What's your favourite four consecutive albums by artist?

[Jack Joe Tip Toe]

Prince - Dirty Mind. Controversy. 1999. Purple Rain. All of those albums satisfy almost all of my musical tastes. Rock, Pop, Soul, Funk, and more.

I'm torn between that and the sequence: Around the World in a Day, Parade, Sign 'o' the Times and The Black Album/Lovesexy (whichever you prefer of the last two). I can't decide though, because whilst Sign 'o' the Times is definitely my favourite Prince album, Dirty Mind and 1999 and my second and third favourite respectively. This is a profound and difficult decision for one to have to make.

Sign O The Times is my favorite too and I would've done Purple Rain - Sign O The Times, but I just don't care much for Around the World in A Day. And I like The Black Album way more than Lovesexy. Besides the title track, Alphabet St, and Glam Slam I don't care much for it. I love all the songs from The Black Album.

 

[Chimichanga]

BAD RELIGION. Well TBH, my four favorites are Suffer, No Control, Stranger Than Fiction, and The Empire Strikes First - but I actually happen to like a lot of their work in between those albums, so my favorite chronological four are:

Suffer (1988)
No Control (1989)
Against The Grain (1990)
Generator (1992)

 

[Darklord008]

Since someone already mentioned Iron Maiden, I'll mention my backup pick: the Beastie Boys.

Everyone knows Licensed to Ill, it's an instant classic.

Paul's Boutique is a fantastic album, the first time they showed off their creative, experimental side. Also, ALL THE SAMPLES.

Check Your Head is, in my opinion, an under-appreciated gem, with no real standouts, but a great overall sound.

As for Ill Communication? Sabotage, Sure Shot, Sabrosa. Boom

I could continue, because the next couple are excellent as well, but the post asked for four, so I'll leave it there.

 

[San Martin]

Prince - Dirty Mind. Controversy. 1999. Purple Rain. All of those albums satisfy almost all of my musical tastes. Rock, Pop, Soul, Funk, and more.

I'm torn between that and the sequence: Around the World in a Day, Parade, Sign 'o' the Times and The Black Album/Lovesexy (whichever you prefer of the last two). I can't decide though, because whilst Sign 'o' the Times is definitely my favourite Prince album, Dirty Mind and 1999 and my second and third favourite respectively. This is a profound and difficult decision for one to have to make.

Sign O The Times is my favorite too and I would've done Purple Rain - Sign O The Times, but I just don't care much for Around the World in A Day. And I like The Black Album way more than Lovesexy. Besides the title track, Alphabet St, and Glam Slam I don't care much for it. I love all the songs from The Black Album.

That's a fair point, Around the World in a Day is probably the weakest of his 80s albums. Well, either that or Controversy. The former has a far greater sense of cohesion, whilst the latter is all over the place in terms of tone and style, even if the individual songs are of a higher quality.

I like all of Lovesexy, although I will concede that Positivity doesn't really go anywhere, and a different song might have closed the album better.

I also agree that The Black Album is the better of the two. It has a lot going for it. Le Grind, Cindy C and Rockhard in a Funky Place are three of his very best funk tracks, and I'd also argue that despite being a deliberate piss-take of the genre, Dead on It is the best rap song Prince has ever recorded. I think my only complaint is that When 2 R in Love doesn't fit with the rest of the album, and if it has to share a song with Lovesexy, Dance On would have been more fitting with the general theme.

Well, I could go into a lot more detail, but I have no idea if you actually have any interest in discussing Prince with me. Amongst my friends it's very hard to find people who like anything by Prince, let alone enough to have heard something more obscure like The Black Album, so I can't resist the opportunity to try to talk about him!

 

[Panthera]

Man, what is with the question "what is your favourite X?" prompting people to list seventeen trillion options as if favourite isn't a singular thing? I swear this is my biggest (and weirdest) irrelevant internet pet peeve.

Anyway. Immolation. Dawn of Possession, Here in After, Failures for Gods, Close to a World Below. Tough choice on including Dawn of Possession or Unholy Cult, but I think half my fondness of Unholy Cult comes from just one song on it. HiA, FfG, CtaWB are three of my favourite death metal albums of all time, and I can't think of another band that has as good a stretch of consistently good to great material.

 

[someonehairy-ish]

The only ones I can think of that no-one has mentioned yet are:

Meshuggah - Nothing, Catch ThirtyThree, Obzen, Koloss

This is the band that first figured out how to take time signatures that would make a jazz musician wet himself, and turn them into pure extreme metal brutality. And they keep getting better. Awesome.


Gojira - The Link, From Mars To Sirius, The Way Of All Flesh, L'enfant Sauvage

This would probably be my favourite consecutive four albums of all time, if only The Link was a bit stronger. Gojira have written a good portion of the most memorable extreme metal songs of all time that still deserve to be called extreme. Those last three albums are intelligent, elemental death metal.

I think my favourite consecutive four albums ever, though, would have to be Tool's four studio albums.

 

[ninjaRiv]

Red Hot Chili Peppers:
Blood Sugar Sex Magik
The album that made them. It's full of great songs that combine the funk punk they were already asociated with and the more mellow stuff.

One Hot Minute
Navvaro wasn't bad, despite what people say. He was a great fill in on guitar and this album is much darker than the others, showing they can do different stuff.

Californication
The return of John frusciante! He came back rusty but soon showed he had more creativity than ever.

By the Way
My first proper album. They had a more mellow sound here.

I'm With You
John left again but not due to drugs. Klinghoffer's a great replacement and this album shows how the band can adapt and produced varied music.

 

[Tsun Tzu]

Breaking Benjamin

Saturate (2002)
We Are Not Alone (2004)
Phobia (2006)
Dear Agony (2009)

There isn't a single song on any of the above albums that I don't absolutely adore.

 

[RedDeadFred]

The Strokes

Is This It (one of my favourite albums of all time)
Room on Fire
First Impressions of Earth
Angles
(I like their new album too -it's pretty different though)

Kanye West

Graduation
808s and Heartbreak
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (another one of my favourite albums of all time)
Watch the Throne
(I haven't gotten around to listening to his new album yet)

 

[OmniscientOstrich]

Spoiler: I'm sort of cheating by adding a couple of double albums, but here goes...

Akercocke - The Goat of Mendes, Choronzon, Words That Go Unspoken; Deeds That Go Undone and Antichrist

Amon Amarth - Versus the World, Fate of Norns, With Oden on Our Side and Twilight of the Thunder God

At the Gates - The Red in the Sky Is Ours, With Fear I Kiss the Burning Darkness, Terminal Spirit Disease and Slaughter of the Soul

Baroness - The Red Album, The Blue Record and Yellow & Green

The Beatles - Revolver, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Magical Mystery Tour and The White Album

Black Sabbath - Paranoid, Master of Reality, Vol. 4 and Sabbath Bloody Sabbath

Burzum - Burzum, Det Som Engang Var, Hvis Lyset Tar Oss and Filosofem

Darkthrone - Soulside Journey, A Blaze in the Northern Sky, Under a Funeral Moon and Transylvanian Hunger

Death - Human, Individual Thought Patterns, Symbolic and The Sound of Perseverance

Devin Townsend - Ki, Addicted, Deconstruction and Ghost

Drudkh - Estrangement, Microcosm, Handful of Stars and Eternal Turn of the Wheel. (Would have opted for the first four but I didn't really care for The Swan Road.)

Emperor - In the Nightside Eclipse, Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk, IX Equilibrium and Prometheus: The Discipline of Fire & Demise

Ihsahn - The Adversary, AngL, After and Eremita

Isis - Oceanic, Panopticon, In the Absence of Truth and Wavering Radiant

maudlin of the Well - My Fruit Psychobells...A Seed Combustible, Bath/Leaving Your Body Map and Part the Second

Opeth - Morningrise, My Arms Your Hearse, Still Life and Blackwater Park

Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon, Wish You Were Here, Animals and The Wall

Thin Lizzy - Fighting, Jailbreak, Johnny the Fox and Bad Reputation

Tool - Undertow, Aenima, Lateralus and 10,000 Days

Ulver - Perdition City, Blood Inside, Shadows of the Sun and Wars of the Roses. (Were it not for 'Themes' I would have gone with the first four, but these are all exceptional albums in their own right with just as much variety on display.)

 

[Nigh Invulnerable]

I may have missed other, but I've only seen one mention of Black Sabbath and that's a shame. Their first 5 albums are solid as freaking lead and basically formulated heavy metal as we know it. The albums are: Black Sabbath, Paranoid, Master of Reality, Volume 4, and Sabbath Bloody Sabbath.

 

[Jack Joe Tip Toe]

Prince - Dirty Mind. Controversy. 1999. Purple Rain. All of those albums satisfy almost all of my musical tastes. Rock, Pop, Soul, Funk, and more.

I'm torn between that and the sequence: Around the World in a Day, Parade, Sign 'o' the Times and The Black Album/Lovesexy (whichever you prefer of the last two). I can't decide though, because whilst Sign 'o' the Times is definitely my favourite Prince album, Dirty Mind and 1999 and my second and third favourite respectively. This is a profound and difficult decision for one to have to make.

Sign O The Times is my favorite too and I would've done Purple Rain - Sign O The Times, but I just don't care much for Around the World in A Day. And I like The Black Album way more than Lovesexy. Besides the title track, Alphabet St, and Glam Slam I don't care much for it. I love all the songs from The Black Album.

That's a fair point, Around the World in a Day is probably the weakest of his 80s albums. Well, either that or Controversy. The former has a far greater sense of cohesion, whilst the latter is all over the place in terms of tone and style, even if the individual songs are of a higher quality.

I like all of Lovesexy, although I will concede that Positivity doesn't really go anywhere, and a different song might have closed the album better.

I also agree that The Black Album is the better of the two. It has a lot going for it. Le Grind, Cindy C and Rockhard in a Funky Place are three of his very best funk tracks, and I'd also argue that despite being a deliberate piss-take of the genre, Dead on It is the best rap song Prince has ever recorded. I think my only complaint is that When 2 R in Love doesn't fit with the rest of the album, and if it has to share a song with Lovesexy, Dance On would have been more fitting with the general theme.

Well, I could go into a lot more detail, but I have no idea if you actually have any interest in discussing Prince with me. Amongst my friends it's very hard to find people who like anything by Prince, let alone enough to have heard something more obscure like The Black Album, so I can't resist the opportunity to try to talk about him!

I do love talking about him. Since I have never meet a Prince fan who actually listens to more than Purple Rain.

 

[Kenbo Slice]

Underoath: They're Only Chasing Safety, Define the Great Line, Lost in the Sound of Separation, and Ø (Disambiguation) are all fantastic albums in their own rights. Define the Great line is probably the best one, the post-rock meets metalcore aspect is amazing.

Here's some samples from each album:

Spoiler

 

[Arqus_Zed]

Can't I just list the entire Monster Magnet discography?
No?
Okay then...

Monster Magnet: Spine Of God, Superjudge, Dopes To Infinity, Powertrip

 

[GamerAddict7796]

AC/DC: Powerage (1978), Highway to Hell (1979), Back in Black (1980) and For Those About To Rock (1981).

OH YEAH!!

 

[BathorysGraveland2]

Nile: Annihilation of the Wicked, Ithyphallic, Those Whom the Gods Detest, At the Gate of Sethu.

Nile, for me, is one of those rare bands where I enjoy their later/new materiel more than the early stuff, with the possible exception of Black Seeds of Vengeance. Nile's past four albums in a row have been amazingly brilliant, and I'm looking forward to seeing them when they play in AUS in November.

Morbid Angel: Altars of Madness, Blessed Are the Sick, Covenant, Domination.

Morbid Angel's first four albums with David Vincent are all death metal classics, so much is true. But beyond the reputation, the music actually stands completely fucking firm. Often, music tends to get overrated somewhat when it has achieved "classic" status, and not these four albums. Absolutely beastly stuff with some great riffs, wildly chaotic leads and some pretty cool vocals. I consider Morbid Angel to be THE original death metal band, beating out Death.

Obituary: Cause of Death, The End Complete, World Demise, Back from the Dead.

I know, odd not to include Slowly We Rot instead of Back from the Dead, but I actually really, really enjoy the groovey kind of stuff Obituary added on The End Complete and the two albums that followed, over the raw, primitive viciousness of the debut album, though I love that too.

Runemagick: The Supreme Force of Eternity, Enter the Realm of Death, Resurrection in Blood, Requiem of the Apocalypse.

Runemagick's first four albums are just sheer death/doom goodness. Powerful as fuck guitars with a real beastly tone, and some awesome riffs and melodies throughout. Awesome stuff, with very cool cover artwork to boot.

Melechesh: Djinn, Sphynx, Emissaries, The Epigenesis.

I used to consider Melechesh the black metal version of Nile. An immature view, but one that might not be too far-stretched. Their four latest albums are just loaded with amazing riffs, and rather strong productions.

Yeah, that looks pretty good. I could add plenty of others, but many I'd pick, such as Vader, Bathory, Graveland, Deicide etc, are hampered by one slightly flawed album each in between that brings down the whole "four consecutive" album rule.

 

[HoneyVision]

Mariah Carey: Daydream, Butterfly, Rainbow, Glitter.

BUT to exclude her comeback album would be criminal, so a very close runner up would be Charmbracelet, The Emancipation of Mimi, E=MC2, Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel

As the female with the most glorious voice to ever exist, she can do no wrong in my eyes. It's psychologically impossible for me to dislike anything she does. But of course I have my favourites. Even at her worst, she's still light years more talented than the vast majority.

Although Glitter is probably her worst album, it's right in the middle of her career so it's hard to avoid it in this answer,

Best songs: Honey, Heartbreaker, We Belong Together, Fly Like a Bird, The Roof, Fantasy, Yours, Boy(I Need You).

 

[Dirge Eterna]

All eight (if you include the Burn The Priest album) of Lamb of God's albums are pretty awesome, they can bit a bit samey but each album has a different feel. Wrath may be a touch overproduced, and the earlier albums lack the real standout songs that the later ones like Sacrament and Resolution do, but they're still great. I personally think the latest, Resolution is probably the strongest all-round album. It retains the better production values of Wrath but tones it down a bit, brings back some of the intensity of the earlier albums and has a bit less filler on it. That and Randy's vocals on it sound perfect, he's improved his technique and they're really well produced so they're nigh on perfect screams.

I was going to say the same thing. Personally the BTP and New American Gospel are my least favorite albums mostly because of the sound and how it was recorded as I love the songs live but on the CD I hardly ever listen to them,

I would second Tool, Rammstein, Faith No More, Slipknot, Megadeth and Metallica.

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

I was going to say the same thing. Personally the BTP and New American Gospel are my least favorite albums mostly because of the sound and how it was recorded as I love the songs live but on the CD I hardly ever listen to them,

I would second Tool, Rammstein, Faith No More, Slipknot, Megadeth and Metallica.

I agree, although New American Gospel has O.D.H.G.A.B.F.E on it, which is one of my favourite riffs. Also, Slipknot? I didn't think All Hope Is Gone was all that great barring about three tracks.

EDIT: I forgot, the 36 Crazyfists discography is pretty solid. Probably start with Bitterness the Star then A Snow Capped Romance, Rest Inside the Flames and The Tide And Its Takers, but that misses Collisions and Castaways... It's a toss up between Bitterness the Star and Collisions and Castaways, which isn't a choice anyone should have to make. That said, BtS has Slit Wrist Theory on it which is probably their best song so it might edge it, but then it's not quite as consistent as CaC.

 

[rob_simple]

I wanted to say Dir en Grey, but they have this really weird habit of following up one amazing album with another that's almost identical to the previous but not as exciting.

Instead, I will opt for absolutely any four Half Man Half Biscuit albums in a row, as they are all a joy to listen to. For those not in the know, they are pretty much just the Arctic Monkeys but twenty years earlier, and no one gives them enough credit, presumably because they write songs with names like, 'Improv Workshop Mimeshow Gobshite,' but musically they are solid as fuck, even if the lyrics are amusing.

Anyhoo, I'll just pick my favourite track from each of the last four albums.

Spoiler: Trouble Over Bridgewater

Spoiler: Cammell Laird Social Club

Spoiler: Achtung Bono

Spoiler: CSI: Ambleside