It sometimes seems to me that albums that only click about half the time make an overall more fulfilling listening experience. Maybe it's because it feels like these albums are specially tailored towards a particular mood, but I always feel extremely satisfied after finishing one of them.

Though I can think of many albums that fit the above description, the vast majority are by death metal bands that went absolutely nowhere. The only two I can name off the top of my head are Dark Angel's Darkness Descends (it's a ferocious album, for sure, but the vocals and raw production job put me off the album more often than not) and Cannibal Corpse's Butchered at Birth (which, despite being a sort of confusing, difficult-to-tolerate mass of primal death metal, I find being one of the coolest things I've ever heard whenever I'm in the mood for it).

What about you? What albums only strike your fancy once in a while, despite being perfectly good albums? And do you find that listening to these albums is more worthwhile than the average album that's fun whenever you listen to it?

A lot of albums that capture a particular mood are like that for me, especially since I like to listen to albums front-to-back. Primordial's stuff, for example, is some of my favorite music ever, but sometimes it just doesn't feel "right" if I'm tired or fatigued. Same with Ulcerate, except that's best enjoyed when one is tense and on edge.

It's sad, most of my music is like that, I cant even think of one that is constantly gratifying.
But I suppose one of the most wavering is Watershed I adore that album greatly but about two thirds of the time I can't be bothered to finish a track off of it.

Voivod's Nothingface is one of these albums. I really don't think I understand why people say it's so great, and if I just listen to it with that in mind I can't really enjoy it. Occasionally, though, I'll be in just the right mood for some offbeat thrash and it's awesome!

On a non-metal example, Lift Yr. Skinny Fists Like Antennae to Heaven by Godspeed You! Black Emperor is one of these. I think it's one of the greatest albums ever made, but it is quite lengthy and very musically sparse at some points. It is fantastic, though, during very bad days, when it is probably the best catharsis ever. By the end of it I always feel refreshed and I come out as a different person.

Most of the funeral doom I've come across. I've enjoyed it, but it's really mood music and I couldn't listen to Esoteric and follow it up with Evoken the way I could listen to Fates Warning and then Slauter Xstroyes.

Queensryche - Operation Mindcrime. I feel like I'm listening to an audiobook or a movie narration when I listen to this album. I listen to it quite rarely, but when I do, it's always from start to finish.

Darkthrone - Transilvanian Hunger. I cannot even imagine listening to this album in the summer and/or during daytime. But when it's snowing outside at 2am, this is perfect.

Mozart, Tchaikovsky & Beethoven - Greatest hits. I only listen to these guys when I'm writing papers for school.

Municipal Waste - The Art of Partying. Best listened to when getting drunk with friends. That's the whole point of this band really.

To answer the OP's question, I do think there's something fulfilling about listening the right album at the right time. Especially with Queensryche & Darkthrone, I get the sense that something has ended when I get through the album. It's similar to the feeling I get when finishing a book.
I think it does offer something more than just listening to a suffle playlist or to an album/artist you can listen to pretty much anytime (examples for me: Anthrax, Megadeth, Skeletonwitch, Amon Amarth) Not to say anything bad about these bands, since they are some of my favorites. It's just that those aforementioned albums offer a different approach to experiencing music imho.

This happens to me with nearly any album that is carried more by its atmospherics rather than less esoteric things like riffs, hooks, vocals etc. The two major examples that come to mind immediately are Teitanblood's Seven Chalices, and Negative Plane's Stained Glass Revelations. I openly profess to love both albums, but its few and far between when I actually sit down and commit the time to listen to them. They are both somewhat lengthy (although Teitanblood feels much longer than it is), extremely dense, emotionally draining, ugly pieces of musical art.

Manilla Road's Voyager is another one like this, although much less "extreme" than the other two examples. The album is just so perfectly constructed that I refuse to listen to it without hearing the entire thing front-to-back with no distractions. This can be difficult when you find yourself living with your two favorite people on earth. A lot easier to just throw on The Deluge or Open the Gates if I've got a bit of time to myself.

Edit: Oh and definitely any album by Reverend Bizarre aside from Crush the Insects. That one opens up with enough catchy and rocking songs that I don't need a special occasion to put it on. The debut and So Long Suckers, however, require a huge chunk of time to be set aside, and a very specific mood.

A lot of the later Moonsorrow albums. Especially Havitetty, love it but that album is something you don't just play on a whim. I need to make some time to listen to it.

Opeth's My Arms, Your Hearse, Still Life, Damnation and Dream Theater's Images and Words, Awake and Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes From a Memory is stuff that I can't listen to at all times, as I find it particularly difficult to digest. The same goes for Alice in Chains' selftitled (is this thing dense or what?) and Edge of Sanity's Crimson bilogy (terrific pieces of music both of 'em, but also very tiring to listen to). Oh, and Ayreon's The Human Equation also requires a certain mood from my part to recieve a spin.

Insect Warfare, have to be in that mood. Wouldn't be the first thing I'd blast straight after getting out of bed or to fall asleep to for example.

Most thrash metal, because it's just too frenetic for constant listening. I need to be in a very high energy, aggressive kind of mood for it. And a lot of Primordial/Moonsorrow/Mael Mordha-esque stuff just because of how big, epic and serious it is - just not meant for every-day, casual listening.

Definitely this. I really appreciate what a lot of these bands are doing but I hardly ever listen to any of them. Esoteric is particularly special to me, and I basically stand in awe of every one of their achievements....yet I go whole years without listening to a note of them. It's good though, because when I return, it's only at special times, and the experience will never be diminished through over-exposure. I guess I could say the same for bands like Evoken, Skepticism and Mournful Congregation, all of whom make great music....while they didn't shatter my world like Esoteric did many years ago, I would gladly recommend them to anyone who's a fan of this kind of music, but I hardly listen to such trudging and long-winded morose stuff nowadays.

Every time I listen to Om I end up listening to their entire discography, so I tend not to listen to them as much as I used to.

I guess for me, it's probably a lot of with really strange/distasteful production jobs. Take Adramelch's Irae Melanox, for instance, which is a unique and brilliantly written album... and given that it's an early power metal album it's very much "my thing" (read: it came before the boring, homogenisation of the genre). But I don't listen to it that often because the sound is so weird; cloying, knit-your-own-instrument... it's not entirely ill-fitting, but it's damn weird.

Iron Maiden - The Final Frontier.

This album feels like an epic journey to me, it's so full of emotions and atmospheres that after listening to it anything I may listen to results boring and uninspired (and of course, I don't like that) so I listen to it only when it's late at night and I want to go to bed

I listen to this one all the damn time. Totally the opposite of this thread's topic for me...funny how perceptions work like that, huh?

This happens to me with Tyr, I really like them, but I only listen occasionally, or not so often like other bands I enjoy. Don't know why, there's something weird in their sound.

Haha, it happens to me too with Tyr, their music is great but I feel 'saturated' after a while.

Napalm Death - "Scum" and "From Enslavement to Obliteration"

I am a huge, huge, huge fan of Napalm Death - and that would include these albums, though for some reason I don't get the urge to play these albums very much as I prefer to discern songs which isn't easy for albums which are comprised largely for 30-second blasts of energy and two-note riffs. I listen to "Harmony Corruption", "Utopia Banished", "Words from the Exit Wound", and "Time Waits for No Slave" much more for this reason.

I love Darkspace and generally enjoy all their albums, but I don't put them on much knowing they're a tough listen.

Reido's F:/all is another. Great drone/funeral doom but it's so thick and suffocating that one listen is enough for some time.

Ulcerate, too.

I'm the same. I've had their albums for a while and I like listening to them, but when last I put one on? Too long, and it'll be too long again the next time I decide to hear it.

Anything Burzum. I'll usually have 1 or 2 weeks per year where I think Burzum is the greatest band ever, but during the remaining weeks, I can barely stand listening to one of their albums.

I completely agreed with you on Ulcerate and Darkspace so I checked out that Reido album and damn,that is a draining listen. But it's so friggin' good. Cheers mate!

You're welcome. I actually haven't heard Reido in forever so I will have to change that. I do know that one listen will do me until about May, haha.

For me it is anything slow or very atmospheric. I get bored if I am not in the right mood or I just don't want to get into that mood listening to them.

Most doom metal, particularly funeral doom is this way for me. And for very atmospheric music, Blut Aus Nord's Ultima Thulee is unbelievable but I haven't listened to it in a long time because it just has that mood I try to avoid of being cold and isolation inducing.

This happens to me with moody stuff a bit, of course, but is actually more noticeable for me with very technical, proggy, or otherwise 'weird' albums. Ulcerate, Gorguts, any of Ron Jarzombek's projects, etc. are all unbelievably good but I can't listen to them as frequently as a lot of other stuff. In fact, I often feel that most of my truly favorite music is tough for me to listen to because I don't want to do anything else while listening to it and the aforementioned bands definitely fall into that category. It would feel almost 'irreverent.'

Also, (and related to Darkspace,) Paysage d'Hiver. Wintherr channels the spirit of winter and cold so effectively that it's impossible for me to listen to that material when it's not below freezing.

Good Thread Malignant, your mom would be proud.

I think for me it would be pretty much all the thrash scene. I used to be a huge Megadeth fan and I still enjoy them from time to time, but my thrash phase is pretty much gone. Same thing for Kreator or Sodom. I mean, I like these bands a lot, Agent Orange is one of my favorite album, but I only listen to them on occasions. The only thrash album I spin often is Show No Mercy, who well isn't really thrash...

Celtic Frost - Monotheist

It's a long, emotionally harrowing, almost painful to endure yet perfect album that I can only listen to every so often. Same goes for Triptykon.

Xasthur. Like the "A Gate..." demo, which is over an hour of music plus the 30 minute bonus disc that came with it. I refuse to remove it from my iPod even though it takes up valuable space, and it's kind of average for the most part except for a few songs, yet I still honestly can say that I enjoy it. The right mood is required though. ..

King Diamond's Abigail. I love this album, and though I don't listen to it as much as I should, when I do it's almost always complete listen, probably because I get wrapped up in the storytelling.

Bal-Sagoth's albums have a similar effect effect on me too.

thrash is something i have to listen to while in the mood, i can put it in a thrash album and listen to 3 or 4 songs any day of the week but to listen to a whole thrash album start to finish i have to be in the mood for it.

I prefer to listen to music as albums rather than songs, so I tend to have this attitude towards a lot of those 2-disc rock opera progressive concept album sort of things. If you start listening to one of these monumental "vision pieces" you tend to be in for a bit of a long haul.

Not Metal precisely but ''Eat 'Em And Smile'' by David Lee Roth
I need to be in a calm mood. I was digesting this album daily for 2 months, and though i like what I've hear from the album, it was only in certain moments when the music was awesome, catchy, funny, great etc.

On the Metal side..hmm, ''Spirit'' by Eluveitie.
Not happy like many other Folk bands, it was more serious and kinda complex (so to speak, for one so costumed to bands like Mago de Oz or Lándevir. It's a great album to listen to, and i need to focus only in the music. In the right mood at the right moment

Anything power metal. I have to be in the right mood to handle all the cheese.

Fates Warning's Awaken the Guardian, and I don't even know why. Whenever I think "Hey, I'm in the mood for some epic traditional/power!" I end up slightly bored and disinterested (Exodus aside; I cannot not love that song) but when I pull it out semi-randomly I find myself much more drawn. The murky production is probably responsible for that, and despite the songs being decidedly epic in goal, the riffs are actually more aggressive than I would usually like. But sometime it works perfectly.

As if, ain't nothing better to get pumped up in the morning to than some grind.

Marduk - Panzer Division Marduk
Funeral Mist - Maranatha
Obituary - Slowly we rot

Those are three albums from the top of my head that works this way for me. They might be here in this type of list simply beacuse I`ve listened to them way to much while playing Fallout on Xbox, and now I`m a bit tired of them.

I'm also going to say Primordial, because their music is so bleak and emotionally exhausting to listen to. Particularly the latest album, which is a great album (though not quite at the heights of the previous two) but after I listen to it I feel as if I've been run over.

I'm with you on this (but I'd swap 'Words from the exit wound' for 'Enemy of the music business')

I go for thrash or punk for that, then progress to harder stuff throughout the day.