I’m envisioning a future project — a list of bands that produced one excellent album but nothing else that crossed my radar.
This is different from a one-hit wonder because the whole album, not just a single song, has to be great. And it can’t be a group that has a few pretty good albums and one amazing one. This one album has to be the only work of theirs you own.
I might not have more than one candidate for this list, but I definitely have one, and it’s The Smithereens.
Their 1986 album Especially For You is a pop masterpiece, all the more impressive for being their debut. I love every song on this thing, and yet it’s the only Smithereens record I’ve ever owned.
I envision scores of Smithereens fans objecting to the whole premise of my post right now, arguing that the band put out a number of stellar albums after this one. Indeed, the band has released 12 other full-length records, including two live albums and two collections of Beatles covers. Some of them are bound to be good.
But my list doesn’t require the band to release only one quality record, period. It requires that only one quality record got through to me. For whatever reason, I never sought out another Smithereens album. My loss, I’m sure.
Note: For some reason I simply count not find the lyrics to this song anywhere on the web. Plenty of sites listed the song but every one of them included the lyrics to another song under this title. Bizarre.
Meet Me In Montauk 
An intriguing premise. Would your list include artists where you have bought or heard other albums that didn’t grab you or just artists where you loved the one album and never bothered to hear anything else? If the latter, which is what I think you are suggesting, I would be curious to know why you never sought out more since you presumably love the one album and you are by nature a completist.
Meanwhile, the guitar break at the end of this song is virtually identical to the Byrds’ “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better” (probably more known to us by Tom Petty’s cover), I hope the homage was intentional.
The Byrds homage was intentional… I read a quote from the lead singer mentioning it.
I think you gave me a song from this album on one of my compilation tapes. Do you remember which one it was?
Yes.. it was ‘In a Lonely Place,’ a duet with Suzanne Vega.
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE that song!!!! Thanks you 🙂
http://officialsmithereens.com/124/in-a-lonely-place-video/ When I looked up the song on your blog, I was sad to see the video has been taken down. Figured I’d remedy that here. Also, I was tickled to learn that the song is paying homage to “The Girl from Impanema,” which made sense as soon as I read it but I’d never thought of it before. 🙂
I went back and fixed the clip on the previous post. I hate when the videos stop working. Fortunately somebody has usually posted another version.
Here are the lyrics to “I Don’t Want To Lose You”:
You turn to me with that look on your face
The kind of smile I’ll never replace
But if you can’t love me then I’ll have to go
But first there’s something that you should know.
You turn to me
And your eyes say you want to be free
What can I do
When I spend my whole life lovin’ you?
I don’t want to lose you
Now you come around and you want me again
Let’s face it girl we just can’t pretend
We can’t go back it just can’t be the same
So don’t be sad there’s no one to blame
You turn to me
and your eyes are the eyes of me
what can I do, when I spend all my life wanting you?
I don’t want to lose you
Bridge:
What did I do tell me what did I say that was wrong
Where will this pain leave my heart but take so long
I think that someday we’ll both look back on this
We’ll laugh and smile and both reminisce
About all the times together we’ve had
But girl I know that I’ll still be sad.
Still I want you
When I know it’s the wrong thing to do
Can we believe
And still have love enough left to give?