Blue is a great album, but there are many great albums released every year that don’t receive the reverence it does. I can’t think of any album that benefits more from nostalgia and people identifying with the band as “one of us.” My Name is Jonas, The World Has Turned and Left Me Here, and Say It Ain’t So are particularly excellent.
Pinkerton is also a great album. I love the energy in it, it feels like he’s going to jump out of his skin, especially on Tired of Sex, Why Bother, and El Scorcho. It has some of the best sounding drums on any album. The Good Life is a fantastic single, and Falling for You has that great bridge.
Green album is pretty much a phoned-in turd, aside from Hash Pipe which is a monster single. Island in the Sun is horrendous.
Maladroit is a tough one. It has some very enjoyable songs (American Gigolo, Take Control, Burndt Jam, and Fall Together especially), but also many whatever and even annoying ones. Making the muppet music video was another infuriating but excellent business move - what a fun nerd! I hadn’t listened in years and recently revisited it, and I was shocked by how grating the production was, it basically ruins the album.
The rest is for the most part insufferable nonsense with some meh and some catchiness thrown in. No one else would get away with it. I was thinking about listening to all of it whenever this thread came out and seeing if my opinion has changed, maybe I’ll get to it next week.
Whenever I vote I’ve been going off of peak, but it doesn’t feel right here. So I guess it’s going to be 2/5 as a band, with 5/5 as businessmen. At this point to me they’re nothing more than a brand, it’s like looking to an insurance commercial for music.
