Recently, pop legend Prince returned with not one album, but two new albums — Art Official Age and PLECTRUMELECTRUM — both of which were released Sept. 30. Though this is typical Prince eccentricity, he is far from the first artist to do this. Here are seven other artists who have released two albums in one day, including Guns N' Roses and Bruce Springsteen.
1. Plastic Ono Band (John Lennon/Yoko Ono)
In 1970, John Lennon and Yoko Ono decided to record their debut solo albums simultaneously, using nearly all the same musicians and engineers and even similar album artwork. Both albums, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band were released Dec. 11, 1970.
2. Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa was an insanely prolific artist, often releasing two or three albums in the same year. In May 1981, Zappa outdid himself by releasing not one album or two albums but three albums on the same day: Shut Up 'n Play Yer Guitar, Shut Up 'n Play Yer Guitar Some More and Return of the Son of Shut Up 'n Play Yer Guitar, all of which compiled live recordings of instrumental electric guitar music. In 1982, Zappa compiled all three albums into a triple-LP box set.
3. Guns N' Roses
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Guns N' Roses was the biggest band in the world, and to follow up their mega-selling debut Appetite for Destruction, they decided to record and release two albums at once: Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II. Even more impressive is that each album is a double album, essentially making Use Your Illusion a quadruple album if put together as a complete piece.
4. Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen's first double album The River was released as a conventional two-LP set in 1980, but for his next double album in 1992, Springsteen went a different route. Though recorded at the same time and released on the same day, Springsteen's Human Touch and Lucky Town were released as two separate albums.
5. Tom Waits
Tom Waits has written songs for a number of plays, including Frank's Wild Years, The Black Rider, Woyzeck and Alice, and has re-recorded and released these songs as studio albums. The albums for Woyzeck and Alice, in fact, were released May 7, 2002, though Waits decided to release his Woyzeck songs under the title Blood Money.
6. Bright Eyes
Though he is primarily known as an indie folk artist, Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes has also experimented with electronic music. Oberst demonstrated both sides of his musical palette in 2005 by releasing two albums, the folky I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning and the electronic Digital Ash in a Digital Urn, on the same day.
7. Boris
On two separate occasions, Japanese experimental band Boris has released two albums on the same day. In April 2006, they released the second and third parts of their The Thing Which Solomon Overlooked drone metal series, while in May 2011, they simultaneously released the albums Heavy Rocks and Attention Please.
Who are some other artists who have released two albums on the same day? Let us know down in the comments section.
