Thursday Band • Page 218

exactly, these days a lot of bands/artists aren't being told no or having any guidance and well we all see what comes out when that happens, and its not all bad but there are reasons certain producers got the best out of certain artists etc.

and with a city by the light divided it is criminally underrated, they must've had a decently good experience working with Dave Fridmann because they went back to him for the follow up!

 

Everyone who didn’t want to pay for music always made the argument “oh everyone can just self-record now on a laptop” but I argued then and would still argue now that we’ve probably lost out on a lot of great music as bands who could have really gotten somewhere different by collaborating with great professional producers lost that opportunity.

 

true, a lot of garage band produced music back then sounded like turd anyways. there is just to many artists now, it's hard to give a shit nowadays.

 

Island really fucked them with that album. I believe it was largely because the A&R guy who signed all these scene bands to Island left or was fired so they had no advocate at the label anymore.

 

I’m sure that’s true. I’m also sure that their fanbase being closed-minded losers and whining about it being bad was a major factor.

 

I know I got into them late, specifically in between CE and ND, but I remember seeing complaints online about the production of ACBTLD and CE and people wishing they’d go back to the sound from FC and WATT as if the production on WATT wasn’t dogwater lol

 

Not sure how anyone can listen to a song like Running from the Rain or Into the Blinding Light and think “bad sound quality”

 

From what I recall, people weren't psyched about "Counting..." as the first single and that caused a lot of people to write off the entire album.

 

It's partially that and partially people just not liking the rest of the songs either, like me

 

This is coming from someone who thinks ACBTLD is far and away their best album, but I think the timing of the release didn't help matters either (to no fault of their own). By 2006/2007, a lot of the big scene bands were starting to fade out. Unless it was super mainstream (i.e. TBS - Louder Now), it wasn't getting the same attention it was in the 2000-2004 era for whatever reason.

 

The Kill the House Lights DVD shed some interesting light on their time on Island. I haven’t watched it in a few years, but there’s a clip where some exec from Island met with the band with the intention of signing them, believing they would be the next Nirvana.

That obviously didn’t happen and it seemed like Island gave up on them after WATT wasn’t as successful as FC. By the time the band was writing and recording ACBTLD, it was pretty much over.

 

Although, credit to Island, the band sent WATT to whoever it had to go to and they told the band to go back into the studio to write some more songs because there weren’t any singles and that led to them writing Division St and Signals Over the Air

 

Commercially speaking, wasn't WATT more successful than FC? WATT debuted at No. 7 on the charts and Signals and WATT were pretty big singles for them.

 

I’d have to go back a rewatch the documentary, but I’m pretty sure the band noted that WATT hadn’t sold nearly as much as FC within the first years of their respective releases

 

I don't think that's true.

 

I could be misremembering the specifics, but I do recall that the general vibe from the band and/or label during the WATT cycle was as that they weren’t nearly as successful as they thought they were going to be

 

I was a freshman in college when WATT came out and I remember seemingly everyone on my dorm room floor was into that album. You couldn't go a day without seeing a video for WATT or Signals on MTV or MTV2. I remember it being pretty big for them.

It debuted at No. 7 on the charts selling 74K in its first week and according to Wikipedia, it had sold 259K copies in its first six months. To put that in perspective, it took Full Collapse 7 years to sell over 300K.

I don't know where the album sales stand to date for either record, but I very clearly remember WATT being very popular at the time. I can't imagine anyone at the label - major or not - thinking it was a disappointment.

 

I will fight to the death for A City by the Light being far and away their best album, and it's not even close for me. A true bummer that it isn't as celebrated as the first two albums.

 

Yeah it's kind of atonal for a single, definitely not as catchy as almost anything on WATT. Even if Island had put their best foot forward on the marketing (I really don't remember either way), I don't think a lot of bands could have followed in this album's footsteps. The blend of cacophony and atmospheric sounds feels like a one-off in the post-hardcore space.

 

It’s tied with No Dev for me

 

Yeah my b, I was confusing with all the in-fighting that was occurring within the band during the album cycle and what the label expected. I knew it sold well enough and that they were blowing up. I must have confused how the label felt with some other band. ACBTLD was definitely where the divide truly started to form between the band and the label

 

Came here to say this. They went out with their releases on such a high note with No Devo. I remember Geoff telling me about when Epitaph first heard the album and their response was "There are so many singles!" and he laughed at them because they are a band that has never tried to write a single.

Had No Devo gotten more momentum, it really could have revived their career without going away for a few years. I'm confident of that. It received so much acclaim but had no push behind it. https://www.metacritic.com/music/no-devolucion

 

More WAT live on vinyl pre-order: Thursday - War All the Time (Live)

 

I remember a lot of people feeling like Geoff's vocals weren't loud enough in the mix on City. Idk City has always been my fave Thursday album and I love their albums after that one as well. Thursday has one of the best progressions and growth as musicians throughout their catalog imo but "the scene" or whatever wanted something different from them I guess and so now we just get the millionth Full Collapse anniversary tour.

 

This pod from last week he talked about the island thing a lot and how WATT was very big. I think he said it’s sold over 500k or something like that. He also said after they turned in ACBTLD the new guy at island told them they could leave if they wanted. Again, great listen for fans of gossip