Alphabet Soup Week 44: The V Tracks

After being blown away by The Cure's new album, I wondered how it compares to other albums released by artists after a long layoff. Climb aboard and follow me down the rabbit hole to find out...

As I wrap up this week’s installment of Alphabet Soup, I’m also watching/listening to the replay of The Cure’s launch party for their latest album, which was held at The Troxy in London on Friday evening. I’m currently a little over two hours into the three hour runtime. The band is in fine form and Robert Smith, his black shirt soaked with sweat and his voice as fabulous as it’s ever been, is wrapping up a stirring rendition of Disintegration. But the main event is, essentially, already complete. Over the course of the first hour my favorite band of all time performed the entirety of the stunning Songs of a Lost World, their first album in sixteen years.

This is now the 12th time I’ve listened to the full album since its release on Friday. For my tastes, the last great album the band released was 2000’s Bloodflowers, which was my favorite since 1989’s Disintegration. So you could say I’ve been looking forward to this album for over two decades. I already had an idea of what to expect as Tina and I had seen the band perform four of the eight tracks when we saw them live in Philly last year. But immersing myself in the album over the last few days has been an incredible experience, a reminder of what a marvelous song writer Robert Smith is and how much I’ve missed the darker side of the band. The album is, in a word, brilliant.

I’ve been finding myself struggling to characterize the nature of this album within the context of the band’s entire catalog. Despite the long stretch between releases, it’s hard to call it a “comeback album” as they’ve been touring regularly and have already played most if not all of the new songs live at some point over the last two years. Given the sixteen years that have elapsed between albums, I got to wondering how this album compares with those released by other artists after a long gap. I’ve been diving down rabbit holes and slicing and dicing data all afternoon to see whether I can create a framework to compare this album with others that have been released after a gap of ten or more years.

My starting point was Wikipedia ‘s (extensive but certainly not exhaustive) List of longest gaps between studio albums. This provided a list of 587 albums released after a gap of ten or more years, which I subjectively narrowed down to a list of 50 albums from bands that I felt were were either good to great or had produced good to great albums after a long layoff. From there I wanted to compare the critical reviews of each of the albums that straddled the long layoff. In terms of critical review aggregators, metacritic didn’t cut it for the universe of artists/albums, so I ended up going with AOTY. After pulling in the ratings for the selected 50 albums, I compiled the top 20 list below based on the aggregated AOTY score of the album after the long layoff:

While I’m pleased to see Songs of a Lost World has such a high score, the fact that the AOTY aggregated score for the album is the highest of The Cure’s entire catalog is a major red flag. Also, there are obvious limitations on any review aggregation site (increase in the universe of music review sites, well-known genre biases by certain music review sites, poor initial reviews on older albums that have aged well, etc.). As such, I’m taking the whole exercise with a grain (a pinch? a fistful?) of salt, but I nonetheless see it as an instructive little project with some interesting observations.

I’m not overly familiar with D’Angelo’s work and was surprised to see that both his 2000 and 2014 albums scored so highly; I’ll give them both a listen. I’m not surprised to see My Bloody Valentine, Portishead, Peter Gabriel, Slowdive, and The Avalanches with such high scores for both the prior album and next album after a long layoff. I’ve been following music quite closely for the better part of the last 15 years and regularly perusing music review sites and the critics’ annual “best of lists” and these artists and albums have all ranked quite highly.

Perhaps the biggest surprises for me were Redd Kross and Swans. I’m not really familiar with either band; in fact I only recently became aware of Redd Kross on Tuesday when Dan Epstein of Jagged Time Lapse announced his new book on the band. Across eight albums since 1986 they’ve received an average aggregated score of 78 with a high of 83 and a low of 68. Swans have a large catalog (sixteen albums since 1983) and a consistently high aggregated score with an average of 76 across their career and an average of 82 over their last ten albums. Although I’ve been vaguely aware of them for some time, I’m pretty sure I’ve only ever listened to their 2014 album To Be Kind. For both of these artists (and several others on the top 20 list) some exploration is clearly in order.

So over to you Dear Reader! What albums do you remember yearning for after a long layoff? When the album you were waiting for arrived, did it live up to your expectations? Were there any surprises for you on the top 20 list above? Have I missed an artist/album that I should have included? If so, please let me know. I’d love to hear any and all thoughts on this exercise so please don’t be shy!

And now on to this week’s playlist: ten tracks beginning with V. There’s some fantastic ones here (if I do say so myself), hopefully something for everyone. Enjoy!!

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ALPHABET SOUP WEEK 44: The V Tracks

This week’s selections:

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TRACK: “Violet” from Live Through This (1994)

ARTIST: Hole

The last time we saw the Courtney Love-fronted band Hole was in the week 15 installment when I included Doll Parts from the same album, 1994's Live Through This. Violet was the third single released from the album and while it was well received by critics, it failed to achieve the chart success of earlier singles. This is one of Hole's better known tracks; indeed, some would argue it's their signature song.

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TRACK: “Vasoline” from Purple (1994)

ARTIST: Stone Temple Pilots

Vasoline, the second single released from Stone Temple Pilots second album, 1994's Purple, was the band's most successful single since Plush from their debut album; both albums topped the Billboard Mainstream Rock Chart. In last week's installment I  referenced Scott Weiland's drug abuse when discussing Velvet Revolver's Fall To Pieces and that theme is also reflected here. In his autobiography Weiland acknowledged that the lyrics to this song are "about me becoming a junkie" and about lying to his first wife and the band about his heroin addiction.

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TRACK: “Vessel” from Club Meds (2015)

ARTIST: Dan Mangan + Blacksmith

I'm completely clueless as to how and where Dan Mangan's Club Meds found its way into my CD collection. It's the only album of his I ever physically owned and it was released well into a period during which I was generally no longer buying physical media. The only other album on my AOTY list for 2015 that I physically owned was Ibeyi's self-titled debut which I picked up at their concert in Boston. Although I loved this album, ranking it #21 in my end of year list, his subsequent releases haven't really done much for me.

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As you make your way through this week’s playlist, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Do any of these tracks really stand out for you? What do you like? What don’t you like?

Please click the button below to leave a comment.

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TRACK: “Victory Dance” from Circuital (2011)

ARTIST: My Morning Jacket

Victory Dance is the opening track from 2011's Circuital, the sixth album from Louisville, KY-based rock band My Morning Jacket. The album, which was a nominee for Best Alternative Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards, peaked at number five on the Billboard 200, the highest position for any of their albums. This was the first and only album of theirs that I physically owned as I was a little late coming to their music. Although I thoroughly enjoyed this album, I've found their more recent output to be a little hit and miss for my tastes.

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TRACK: “Vengeance Is Sleeping” from Middle Cyclone (2009)

ARTIST: Neko Case

Despite loving Neko Case's voice, and enjoying much of what I've heard from her, she's an artist whose work I've only dipped into over the past. I’ve never really listened to much of her work with The New Pornographers, an oversight I need to rectify. I absolutely adored her 2016 collaboration with k.d. lang and Laura Veirs, case/lang/veirs, so much so that it's one of my eight Desert Island Discs. This track, Vengeance Is Sleeping, is drawn from 2009's Middle Cyclone, which debuted at number 3 on the Billboard 200, Case's first album to reach the top ten in the US.

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TRACK: “Vox” from Touch (1989)

ARTIST: Sarah McLachlan

Although I'd consider myself a fairly big fan of Sarah McLachlan, I'd never heard her 1989 debut Touch until Tina and I got together in 1997. Vox, the lead single, peaked in Canada at number 90 with the album peaking at 61 in Canada and at 132 on the US Billboard 200. Despite being based in McLachlan's home town of Halifax from 1989 through the mid 90's, my entree into her music didn't arrive until her 1993 international breakthrough Fumbling Towards Ecstasy. She toured that album recently and Tina and I were lucky enough to see her at Radio City Music Hall in June, a concert which ranks up there in the top ten for me, possibly the top five.

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TRACK: “Valley of Sound” from Siren (1998)

ARTIST: Heather Nova

I'm bursting with pride as this is the first time a fellow Bermudian has appeared on Alphabet Soup. Heather Nova, born Heather Frith, has released eleven studio albums and six EPs since 1993 and we're tapping her third album, 1998's Siren for this week's playlist. Nova has always seen much more success in Europe, where the album made the top 30 in multiple countries. In the UK the album peaked at number 55 (number 4 on the independent albums chart) and in the US hit number 156 on the Billboard 200, her highest position ever on that chart.

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TRACK: “Vanities” from IRM (2009)

ARTIST: Charlotte Gainsbourgh

IRM is the third studio album from French electropop singer Charlotte Gainsborough, daughter of Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg. All of the songs on the album were written and produced by Beck, who provided vocals on the lead single Heaven Can Wait. The album was generally well received by critics, particularly by Pitchfork who rated it 8.4 and bestowed upon it the vaunted "Best New Music" moniker. As might be expected for a nepo baby the daughter of a French singing legend, the album reached number 4 on the French Albums Chart but also did well across Europe, making the top 40 in Belgium, Greece and Switzerland. In the UK the album peaked at number 62 while in North America it reached number 27 and 69 respectively on the Canadian and US Billboard 200 charts.

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TRACK: “Voices Carry” from Voices Carry (1985)

ARTIST: 'til Tuesday

Yes, perhaps this is just a sneaky way to include another track by one of my favorite female vocalists, Aimee Mann, who fronted the new wave band 'til Tuesday for three albums before embarking on her solo career in 1993. But this song still slaps almost 40 years after it was released, sounding as fresh now as it did then.

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TRACK: “Volcano” from O (2003)

ARTIST: Damien Rice

Volcano was a breathtakingly brilliant song on what I considered an otherwise unremarkable album. The critics didn't agree with my take as the album was generally well received, attaining a meta score of 80 on the review aggregation site Metacritic. The album spent a total of 115 weeks on the UK Albums Chart, peaking at number 9. This track, the third single released from the album, spent three weeks on the UK Singles Chart, peaking at number 29. While neither the album nor the single saw much success in North America, the music video was in heavy rotation on VH1 making their top 20 countdown in October 2003.

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Hiking in the Scottish Borders

On Tuesday Tina and I arrived in the lovely town of Melrose in the Scottish Borders to spend a week hiking the Borders Abbeys Way, a 77-mile walk which takes in four 12th century abbeys and several lovely Borders towns. This is our last long walk of the year and probably (and thankfully) the least demanding trip we’ve had since embarking an our epic adventure in July. Here are a handful of photos from our four days out on the trail:

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Here’s the link to the running playlist which is updated on a weekly basis as each new installment is published:

ALPHABET SOUP RUNNING PLAYLIST

Tracks missing from the Spotify playlist:

• Allegory by Murray Attaway (Week 02)

• Face Me and Smile by The Lover Speaks (Week 12)

• From Your Mouth by God Lives Underwater (Week 13)

• This Can’t Go On! by The Lover Speaks (Week 23)

• Two for the Show by Trooper (Week 40)

• Twenty One by Marry Me Jane (Week 40)

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Thank you for reading Joy in the Journey, I appreciate you being here! If there’s someone in your life you think may enjoy this post, feel free to share it.