Artists you disliked but now love...

I grew up hating the Beach Boys, but being a grown up means
assessing things strictly by musical criterion...and "Pet Sounds"
is a milestone album, that even spurred the Beatles on to doing
"Sgt. Pepper's". There’s no songs about surfing on the album,
and in fact, Brian Wilson didn’t even know how to. But there’s
something very touching about the picture of this 24 year old
self-taught kid, who stops touring after several nervous
breakdowns, and inspired by „Rubber Soul“, decides he has to
create an American pop music of that depth and quality, with
top session musicians and his own peculiar arrangements
(who else in the U.S. thought of using a Theremine, or a big
plastic bottle, or baritone harmonica and harmonium?). "God
Only Knows" and "I Just Wasn't Made for these Times", these
are my favorites, but the whole album is on the same level, and
you’d have to look long and hard to find music of more sincerity
or of less cynicism. To say nothing of the totally interesting
melodies, progressions and vocal harmonies. This would have
to go under the heading of proto-prog, "Smile" would have
BEEN prog, if Wilson had been able to finish it (he finally did 35
years later). „They say I got brains, but they ain’t doin’ me no
good.“