How to follow up a massive album

By Manuel Gemperli

There’s problems rock stars (or pop stars for that matter) have that normal people will never truly understand. I don’t either, but I do love thinking about them. Here’s one question only very few people will ever have to ask themselves: How do I follow up a massive album? You know the kind of record that actually has a cultural impact. The one that shot you into the stratosphere. When “Brat” was released, Charli XCX went to pretty great lengths trying to explain what the hell “brat” meant. And it was pretty confusing. But then she decided to tweet “Kamala IS brat” and the record went from successful to cultural phenomenon. Most of us were still quite confused (or more so), but it made the record a meme, bigger than the music on it. I bet many people talked about it without ever listening to it. “Brat summer” was here and even though everything about this record, not only including, but mainly its cover and whole branding, was calculated, I don’t think even its creators could have imagined just how well everything would work out. I may not be the biggest fan of the album musically, but I must admit that I’m impressed by the fact that she managed to bring (traces of) hyperpop into actual pop and have that kind of success with it. (Personally, I think “Club Classics” is the highlight of the record even though I can’t believe they chose a title this extremely on the nose. At least there was no confusion on that end.) 

 

Brat summer is now over and here comes the difficult task of following it up. Whatever she will put out next will be initially a success, but it will be under the kind of scrutiny only follow-ups to mega records receive. So what does history tell us about how to best go about this conundrum? Well, let’s take a look at a few examples. 

 

You could go the post “Thriller” route. Michael Jackson decided to follow-up the biggest record of all time by essentially making it again, but slightly darker (or I guess I should say “badder”). Every halfway sane person would say this worked out pretty well for him. We all love “Bad”. The thing is just that most of us like it a tad less than “Thriller”. (I can’t really decide, but gun to my head, I would probably go with “Bad”). You know you fucking made it to the very top if 35 million album sales are a mild disappointment for you. 

 

The same year Bruce Springsteen had a similar task to fulfill. He had to follow up “Born in the USA” and he chose to go the opposite direction. Just to make sure everybody would immediately notice that this is NOT “Born in the USA – part 2” he essentially kicked his whole band out of process (yes, I do realize some E-Street-members played on it, but you catch my drift). He made a record about a middle-aged guy getting a divorce which ended up being – as you can imagine – not quite as jubilant as its predecessor. Album sales were obviously way lower, but that seemed to have been the point. It proved though that the Boss is smarter than most of us. Because critically (especially long term) this was definitely the correct decision even though I personally will always love the grandeur of “Born in the USA” more. But that might just prove that I’m a simple man. 

 

Guns N’Roses -  I mean Axl Rose – realized that after “Appetite for Destruction” they had so much leverage that they could do whatever the fuck they please and so Axl decided that they would just do everything all at once. And spread it out over two albums. Two albums so long that just about a half decade earlier this would have meant two double albums. I love when artists just go all in. “Use Your Illusion” may have been bloated, grandiose and at times batshit crazy, but to me both of those records are just absolutely brilliant. It showed us what Queen and Elton John together would have sounded like if they had been manically aggressive small town dudes with way too much money surrounded by the most talented street dogs in the business. In retrospect, “Appetite” will always be held in higher regard, but I’m so glad they made those “Illusion” records, because it proved that they were miles ahead of their “peers” (yes, “peers” has to be in quotes).

 

Nirvana had a special conundrum to deal with after “Nevermind”. Not only did they have to follow-up a record that kickstarted a whole new era of music, a record whose impact can’t be described in numbers, but also they had to act like they hated all of that success. So they decided to go out of their way to make a record that people would not like. The problem was just that Kurt was too good of a songwriter to fully achieve that. It’s almost like he couldn’t help but writing brilliant hooks that are by default pleasing to the ears, so he had to make sure to add a bunch of noises and shit. Obviously, the record still sold like crazy. But not as crazy long term as “Nevermind”. Mission accomplished, I guess. Nowadays, “In Utero” is one of the cool answers when asked which Nirvana record is the best. But the correct answer is still “Nevermind”.

 

So, which route is Charli going?

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