4 ms·

Indeed but, honest question, was it mainstream when they created those albums? (I'm too unfamiliar with Blind Guardian's back catalogue to know.)

gpderetta 4y ago
"Nightfall in Middle-Earth" is from '98. Up to you to decide if it was mainstream by then. They do have plenty of Tolkien references in previous albums as well and generally their songs take inspirations from a lot of fantasy sources. "The bard's Song" is allegedly inspired by "the Bard's Tale" video game; that's pretty nerdy!
- bartread 4y ago
  1998 was still very thoroughly the era when sysadmins were naming servers after characters and regions in Middle Earth. It was also the last time I read LOTR and The Hobbit (obviously read both multiple times - starting in 1988). LOTR has always fallen into this odd middle place though, where lots of people had read it, or at least started reading it, but it was still considered pretty fringey. Only real spods like me got completely obsessed by it at school. Same with D&D: lots of people dabbled (including me), not many stuck. And D&D is still, I think, considered pretty nerdy, unlike perhaps LOTR. The films - and the whole media and merchandising franchise that developed around them - really wrecked it all though: they weren't bad (in fact I enjoyed them) but LOTR and, later, The Hobbit was just everywhere for far too many years. Beyond that, they basically destroyed the imagery I had in my own mind of what Middle Earth was like. I can't say I'm particularly grateful. I haven't read the books since. Partly that's because my tastes have changed and broadened, but it's also that the films somehow removed the appeal and motivation. So I'd say the mainstreaming of LOTR really occurred with Peter Jackson's films meaning that, yes, Blind Guardian score high on nerdiness for creating albums around the books before this.

gpderetta 4y ago

"Nightfall in Middle-Earth" is from '98. Up to you to decide if it was mainstream by then. They do have plenty of Tolkien references in previous albums as well and generally their songs take inspirations from a lot of fantasy sources. "The bard's Song" is allegedly inspired by "the Bard's Tale" video game; that's pretty nerdy!

bartread 4y ago
1998 was still very thoroughly the era when sysadmins were naming servers after characters and regions in Middle Earth. It was also the last time I read LOTR and The Hobbit (obviously read both multiple times - starting in 1988). LOTR has always fallen into this odd middle place though, where lots of people had read it, or at least started reading it, but it was still considered pretty fringey. Only real spods like me got completely obsessed by it at school. Same with D&D: lots of people dabbled (including me), not many stuck. And D&D is still, I think, considered pretty nerdy, unlike perhaps LOTR. The films - and the whole media and merchandising franchise that developed around them - really wrecked it all though: they weren't bad (in fact I enjoyed them) but LOTR and, later, The Hobbit was just everywhere for far too many years. Beyond that, they basically destroyed the imagery I had in my own mind of what Middle Earth was like. I can't say I'm particularly grateful. I haven't read the books since. Partly that's because my tastes have changed and broadened, but it's also that the films somehow removed the appeal and motivation. So I'd say the mainstreaming of LOTR really occurred with Peter Jackson's films meaning that, yes, Blind Guardian score high on nerdiness for creating albums around the books before this.