What are some of your favorite album runs?

One could argue Radiohead is 9 for 9 (let’s be real, my phone just auto-capitalized them for me). Who else has nailed it for multiple records straight and why do you think?

 

At the top of my head:

As Cities Burn - All three records

Bon Iver - All three records

Mew - Frengers, Glass Handed Kites, No More Stories (maybe my favorite run of albums)

Relient K - MMHMM, Five Score, Forget (If Air For Free came right after Forget that would’ve been unreal)

Underoath - Define, Lost in the Sound, Disambiguation

 

Reliant K really hasn’t missed in a minute. Five Score got a little too cutesy for my taste and lost a tiny amount of charm, but Forget is pretty error free and the later career ambition of Air for Free really worked a lot more than I figured it would. Not an overstuffed album somehow

 

Tigers Jaw is super consistent imo.

but Moving Mountains takes the cake for me. Damn near flawless discography.

 

when I think of consistency it is impossible not to think of Stephen Malkmus, from Pavement onward. perfect album run? nah, but incredibly consistent with periods of incredible peaks. why: I think being outside popular indie tastemaking zeitgeist (post Wowee Zowee) allows him to make music that keeps incorporating new influences while refining the things that make him unique as a songwriter. it's vast influences refracted by the familiar.


Cursive and Thursday are also the other bands where I think they have a rock solid discography. I understand the criticisms people have with some of their albums but I don't rly agree, especially in regards to Cursive. both bands are interesting bc their consistency is driven by strong ideas more than anything. each album is a strong statement of intent and the songs reflect whatever those ideas are -- in Cursive's case, as the ideas got more complex, so did the arrangements and songwriting. in Thursday's case, as Geoff stepped out of the ego convention of the time to examine more humanistic ideas, the music also got more expansive and atmospheric. then there's the underlying tension between their popularity, Geoff's desire to subvert it by becoming more aggressive and the rest of the bands desire to simply develop a broader sonic/melodic palette. tension tends to lead to something greater than the sum of it's parts among people who understand each other imo. the Beatles are like the case study for that

Hop Along. a strong songwriter joining other strong songwriters and learning to play off each other's strengths in that department while adding to the songwriting their own chemistry as a band as they continued to gel and mesh more efficiently through experience. probably the most thought out and collaborative set from the ones I mentioned.

this is fun

 

Arcade Fire- Funeral, Neon Bible

R.E.M.- Document, Green, Out Of Time, Automatic For The People

Elvis Costello- My Aim Is True, This Year's Model

I feel like going with someone like The Beatles or The Stones or Bob Dylan is too obvious

 

nah, not if it's one of your favorite runs

like it'd be fairly obvious to throw out the National (a solid four or five album run) or like. Fugazi, Sleater-Kinney, Dinosaur Jr (bands with no bad albums) but I think it's worth examining the obvious. why do these records resonate with us and continue to find new audiences?

I didn't mean to lecture Ian but I typed all that and I won't delete it

also Frank Ocean will never put out anything bad. Kanye just ended a really impressive run

 

Anberlin - Never Take Friendship Personal, Cities, New Surrender, DITWLIAP, Vital/Devotion

Underoath - They're Only Chasing Safety, Define the Great Line, Lost in the Sound of Separation

I'll second the Relient K run.

Copeland - all

Thrice - Vheissu, The Alchemy Index, Beggars, Major/Minor, TBEITBN

 

Taylor Swift - Speak Now, Red, 1989, Reputation
Beyoncé - 4, Beyoncé, Lemonade
Ellie Goulding - Lights, Halcyon, Delirium
mewithoutYou - AB Life, Catch For Us The Foxes, Brother Sister

 

I'll be that guy though!

Stones - Beggars Banquet/Let It Bleed/Sticky Fingers/Exile on Main St

Hendrix - Experienced/Axis/Electric Ladyland

U2 - War/Unforgettable Fire/Joshua Tree (but if you wanted to October or Achtung Baby I wouldn't complain)

 

father john misty has had a p incredible run with his last 4

 

lana del rey - ultraviolence, honeymoon, lust for life

charli xcx - vroom vroom ep, number 1 angel, pop 2

kendrick lamar - good kid maad city, to pimp a butterfly, damn.

jimmy eat world - bleed american, futures, chase this light

 

To me it's gotta be a 3 album run, minimum to count. Suburbs I'd include in this. Anything after...not so much.

The Menzingers: On the Impossible Past / Rented World / After the Party (RW the weakest, but still a good record)
Every Time I Die have never put out a bad record (excluding their first)
The National: Boxer / High Violet...then you can book-end with Alligator and/or Trouble Will Find Me, depending on your taste
Converge: Jane Doe / You Fail Me / No Heroes (again, you could pick every post-JD record, but I think Axe to Fall breaks the streak)
Deftones: Around The Fur / White Pony / s/t
The Wonder Years: Upsides / Suburbs / TGG
Touche Amore: PTTS / Is Survived / Stage Four
Joyce Manor: last three albums
Beach House: Teen Dream / Bloom / Depression Cherry. (Would have been 4 with "7" except Thank Your Lucky Stars is subpar"

 

The National is pretty spot on: Alligator, Boxer, High Violet, Trouble Will Find Me, Sleep Well Beast

Health as well: Health, Get Color, Max Payne 3 soundtrack, Death Magic

Relient K had a long stretch for me: Anatomy, Two Lefts, Mmhmm, Five Scores, Forget

Joy Electric legacy series is perfect: White Songbook, Tick Tock Treasury, Hello Mannequin, Ministry of Archers, Otherly Opus, My Grandfather the Cubist, Dwarf Mountain Alphabet

 

Metallica - Kill 'Em All, Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets, And Justice for All, Black Album

 

I've loved every single The Devil Wears Prada album with the exception of the Space EP. So I guess Dear Love - 8:18 would be the "run". I did love Transit Blues, though.

Let's see what else...

Every Time I Die - all albums
Underoath - all albums (yes, including Erase Me and their old death metal/deathcore albums)
Jimmy Eat World - Bleed American, Futures, Chase This Light, Invented, Damage
The 1975 - all
August Burns Red- all
Blessthefall - all
Architects - everything from Daybreaker onward
Bring Me The Horizon - Suicide Season and onward
Drop Dead, Gorgeous - all
Moving Mountains - all

 

Neil Young. Ten years.

 

Circa Survive - All of them, but especially Juturna/OLG/BSN
The National - Boxer-SWB
Hop Along - All
The Hotelier - All
JEW - Clarity - Integrity Blues
The Menzingers - OTIP - ATP
Paramore - Riot! - AL
Pianos - TLLA - Wait For Love

 

underOATH : Act of Depression, Cries of the Past, The Changing of Times
The Weakerthans : all four studio albums are flawless
Between the Buried and Me : strong bias towards the first 3 albums, but every single record is 10/10
The Cure : Three Imaginary Boys thru til (and including) Wish is 10/10 flawless
not a consecutive run, but all the Jan Garbarek records with the Hilliard Ensemble choir backing him
Tomasz Stanko New York Quartet : both 10/10 albums
The Faceless : first three
UGK : Too Hard To Swallow, Super Tight..., Ridin' Dirty
all Undying releases
all Animosity albums
the lone Morose (2010) record
all Alcest records
Hiroshi Yoshimura : Music For Nine Postcards, Pier & Loft, A*I*R, Green
Discordance Axis discography
From First To Last : both Sonny albums
Have Heart discography
AFI : Shut Your Mouth, AFI EP, Black Sails, Halloween EP, Art of Drowning, Sing the Sorrow
Anathema : The Silent Enigma and on, every flawless album. first album is good too, just prefer Vincent on vox

edit: oh yeah every George Strait record

 

Ramones, Leave Home, Rocket to Russia, Road to Ruin I could go on personally.

Black Sabbath, Paranoid, Master of Reality

 

This is pretty biased but
Say Anything - ...Is A Real Boy > ...In Defense Of The Genre is a pretty badass run.

 

Fall Out Boy - FUCT - SRAR
blink-182 - Dude Ranch - Untitled
Midtown - All
Vampire Weekend - All
Arctic Monkeys - WPSIA,TWIN - Humbug
Motion City Soundtrack - CTTM - MDL
NFG - S/T - Catalyst
P!ATD - AFYCSW — V&V
Saves The Day - Through Being Cool - In Reverie
The Front Bottoms - Talon of the hawk - Going Grey

 

Rise Against's Revolutions Per Minute-Siren Song-Sufferer and the Witness stretch is unfuckwithable

 

Thursday - like their entire catalog

Jimmy Eat world - Bleed American, Futures, Chase This Light, Invented, Damage, Integrity Blues

Taylor Swift - taylor swift, fearless, speak now, red

Beyonce - 4, beyonce, lemonade

Shakira - entire catalog up until Sale el Sol

Christina Aguilera - stripped, back to basics, bionic. Dont even @ me!

 

New Found Glory - S/T, Sticks & Stones, Catalyst
Thrice - Illusion Of Safety, Artist In The Ambulance, Vheissu
Coheed & Cambria - Second Stage Turbine Blade, In Keeping Secrets, Good Apollo

And though it's early still, The Sidekicks have released three great ones in a row (Awkward Breeds, Runners In The Nerved World, Happiness Hours).