(Credits: Far Out / Josh Chiodo / Chris Lawton)
Fri 12 December 2025 23:00, UK
We millennials are often told that the music of years gone by was far superior than what we have now. A time when the artistry and chart success overlapped from one another, and good taste was a homogenized concept. According to that logic, somewhere along the line that went awry and what we’re left with now is chart topping trash on one side, and genuine albeit unprofitable artistry on the other.
Is that really true? Was music in the days of our forefathers so universally adored that all the classics achieved widespread success? Because if it was, why were albums like The Stooges and The Ramones’ self-titled albums, Joni Mitchell’s Song to a Seagull and Tom Waits’ Closing Time all chart flops? Somewhere amidst the heyday of music, these behemoths of culture were somehow misinterpreted by a supposed music loving audience.
Maybe after all of that, the extension of gratitude should perhaps be reversed. Because it took the great taste and respect of oncoming generations to keep these albums afloat in the sea of social consciousness, and not find themselves submerged under the swathe of commercial rejection.
This is a point displayed no better than through the lens of 1970. The year that kicked off what many would consider the greatest decade in music. A decade celebrating creative diversity and innovative ideation, resulting in some of the most important albums and important genre revolutions of all time.
Nevertheless, despite all this, one of the albums that kicked this new decade off and has since been considered one of the most influential albums of all time, failed to even threaten the top 100 in the charts and racked up a relatively meagre number in records sold.
So what classic 1970 album failed to break the top 100?
The record in question is The Velvet Underground’s Loaded. Even though the band achieved instant greatness with The Velvet Underground and Nico three years earlier, the band failed to make a commercial dent with their 1970 record, peaking at 171, with follow-up White Light/White Heat performing even worse, charting at 199.
Brian Eno, once put it best when he explained, “I was talking to Lou Reed the other day, and he said that the first Velvet Underground record sold only 30,000 copies in its first five years. Yet, that was an enormously important record for so many people. I think everyone who bought one of those 30,000 copies started a band!”
Sure, the band were figureheads of a rather avant-garde artistic movement in that period of history but Loaded wasn’t representative of that. It was arguably their most accessible work to date and celebrated a sort of cinematic atmosphere perfect for any ‘70s music fan. It was the perfect soundtrack to this optimistic new era of creativity and sonically, helped bridge tropes of the late 1960s to the more progressive worlds of the ‘70s. And while 1970 had plenty of great records to choose from, be it All Things Must Pass or Bridge Over Troubled Water, I find it hard to believe that there were 170 better than Loaded.
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