The 17 Best CONCEPT Albums EVER!

The mighty Fab Four were the first to conquer a great many musical feats, and I believe that includes being one of the first to create a mainstream concept album. In 1967, albums were obviously a huge thing, but singles still ruled the airwaves. This meant that albums had the potential to sit apart, and not be merely vessels for singles. They could deliver something else entirely.

So it was with Sgt Pepper’s, one of the most spoken-about albums in existence. By 1966, the Beatles had stopped touring, which afforded them time to experiment with producer George Martin. It was Beatle Paul’s idea to frame the music around the idea of a fictional Edwardian military band, perhaps inspired by the Salvation Army bands who’d play at nearby Strawberry Fields, an orphanage close to his and Lennon’s childhood homes.

There are so many styles of music on Sgt Pepper’s, that it’s almost a kaleidoscope of British culture - both real and imagined - during the psychedelic late 60s. Some call it art rock, others see it as the first concept album, but in truth it’s all of these things and something else entirely.

Is this the most famous example of the concept album? A double record with stark, crisp production from Bob Ezrin and some of Pink Floyd’s greatest songs, The Wall is a rare concept album that works as a whole and when sampled piecemeal.

Overall, the narrative reflects the tortured inner-trauma of a rock star whose problems ultimately end up being his own self. It’s actually one of the Floyd’s most accessible albums in terms of songwriting and arranging, and whilst it’s a long record, it earns every minute again and again.

Peter Gabriel’s last album with prog-pioneers Genesis was a sprawling double album based around a fictional New Yorker called Rael. The story is a pretty elliptical and surreal one, which operates with a kind of dream logic and, in all honesty, isn’t the strongest part of the album. Musically though, it’s frequently astonishing, and still stands out as an unusual and ambitious record, over 50 years since it was created.

Early Marillion music perhaps flew a little too closely to Genesis, but by this, their third album, they’d not only hit their stride but created their own kaleidoscopic masterpiece. Misplaced Childhood was quite unlike anything being made by guitar bands in 1985, with its widescreen vistas, emotional heft and colourful hues. The album is a classic concept piece with multi-part song suites that are linked by musical motifs and recurring melodies. The concept itself speaks to the psychological trauma and pain of adulthood compared with the wonder and innocence of childhood. Universal themes for sure, but told with idiosyncratic grandeur.

Vocalist Fish would write one more album with Marillion before he left for a solo career, and was replaced by Steve Hogarth. Did either party ever better this album though?

It looked like career suicide when Green Day announced American Idiot: a prog-punk concept album? Who on earth would ever want that?

Millions, as it turned out. Billie Joe Armstring has also been able to connect with the voice of the suburbs, whether that’s those in the USA or anywhere else. The song lengths mattered little, because they were mini suites that flowed effortlessly. The framing device of the story about a sort of loser messiah character wasn't actually too far from what Green Day often wrote about, so the step wasn’t a difficult one to take for either band or fanbase.

And how often has a band ever been able to successfully write a ten minute punk epic? This is both proof and permission to anyone who wants to be ambitious with their writing but isn’t sure it’ll be accepted: just do it!

The Who weren’t a band who were short on ambition, either. Tommy was their first ‘rock opera’, which seems to be a maligned term these days. Maybe it’s just too hard for most people to create?

Anyway, before Quadrophenia, there was Tommy Walker, a poor abused child whose journey to becoming a messiah figure formed the spine of the album. A huge departure from their early work, Tommy also features some of The Who’s greatest deep cuts.

This is one haunted album. Preacher’s Daughter is by turns romantic, atmospheric, horrific and elegiac. Despite its fictional nature, there’s an authenticity to the emotions on display that make the album enormously affecting. Everything swims in reverb and regret, and the story - which goes further into extremes than you might expect from the music itself - is something you should check out for yourself after you’ve listened to the full album.

In the mid-90s, David Bowie was settling into a particularly purple patch in terms of his creativity. Decades on from Ziggy or the Thin White Duke, Bowie was wrapped up in painting, fashion, and embracing his ‘middle years’. For him, this manifested in a labyrinthine futuristic concept album about art-crimes, murder and a recurring theme of a minotaur. Bowie worked with producer Brian Eno and co-writer/guitarist Reeves Gabrels to create an entire pre-millennial world, which he populated with multiple characters, all voiced by him throughout the album.

It’s a massively unique and fascinating thing to behold, and if you want more, have a read of this Reeves Gabrels Interview, where he speaks candidly to me about the making of the record.

Janelle Monae brings funk, soul and a myriad of other influences to her widely ambitious Metropolis-inspired concept trilogy. This album contains parts 2 and 3 of that trilogy, and blends the dystopia with a sheen of fresh ‘otherness’ that’s not only unique but richly inspiring.

She’s also an actor and author! When does she sleep? Amazing.

Prog rock is the traditional home for concept albums. This one caused quite the splash when it arrived out of nowhere in 2003. Produced by Rick Rubin, featuring performances by members of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and created by half of At The Drive-In, The Mars Volta were a prog force of nature that nobody saw coming.

So what’s the concept? Behind the intricate, muscular performances, there was a typically psychedelic story about a character overdosing and taking a surreal journey through his own psyche, and it’s loosely based on the death of the band’s artist friend Julio Venegas. The Mars Volta have a number of concept albums in their catalogue, including one about ouija boards and another about the secret journals of band-associate Jeremy Ward. There’s a lot to dive into with this band, and I’d suggest that their thrilling debut De-Loused in the Comatorium is the best place to begin.

Lily Allen’s newest album is not ambiguous in its message. It’s been 7 years since her last release, in which time she married Stranger Things actor David Harbour. They’ve since split up and divorced, and it seems like she has used West End Girl as an album-long narrative on what went down. 

It’s not a pretty story. Whilst it’s important to separate the art from the artist - and to always allow space for creative license - it does seem that the album is one long, continual story with the tracks running sequentially from a marriage to attempts at an open relationship to affairs and the eventual split. It feels brutally honest, and something tells me that’s because it simply is a genuine report on a painful relationship. A concept album? Yes, definitely!

I’m including this as much for the mystery as anything else. Radiohead seem to change their tune about the existence of a concept behind Kid-A, and internet sleuths love attaching relevance to every note that’s played. But there seems to be something, beyond the simple facts of a rock band who got bored with their own sound and so drastically changed it. 

One popular theory is that ‘Kid-A’ is a human clone, and the album is a fairly straight narrative of that person’s life, from birth to death. It certainly works as a concept, but the band members have never come out and confirmed it, nor do I suppose they ever will. Still, perhaps part of the album’s staying power is its very ambiguity?

Here’s one album whose concept isn’t in any way ambiguous. In addition to his main gig, Porcupine Tree mastermind Steven Wilson has also created a series of successful solo albums, which all have a unique angle and sound.

2015’s Hand. Cannot. Erase. album was a concept record that based itself on a real-life tragedy of a particularly modern variety. Wilson read about Joyce Carol Vincent, a woman with a job, family and friends, living in a London flat and nevertheless dying alone and lying undiscovered for over two years. Wilson took this tragic true-life tale and wove his own narrative around it, dressing the songs in his trademark melodic melancholy.

Lou Reed has never been an artist to hold back. The ex-Velvet Underground visionary made a career out of edgy songwriting, and with Berlin, he made one of his most powerful statements.

Berlin is a concept album based around the life of a fictitious woman named Caroline. Caroline lives a tragic life of emotional and physical abuse with her partner, an addict named Jim. The album deals with their downward spiral, using the city of Berlin (at the time split into East and West sections) as a metaphor for their fractured psyches.

It's a rough listen for sure, particularly towards the end. Thematically it’s heavy, but some of the methods used by producer Bob Ezrin were also troubling: it’s real children (his own) crying at the end of ‘The Kids’, which features lyrics like ‘they’re taking her children away, because they say she is not a good mother’. 

It’s gloomy but it’s also a committed masterpiece.

My Chemical Romance are one of those bands who built their own sort of interior universe, and then created stories to fill those worlds with. Calling them ‘emo’ is a bit simplistic, giving the grandiosity and epic sweep of much of their work. The Black Parade is perhaps the best example of this, and is a bona fide concept album to boot.

The story is basically of a man in a hospital bed dying of cancer, and the album begins with his death. The story moves through the man’s afterlife, and the narrative device of the ‘Black parade’ is the form that death takes for the man. It’s poetic stuff, and also sounds like a hyperactive version of Queen, which is definitely a worthwhile road to travel down for a while!

Each Mastodon album for at least their first five releases are intricate concept albums. The first four took an element as a loose thematic coat hanger: Remission was Earth, Leviathan would be Water, Blood Mountain was Fire and this one, their fourth, was Air. 

But Crack the Skye was about far more than that. Indeed, the central concept concerns a patient in a bed (another one!) who astral travels at night and comes into contact with the spirit of Rasputin, who attempts to reconcile the boy to his physical body. Tsarist Russia is a part of the story’s fabric, as is the idea of intergalactic wormholes. Satan makes an appearance, as he tends to.

On top of that though, the title of the album refers to drummer Brann Dailor’s late sister Skye, who committed suicide when she was 14 years old. The album is a tribute to her memory: Dailor said that news of her death was like the sky cracking.

Iron Maiden are not a band to shy away from grand epics, as extended length narrative songs such as Alexander the Great and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner attest. However, when they take this approach and then drape it across a full album, that’s when the greatness really starts to begin!

Seventh Son of a Seventh Son is a pretty tightly plotted tale about a supernatural prophecy, and of the titular child being born with the lamentable gift of second-sight. This is fertile ground for Iron Maiden, who are hardly strangers to occult themes and dark storytelling. Indeed, Seventh Son is one of their very strongest albums, and the title track - complete with a super-atmospheric ritual part in the middle - the best of all.

There are loads of good concept albums out there, just awaiting your time and ears. Please use this blog as a springboard for inspiration and for finding new music: your new favourite album could be in this list! And because there are so many great concept albums, here are a few honourable mentions that I didn’t have time to write about properly:

• Undun - The Roots
• Igor - Tyler the Creator
• Operation Mindcrime - Queensryche
• Exile in Guyville - Liz Phair
• Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd
• The Downward Spiral - Nine Inch Nails
• To Pimp a Butterfly - Kendrick Lemar
• Transatlanticism - Death Cab for Cutie
• In the Wee Small Hours - Frank Sinatra