Worst albums you've ever heard

[LovePowerFromTheMamaHead]

I was expecting someone to have said Dokken's Shadowlife by now. I actually like a lot of the songs on it, but the production is awful and some songs have some bad lyrics

[Bono Nettencourt]

Could also see an argument for any of the pre-Pepper Keenan CoC albums when they were still trying to be punk, (Eye for An Eye, Animosity, Technocracy). Those are all pretty rough.

I am not a huge fan of these albums. But I have lived in Raleigh for 20+ years and people who grew up here and are a little older than me (I'm 51) hold them in high regard.

Apparently a COC show at Sadlack's (one of my favorite all-time bars, may it rest in peace) was a thing of beauty.

They were terrible. Drove around to colleges in a graffiti van. So pseudo-edgy.

[kytepunches]

I picked up two CD’s out of curiosity from the 2 dollar bin years ago. They were both unbelievably terrible and had zero redeeming qualities. Both were former Kiss drummers .

1. Criss Cat #1 - By Peter Criss
2. Eric Carr - Carr Crash …or something like that. It was unreleased and demo’s.. Just brutal.


I expected bad.. but they were beyond what the ears should ever be put through.

[DonJuanDeMarco]

Babylon AD - Revelation Highway

Yeah, it's horrible compared to the debut. You can tell it was recorded in a home studio.

The drums sound is terrible but the songs are awesome and the vocals and guitars are great. Just poor production.

Some of those songs were previously released on their demo album. Production is not so great there either though. I’m guessing all or at least most of them are old songs because the Roam Wasn’t Built in a Day record wasn’t nearly as good.

[Indy_Rob]

Lynch Bizkit. One of only 2 CDs I returned to Best Buy.

[diablomozart]

I nominate the Lou Reed/Metallica abortion.

i'll go one farther...lou reed metal machine music...bought it because of the cover...that was, by far, the coolest part of the album...d.m.

[fletch123]

Peter Criss - Out of Control

More like Out of Tune, Out of Ideas, Out of Patience. This album sounds like Peter recorded it in a broom closet with the mic wrapped in toilet paper. The drumming is so buried it feels like even the producer was embarrassed.

If you need to clear a party fast, just put this on. Works better than a fire alarm.

“By Myself” – It’s almost impressive how accurately Peter predicted his career trajectory with this title.

[risingfarce]

R.E.M. "Monster"

Listened to it twice. Never purchased another R.E.M. cd or listened to another R.E.M. cd after "Monster".

[roxxxtar]

When the Donna’s were all the rage for about five minutes, I picked up their very first CD.

I don’t even know what it was just sounded like a bunch of noise

[HueyRamone]

This could be the longest thread ever. And the obvious choice, second maybe only to Quiet Riot’s catalog, is the UYI albums. But that goes without saying, so allow me to ruffle some feathers…

Faster Pussycat’s Wake Me When It’s Over.

Atrocious, over produced, sickeningly polished, HORNS. C’mon. Awful. And especially painful on the heels of their s/t sleaze masterpiece.

I prefer it over the debut

Agreed. I was given it, and liked it more than I thought I would. Bathroom Wall and whatever else I heard on the debut annoyed me.

[Van Ailin']

Billy Idol - Cyberpunk (you can hear the drugs dripping off it)

Krokus - Heart Attack (you get the HeadHunter lineup back and then do this???)

WASP - Inside the Electric Circus (minus covers, nothing interesting - but the next album was great)

Quiet Riot - IV (with Paul Shortino - good singer, no songs)

Fleetwood Mac - Time (nice idea and Becca was good in Fleetwood's Zoo, but this one didn't have any songs)

Navarro & Avery - Deconstruction (wanted to like it, but aside from one good instrumental, it was awful)

Keel - S/T (they ran out of songs - nothing interesting there)

Black 'n Blue - In Heat (again, just no songs - well had run dry)

[Van Ailin']

This could be the longest thread ever. And the obvious choice, second maybe only to Quiet Riot’s catalog, is the UYI albums. But that goes without saying, so allow me to ruffle some feathers…

Faster Pussycat’s Wake Me When It’s Over.

Atrocious, over produced, sickeningly polished, HORNS. C’mon. Awful. And especially painful on the heels of their s/t sleaze masterpiece.

What's wrong with horns? Horns are awesome in music.

[GoodJudge]

R.E.M. "Monster"

Listened to it twice. Never purchased another R.E.M. cd or listened to another R.E.M. cd after "Monster".

For once I (almost) agree with your musical choice. They made a shed-load of money from Shiny Happy People / Automatic For The People, and the fan-base explosion that followed, then did a 180 because Stipe hated being popular so they released half a dozen albums of mostly dull droning, the type of music that only serious music journalists love. I had a dubbed cassette of Monster from a friend; listened twice, never bothered to buy it or any other later album.

That said, Bad Day was a great single during that time but it was a one-off track using an 80s riff. They also released E-Bow The Letter as a single, which I quite liked despite it being dull droning, and one of the extra tracks, a cover of Wall Of Death by Richard + Linda Thompson, became one of my favourite songs.

[Kid-Wicked]

Vince Neil - Carved in Stone

my first thought too. the edm shit george lynch put out was horrible too.

[Tyketto Meniketti]

The Faster Pussycat industrial remix album was laughably bad.

Which is weird bc Taime's Newlydeads stuff was pretty catchy.

Virgos Merlot
Load or Reload I can't remember
St. Anger had no positives
Hollyweird was bad
American Hardcore by LAG

There are plenty of others. But Virgos Merlot is the worst.

[Bono Nettencourt]

R.E.M. "Monster"

Listened to it twice. Never purchased another R.E.M. cd or listened to another R.E.M. cd after "Monster".

Neither did the rest of the world. There were a lot of Monster CDs in used bins in 1994 alongside Your Filthy Little Mouth and Motley Crue.

[Zander]

Objectively the worst record I've heard must be The Shaggs' Phlosophy of the World. Or "heard", I couldn't bear to listen that all the way through. Everybody in the band seemed to play different songs at any given time. Completely tuneless stuff that's either avantgarde rock at its finest or guaranteed to give you a headache, depending on your view.

[DonJuanDeMarco]

This could be the longest thread ever. And the obvious choice, second maybe only to Quiet Riot’s catalog, is the UYI albums. But that goes without saying, so allow me to ruffle some feathers…

Faster Pussycat’s Wake Me When It’s Over.

Atrocious, over produced, sickeningly polished, HORNS. C’mon. Awful. And especially painful on the heels of their s/t sleaze masterpiece.

What's wrong with horns? Horns are awesome in music.

I get it. If you love their first album you may not like the 2nd one. To me, the band/producer/record company were trying to bring out the Aerosmith influences instead of the “plug in and play” garage rock sound. I like both equally. It was Whipped that was a huge step down except for Nonstop to Nowhere which is awesome.

[Anthrax442]

I nominate the Lou Reed/Metallica abortion.

Oh, shit, I totally forgot about LuLu. Yeah, nevermind what I said, that's my answer. As much as I dislike VHIII, that pile of shit is another level bad.

[Bono Nettencourt]

No Code. Pearl Jam's Monster. They were never the same.

[Van Ailin']

No Code. Pearl Jam's Monster. They were never the same.

Agree. They did some very good music after (especially last year's album). But No Code was truly awful, and it was then end of them as a pop act. Fortunately for them, they had cultivated a Phish-kind-of-thing where live shows were unpredictable and covered a lot of different material. They sowed an audience large enough to support their career and also who were in to the idea that they'd play a wide range of their catalogue. That breeds a kind of musical freedom that I'm sure they appreciate. They still tour to pretty large numbers so they did something right.

[Bono Nettencourt]

Having 3 all-time classic albums beforehand helped. They were also stable lineup-wise save the drummer carousel.

[fromanotherplace82]

Grave New World by Discharge
Cold Lake by Celtic Frost
Let's Eat by Love/Hate
Acid Monkey by BulletBoys (Toy is the only good song on that album)
American Hardcore by L.A Guns
Runaway Brides by Brides of Destruction

[Gibsonite]

No Code. Pearl Jam's Monster. They were never the same.

Agree. They did some very good music after (especially last year's album). But No Code was truly awful, and it was then end of them as a pop act. Fortunately for them, they had cultivated a Phish-kind-of-thing where live shows were unpredictable and covered a lot of different material. They sowed an audience large enough to support their career and also who were in to the idea that they'd play a wide range of their catalogue. That breeds a kind of musical freedom that I'm sure they appreciate. They still tour to pretty large numbers so they did something right.

Like Neil Young's Ditch Trilogy, No Code got rid of all the casuals who only liked them for the radio songs. It's far from a bad album, it just sounds nothing like what came before. I dig it.

[Van Ailin']

No Code. Pearl Jam's Monster. They were never the same.

Agree. They did some very good music after (especially last year's album). But No Code was truly awful, and it was then end of them as a pop act. Fortunately for them, they had cultivated a Phish-kind-of-thing where live shows were unpredictable and covered a lot of different material. They sowed an audience large enough to support their career and also who were in to the idea that they'd play a wide range of their catalogue. That breeds a kind of musical freedom that I'm sure they appreciate. They still tour to pretty large numbers so they did something right.

Like Neil Young's Ditch Trilogy, No Code got rid of all the casuals who only liked them for the radio songs. It's far from a bad album, it just sounds nothing like what came before. I dig it.

I actually consider it bad. One really good song - Present Tense. Nothing else works on that record. So it's genuinely bad. But it did serve the purpose of no longer making them seem like a band of grunge stars looking for the pop market. It forced their truer fans to stick with them via the live shows, which were good. It made a stronger relationship between them and their more fervent fans. But musically? It just wasn't good.

[Bono Nettencourt]

Their appeal became more selective.

[EuroJR]

Worst album I have ever heard?

There are so many.
One of the biggest disappointment for me has to be Demon - Commercial Dynamite

It got good reviews. I can't understand why.

The Demon made 4 classic albums. The Night Of The Demon (NWOBHM), The Unexpected Quest (NWOBHM), The Plaque (hard rock/prog), British Standard Approved (neo-prog). After that it was only downhill. Maybe because the song writer Malcom Spooner died.

[risingfarce]

Fleetwood Mac - Time (nice idea and Becca was good in Fleetwood's Zoo, but this one didn't have any songs)

This is a good song by Christine:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=to6koX4 ... 8&index=12

[CrankerBait]

No Code. Pearl Jam's Monster. They were never the same.

Agree. They did some very good music after (especially last year's album). But No Code was truly awful, and it was then end of them as a pop act. Fortunately for them, they had cultivated a Phish-kind-of-thing where live shows were unpredictable and covered a lot of different material. They sowed an audience large enough to support their career and also who were in to the idea that they'd play a wide range of their catalogue. That breeds a kind of musical freedom that I'm sure they appreciate. They still tour to pretty large numbers so they did something right.

No Code wasn't very good - probably the worst Pearl Jam album - but it didn't exactly ruin Pearl Jam's career. They bounced back with Yield, a very good album, and have released a number of good albums since. As you pointed out, they have been a huge live act for the past couple of decades. Their core fans stuck with them.

[kanister]

I picked up two CD’s out of curiosity from the 2 dollar bin years ago. They were both unbelievably terrible and had zero redeeming qualities. Both were former Kiss drummers .

1. Criss Cat #1 - By Peter Criss
2. Eric Carr - Carr Crash …or something like that. It was unreleased and demo’s.. Just brutal.


I expected bad.. but they were beyond what the ears should ever be put through.

Surely no Criss album can be worse than One For All. It was the first album I thought of seeing this thread. I laughed at a local Kiss fan calling's Paul Stanley Soul Station record worse than One for All. While that one is far from a great record, just show total lack of understanding of songwriting, musicianship etc. It boggles my mind people like Paul Schaffer and Will Lee were involved in making One for All. They must have had no budget for studio time at all.

Eric Carr is a good choice too, even if he didn't have an official record out. It's funny he felt injustice for not getting his crappy songs on a Kiss record. None of it was better than No No No or Boomerang and he was just hired hand. He should have been grateful for getting one song on HITS.