Originally Posted by Paedantic Basterd

Some other factors that result in disappointment with classics: Cultural context. Sometimes something is brilliant for what it dared to do in a particular timeframe, but that doesn't age with the album and becomes lost in time. Also, people seem to have a hard-on for artist who invented a thing, but are less impressed with artists that combined or refined a thing. For me, I don't really care that Blah Blah invented the time signature or whatever--I'm more interested in what can be done WITH that invention than the mere invention OF it. So again, a lot of classic albums or great artists are lost on me.