r/ToddintheShadow

She went from tomboy during the first album to being dark in the second album, and remained successful.Her third album was a complete change in image and while the album sold well and she got a #1 album and #1 song, it damaged her career in the long run.Her tour already saw a decline in sales in 2007-2008 when compared to her first two tours in 2002-03 and 2004-05. Ticket sales declined from 98% in 2004-05, to around 85% and then to around 75-80% in 2011, 65% in 2013, and by her 2019 tour, she was performing in theaters of 3000 capacity max.

Around 2011, she even started stripping more and revealing skin, which is fine, but it felt like she was trying a new image to gain back relevancy.

Its sad she is only known for mostly her first two or three albums.Her career and image has failed to evolve much after 2007.

Since 2021, she just makes money on nostalgia.

Her image change from 2002-present. Love Sux era was like TBDT from 2007.

Pictured:
Lil Pump - Harverd Dropout (will, and should)
Bow Wow - New Jack City II (should, probably won’t)
M.I.A. - M.I.7 (probably should, might actually be covered)
Vanilla Ice - Mind Blowin’ (grand slam, will 1,000% be covered)
Korn - Path of Totality (shouldn’t but likely will)

P!ATD - Viva Las Vengeance (SHOULD and probably will)
FOB - Mania (should not.. but will)
Lupe Fiasco - Lasers (probably will, and deserves it sadly)
Paula Abdul - Head Over Heels (I think this is a sleeper “absolutely will,” and it also absolutely should be covered)
Smashing Pumpkins - Adore (probably won’t but imo absolutely should be)

I was surprised to learn that English singer/songwriter Beverley Craven (famous for the 1991 European megahit ballad Promise Me) wrote one of the follow-up singles, Woman To Woman (#40 on the UK charts), about her friend Alison Goldfrapp. Craven wrote the song about how every time Goldfrapp would fall in love, she would neglect their friendship.

Any other songs you know about a person, place, thing, subject, etc. that surprised you?

Like how all the 60s and 70s artists were releasing absolute dogshit during the 80s, and how during the 90s and 2000s a lot of 80s artists weren't that great, and in the 2020s a lot of 90s and 2000s artists were done for

Are you guys excited/nervous about how terrible the 2010s artists are gonna be by the next decade?

The Strokes - First Impressions of Earth : This one probably will never be covered just based on the revival the Strokes have had this decade, but this album pretty much killed the momentum they had from the first two albums. This bizarre attempt to go mainstream pretty much lead to the nearly 15 years of the band turmoil, label disputes, and strange albums.

Hot Space - Queen : This one probably has the most likely chance of becoming a trainwreckord episode. Queen’s bizarre half assed attempt of making disco pop goes terribly wrong. After this album, Queen never reclaimed the fame they had before. Yes, Live Aid helped boost their career, but they never again had the same success they had before this (At least when Freddie was alive).

Give My Regards To Broadstreet - Paul McCartney : This one will just be funny. Paul was experiencing a mild career comeback after the dissolution of Wings, with his collaborations with Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson, but this album/movie where he butchers a ton of classic Beatles/Wings is unexplainable.

Head - The Monkees : After getting their show cancelled by NBC, The Monkees make a weird drug induced movie which turned off their entire fanbase. I actually love this album, as it has so many good songs, but it 100% ruined their career

Human After All - Daft Punk : This one will never get covered just based on the heights Daft Punk achieved with RAM, but this is one of the most confusing albums I’ve ever heard

2300 Jackson Street - The Jacksons : Years after Michael left, The Jacksons make a strange attempt at a career renaissance. It’s not bad, but it explains why they never recorded any again and stuck to being a legacy act

I was listening to Rolling in the Deep, but instead of enjoying the song, brainrot seeped into my brain and couldnt stop thinking "what do you know about rolling down in the deep". So i just randomly remembered this song and wanted to yap about the song and masked wolf for a bit.

This song turly feels like it is a perfect example of an one hit wonder: Incredibly sticky hook, but has nothing else to show for it. The weird religious lyrics, the unimpressive flow, just the stupidity of the whole concept, it sounds so generic but it such a novelty song that became one of the... songs, of 2021.

Masked Wolf is an interesting entity of itself. Being an aussie and a white rapper with a corny song, the backlash against him was inevitable, but he never got the amount that Dance Monkey or Jack Harlow ever got. This put him in a weird spot that his music wasn't good enough to be followed but he wasn't bad enough to hatelisten, so he fell into obscurity.

So what happened to Masked Wolf? Well, according to himself he split from his major label at the end of 2022 and then... he just made music. Probably most notable work after is a colab he made for an indian album which he feels very out of place on, a colab with Sidemen member Vikkstar which... jesus christ why does Masked Wolf sound like that???? But my favorite song of his that I have come across is a song called Spiderman In Space. I guess in the Masked Wolf cinematic universe, astronauts are in the ocean and superheroes are in space. Nowadays, very predictably, he loves to use AI. I don't know if he uses AI for his music currently, but he sure loves using it on his social media and for his song covers.

Ian Cohen defined it as " Critics like myself had to get more creative in 2012, whereas nowadays, I can just say "dudes rock" and be done with it -- "dudes" as either an adjective and a noun, "rock" as either a verb or a noun. It's a non-toxic masculinity, where a constant chorus of whoas, yeahs, high-fives, and bear hugs aren't deflections from sharing deeply held emotions to friends and partners but expressions of them in their purest form -- something closer to a purifying primal scream than the oversharing and self-deprecation and buzzwords that have arisen alongside the mainstreaming of therapeutic language."

If the classic examples are Japandroids, Menzingers, Titus Andronicus, etc, who else is in the category, and who's making it now?

Also, what are your thoughts on these of bands?

I listened to Confessions II before all the reviews started coming in and had already decided it was the best thing she had done in ages. I can't think of a single pop artist who has achieved a creative renaissance at this age with the exception of Bowie. In terms of the big three, Michael Jackson and Prince both stopped putting out acclaimed work in the 90s but Madonna's artistry peaked in the 90s and since 2000 she's released three acclaimed albums with Music, Confessions On a Dancefloor and Confessions II. Her career is clearly the most legendary in the history of mainstream pop but she won't get full credit for it until she's no longer here.

https://i.imgur.com/JkwRl3J.jpeg

TikTok, love it or hate it (or be completely indifferent to it), the power it has to bring new life into bands and artists that would've otherwise just stayed in their own niche, or woulda remained obscure, is kinda insane. So throw a band up at the wind you feel TikTok kids would've eaten up if they ever discovered them today.

Honestly I think the kids should discover acts like Spiderbait, The Blood Brothers, Eyedea & Abilities and Sleigh Bells lmao

Whether is critical or complementary, satirical or earnestly patriotic of it.

Esthero's 1995 album Breath From Another is my favorite trip hop album. It's absolutely oozing with this cool, futuristic sound. Every track was produced by "Doc" McKinney with her contributing on much of the produciton. It was also a solid underground hit and sold over 100,000 copies.

But her followup album Wikked Lil' Grrrls was not only released eight years after, but was far less successful. Critically reviews were mixed to bad, and in terms of popularity it received just a fraction of her first albums sales/streams. The dropoff on music review websites is also pretty big, going from a 3.84 on her first album to a mere 3.17. She also had to switch labels after her first went defunct.

Why was it so much worse? The major difference is that Doc didn't return to produce for most of the album outside of only four tracks. The rest of the album, instead of being produced by a two person vision, features a wide variety of different producers, 11 in total. Instead of a triphop/R&B album like the first one was, it also covers a far wider variety of sounds and it generally more pop in nature with other strange and ill fitting genre's thrown in. I have no way of proving this, but I also think the first track may have turned people off as she complains that MTV plays too much Ashanti and Britney Spears (though she also does diss R Kelly in 2005 which I appreciate).

Generally, the aesthetics of the album are just awful too. She went from this cool futuristic vibe to misspelling "wicked" and having three r's in the title. Some of the song titles are just cringy too, like "We R in Need of a Musical ReVoLuTIoN" or "Bad Boy Clyde". She overuses voicemails from her friends on the album too, it doesn't really add much. There was also an issue with the Andre 3000 feature they originally planned. When her label wanted to release the song Junglebook with Andre as the feature for the lead single, she told Andre to ask for more money so they would pick another one. This ultimately led to the feature getting cut.

There are some pretty great tracks like Gone and Torture. But as a whole the album is supremely disappointing.

Followups

Unfortunately Esthero's story doesn't end well. It took her another five years to come up with her next album, Everything is Expensive, which completely abandoned her sound for a more folk approach. It wasn't successful but I do think it was better than her second album, and has a cool song called Black Mermaid. After that comes nothing but occasional singles and a demo album. Unfortunately she has also mentioned money issues on Facebook as well.