Canonic Albums by Artists Who You Love and Revere But For Some Reason This One Bypasses You Almost Completely

[version]

The Gift

The instrumental's probably my favourite thing they ever did. There's that cool live version on one of the reissues too.

 

[version]

banana album is pure shit

I like some of the stuff on it - Sunday Morning, I'm Waiting for the Man, Venus in Furs, Heroin - but yeah, never fully clicked for me and the rest ranges from plodding to irritating. WL/WH and the other self titled one are great though.

 

[version]

Shame this never made the album.

 

[thirdform]

still trying to come to terms with the fact that Blissblogger reveres Bowie. I always gave him the benefit of the doubt that he pretended to like them to get in to the good graces of journalistic circles.

I'm actually shocked, shocked, he can rank him.

I might not survive into the morning. The shock is too overwhelming to endure. Farewell lads.

 

[thirdform]

Although this could be an interesting thread idea. Music you pretend to like. Every music fan does it until their taste is fully solidified.

 

[linebaugh]

The instrumental's probably my favourite thing they ever did. There's that cool live version on one of the reissues too.

this recording is so good I count it as the official album cut. love the long melodic drone sound solo

 

[linebaugh]

banana album is as good as advertised

 

[linebaugh]

instant lowering of respect for all bowie fanboys I agree @thirdform

 

[thirdform]

instant lowering of respect for all bowie fanboys I agree @thirdform

only decadent bourgeois libertines could enjoy the sound of the incontinent singing.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

loaded is the best vu album by far
best songwriting and no stupidity
banana album is pure shit

Lol I know better than to rise to that kind of bait, whether it's sincere or just trolling

After all who am I to question the taste of the man who speaks French and wrote a novel and whatever else you said yr CV was when you called everyone else dumb

Loaded is about 2/3 great, 1/3 dumb. They were consciously trying to crank out pop hits so if accessibility is yr jam that's for sure the one. If droning cellos and motorik is yr thing, not so much.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

If I had to rank them I'd go

& Nico >> WL/WH >> 3rd >> Loaded

But I still think Loaded is good

Squeeze is fucking terrible but everyone knows that

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

Best VU is live VU anyway

For a band that embodied the polar opposite of hippiedom they have a surprising amount in common with the Grateful Dead (who I can't stand tbc) in that way, esp talking ca. 65-69 or so. Different drugs, different vibes obv.

1969 ofc (What Goes On on there is a personal favorite) but any late 60s bootleg really. The Quine Tapes et al. Foggy Notion is one of their 4 or 5 best songs and they never even recorded it. There's a famous - to me at least - Peter Laughner line that every band from the awesome Cleveland pre-punk scene (i.e. Rocket From the Tombs, Electric Eels, etc) did a Foggy Notion cover.

 

[droid]

The original release of loaded isnt great, but Fully Loaded is amazing. It has some of my fave VU tunes.

 

[Leo]

side 2 traditionally starts well, with accessible / exciting tunes (often a single) and then gets ropey as the least impressive things made during the session get thrown in at track 4 side 2.

I knew a record label guy who always said an album's most important song is the first one on side two, critical to an LP's success. it has to make you want to flip the platter and continue playing the records, offering a halo effect to the rest of the side.

 

[Mr. Tea]

I hope this thread means @luka will finally get off my fucking back about my alleged 'worst-titled thread of all time.'

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

the riffs/grooves are so dull to me, particularly TV Eye, that ones almost embarrassing

oh boy I might have to revoke yr kool rock music license for that one tho. TV Eye is best song on record, easy top 5 Stooges tune.

the second half when Iggy is freaking out over that nailed on groove and everything suddenly drops out and then that blinding Ron Asheton riff cuts back in like a bolt of lightning to the base of yr spine? forget about it

I do agree that side 2 tails off after 1970. tho I do like L.A. Blues, but I have a healthy appetite for both noise rock and late 60s/early 70s shambling post-hippie freakouts i.e. Amon Duul I and that kinda thing.

 

[version]

There's that other tune of theirs called 'Asthma Attack' that feels like a proto - 'L.A. Blues'.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

as above, if I had to rank Stooges LPs

Raw Power >> Fun House >> S/T

if self-titled was an EP of just 1969, I Wanna Be Your Dog, No Fun (and maybe Little Doll) it would be number one. the rest sounds like exactly what it is, shit they just made up on the spot to to fill up the rest of space, especially the interminably dull 10 minutes of We Will Fall.

I definitely prefer the original to the Williamson lineup in the way I prefer Mooney Can to Suzuki Can but side 1 of Raw Power is so unrelentingly awesome that it's hard to deny

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

There's that other tune of theirs called 'Asthma Attack' that feels like a proto - 'L.A. Blues'.

when they started off they were actually much weirder, noisier, and de facto avant-garde

their early live show was some proto-Einsturzende Neubaten ish, microphones in blenders and weird machine sounds type craziness combined with instrumental ineptitude and bug-eyed young Iggy stage antics

compared to say MC5 who were always a bona fide rock and roll band in the Detroit tradition

 

[version]

I remember liking some of that Iggy and Williamson album, Kill City. There are some good Stooges outtakes too, 'Open Up and Bleed', 'Rubber Legs', 'I Got a Right'.