Talk:Concept album

Missed a Couple Obvious Ones
Blows Against the Empire - Jefferson Airplane If I Could Only Remember My Name - David Crosby Working Man's Dead - Grateful Dead Power - Ice T Fleetwood Mac - Fleetwood Mac Rumours - Fleetwood Mac Small Change - Tom Waits The Pros and Cons of Hitch-hiking - Roger Waters

Renominate this article for deletion
This article is a horrible mishmash of different fans of different bands writing about their favorite albums. The result is a horribly inconsistant article that is certainly not informative about the genre of concept albums. Unknown bands getting large write-ups on their unknown albums while major works of major artists are ignored is reason enough why this article should GO!98percenthuman

The Wall?
Other rock opera concept albums are mentioned but for some reason nobody has mentioned Pink Floyd's The Wall. Strange, considering it is the third highest selling album ever. Should at least be fleetingly mentioned.

NPOV?
This article seems to be filled with speculation and conjecture, often with a very biased point of view. I certainly do not feel there's neutrality while reading this article. It could also use some cleanup, as much like many concept albums, it just doesn't gel very well.

Alan Parsons Project
I am surprised there is no reference to the Alan Parsons Project here on the concept albumn page, the works of whom are aways very conceptual, each albumn exploring a chosen theme. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Alan_Parsons_Project ANC001 added a paragraph on these, IMHO the best examples of theme concept albums there are (as oposed tot he equally important narative concept albums).

added a paragraph on these, IMHO the best examples of theme concept albums there are (as oposed tot he equally important narative concept albums).

Radiohead
Radiohead's Kid A and Hail to the Thief are not ostensibly concept albums. Can anyone prove that they are? I believe that Radiohead may have intended for them to be at the outset, but abandoned the idea. I don't think they belong here. Matthew McVickar 20:08, Apr 11, 2004 (UTC)

Descriptions lacking
The descriptions for alot of these albums aren't very detailed. Ill fix some of them and nope the Wikipedians fix more. --Armus Aran Hail to the Thief is not a concept album.

spoilers
it makes sense to me to have the spoiler warning on this article. Kingturtle 07:26, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * So what do we do now? I think neither of us is interested in an edit war, but I also think giving arguments will not help, since we probably already know them... I give mine below, but I don't think it will help.


 * My argument is that a spoiler warning should indicate that reading the article might 'spoil' people's pleasance in reading a book by giving away what happens. To me this includes extensive reading, and the mentioning of major plot events. It does not include giving the basic setting of a book (thus my comment about the Odyssee - I would not expect a spoiler warning before "The Odyssee is about Odysseus, a Greek hero from Troy, who tries to get back home". A second reason is that a concept album is quite different from a book - few will listen to a concept album in a "what happens next?" state of mind. Andre Engels 09:13, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

In general I think it's kind of silly for an encyclopedia to have spoiler warnings; if someone is looking something up in an encyclopedia, he should be aware that he might get more details than he is looking for. The difference is that this encyclopedia is on the web, and seems to turn up in Google searches more and more these days. So I think it makes sense to assume the spoiler warning is more of a courtesy for people who navigate to the page accidentally.

In that light, I think the overriding argument is to leave the warning in; it doesn't really detract seriously from the article and you never know who might stumble onto the page. Although it does bring up the interesting point: a spoiler warning should probably add something to the page rather than just a message in the body...

Chinasaur 09:33, Mar 5, 2004 (UTC)

Where is Johnny Cash on this page?
Johnny Cash's Ride This Train is one of the first concept albums according to the defintion presented on this page.

This annoyed me
"In the wake of the Sgt. Pepper triumph, concept albums became the rage among serious rock artists, with mixed results. The Rolling Stones attempted to duplicate Sgt. Pepper with more explicitly drug and occult-inspired overtones with Their Satanic Majesties Request, but it proved to be a commercial and artistic failure, one that the Stones quickly learned from and moved on. The album made no attempt to fashion a concept around the disparate songs on the album. The unifying nature of the album (such as it was) came primarily from the musical atmosphere, the subject matter of the lyrics, and the psychedelic cover art; the Stones themselves never identified the album as a concept album."

Why is this album even mentioned, it was not a concept album and the paragraph is just someones opinion.

King Diamond
I'm putting in a mention of hims since all of his albums are concept albums

Little Deuce Coupe?
Been doing some research for the Album era article and happened to come across mention of the Beach Boys' Little Deuce Coupe as the first pop/rock concept album. From Chris Smith's 101 Albums that Changed Popular Music (p. xix): "The Beach Boys release the car-themed Little Deuce Coupe in October [1963], introducing rock and roll to the concept album. Though albums such as Frank Sinatra's 1955 In the Wee Small Hours and Marty Robbins' 1959 Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs had already introduced concept albums, Little Deuce Coupe was the first to comprise almost all original material rather than standard covers."

There's not even a hint of this at Little Deuce Coupe, and I've never come across it before. I'm normally quite wary of these general, wide-ranging music books when it comes to specific details – the scope is so wide, covering several decades and hundreds of artists, and there are always a few major errors as a result. But maybe this is on the level? JG66 (talk) 04:24, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

"A concept album of sorts", according to Richie Unterberger. JG66 (talk) 04:55, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Why was this edit reverted?
I recently added the following to the article, which I felt was notable and worthwhile. Could someone tell me why it was reverted? I thought that WP:PRESERVE would apply? And that the addition would pave the way for further article expansion by others?

"Concept albums also exist in other musical genres. For example, African jazz trumpeter Hugh Masekela's Colonial Man (1976) features Masekela on the album cover, standing on a ship, dressed as a European explorer. The album's lyrics express anti-colonial sentiments and challenge European narratives about the "discovery" of Africa."

--Danimations (talk) 02:40, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It was not sourced (WP:RS), and even if it was, there was nothing significant about the album in the context of this article (WP:NAMEDROP). "Concept albums also exist in other musical genres" is a redundant claim. Ilovetopaint (talk) 19:00, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

well then fix it instead of deleting it

Muse?
Should Muse be here? They’re a very popular band and have done a few concept albums DemonDays64 (talk) 00:19, 6 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Being a popular band that recorded concept albums is not notable in itself. --Ilovetopaint (talk) 16:51, 9 October 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 16:08, 18 September 2020 (UTC)
 * The Beatles magical mystery tour.jpg

The term "concept album"
I wonder if anyone knows when the term "concept album" was first used. I thought it was coined in response to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - I had never heard of it before then. Of course, I was only 13 at the time, and didn't read the serious music magazines (which in those days didn't focus on rock at all). PatConolly (talk) 07:03, 20 February 2021 (UTC)


 * I was wondering this as well, since I read Johnny Rogan state in a few of his books about the Kinks that the term didn't yet exist in 1968. I haven't found anything in dictionaries on its first use. Google Ngram Viewer indicates it first appeared in print in 1965.  Tkbrett  (✉) 23:05, 30 June 2022 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 07:00, 30 June 2021 (UTC)
 * The Beatles magical mystery tour.jpg

It is extremely frustrating to have revisions reverted with no explanation
I don't think established Wikipedia users understand how frustrating this is, when your edits just get immediately reverted with explanation. It drives away anyone that wants to productively contribute. I removed a paragraph that gave undue weight to a fringe view. It was reverted without explanation, so I removed it again. It was re-added again, saying I need to get 'consensus'. Let's remember 'Be Bold', people. It is not necessary to get consensus before removing useless information.

> In a year-ending essay on the album in 2019, Ann Powers wrote for Slate that the year found the medium in a state of flux. In her observation, many recording artists revitalized the concept album around autobiographical narratives and personal themes, such as intimacy, intersectionality, African-American life, boundaries among women, and grief associated with death. She cited such albums as Brittany Howard's Jaime, Raphael Saadiq's Jimmy Lee, Jamila Woods' Legacy! Legacy!, Rapsody's Eve, Jenny Lewis' On the Line, Julia Jacklin's Crushing, Joe Henry's The Gospel According to Water, and Nick Cave's Ghosteen.

This is just not material that needs to be in the page. To put it as politely as possible: Ann Powers is not exactly Roger Ebert. Her views just aren't that notable. This section is meant to cover a period of 40 years. About a third of it is dedicated to covering an essay in Slate, going on to talk about, frankly, a bunch of very obscure musicians. The paragraph also uses some very political concepts like "intersectionality". This just sounds like some critic filling a word quota for her weekly column by picking buzzwords out of a hat.

I'll put it this way: should there be a paragraph in the article covering every opinion piece ever written that mentions concept albums? Or should it be restricted to including notable contributions to the body of human knowledge? I think it is clear that Wikipedia's policies and general style favour the latter. You're reading an article about concept albums in a broad sense and then you get a random paragraph at the end that is just incongruous with the rest of the article. Very annoying to have to come here and debate removing it when it is so obviously unnecessary. mrout talk  10:15, 9 August 2023 (UTC)


 * WP is not your private fiefdom. Stop playing the victim. Ann Powers has an article. So at least some editors think her views are notable. Add more material from the last 40 years because as you said that other views are necessary. Concept albums are still being made today. So we need more, not less, critical analysis of modern concept albums. Also, political philosophies are a standard and commonplace part of mainstream criticism. This material is only unnecessary and/or incongruous in your opinion. It flows perfectly well with the rest of the article. There's some truth to the claims of obscurity, although I wouldn't call Nick Cave obscure by any stretch of the imagination. 5.151.106.5 (talk) 20:19, 12 August 2023 (UTC)