Alternative History Options

[Merica]

Say... what if, in a world far more intelligent and just that ours... TDTH was received as it deserved - tens of millions of albums flowing off the shelves. It's one of the greatest artistic achievements of mankind, and it simply didn't get the reception it deserved.

What if it was even just as big as TC, say? Maybe it contained some of the rockers instead, or maybe it was exactly the same but people just appreciated it more? I wonder how that would affect the history of Live? Maybe V and BOP etc would never have happened, and they would have continued in the TDTH vein? And never broken up?

It's one of the few things I feel sorry for Ed about. Even Chad Taylor said that TDTH was Ed at his absolute very best. He was a genius at the pinnacle of his artistic expression. And it didn't even hit number one on the fucking charts. I can imagine that was a little heart breaking.

What do you think?

[Pokey]

It sure would have been interesting. It was much better received (at least here) than SS was. SS debuted really highly on the heels of TC but I remember reading a review soon after that it was an album "from a band that just isnt trying anymore". I think it would have been more interesting if SS was the absolute take off success. Live stated many times they wrote it as a retreat from the spotlight of TC ... imagine if they in a sense backfired on them and the world dictated that thats what they wanted. Would the brightness of TDTH followed?

I know V was written in a very different way and light to what TDTH was. But even though Ed has changed styles in many ways from album to album (MC to TC to SS to TDTH) were all very different Ed's from the previous. But I struggle to recall another artist having such a dramatic leap in almost every way that Ed did from TDTH to V. He went from penning stunning stuff like RTTW and TSUFL to OK and People Like You. I know that it blows my mind that the same guy that wrote Brothers Unaware also wrote Just In Time. But look how long there was between those songs. TDTH to V was such a drastic change in such a short period.

To your question. If the record company really did have Live by the throat as much as CT has said they did and wanted them pimped out like crazy. Then if TDTH was the success you mentioned then almost contrary to whatever Live wanted to do you'd have to believe the record company would have pushed very hard for TDTH2 rather than V.

Interestingly though as I was thinking the other day. V was still wholely of Live's creation right? They weren't really hearded that way by the record company. CT did state that the record company was looking to pimp them hard, but I think regardless of what music Live were making they were going to get pushed like crazy. So it's more of a shame that there wasn't a TDTH2 because a product that Live were completely happy with unlike V, could have had a very different psychological result on the band when coupled with the pressure of the company. Instead of "yeah they pushed us hard when we were writing our worst material and tempers flared and things began getting shakey." It could have been "they pushed us hard but in the end we came out with our best ever album even topping TDTH". Could have been so different.

rambling.