop, where the speakers and volume were bigger and louder that what I'd use at home. OTOH, Propaganda and other ZTT artists seem similar to C&P in going for an epic sequenced sound, but I can listen to them on CD or mp3, so maybe it is the C&P CD mastering that's at fault.

i dunno, i don't think there's much difference, musically, btwn Cupid & psyche and, say, culture club or something.

Cupid & Psyche is one album I really do not "get" at all. To me it just sounds like really horrible cheesy 80s pop like the Thompson Twins or something.

hope to see the Colonel bump this thread in a decade's time to say that he didn't "get" Quick Step and Side Kick until years later

I don't think Cupid & Psyche sounds much like Thompson Twins but I really like Thompson Twins so I'm maybe not the best person to ask

Thompson Twins prob not a good ref, it's actually a been a few years since I listened to C&P, maybe I will get it now!

2014: the year I "got" Miles' On The Corner.

long time since I've heard cupid and psyche but I bought a cheapie 'Quick step and side kick' half is great, half is singles a-sides, not the same half always, but.

um, anyway, 'the word girl' alright?

Sandinista

Thompson Twins and Scritti Politti did both make a curious journey from late 70s left-wing post-punk squatter collective to to mid 80s glossy hit makers

Reading, Writing and Arithmetic by The Sundays. I have a feeling this album was probably quite instant for most people who love it but I bought it about 15 years ago and always liked it but could never really see why it was seen as such a classic. It was only a couple of years ago it really hit me what a perfect record it is.

Another one is the first Modern Lovers album. Always enjoyed Roadrunner, Hospital and a couple of other songs but it was probably about five years ago it clicked and is now one of my favourite albums ever.

It wasn't years but it definitely took a while for me to really get DI Goes Pop. When I did finally get into it I bought Technicolour straight away which I fell in love with way more instantly.

Reading, Writing and Arithmetic by The Sundays.

Some corners originally pushed this album as "The Smiths with a chick," which does a huge disservice to band and listener both.

I have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea of not getting Reading, Writing and Arithmetic. It's no exaggeration to say that album changed my musical life at a relatively young age. Maybe I heard it with just the right level of context and expectation (read: none).

It didn't help that my copy was one of those picture discs that sounded like it was pressed off-centre.

I just thought it was a nice album with some pretty songs but only later I really started to appreciate the beauty of the playing, the wonderful lyrics or just how unique her voice is. I knew how popular it when I bought it but for a while I just couldn't see it.

I brought home the 45 of "Can't Be Sure" from Rough Trade on my first visit to London after a rave review in NME, so I've always felt like I was in on the ground floor with The Sundays. The flip, "Kicked A Boy" IS pretty Smiths-y imo.