What are songs that act like a prequel or a sequel to their more popular songs?
What are songs that act like a prequel or a sequel to their more popular songs?
For example, Pink Floyd's Another Brick in the Wall part 1 and part 2.
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Primus has the four Fisherman's Chronicles songs.
- John the Fisherman
- Fish On
- The Ol' Diamondback Sturgeon
- Last Salmon Man
Another thing that might count as an example is that Wings' Band on the Run and Helen Wheels both mention a character named Sailor Sam.
Edit: Added to post.
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It's post-Primus but Les also has Rumble of the Diesel about fishing. Dude just loves fishin
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I've got to find a digitally saved copy of the original Cheesy Primus Home Video (I lost the VHS years ago) because it included ample footage of the band on a fishing trip.
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Sandstorm by Darude has a song right before it on his album called "the calm before the storm" and I actually enjoy it quite a bit.
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Darude Sandstorm lore? Wow lol I'll keep this on my list to listen too 😂
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Tool Parabol - Parabola
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Sounds interesting, I shall listen to this 😎
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David Bowie wrote a continuation to "Space Oddity" ("Ashes to Ashes") and the original also inspired a few songs by other artists that directly reference it ("Major Tom (Coming Home)" by Peter Schilling, "Hallo Spaceboy" by Pet Shop Boys).
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major tom also shows up in the music video for blackstar
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The Pet Shop Boys version is a remix of Bowie's Hallo Spaceboy.
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They're not that popular compared to Pink Floyd or David Bowie, but there's a band called The Dear Hunter that have 5 albums called Act I through Act V that are one continuous story of a guy's life.
So in that sense every song on those albums are a sequel and prequel to every other, but some of the musical themes and motifs are more obviously reintroduced, referenced, and re-applied in new contexts as the albums go on.
They have albums that aren't those 5, which are not in the canon, by the way.
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What's your favorite color? I'm torn between green and orange.
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Honestly, I was kinda "meh" on the colours 😅
At first I thought it was maybe a "I like their earlier work" sorta thing, that can sometimes happen with bands, but when I looked up the release dates I was surprised to discover the spectrum came out between III and IV, but I like III and love IV and V, so I guess it's not that!
I guess maybe the identity of the Acts is just enough that they have something colours lack for me? I don't know what, but they've never grabbed me. Oh well, such is taste!
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GUNSHIP
The Decemberists
The Crane Wife 1 & 2
\ The Crane Wife 3The Unicorns
I Don't Wanna Die
\ Ready To DieHandsome Boy Modeling School
Look At This Face (Oh My God They're Gorgeous)
\ Modeling Sucks-
Can't say I've heard of them, but I will listen to these, thanks for your recommendation 🤘🏽
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Hold up, tech noir… 2???? Thank you so much for introducing this to my life
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I'm recording this because the survivors no longer envy the dead.
The opening of tech noir 2 goes so fricken hard and really sets the radically hopeful tone of the song so well. Wasn't expecting to see Gunship mentioned on here, but glad someone did.
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Basically all of King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard's discography.
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Rush: Cygnus X-1 books I and II. More of a two-part story, but kind of fits the question.
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Tool - Parabol / Parabola
Tool - Intermission / Jimmy (although probably among their less popular songs)
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Tool... Lost keys and Rosetta Stoned
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Will give these a listen, always down for listening to different genres 👍🏽
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Metallica has the unforgiven, unforgiven 2, and unforgiven 3
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From the band Grandaddy (across about 15 years of releases):
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Jed's Other Poem is so fucking good
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I like it when songs are connected to each other, like a big storyline kinda of thing, thank you for the recommendation 😎
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The Smashing Pumpkins- “1979” and “Perfect”.
People said “Perfect” sounded so much like “1979” that the music video was intentionally made to be a sequel to the latter.
EDIT: The Smashing Pumpkins are my favorite band. If you can find a copy of Greatest Hits Video Collection (1991–2000) (a DVD collection of music videos and other goodies; acted as a companion to Rotten Apples), I recommend it. There is extensive audio commentary on the videos. For example, Stéphane Sednaoui who directed “Today”, claimed to had never listen to the song before the first day of filming. “1979” in particular had master tapes got destroyed after someone left them on the roof of their car, so the entire video had to be re-shot. “Perfect” commentary, Corgan makes the connection to the similarities with “1979”; all but one of the original teenage actors from the first video returned. There is a short film version of “Try” that featured a different ending to “Try, Try, Try”. A few live recordings are included, among them “Fuck You (An Ode to No One)” from the final Metro show when they broke up and “Geek USA” (a special mix that utilized maximum volume on the audio system).
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To this day I still haven't heard any of their songs, this might be the day I listen to their songs 😅
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If you dive in, here's one that I love that I feel is a bit of a departure from their more typical formula with some very pleasant strings
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Radiohead's Creep, My Iron Lung, and All I Need
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Radiohead is good, now there's more to add to my list 🔥
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For me it's panic at the disco:
Part 1. Say Amen (2018)
Part 2. This is Gospel (2013)
Part3. Emperor's new clothes ( 2015)
(Specially the vids they did are conected if you wanna watch them in that order.)
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Don't they also have some disc where the song titles complement each other, forming full sentences, or something similar?
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Megadeth with Hanger 18 and later in their career Return to Hanger.
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Ozzy had "Crazy Train" and also "A.V.H." which contained the lyrics
Riding on a train that I can't control
One might say such a train was... crazy.
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All abooooooooaaard!! R.I.P. Ozzy frfr 😞
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This also reminds me of Nelly, his song E.I. the line says "I'm a sucker for cornrows" and then his song Shake Ya Tailfeather "I'm still a sucker for cornrows you know I never changed that"
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Not sure if this counts because it’s on the same album but on The Mountain Goats album Transcendental Youth starts with “Amy (AKA Spent Gladiator)” and the second to last track is “Spent Gladiator 2.”
Also, their album Jenny From Thebes is a sequel to their album All Hail West Texas.
Also also, there are a number of songs early in the discography that are about the same couple, culminating in the album Tallahassee.
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Also also, there are a number of songs early in the discography that are about the same couple, culminating in the album Tallahassee.
The Alpha Couple!
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I just recently learned that Mother Mother released "Hayloft II" in 2022, 14 years after the banger "Hayloft"
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Amazing songs and my first real intro to this
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ELP's Karn Evil 9 is a pretty epic trilogy.
The first impression part 2 is what got played most often on the radio, but personally i think part 3 is where it shines.
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Anecdotally, I've heard The Police's Synchronicity II on the radio way, way more than Synchronicity I. They're both bangers though.
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I'm not sure if this exactly fits what you're looking for, but the following 5 albums by The Dear Hunter are connected through a shared storyline [1]:
- Act I: The Lake South, The River North [2]
- Act II: The Meaning of, and All Things Regarding Ms. Leading [3]
- Act III: Life and Death [4]
- Act IV: Rebirth in Reprise [5]
- Act V: Hymns with the Devil in Confessional [6]
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Did you use some program to format references like that?
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Nope! I do it all manually; though, it can definitely be tedious at times. It has crossed my mind to write a script to automatically generate at least some of them (or even just some of their components), but I just haven't gotten around to it yet.
Also, as a side note, the citation style is my own that I've been "developing". I'm sort developing it as I use it.
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The Killers- “Mr. Brightside” and “Miss Atomic Bomb”
It may not seem obvious but “Miss Atomic Bomb” is intentionally a sequel. The music video even tells a story that is a continuation of the “Mr. Brightside” video, with Izabella Miko and Eric Roberts reprising their roles.
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Opeth - Patterns in the Ivy and Patterns in the Ivy II. The latter is so beautiful, could've easily been on BWP too imo
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I'm pretty sure that The Killers have two songs like that, with Mr. Brightside being followed by Miss Atomic Bomb.
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Mr. Brightside always a banger 💯 will give the song a listen
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360 and 365 from Brat By Charli xcx
Also, Haken's full albums Virus and Vector are prequels to the song Cockroach King from their album The Mountain.
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For that song I wouldn't have chose these two parts. I would've gone for Part 1 and Part 3. Instead of a sequel Part 2 feels like a separate installment if you get what I mean.
Plus that's kind of cheating. Is every prog song split into multiple parts considerable for this? Like also from Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here (the suite?) is split into two large sections, and the folksy Pigs on the Wing acts like a storybook introduction and ending split into two parts and put at the start and end of the album.
There's a ton more examples like that. Especially on concept albums. The Beach Boys'/Brain Wilson has Wonderful, Song for Children (Look), Child is Father of the Man, and Surf's Up exploring the same idea and building on top of one another.
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The suite on Wish You Were Here (album) is called Shine On You Crazy Diamond.
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oops
coincidentally i think the actual wish you were here song is also a folksy one but more rock
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The Blood Brothers’ “Celebrator” flows very well into the final song on the album, “Devastator”!
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Electric Six has a song called Gay Bar Part Two, the context was purely ironic but it still counts
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This might be a stretch. Mute - Walking on a Thin Line, which is the end of the album Remember Death, is the direct prequel to the song Resistance which actually starts the album. Its like it's there just to get you to listen to the whole thing again. Which you should. Its really good.
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Empty spaces > What shall we do now?
"What shall we do now?" Is basically the part 2 of "Empty Spaces" but was removed from the album as it wouldn't fit the vinyl.
The song is still present in the film, and a boxset if I recall
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Falco's Jeanny and Coming Home.
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It depends if an ouverture counts, and how popular of a song.
Bad Religion has Ouverture before Sinister Rouge. They are different tracks but they merge together.
Also, one could argue that most of the songs on the album American Idiot by Green Day, are a prequel to the next one. The songs can be separated but they are parts of a story.
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Cher then all the divas after her
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Looool that's cool man 😅
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Metallica's My Friend of Misery and Inamorata
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Not the obvious The Unforgiven 1, 2 and 3?
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Those were already mentioned, so I thought I'd post something that feels like a sequel/prequel. I don't think they're officially though. At least I haven't heard about it from Metallica guys.
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Thomas D. of the German hip hop group Die fantastischen Vier has added more and more songs to his warrior trilogy over the years.
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The Prodigy - Omen(Reprise)
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Didn't know about this, I'll give it a listen 👍🏽
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Subway to Sally have a pretty popular song called Traum vom Tod II (Dream of Death 2). Took me years to find Traum vom Tod I.
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Tim Armstrong was a guest on Bad Religion's Television, on Stranger Than Fiction. So I've always wondered if Radio by Rancid was a follow-up.
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Veruca Salt, in Volcano Girls, they reference Seether.
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Rise Against's I Was A Teenage Anarchist feels a lot like a sequel to their Baby, I'm An Anarchist.
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Destiny Potato - The Buildup. It establishes most of the motifs used in Indifferent one track later on the same album.
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Isn't My Bkyfriend's Badk a sequel to It's My Party and I'll Cry if I Want To? Or the other way around?
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The Unforgiven and The Unforgiven II by Metallica
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The first track in the album "diamond mine" which is a collaboration between Scottish singer King Creosote and producer John Hopkins. Absolutely fantastic album through and through but the first track is just ambience from a Scottish pub with the music very slowly coming in until it eventually seamlessly transitions into track 2 which is the "most famous" from the album. Just perfect.
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Judy is a Punk and Return of Jackie &Judy by the Ramones. Also Havana Affair and This Ain’t Havana by the Ramones.
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Not really super well know ones, but:
Marianas Trench - Masterpiece Theatre album has Masterpiece Theatre I, II, and III on it. My favorite album of theirs. The songs from this album actually permeate the rest of their albums after this one.
Sleeping With Sirens - If you were a movie, this would be your soundtrack. A five part musical of sorts that's really well done.
98 comments
Dream Theater has a song called Metropolis Part 1. Originally they didn't plan to have any additional parts, but it worked out that eventually they decided to follow it up. Instead of a single song, they did a whole album: Metropolis Part 2: Scenes from a Memory. And I think it's their best work.