Whether or not the songs were written to fit the story or whether the songs already existed, Meat has mentioned before that the songs were tweaked to fit the storyline a bit so there was some re-writing of certain lines. I think that the concept is a good one, personally, and whether or not you can feel the story running through the CD is largely irrelevant as the songs do flow well from one song to the next and I happen to think you can sense the movement in the story as you play the CD in its entirety.
Whether other people pick up on that I neither know nor care. Quite a few concept albums don't convey their actual "message" to the masses because the concept is not the overarching thing making someone enjoy an album usually. More often than not, it's the quality of the tunes and in HCTB, the production of the music is fantastic and for me it's simply a case of whether you enjoy certain songs or not.
So again, I think its irrelevant whether the songs were picked before, tweaked after or made to fit the concept, I feel the concept is fairly loose and prevents us from being restricted to ONLY thinking of the story throughout the album. There's way too much going on in HCTB to ONLY focus on the concept and I doubt Meat's original intent was for us to think purely of the concept as the songs are played anyway. I view the concept as an addition to the music, not the one thing governing the entire album.
And to criticise album sales and suggest the album isn't successful? The album is a success on a personal level for Meat, who has never been about the money anyway. Sure, he would love the album to be a massive success and who's to say that still won't happen? I love it and prefer it to anything Meat has done since Bat 2. That makes it a success for me and that is what counts, IMO. I don't much concern myself with album sales because that has nothing really to do with me.
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