The ones what got away...

Octahedron

Yes...

Hurricane Party changed their name to Roadstar after hurricane Katrina (I think) and they cited that they didn't want to cause offence due to their band name. They released one EP (Get This) as Hurricane Party, 2 albums as Roadstar (Glass Mountain and Grand Hotel). Then they split with the producer/manager and another lineup change as Heaven's Basement. The stuff they made as HB (an EP and a few songs were on MySpace only and some of it can still be found on YouTube), with the original singer was by far their best stuff. Then the singer quit. And now they suck. There's only 1 original member left in the band (drummer). 

Philly_Q

Nice to see Warrior Soul getting a mention!

There's a third Badlands album, Dusk, released after Ray Gillen died.  I thought it would just be studio leftovers, but it's excellent.

Some bands I really liked who never got as big as they should've... not necessarily one-album wonders, in fact some made quite a few:

The Mother Station

Riverdogs

Cry Of Love

Burning Tree

Babylon AD (great first album, awful second)

Circle Of Soul

Saigon Kick

Galactic Cowboys

MD.45 (the Dave Mustaine/Lee Ving side project, one great album)

Coney Hatch

The Posies

Nuclear Valdez

Quite a few of them were from that period just before Grunge.  I liked (and still like) Grunge, but it killed off a lot of good bands as well as some utter dross.  And then we had to suffer Nu Metal.... thank god that didn't last long.

monquixote

I was always baffled My Vitriol didn't do much. 

They had a decent first album with this superb single on it:

Then they seem to have pissed about threatening to release a follow up album for the last 10+ years, but never actually doing very much.

Captain are another band I thought would be big and then did precisely nowt. 

Octahedron

guitarfishbay said:

Not guitar music but the Postal Service.  I really like their album.  Try if you like soft sounding synth pop.

For guitar stuff:

Fair To Midland - They released an IMO pretty cool album called Arrows and Anchors then pretty much as far as I can see imploded.  Try if you like a real mixture of heavy rock genres, they cover a fair bit of ground stylistically.

Opening track (probably my favourite) - 

A much heavier band, The Human Abstract are another band that released one good album called Digital Veil then pretty much disintegrated.  Really quite heavy but their stuff went from tech metal to almost muse/classical inspired prog.

Title track (tech metal) - 

Intrigued by Fair to Midland. Heard the name, not the songs! 

Also just for your personal interest it now seems apparent to me after checking it out that for a while now the intro to "Such Great Heights" (The Postal Service) has been featured in tv ads for Australian mobile network Telstra. Recognised the music right away haha! Here's one of their ads - 

PolarityMan

pulkas:

Kill II This (ok they put out 2 albums but the second one flopped hard)

lasermonkey

Massive Posies fan here! I've seen them more times than any other band. Generally, you'll have to make your way to the continent to see them play these days. The mrs and I saw them in Amsterdam, earlier in the year, with the Amazing Disgrace lineup. They were criminally ignored. Jon Auer is playing a small solo gig at the Lexington, Islington, next Friday.

Bucket

I'll play.

Ride - did a couple of albums in the 90s but never really hit big AFAIK. One of the members went on to join Oasis, but this stuff is miles better. Going Blank Again might be up there with the best 90s rock albums if you ask me. Killer guitar, bass AND drum sounds too.

Jellyfish - two early 90s albums which only produced one moderately successful hit single (below). One of my all-time favourite bands, I love pretty much everything they ever recorded. They wrote fantastic songs, I can't understand why they didn't hit big.

World Party - I've got their album Goodbye Jumbo, not all of it is great but it has a couple of absolutely brilliant, stand-out tracks on it - this being one. Karl Wallinger also wrote "She's the One", of course made famous by Robbie Williams. His original version's better.

Patto - obscure 70s prog band, with a full-on guitar ninja in Ollie Halsall, possibly one of the most under-appreciated players in history. Their stuff is quite weird and not all of it is good, but they had some gems. The solos are always brilliant.

And finally (for now, unless I come back with more later) - Badfinger.

Criminally, criminally underrated 70s power pop band, who were signed to the Beatles' record label and could have been a successful, long-lived band if their manager hadn't been a crooked piece of shit who ruined their finances to the point where two of them committed suicide. Their songs were first-class, catchy as fuck and with vocal harmonies to die for. And they had a cracking guitarist in Pete Ham. If you haven't heard them, you've been missing out on some great music. They even wrote "Without You", made famous by Harry Nilsson and then Mariah Carey.

Nunogilberto

Skin - Nev MacDonald has a hell of a voice on him...

viz

Enjoyed that fair to midland one

Octahedron

Ooh, @Bucket ...Badfinger. Interesting! I know that song, because of the Def Leppard cover on their covers album. I'm liking the Badfinger version too though.  

And that Jellyfish song did it for me too. 

Agree with @Nunogilberto too... Skin were an awesome band. 

Here's another... Freak of Nature. For whatever reasons, they remind me of Extreme's heavier stuff... think Get the Funk Out, Warheads etc and in part they remind me of Alice in Chains/Pearl Jam in places:

guitarmangler

Life, sex and death ( see what they did there)

Sort of faith no more , harmony vox crazy singer. Awesome album.

And Sikth



These are the guys that pre dated the djent craze

FelineGuitars

I loved Sven Gali ...and Freak of Nature - saw them both in Camden early 1990s

I thought Freak of Nature were much better than White Lion which is where most knew Mike Tramp from

Badlands had two official albums and a third was released too - Ray Gillen was a great singer

I really enjoyed Hurricane Party - changed their name after Hurricane Katrina , as USA would have a hard time with the name.

Original singer Richie was their strength and the mature songwriting - by their then manager Laurie mansworth who is now masterminding The Treatment in a similar was (although Laurie's son Dhanialso plays drums for The Treatment)

guitarfishbay

Sikth are gigging again right now if you weren't aware @guitarmangler

guitarmangler

Ah,awesome.Thanks. I'll have to look out that.

guitarfishbay;318350" said:

Sikth are gigging again right now if you weren't aware @guitarmangler

mike_l

Phantom Blue, an all-girl (does it matter?) band from LA in the early 90's. Broke up.

Michelle Meldrum (guitarist) married John Norsrum (?) from Europe (the band), moved to Europe (the continent) and formed Meldrum. Sadly passed away a few years ago.

Linda MacDonald, the drummer, is now drumming in The Iron Maidens (an all girl Iron Maiden tribute band - and bloody good they are too....)

mike_l

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=u9_SEr-ORyk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=wdZrkpgx_1g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=LVITBvRo8k4

 

Enjoy.........

 

 

PolarityMan

guitarmangler said:

Life, sex and death ( see what they did there)

Sort of faith no more , harmony vox crazy singer. Awesome album.

And Sikth



These are the guys that pre dated the djent craze

apparently sikth have reformed