You know the ones I'm talking about.
They had a major label deal (or major/indie).
They released one, or two, or seven outstanding albums.
They only had one semi-hit, that brought them to the public consciousness for just for a short time.

And that one MINOR "hit" was the extent of their mainstream success, despite deserving to be a household name, in your opinion.

So who were the "shoulda beens" that ALMOST made it, but just missed?
The talented bands that HAD THE RIGHT SOUND AT THE RIGHT TIME, yet somehow ducked mainstream success?

Smoking Popes
Had a minor hit with "Need You Around", and got some airplay. Killer songs. Should have been huge in the mid- to late-90's.
Some of you probably never even heard of them.

Hum



Don't be silly.

Man, there's thousands, but two fishy ones come to mind.

Jellyfish and School of Fish.

The Jam, at least in North America. If anyone not into alternative music has ever heard of them it's through "Town Called Malice" and nothing before. A crying shame really.

Audience

Dead-on, exactly the kinds of bands I was thinking of!

Great calls, Phil.

Yeah, there's billions I WISH had made it, but realistically, these are the sort that COULD have.

Also bands like Danny Wilson and China Crisis (before they got all cheesebag boring).

And Fishbone should have ruled the planet.

Nada Surf?

I'll go with Jersey's own Dramarama. 5 great albums during a fairly weak period for good music. Great influences like the Stones, Clash, Replacements. Every album they put out had at least one wicked cover. Had their one hit when a LA station championed Anything Anything

Steve

Gawd...my record collection's littered with bands that had a song go to #27 but no further.

Couple off the top of my head - the Vapors ( everyone knows "Turning Japanese", but New Clear Days is a really, really good album ) & the Korgis ( "Everyone's Gotta Learn Sometime" got halfway thru the Top 40, but they had several other wimpy pop songs that shoulda made them the tasteful version of Air Supply ) .

the former prominent modern rock station in jersey used to play "anything anything" and "last cigarette" all the time which was my first (and pretty much only) exposure to them when i was younger. great songs, though.

Amen! Made the Nightmare on Elm Street III soundtrack. I loved that band, but damn if they didn't lose something between Wonderamaland and Vinyl.

Edit: "Box Office Bomb" made my Listmania.

Also made my Listmania. The follow-up, "Magnets" is also excellent.

This is playing on WOXY Vintage right now.

Yep...I've got the CD with both records on it. I only included "Days" cuz it had the hit, though.

I need to get Cinéma Vérité. It's such an underrated album it really shocked me how good it was when someone gave it to me on tape like 13 years ago. I never replaced it on CD. Good old Rodney Bingenheimer was the one who broke them in LA.

Here is some from my past....

The Buck Pets

The Doughboys

I Mother Earth

Certain Distant Suns

Catherine

Die Kreuzen

This is my NP for today - though, personally, I like their 80's-synthpop-meets-New Pornographers stuff a lot better...

I'll bring up Teenage Fanclub (should've been able to follow up The Concept with something) and The Sugarplastic (Bang! The Earth is Round got buried by Geffen)...

But, then again, Grunge "killed" a lot of good pop bands snatched up to be "Weezer clones" by major labels, and created a lot of one hit wonders with decent-to-amazing carreers (Superdrag, Harvey Danger, I'm lookin' in your direction)...

Big Star?

supergrass

I agree with Hum, especially You'd Prefer An Astronaut.

I still contend that Sixpence None the Richer had some brilliant material circa 1993-1997. If you heard some of their more haunting songs like "Meaningless" or "The Waiting Room," I doubt you'd recognize them as the same band that did "Kiss Me" and shitty The La's, ABBA, and Crowded House covers. And actually, their Sam Phillips, Brian Wilson, and U2 covers weren't all that bad.

I also thought The Cardigans had more to offer than "Lovefool." Well, pre-Gran Turismo anyways.

The Ocean Blue were a cool dream pop band. Just a little too twee for the mainstream listening public circa 1989-1996 and not cerebral enough for Smiths fans I guess.

Grant Lee Buffalo-Fuzzy & Mighty Joe Moon are two of my favorite albums of the 90's. Grant had a beautiful voice, which although sacrilege to some, I'd say was as good as Jeff Buckley's. They could definitely cut it live and Paul Kimble's production on their albums was spot on. Opened for both REM and the Pumpkins and definitely were critics faves but never quite got there.

Oh, Grant has put out some pretty good solo stuff.

Steve

we were THIS close to talking about radiohead on these terms.

Mott The Hoople
Evan Johns
The Bluerunners
The Creation
Andy Prieboy