Forgotten Albums of the 90s: Fantastic Planet by Failure

Retro album art yes, but rest assured it was ahead of it's time.

Halfway through 1996 Failure dropped this forgotten gem, making it their third and final album. Admittedly, at the time I was pretty indifferent to it, the lead single "Stuck On You" was good but it had such minimal airplay that it never really stuck with me (excuse the horrible pun).

While the album and the band managed to stay just shy of the commercial radar, it ended up being one of those albums I meant to pick up at the time but just never got around to it. Nearly 20 years later, after a bit of renewed 90s alt-rock nostalgia, I finally decided to give it a listen with little or no expectations and was quite surprised.

At first glance, Failure seems to be just another post grunge band. However, with the sonic textures, space rock ambiance, and unique harmonies, Fantastic Planet was far more adventurous than many comparable albums of its time. One could argue its somewhat of a concept album about drug addiction, but regardless the selling point here is more the soundscapes than the lyrical content.

Overall, its a hugely overlooked epic that serves not only as a book end to the grunge era, but blends an album like In Utero with OK Computer and delivers a hour long plus listening experience that many bands attempted to craft, but few achieved.