And I guess what I’m trying to get at with these opening statements is that if no one truly remembers any pop music concept albums, they will now. A “pop album video game,” to use the terminology offered by it. Or in the case of Sayonara Wild Hearts, craft an entire game. But a lot of pop music tends to rely on being simple and catchy in order to gain a mass amount of attention, thus it tends to rely on more visual mediums like videos to accompany the music whenever it wants to drive home any story even further. Artists such as Coheed and Cambria, Alice Cooper, and Mastodon have no problem weaving together complex tales as various rock acts.

It feels like the last thing close to a pop concept album that made a notable impact was Daft Punk’s Discovery, arguably due to the Interstella 5555 animated film that went with it. And even those that do produce hit singles, such as works by Duran Duran and Halsey, don’t really feel like they’re remembered as concept albums.

Rarely do we ever see concept albums for traditional pop or dance music. They’re grandiose works of music that form intriguing narratives, but they tend to be mostly associated with rock, prog, metal, etc. Simogo’s latest game, Sayonara Wild Hearts, got me thinking a bit about concept albums.

Daniel olsén sayonara wild heart