"Black sheep" albums you like

Night Prowler

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By "black sheep" albums I mean albums that are wastly different in style or quality from other albums of a band. For example: Metallica's Load, Reload, St. Anger, Lulu etc (in terms of style), Judas Priest's Nostradamus, Helloween's Pink Bubbles Go Ape and Chameleon etc.

I like
Helloween - Pink Bubbles Go Ape, Chameleon
Judas Priest - Nostradamus, Jugulator
Guns 'N' Roses - Chinese Democracy
Iced Earth - The Crucible Of Man, Framing Armageddon, The Glorious Burden
Testament - The Gathering
Megadeth - The World Needs A Hero, Cryptic Writings, Youthanasia
 
Bruce Dickinson - Skunkworks
Guns N' Roses - Chinese Democracy
Megadeth - Risk
Iron Maiden - No Prayer for the Dying
Black Sabbath - Born Again, Cross Purposes, Dehumanizer, Technical Ecstasy
Judas Priest - Nostradamus, Demolition
 
By "black sheep" albums I mean albums that are wastly different in style or quality from other albums of a band. For example: Metallica's Load, Reload, St. Anger, Lulu etc
Those aren't aberrations, that is a TREND...:cool:

I put Pink Floyd's The Final Cut into this category, as it is basically a Roger Waters solo album, and I like it (though not as much as its predecessors).

Opeth, Heritage and Damnation

Jethro Tull, Thick as a Brick

Led Zeppelin, Coda

Dio, Magica
 
I really like Final Cut. It's one of my favorites.
 
Bruce Dickinson - Skunkworks
Guns N' Roses - Chinese Democracy
Megadeth - Risk
Iron Maiden - No Prayer for the Dying
Black Sabbath - Born Again, Cross Purposes, Dehumanizer, Technical Ecstasy
Judas Priest - Nostradamus, Demolition

I've not listened to the sabbath ones too much, but the rest of these I agree with! Plus Jugulator from Priest.
 
I like Jugulator, but I prefer all the live versions on '98 Meltdown to the ones on Jug.

Also like Skunkworks, Chinese Democracy, No Prayer.

One that hasn't been mentioned, In Through The Out Door by Led Zeppelin. Not their best, but a good consistent album.
 
Black Sabbath albums with Tony Martin (the most underrated music on this forum)
Maiden's 1990s albums
Bruce Dickinson - Balls to Picasso
Bruce Dickinson - Skunkworks
Dio - Magica
Pink Floyd - More
Judas Priest - Nostradamus. I could also appreciate Jugulator when it came out (now less) and I also like quite a bit of Turbo.
Kiss - The Elder (their best studio album)
Helloween - Pink Bubbles Go Ape (I like about half of it a lot and can stand most of the rest).
 
Iron Maiden - No Rest For The Living, The X Factor (not really a black sheep here though), Virtual XI
Bruce Dickinson - Balls To Picasso
Jethro Tull - Too Old To Rock 'N' Roll: Too Young To Die!, Stormwatch
Judas Priest - Jugulator
Black Sabbath - Dehumanizer
Pink Floyd - More, Atom Heart Mother, Obscured By Clouds
King Crimson - Starless And Bible Black

Not much, maybe more will come to mind later.
 
I've discovered lately that a lot of threads are really testing my ability to comment in terms of music beyond Maiden because I am fairly new to being into music and I don't have an incredibly large budget on which to buy music (I usually buy two or three albums per month). In fact, Maiden is the only band of which I have a complete discography, or even all the studio albums (well, if you count British Lion, but that's only one album, so I wouldn't).

Regardless, I do have a few comments on this topic, and I'll share what I like about these albums as briefly as I can. I'm going to discuss these through the viewpoint of the general community of these bands' fanbase so I can actually mention some of these.

Iron Maiden - No Prayer for the Dying - Despite shorter songs and new vocal style, this album has some very brilliant musical moments that stand up easily next to the 80s such as "Run Silent Run Deep" and "Mother Russia".
Iron Maiden - The X Factor - Perhaps their best album and definitely a heavy metal classic. Bayley's vocals and the dark songwriting by Harris and Gers perfectly set the mood that permeates this album. Highlights: "Blood On the World's Hands", "Sign of the Cross", "The Unbeliever"
Iron Maiden - Virtual XI - TXF's even more maligned little brother album. While not being as good as its predecessor, VXI gets more listens from me because of its more accessible mood. Though it is not a flawless album, it is a very strong, fun and consistent album with no weak tracks (yes, I did say that). Highlights: "Futureal", "The Clansman", "When Two Worlds Collide"
Dream Theater - Train of Thought - This album's detractors are correct when they say that this is a case of Mike Portnoy pulling the band in a more modern metal direction. And they are correct to say that it is no Images and Words. But this still has to be considered one of the most brilliant albums in prog, if only for the "Stream of Consciousness" instrumental and the "In the Name of God" epic. I also love the pure aggression of "Honor Thy Father", particularly the midsection.

Not sure if these qualify, but one I feel I must mention since Metallica came up and this album is very much maligned. And the other is just another much hated album. And also because I feel self-conscious about the fact that my list is short and almost entirely Iron Maiden. So here it is:

Metallica - Metallica - "The Black Album" is, in many ways, a parallel to No Prayer. Both Maiden and Metallica had moved in very progressive direction by their standards on their previous album, and both bands felt that, at the time, they could not move further in that direction. They both decided to strip down their sound. The only true difference between No Prayer and the Black Album is that the former is the better album and that the latter was a mainstream commercial success. Highlights: "Sad But True", "The Unforgiven", "Through the Never"
Rush - Caress of Steel - This is, of course, the album that almost killed Rush. It was a commercial failure compared to Fly By Night and the success of 2112 came on the heels of a warning that Rush would be cut from the label if they produced another failure. This album very clearly fits under the heading of "Flawed Masterpiece". Side-long epic "The Fountain of Lamneth" is certainly a highlight despite probably being the least brilliant of Rush's three songs of that type. Still, in theme it is the most ambitions and it very successfully captures the various moods that it attempts to evoke throughout. Another highlight is opener "Bastille Day", which is of course majestic.
 
I don't have an incredibly large budget on which to buy music (I usually buy two or three albums per month).
On YouTube there are many complete albums (in one clip). Pretty cool to discover new music without or before buying it.
 
I only used YouTube to discover music so far. It's a giant opportunity. Also I use Wikipedia to keep up with the information, helps a ton.
 
That is true, and I have done this in the past, often to check out an artist that I'm not sure about before buying anything.

[tangent]In fact, this is how I got into music at all. One of my friends kept talking all the time about this band called Iron Maiden, and I kept mostly ignoring it until he convinced me to click just one of his YouTube links to this crazy thing called "When the Wild Wind Blows" and the rest is history.[/tangent]

However, I don't do it too often due to a somewhat odd inclination (inclination? Maybe approaching "fetish"?) I have where I truly enjoy music more if I bought it. This is probably because it makes me feel like a) I own the album and can listen to it at my leisure and b) I paid the artist and therefore they got something in return for the enjoyable experience of listening to the album that I got from them.

Edit: Oh, and I definitely use Wikipedia to obsessively learn about artists. My friend will show me a band he likes and a month later I'll know more about it than he does. I bet it really annoys him.
 
However, I don't do it too often due to a somewhat odd inclination (inclination? Maybe approaching "fetish"?) I have where I truly enjoy music more if I bought it. This is probably because it makes me feel like a) I own the album and can listen to it at my leisure and b) I paid the artist and therefore they got something in return for the enjoyable experience of listening to the album that I got from them.

Edit: Oh, and I definitely use Wikipedia to obsessively learn about artists. My friend will show me a band he likes and a month later I'll know more about it than he does. I bet it really annoys him.
I hear you. It's almost like I am reading myself. When I have the slightest hunch that I could like most albums by one particular artist, I quit "discovering" and I start buying. Not per se in a speedy tempo. E.g., over the last two years I have bought all pre-1980 Jethro Tull albums (that's a lot of material but I took my time for it; and I am planning to continue with 1980 and further). I'd like to do the same with Hawkwind. Also I love spending hours on wiki reading about artists.
 
Dream Theater - Train of Thought - This album's detractors are correct when they say that this is a case of Mike Portnoy pulling the band in a more modern metal direction. And they are correct to say that it is no Images and Words. But this still has to be considered one of the most brilliant albums in prog, if only for the "Stream of Consciousness" instrumental and the "In the Name of God" epic. I also love the pure aggression of "Honor Thy Father", particularly the midsection.

All of this. SoC is my favorite DT instrumental and Honor Thy Father's middle section really kicks ass. I think this is the only time where DT got the pure metal style completely right. After that it seemed too forced and often times, boring.
 
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I probably spend %90 of my time on the net on YouTube and Wikipedia opened up in different tabs. So much fun.
 
I hear you. It's almost like I am reading myself. When I have the slightest hunch that I could like most albums by one particular artist, I quit "discovering" and I start buying. Not per se in a speedy tempo. E.g., over the last two years I have bought all pre-1980 Jethro Tull albums (that's a lot of material but I took my time for it; and I am planning to continue with 1980 and further). I'd like to do the same with Hawkwind. Also I love spending hours on wiki reading about artists.

Your post reminds of how many various bands that I'm interested in but haven't gotten to yet. At least I won't be bored and ill keep experiencing new music for many years to come.

All of this. SoC is my favorite DT instrumental and Honor Thy Father's middle section really kicks ass. I think this is the only time where DT got the pure metal style completely right. After that it seemed too forced and often times, boring.

Two of the most amazingly kickass moments in music are "Don't cross the crooked step" and right after the last "What have I done?". The riffs on that whole album feel like "Oh, and look! John Petrucci can do this too."
 
Yea, exactly. Honor Thy Father has got to be one of the most underrated songs.
 
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