To me the poster child for this topic is Hawkwind, and y'all neatly steered clear of that mess! 😆

Before I even hear the picks for this topic, my mind goes to one of my favorite bands of all time, Pink Floyd. You start with the Syd Barrett era and their most oddball album in Piper. Then you move on to more oddball albums with Saucerful, More, and Ummagumma. Starting with Atom Heart Mother, they start to dial in their core sound which carries them though the 70s and their best works. Obscured by Clouds is also an oddball album in being a soundtrack even though it still has the now Floyd sound. Then as the 80s approach you get Waters attempting to take over the whole band, losing Wright eventually, and changing their sound again, resulting in their most divisive album in The Final Cut, and thus begins the Waters/Gilmour divide which still persists to this day. Gilmour takes the band over (to the detriment of lyrical content perhaps) and returns to their more trademark sound, eventually bringing Wright back in fully for Division Bell (such an apt title in the context of this topic). Now years have gone by and we get what is probably their final album in the Endless River which itself is a mess, almost by design. Sporadic live albums dot their catalogue as well, with varying results. Seems perfect for this topic

On the flipside; Most 'tidy', almost systematic catalogue could be The Police. Short and concise with quality and with a natural progression from punkish pop, to almost progressive pop (in my mind anyway).

Popoff and Pardo are it again with some of the messy traits that bother them about some of the catalogues for bands. Always fascinating to listen to Martin and Pete dive into the topic of the week. The current personal messy issue of catalogues is the tendency of reissues to be in various configurations and sized boxes or packages that make it a challenge to store these items - particularly if your buying the CD versions. For examples, offer up the Jethro Tull anniversary "with book" reissues and the reissues that have to include LPs and CDs and thus require and album size storage arrangement when all that is really wanted is the CD. Storage is already often an issue and these types of matters - as much as they may be enjoyed - are not adding to the simplicity of adding the product to our collection. Enough of the personal rant. Thanks once again, gents, for taking the time to discuss your thoughts on this topic. There ya go!

The Stones come To my mind First, especially The 60s albums in its uk and US versions. Its quite tough to get a clear picture on their discography...great Show again!

Clearing up Chicago confusion because I love them since 1969 and they were my first concert. Chicago Transit Authority found out the band was using the name and threatened to sue unless they changed it so the second album was released as Chicago in 1970. There’s no 2 or II on the original lp because I just checked my Columbia lp and the record label on the vinyl says Chicago. The Live In Japan concert was never released in the USA on lp and the cd didn’t come out until 1996. Chicago’s Greatest Hits is Chicago IX. The Roman Numerals stop with Hot Streets (12) Chicago 13 is the first time they use the Arabic numbers then back to Roman numerals for XIV, Chicago’s Greatest Hits Vol. 2 is the 15th album. 16,17,18,19 stay consistent but then 20 is Greatest Hits 1982-1989 Then Twenty1 is released with a huge 1 and Twenty going vertical in the 1. Then they do something called Night & Day which is 1940’s big band Jazz standards. For their first Christmas album Chicago XXV was released in 1998. Chicago XXXVI is Now (2014) The latest studio album is Born For This Moment (2022) They are still going to this very day.

My bands with a messy catalog. *1)* Boston *2)* MSG (Michael Schenker Group / McAulley Schenker Group) *3)* Yes *4)* Blue Őyster Cult *5)* Guns 'n' Roses *6)* Greatful Dead *7)* Electric Light Orchestra *8)* Kansas *9)* Asia *10)* Deep Purple Honorable Mentions: Toto Pure Prairie League BTO (Backman Turner Overdrive) Queenswÿche Styx Lynyrd Skynyrd The Moody Blues Pink Floyd

The Grateful Dead with the "Dick`s Picks" and all the live albums and bootlegs; The different incarnations of the band with offshoots and solo albums, and the stylistic changes through the years, makes for a messy catalog.

Great episode! Cant wait for the Quadrophenia book Martin. I'll be looking out for it

I find Foreigner's catalog pretty messy in terms of lineup changes. They were a six-piece band for three albums, then for some reason it was reduced to four members while they had session players in the studio (one of whom played the sax part on "Urgent", which is an essential part of the song, but the guy wasn't an official member). Then Lou Gramm left the band, Johnny Edwards joined, recorded an album, the album flopped, Lou Gramm came back for an album, but they recorded it as a five-piece. Then there were quite a few lineup changes again and finally they recorded an album with only Mick Jones as the original member and it was recorded by a six-piece again.

Great show! Always happy to learn way more about Bands I don’t own much or anything from and you guys discussed a few! 👏

Great weather report! I especially liked Pete‘s surprising look back to last week‘s weather in the Hudson Valley.

I love The Allman Bros but I simplified my collection down to 4 live albums: Fillmore East (original version), First Set, Second Set, One Way Out.

The original "Garage Days Revisited" EP contained only "Blitzkrieg" and "Am I Evil", which were eventually added to subsequent issues of Kill Em All. So when they did the EP with Newsted, it had to be "Re-revisited".

Look forward to Friday funhouse with you guys . Makes my somewhat hard life much more bearable . Thanks guys

The Sweet spring to mind. Just think if their label had released non-messy albums, the same in both the UK and the US, and with all the best tracks from both the singles and albums on them.

Jimi Hendrix live catalogue and post death releases are all over the place. Had he lived I am sure he would exerted a much greater quality control over what got released. Likewise exactly the same thing can be said for Bob Marley with umpteem greatest hits collections some of them of very poor quality. There are those artists that the catalogue is so big it becomes difficult and messy to organise them. Frank Zappa, Neil Young, the Grateful Dead, Todd Rundren and Utopia, are just some of the examples of difficulty sorting through their sections in the record shop or online.

When I saw the title, my mind went immediately to Sabbat, Nunslaughter and the likes; ands who have tens, if not hundreds of releases. Just to take Sabbat (Jpn) for example: They have 9 studio albums, which is probably the least messy part of their discography. It's still messy in the way that most of them have multiple covers or different color of the same cover, depending on where (or when) they were released, plus Karisma was released both in English and Japanese language versions. But then there are the EPs, singles, splits, live albums and compilations...I don't know where to start! Some EPs are with new stuff, some are re-recordings of older songs, some different language versions of songs (Black Fire in particular... even has a Swahili version). Some live albums are releaaed in different parts (Shinjuku Incident part 1 and part 2), some live EPs in different formats (12", 2x7" and tape). And the split albums are usually previously unreleased live stuff, but some are found elsewhere... and then they have like 20 compilations to have all these non-album songs in the same place. Other bands with similarly super long catalogs are Nunslaughter, Abigail, Unholy Grave, Agathocles, Via Dolorosa, Senmuth (although most are full-lengths), Fucked Up, Merzbow and Buckethead, and Trhä seems to be heading into that same category as well. Just a jungle of EPs, singles, splits, comps and live albums with the occasional studio album thrown in there for good measure. That's the definition of what a messy catalog looks to me.

The Misfits, impossible to collect their material without buying the same songs twice. Also a lot of inferior re recorded versions Danzig did by himself after the band broke up. Wish the Stones sorted out the differences between their UK and US editions like The Beatles eventually did

Savage Grace came to mind. Different singers on each of their first three releases. Then the guitarist takes over on vox on the next three, and then a fifth lead singer when the reformed recently. 7 releases, 5 singers.

First band that comes to mind is the mighty Guided By Voices. Between Robert Pollard's compulsively prolific yet largely exceptional output, the number of related pseudonyms like Boston Spaceships, Ricked Wicky, Circus Devils, etc., and the obscure labels like Scat, Rockathon along with Matador and the more recent GBV records, it can be a frustrating yet rewarding task of tracking down the discography. GBV! GBV! GBV!

The first names that come to my mind are Zappa and Buckethead.

Ace Frehley has a messy catalogue. Is the first album part of the Kiss discography or Ace's? Then you have a Ace Frehley-album called Frehleys Comet, followed by an album and an EP (both live and studio) by a band called Frehley's Comet, before going back to using his name again. There's also compilations released as Ace Frehley with a lot of Comet-material and a couple of cover albums.

Talk of Chicago brings back memories. In the early 70's I got invited to a party of a female classmate. She has just had her birthday and she showed off her gifts. One was the Chicago 4 albums. I knew of some double-albums but have never seen a quadruple-album and was blown away.

Both Ronnie Montrose and Ritchie Blackmore made regular lineup changes, including lead singers. I think it was to maintain control over the band and creative direction. I think Martin mentioned in one of his books that Ritchie says he did it to keep getting in new blood into the band.

Great video, interesting to hear you talking about these things.

Messy catalogs off the top of my head 1. Steve Miller 2. Chicago and all incarnations 3. Beatles definitely Between the UK and the USA releases and all the others that came along with it 4. Rod stewart (it's not quite the band LOL) 5. Todd Rundgren I'm sure this could change if I thought more about it but this is just what came off the top of my head thinking of discography

When a band change logo or style of album cover, you know everything isn´t all right in the band. That could be a coming topic for a show.

Honestly I want to go to a band themed camp now! Start it Martin!!!

Good show guys, I waited until the end to make sure Martin was/wasn't going to pick, G'N'R. lol Glad you did though Martin, they were the first band that came to mind for me. So I'll pick, Riot instead. A band with a revolving door of members, the first 3 albums were with singer, Guy Speranza ( my 3 favorite ), then Guy left and Rhett Forester came in and did two albums, both lineups were basically good solid hard rock/early metal. Then you get Rhett leaving the band in '84, they sorta break up for a while, then they put out a speed/power metal album with, " Thundersteel " in '88, with a third singer named, Tony Moore. The next album, " The Privilege of Power " in '90, was metal fused with Martin's favorite instruments, horns. lol I actually like that album, it's not great but there is some cool stuff on it. Then in '93, they release another album with a 4th singer, Mike DiMeo called Nightbreaker, which had a cover of their early tune, " Outlaw " and a couple of covers ( Deep Purple's, " Burn " & Procol Harem's, " A Whiter Shade of Pale ". Then they did a concept/themed album about Native American history called, Brethren of the Long House in '95. They released a string of about 4 more albums between '96 & '06 with that lineup. Then in 2011 or so, Tony Moore came back as vocalist for one album, " Immortal Soul ". Mark Reale, the only original member left in the band, died in 2012, the band would hire the 5th official singer, Todd Michael Hall, who took over in 2013 and they changed the name to, Riot V. They've done two studio albums since as Riot V, one in 2014 and one in 2018 I believe. I like most of their material but the lineup changes have been a plenty and not consistent sounding style wise, so they're MESSY in that regard but like I said, I enjoy songs/albums from most eras of the band.

Great show Pete and Martin - Agree Pete with Allman Brothers with all their live albums and the many bootlegs . Here are my top choices 1. Allman Brothers 2. Frank Zappa 3.Grateful Dead 4. Crack the Sky 5. John Mayall

For me The Stooges are the perfect example for this topic: first there is a slightly different band called Iggy & The Stooges which is kind of the same band, kind of not. Then they have three very different albums in their classic period, loads of semi official live and outtakes albums, then the reunion albums of both bands etc.

This is an excellent topic. You guys rule. So does Chris Alo

I enjoyed this. I just started watching to see what you two would say and I was intrigued the whole way through. I love Martin but I tend to disagree with his music opinions almost every time! I love some punchy brass and love flute!

The Who is one of my favorite bands, and yeah guys, i always thought their catalogue was pretty messy. You know, what’s this and what’s that… chaos. And man, King Crimson… forget about it.

A couple that come to mind. The Yardbirds. Some many variations of albums out there. My Bloody Valentine- Tons of EP’s and 20 years between albums. Totally onboard with Martin on flute in rock.

Stay hydrated gentlemen! Be glad you’re not down here in New Orleans. The heat is brutal! Great topic!!! I like Jim Steinman’s solo record Bad For Good which came out in between Bat out of Hell and Deadringer. Was supposed to be a Meatloaf album but he couldn’t sing as u mentioned. And of course some of those Steinman solo songs are remade for Bat Out Of Hell 2.

Great show guys! For me number one messy catalog are the albums from Neil Young... I have one suggestion for a future show, maybe with Martin & Phil Aston. What about talking about bands with a long career and a very stable lineup or a few changes in the lineup and on the other side bands with constant changing lineups during a long career.

Excellent episode. It's not a subject I have ever considered before. Apart from a few notable exceptions I generally steer clear of Live albums (maybe mistakenly) as I always thought that they were often 'fillers' for gaps in new writing or other events stopping recording and the quality dependent on the luck of the night. Long time gaps between studio albums, line up changes and label changes definite 'flags' for messiness. Big stylistic shifts can lead to magic (Talk Talk) or messiness. Not an area you would look at but Prince's catalogue in later years became extremely messy. Metallica's later catalogue is very confused and messy as is Boston with the huge gaps and limited output. Agree King Crimson - where do you start! My advice - buy the lot. This period in prog rock had a lot of line up swapping going on for sure. Helloween spring to mind a they had a period where quite a few live LP's were churned out rather than new material as they were going through a lot of line up changes but then they seemed to get back on track release wise.

I have to be a bit detatched and say Neil Young is pretty hard for even somewhat big fans but not diehards. So you get the Bootleg Series which is old shows....but that's not the same as the Performance Series...which is old shows. Or Archives....which is old shows, sessions and Unreleased albums. Or the Special Release series which is old albums and can be part of Archives. Or the contemporary live albums that aren't on a sub-labell, except when they are. I get the promos with PR releases, own everything three times over and even I have to put myself into a trance to get it straight...

Great show. 🎉

I'm 63 years old, been to a lot of shows. Do not agree with you on the live concert opinions. Very often the live concerts sound better than the studio albums because they have played them 60 nights in a row and kind of get a feel for what the audience likes in different cities and countries. Also, what is the difference between a video concert and an audio concert? To me the only difference would be that they are aware that they are being videotaped. As long as the sound quality is great, I think it is a good and legitimate addition to the catalog. Too often so many great bands did not record entire tours, especially back in the 1970s and 80s. So much was lost. Bands like Pink Floyd were the first to admit their error in judgment. Another great show. Thanks.

The Who is very messy because their early singles were not on their albums so you have to buy various compilations to get all of the singles and b sides

Another great topic! BTW, originally Chicago 9 was their Greatest Hits

Love the way you guys tell it as it is fantastic

Meatloaf could have farted into a microphone, called it "Bat out of Hell 4," and it would have went platinum!!!

I agree with Pete re the first few Allmans studio albums vs the later ones with Warren Haynes in the band. Equally excellent after the arguably patchy but still good middle period of studio albums. As for the live albums, Fillmore of course but from the immediate post-Duane's death live albums I'd put Wipe The Windows Check The Oil, Dollar Gas in there...and during the Haynes period An Evening With The Allman Brothers Band (both albums, first and second set) and One Way Out ... there's a pile of 'retrospective' live albums like Atlanta festival, Ludlow Garage etc which are good, too, plus the more recent "instant live' CDs from concerts you can effectively wrap up with the Cream Of The Crop 3-CD live compilation of shows from the Haynes period.

Fun show. Surprised there were no honorable mentions. Expected to hear Sabbath, Purple, Sweet, Hawkwind, maybe Hendrix. Not really in the genres, but Sisters of Mercy and Joy Division might qualify too.

To Make matters Worse, How About All The Best of/Greatest Hits Comps & All Those So Called Budget labels. A Couple of Catalogs That Come To Mind Are Elvis Presley, &Frank Zappa/Mothers Of Invention. Ouch The Headaches!!! Santana ,Kiss & Jethro Tull. Boxsets Of All Sorts Don't Help. How About A Show About Producers, Engineers. & Mastering Engineers? Love That You Two Go To The Fringes Of The Box To talk Music. Keep Up The Good Work.

Great White three lead singers,seven greatest hits and three live albums,and only three of them was big Selling albums.The Original five band members will always be the best. 1)Once Bitten 1,000,000 copies 2)Twice Shy 2,000,000 copies 3)Hooked 500,000 copies

Krokus is the first that comes to mind what a mess and head scratching, i think it cost them being a bigger band.

Hearing Pete go through the Chicago discography was a real treat.

Excellent topic.

Hey Pete. You forgot 4 Boston albums that I have. 1) A best of CD called Rock and Roll Band (cheap priced) songs from the first 2 albums from CBS. 2) A Greatest Hits album (1997) with 4 new songs that CBS & MCA put out. Total of like 16 songs. 3) A 2nd Greatest Hits album that Tom Scholz remastered in 2009 (he didn't like the sound of 1997 GH album). 15 songs. 2 new songs from 1997 album omitted. One song from Corporate A n erica added while Living For You from Walk On omitted. Greatest Hits 1997 version is no longer available. Only used. 4) Very rare bootleg CD. Has the original Boston 3 album Scholz was doing before scraping it. Better than their last 3 albums. But Third Stage was better. Also has demos of the debut with original song titles. There's akso a live Boston album from Philadelphia 1976 available as a download if your interested.

Whitesnake has a messy catalogue and David Coverdale has such a control freak personality. Coverdale fired the entire band that's messy! John Sykes was the best guitarist Whitesnake had, it was because of Coverdale's insecurity and jealousy he had Sykes fired. Whitesnake hasn't made anything iconic since 1987 and some might say that's karma for how narcissistic Coverdale was during those recording sessions and his treatment towards Sykes!

As someone who got into the Allmans late, I can tell you, it's a pain in the arse, fun but still a lot of pain. I knew a bit of their stuff before but never really did a deep dive, fortunately, I had Spotify which was really helpful to get an overview but it's still messy. Concerning the quality of their work, I think you are right Pete, their post 1990 catalog is just as strong as the early stuff. And it's the same with the live material. Even the album the remaining members did as The Brothers in 2020 sounds incredible.

Asia is real messy. Weston,Lake,Wetton,Payne,,Wetton. Howe,Mayer,Thrall, Coulson,Thal.assorted players on Then and Now. many different live albums with variety of line ups.

The entire zappa catalogue. The Mothers of invention, the motherS, Frank Zappa and the Mothers, frank Zappa, Zappa, FZ. All different personnel

King Crimson was the first one I thought of for this

Deep Purple spring to mind. So many singers, so many styles, so many live albums!

Funny, each of you presented the favorite band of the other today. 🤣

Great topic!

Every band has a messy catalogue depending how you look at it. Soundgarden would have gone well with martins grunge rant. And, yes Green River and Mudhoney were early and very a huge inspiration to what became grunge.

Rainbow'- 'Finyl Vinyl" contains some amazing music, but has the most nonsensical track sequencing ever.

AC/DC - Jailbreak, High Voltage, Dirty Deeds-what’s really what on original releases? Accept- which one is Accept S/T and I’m A Rebel? Still confused on that one.Diamond Head- Is it Lightning to the Nations or The White Album, and is this really the official first album or Borrowed Time? The Sex Pistols- everything after the first album. Hendrix discography reminds me of your views on the Allman Bros. Band. The Misfits discography.. What’s really the first Motörhead album?

Cool topic , cool show.

Yet another great show, Pete I have a *Question* I was watching one of your RANT videos, and you mentioned the possibility of doing your own Rock and Roll Hall of Fame list each year, I think that's a wonderful idea, tell me have you given that any more thought? A show where everyone could suggest bands and see who makes the final cut sounds like a winner😊

The point of having the price in the title of Garage Days was to keep retailers from over charging for it, and they even included a sticker that said if the price was more than that mentioned in the title, to STEAL IT.

My Bloody Valentine, what a messy catalog. Just 3 LPs, lots of EPs, different syles, huge gap between the last 2 LPs. Awesome stuff, nonetheless

Midnight Rider was iconic in The Devil's Rejects. Hell of an intro. Pure Amurikana smoked.

The Beatles was sort of the first thing I thought of when i saw the video title. I don't personally feel the Alice in Chains catalogue is messy, or that EPs make a catalogue messy. Maybe I'm just used to them. A lot of classic metal EPs as well..Slayer Haunting the Chapel, Destruction Sentence of Death, Sepultura bestial Devastation, Queensryche EP, etc. Hudson Valley just did an episode about this. It costs money to record music and sometimes you don't ahve much. Sometimes eps are just where a band puts a lot of its experimental material, especailly early on (see Cathedral). Sometimes you just want to get stuff out there. Jar of FLies is still longer than some LPs. martin's grumbling about Chicago and their horn section makes me laugh. I'm kind of the opposite -- in my childhood days I liked horns more than guitars, and some of my earliest memories involve listening to my dad's Chicago and Miles Davis records. I wanted to grow up to play "a horn section" not realising at first that that wasn't just a single instrument playing. haha....eventually I did pick up the trumpet, so there you go. Then I started playing drums in an extreme metal band. The things puberty will do to you eh?

Magic Bus is a US only repackaging of Who songs that says ON TOUR on the cover. It is not in fact an album documenting any tour. That confused me alot.

Two picks that come immediately to mind are Legs Diamond and Doc Holliday. Legs Diamond put out three kick ass albums in the late 70’s, broke up for a few years, and started putting out albums in the mid 80’s and on that sound completely different from the early stuff, a few live albums, and sporadic studio output since then, but I think they still tour. Doc Holliday put out two awesome albums in the early ‘80’s that did decent business, but made a huge mistake when they teamed up with Reinhold Mack and put out that horrible album Modern Medicine, and they’ve been trying to recover from that blunder since.

An offshoot to this topic (meatloaf discussion prompted it) would be bands with EKG type success / sales or critical acclaim/derision. High peaks with low points in between them.

Best show on youtube

Thank god that Zappa dropped the Mothers in the early 70s, or his catalog would be nearly impossible to track. Even the various versions of the Mothers are complicated. Original, Flo and Eddie, Roxy band, etc.

When a genre becomes unpopular it is difficult to sort out the mess. For instance post 80s progressive rock is so huge a catalogue, I have not been able to get to grips with it. Everything from Marrilion to Transatlantic, King Crimson to Big Big Train! It is not that it is a mess but it is like a sprawling Monster thats waving its arms and legs at the same time. Likewise, punk, after 1980, carries on, but the scene becomes so huge and so many different styles it is near impossible to go into it without there being a mess.

There was a second "re" in the Garage Days Re-Revisited EP because the first Garage Days Revisited was the covers of Am I Evil and Blitzkreig on the Creeping Death single.

Also...bands that record under a different name: XTC as "Dukes of Stratosphear" and Zappa as "Ruben and the Jets." I'm sure there are more of these...

To me, a messy catalog is best represented by bands like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, AC/DC...where albums in different areas have different album covers and track lists.

My brain is suffering from a massive headache after hearing all of those Chicago album titles. Can't imagine how confusing it must've been for music journalists to get them right.

The logo on the first Rainbow record looks like a Scarecrow motif to me. Possibly another Wizard of Oz connection?

Yeah, it was hard to appreciate later Mudhoney when they hit perfection with Green River and the Superfuzz Bigmuff EP. Martin nailed the appeal -- in '88, a friend and I were all about them and Dinosaur Jr. Outside of metal, that was the only great heavy music happening. Soul Asylum's Hang Time was pretty good too, but not that heavy.

I would argue that The Beatles catalogue is quite straightforward now. Their original UK catalogue is the default and now everything has been uniform since 1987 especial with the addition of "Past Masters" which collects all the non-LP tracks. The US catalogue is effectively redundant except if you want to hear them in crappy reverb & duophonic. The Anthology, BBC, Yellow Submarine Songtrack, Love & Let It Be...Naked are optional extras as are the remixed anniversary releases. Red & Blue and 1 are hits compilations.

Boston for sure!

Neil Young released the messy Journey Through the Past which set the tone for the next 52+ years to use a Vonnegut phrase unstuck in time.

I like " Stranger In Us All " !

The Kinks also had a messy catalog. Also The Move.

Prince with all his stuff done under a pseudonym. Beatles/stones/who us/uk albums Hendrix albums released after he died plus is band of gypsies a Hendrix album or a band of gypsies album Do you file Alice Cooper under Alice Cooper or Cooper, Alice? Queensryche: I frequency unknown a queensryche album or not? Therapy? The first two albums are mini-albums. What’s the difference between a mini album and an ep?

Nice video...

What makes a lot of these worse is going to streaming platforms and trying to navigate through remasters and deluxe editions and endless amounts of live albums. Some bands will end up having 3 versions of the same album and then not one of them will be the original without bonus tracks or something of the sort

Then you have a few bands that essentially never changed their line-ups (except for the eventual death of one or more members) which entails an obvious consistency: ZZ Top and U2. Beyond their debut album, honorable mention to Rush. As far as Metal goes, Iron Maiden hsa been relatively solid after the first two albums.

Saxon & Yes are 2 that comes to mind

How about bands with boring or repetitive album covers that make it hard to distinguish each album from each other?

STYX for sure needs a mention. It starts out on Wooden Nickel different sound, then progresses to more melodic stuff and a major label deal, but then a band member change, enter Shaw and things change, rockier, acoustic and more harmonies for sure. Then concept albums jump in back to back and Tommy is noted as saying, "please no more concepts after this" well a live album one new song and he is gone and the band done for about 7 years. Dennis re-forms without Tommy, a new member with Burtnik, ballad is their only hit off it, bad is dropped from the label, they are gone again, NOW the label wants to cash in with a new best of but they want LADY cant get it, have to reform and add Tommy and re-do and this leads to two very big tours and a live album which goes gold in 1997 which is unheard of for an old band and LIVE too, that album also has a few new songs, then a part 2 of HITS is out more new songs. All this is leading to a new album but also a bitter break where Dennis is let go, which brings on a ton of LIVE non Dennis Albums a Dual Live album with REO, then a new studio album, then more live albums, then a re-do of their songs in two volumes is released to basically erase Dennis from the history in a way, then more live stuff, solo stuff sprinkled in, and two new studio albums that are their best in almost 30 years, a very tiring all over catalog

Ritchie Blackmore is my favorite rock guitarist but any band of his will always have a somewhat messy catalog if for no other reason than all of the lineup changes. Ritchie is brilliant but difficult. I'm also a huge fan of the Allman Brothers and Roy Buchanan I'm condemned to a lifetime of curating messy catalogs. 😂

Boston I think Metallica’s discography is super organized and clean. I think the reason for that is the lack of any ‘Best of’ records. Great pick with Rainbow.

Their are some bands plagued by like a million different compilations which might have one or two new non-live recordings, and the rest is re-issued stuff and maybe a couple live tracks thrown in. Testament and Anthrax come to mind... Maybe Megadeth too.

Can any band's catalog be any messier then Fleetwood Mac's?

King Crimson’s catalogue is so messy. So many different lineups, and the different “ProjeKct” albums. Not to mention the 300 plus live albums.