Grant's Tomb: 10 Albums That Absolutely Suck

Inspired by a recent Yahoo music blog, I bring you 10 albums that absolutely suck, no questions asked.

Writing for Bigfoot has been a blast, and that fact that a great many of you have actually taken an interest in the verbal diarrhea that I spout is quite flattering. For this post I had this great, long winded, pretentious, and over the top interview with the late-great Kurt Cobain (due to the 20th anniversary of Nevermind), but due to all the press that album was receiving I decided against it and scrapped it all. Maybe some day I’ll post it on my facebook page, but who know, and in all reality, who cares? As is expected with this, hate mail will come, and ya know, I honestly welcome a healthy debate over the merits of my writing. In the words of Fred Durst, “Bring it on!”

10. Velvet Revolver-Contraband

Album cover: Hot. Music on album: Not so much

Super groups, as a rule, look great on paper, but rarely ever meet expectations, and such is/was the case with Velvet Revolver. Boasting a line up of past member from Guns n Roses and Stone Temple Pilots (as well as some other guy with a handle bar mustache), you would expect great things, no? Instead what we’re given is a wannabe experience of rock. From Scott Weiland's near miss of an impersonation of Axel Rose, to Slash and crew’s half-hearted riffs and ballads, what could have been rewarding is ultimately pure bargain bin garbage. Take for example the lead single “Slither.” The build up to the beginning of the song is massive and when the riff kicks in you’re ready to go, but what happens? Absolutely nothing, the song putters out even before the soaring vocals in the chorus come screeching in. And such is the case with the rest of the album, all tease and no delivery.

9. Soulfly-Every single album they’ve crapped out.

Soulfly: Nothing new here.

Max Cavallera’s widely publicized split with Sepultura was kind of a shocker to the metal community. Riding high on the success of the bands seminal album Roots (which they have unfortunately been living in the shadow of since), an internal conflict led to Max leaving the band. So what does he do? Of course, he starts a new band, which completely sounds just like the one he left. Yes, yes, his growl/bark/roar is very distinguishable, but the debut album from Soulfly (and every album they’ve released since) has been a complete rehash of his former band and shows no growth whatsoever from him as a song writer. It doesn’t help that he constantly brings up his split from the group and the reasons why there will or won’t be a reunion is clearly just for publicity.

8. Underoath-O (Disambiguation)

Oprah would have made a better album.

Before the albums recording sessions were to begin, founding and only original member, drummer Aaron Gillespie announced his departure. Fans immediately began to speculate what the band would do as he was responsible for a majority of the bands songwriting as well as clean singing. Well, the band decided to carry on and enlisted the help of former Norma Jean drummer, and outspoken Christian, Daniel Davidson to take the vacant spot. The record that was delivered was for lack of a better word, uninspiring. It was completely tired and felt as if the band had hit a creative wall. Not only were they recycling riffs but they had completely lost their drive to deliver something that was edgy or unique (something that the band had been able to accomplish with their last three). Underoath was one of those bands that had no problem changing styles from album to album, but with this one the band simply retread previously gained ground. Astonishing disappointment resounded.

7. CKY-Carver City

This album is not awesome.

Oh yeah, this band broke up recently. After a four year break, CKY released their new album Carver City via Road Runner Records and it didn’t sell for shit. The band, known for giving up their name to drummer Jess Margera’s little brother Bam, released a record that was far more processed than the last T.I. album. Vocal effects, guitar effects, plastic sounding drums and absolutely nothing worth revisiting is what makes up Carver City. The opening track to the record was actually a previous song just played in reverse (Hellions on Parade vs. Escape from Hellview). Awesome…not.

6. Nine Inch Nails-Year Zero

NIN compoop

A bloated concept of a record, Trent Reznor thought he was being original, but George Orwell beat him to the punch several decades before. But lets forget the concept of an out of control government polluting the water, what about the music? Crap. Noisy crap. Glitches, bleeps, bloops, and Reznor’s ridiculous marketing scheme, made this record sound mediocre in comparison to his stellar come back record With Teeth. Just when he had begun to experiment with real instruments and regular song structures, he releases an album that sounds exactly how it was made, on a lap top. Avoid this one at all costs.

5. Sevendust-Next

NEXT!

As the title suggests, fans would have rather just gone to the next record. Following the departure of primary songwriter and backing vocal Clint Lowery, Sevendust was in somewhat of a pickle. Having been dropped/recently left TVT Records, the band decided to strike out on a venture and start their own label and release the record independently. The end result was less than spectacular, and in all reality, boring. As I’ve mentioned above with some of these other albums that were (un)fortunate enough to make the list, this album felt tired and uninspiring.

4. Killswitch Engage-As Daylight Dies

Graduation Required

Oh man was this was a let down. Essentially, this record was their previous one, The End of Heartache, all over again. The same riffs, the same vocal delivery, the same breakdowns, the same song structures, repeated. The verses were screamed, the choruses were sung, and then a breakdown was thrown in for good measure ( a generic breakdown coming on the first and third hit). High school kids ate it up, myself included.

3. KMFDM-Every album since Adios

When they said "Adios," they meant it.

KMFDM are one of those bands you either love or hate, or love to hate for that matter. Sure, they’ve been the self declared godfathers of industrial rock since 1980, but the genre of industrial music is extremely limiting in and of itself. With that said, KMFDM broke up in 1999 due to internal turmoil and label problems (TVT again). A couple years later they reformed with a new line up to record pretty much the exact same noise they had been releasing in the early to late 90’s. Boring riffs, blatantly ripping off Slayer or Megadeth, and the same sloganeering and propagating lyrics that brought them to the forefront of 90’s disaffected youth popularity made for a rehashed and repetitive listen. You can only record the same song so many times, take a cue from Botch and hang it up.

2. Norma Jean-Redeemer

Not quite Redemption

Norma Jean made waves with their break through album O God, the Aftermath (this record deserves its fair share of criticism due to it’s blatantly stupid rip-off of Botch and Isis). But what is a band to due with new found success? Why, throw a wrench in the gear of course. Norma Jean enlisted the help of producer Ross Robinson, most known for working with Korn and Limp Bizkit. The end result was a cheesy, thoughtless attempt at commercial gain and ended in commercial suicide. Singer Corey Brendan cannot sing, period. The riffs were even more atrocious at best. Muddy production (which I normally cream myself for) and disturbingly out of place vocal melodies made Redeemer a pointless piece of garbage.

[The band has since redeemed themselves, no pun intended, on their newest release, Meridional-check it out!]

1. Marilyn Manson-The High End of Low

Definitely the low end.

Do not listen to this record. It sucks eggs. Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap. Someone is taking themselves too seriously. Boooooooooooo, booooooooooo. Go back to banging heroin, or snorting cocaine, do something because this record sucks.

Not mentioned, but also noteworthy:

Motely Crue-Saints of Los Angels (really?)
Metallica-St. Anger (really??)
Green Day-Every album ever (Wtf is wrong with teenagers???)

(Written by Grant Peter)