Terrible albums by brilliant musicians

It happens, even to the best of them: Madonna, U2, David Bowie, Paul McCartney, Queen. Despite all their good intentions, even great musicians can deliver a dud from time to time. Usually, major acts have the instinct and craft to polish an average song until it’s listenable, so mediocre albums are a dime a dozen. What’s unusual are the records where an artist finds all their old tricks failing them, whether it’s due to personal problems, a poor choice of collaborators, or a misguided concept. Misfires like that are so rare that they wind up being memorable and worth noting—perhaps even celebrating. The albums that follow may not be a comprehensive list of the worst records ever made. Rather, it’s a collection of 40 albums that made an indelible impression by barreling the wrong way down the highway.

Aerosmith, Night In The Ruts (1979)

Fast on their way to rock bottom, Aerosmith fractured during the recording of Night In The Ruts. Joe Perry left partway through the sessions and the band soldiered through, coming up with a record that swaps sleaze for sludge. While they try to shake things up with a cover of the classic girl group single “Remember (Walking In The Sand),” they sounds like they’re stuck in third gear. The title is fitting: sure, it’s spoonerism for “right in the nuts,” but it definitely sounds like the band is stuck in a rut.

The Beach Boys, Still Cruisin’ (1989)

Still riding the tropical contact high from “Kokomo,” the Beach Boys threw together Still Cruisin’, a nonsensical slop of classic hits, soundtrack contributions and attempts at recreating that beachy magic. The fact that the second side repurposes some of their bigger hits is mitigated by the presence of “Wipe Out,” an ill-conceived duet with the Fat Boys.

Black Sabbath, Forbidden (1995)

Black Sabbath spent much of the 1990s adrift as guitarist Tony Iommi attempted to split the difference between reviving his glory days and riding trends. Forbidden is the nadir of the latter. Allegedly, Iommi was told Ice-T was interested in producing a Sabbath record, but he instead wound up with Ernie C, Ice-T’s Body Count colleague, at the board. As Ernie C attempts to get drummer Cozy Powell to play Body Count rhythms, Sabbath flails, sounding like imitators, not originators.

David Bowie, Tonight (1984)

The radiance of the album’s hit single, “Blue Jean,” distracts from the barrenness of Tonight, the followup record David Bowie delivered after finally achieving superstardom with Let’s Dance. Working with Hugh Padgham, then one of the biggest producers in the world thanks to his records with the Police and Genesis, Bowie submits to the glossy rigamarole of radio rock. Bowie is barely a presence as a songwriter: he does old pal Iggy Pop a solid by giving him songwriting credits on half the record, then sleepwalks through the Beach Boys’ “God Only Knows.”

Mariah Carey, Glitter (2001)

Designed as Mariah Carey’s silver screen spectacular, Glitter became a notorious flop both at the box office and charts. Of the two, the soundtrack is better but that only is because the movie was incoherent. Here, it’s possible to discern that Glitter was meant to be a bit of a disco revival, perhaps even glean some enjoyment from the covers of “Didn’t Mean To Turn You On” and ‘Last Night A DJ Saved My Life,” but it’s overly massaged, and too self-conscious of its own aspirations to offer a good time.

Cheap Trick,The Doctor (1986)

If any one record could be put into a time capsule from the 1980s it would be Cheap Trick’s The Doctor—not because it was a blockbuster, not because it was any good, but because it represents every single one of the era’s excesses. Teeming with clanking drum machines and cacophonic synth stabs, drenched in artificial echo and razor-thin guitars, it aggressively courts attention, but its power-pop hooks are flattened underneath the digital onslaught.

Chicago, Hot Streets (1978)

The first Chicago album to not bear a number in its title and, more importantly, the first to not feature founding member Terry Kath, Hot Streets finds the band uniting with Phil Ramone, the producer behind the biggest Billy Joel albums. Chicago doesn’t quite replicate The Stranger here but they do lurch toward easy listening while also dabbling in disco. The result is a record that’s redolent of the tackiest elements of the 1970s, from its sleaziest celebrations of “Little Miss Lovin’” and “No Tell Lover” to its zany album cover.

The Clash, Cut The Crap (1985)

Joe Strummer struggled to keep the Clash afloat after the departure of his partner Mick Jones, first scheming to return the band to its punk roots but winding up with a clattering attempt to harness early hip-hop in a rock setting. “This Is England” provides a galvanizing hint of what could’ve been, but as a whole the record is exhausting. Blame some of the synthesis on Bernie Rhodes, the manager who had an outsized influence here, adding too many electronic instruments to the mix.

Chris Cornell, Scream (2009)

With two solo albums under his belt, former Soundgarden leader Chris Cornell made an abrupt turn into pop with Scream. Hiring renowned hip-hop producer Timbaland, Cornell left rock behind and embraced electronic sounds, creating a hybrid of dance-pop and alt-rock. The singer called the music “psychedelic” at the time, but Scream is mind-warping in the worst way: as Cornell tangles with Timbaland’s beats, the effect is hallucinatory.

Elvis Costello, Mighty Like A Rose (1991)

The single tells it all. “The Other Side Of Summer” overspills with ideas, with Elvis Costello’s jabs at other pop stars buried underneath carnivalesque keyboards and Beach Boy harmonies: the intent is apparent but the actuality is exhausting due to an impenetrable production. And that’s one of the calmer numbers on Mighty Like A Rose. No corner of the album’s mix is quiet: there’s always something happening, whether it’s junkyard percussion or guitar squalls. There are plenty of great songs on the album, but they’re all nearly impossible to hear under the cacophonic murk.

Creedence Clearwater Revival, Mardi Gras (1972)

Down to a trio after the departure of Tom Fogerty, Creedence Clearwater Revival faced some serious internal tension: namely, Doug Clifford and Stu Cook were tired of having John Fogerty be the band’s main songwriter. Fogerty called their bluff on Mardi Gras, letting them contribute nearly as many original songs as he did. Fogerty himself is in fine form, turning in the raver “Sweet Hitch-Hiker” and the wistful “Someday Never Comes,” which makes Clifford and Cook’s workaday tunes seem green in comparison.

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, American Dream (1988)

Neil Young promised that he’d rejoin Crosby, Stills & Nash once David Crosby got clean. Crosby finally did so in the mid-1980s, and Neil dutifully had them out to his ranch to cut a record that had nary a hint of rustic charm. It’s all big 1980s production, keyboards, and synthesized gloss—listen to the fake flute and forced gaiety of the title track for proof—all tied to songs that attempt to keep the dream of the 1960s alive in Reagan’s America … but that also don’t try too hard.

Duran Duran, Liberty (1990)

At the end of the 1980s, the hangover started to set in for Duran Duran. Partying calcified into addictions yet the group wasn’t aware of their dire situation at the time, so they soldiered through, making a record that attempts to build upon the ground they opened up with Notorious and Big Thing. Still focused on dance and funk, the group lost sight of their songs in the studio, winding up with a record that focuses on groove and vibe—which would’ve been fine if the vibe hadn’t been the brittle remains of the big ’80s. With its shallow substance and blinding polish, the album is an artifact of all the things that have been rightfully forgotten about the early 1990s.

Bob Dylan, Dylan (1973)

Columbia Records released Dylan after Bob Dylan left his longtime label to be the biggest signee at David Geffen’s Asylum in 1972. Columbia gathered outtakes from New Morning and Self Portrait and if the subsequent editions of The Bootleg Series covering this same period can be trusted, it appears the label picked the dullest tracks they could find. It’s as if Columbia was shaming Dylan for leaving his longtime home.

Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Love Beach (1978)

Emerson, Lake & Palmer, the kings of prog rock, are seen on the cover of Love Beach grinning like madmen on a tropical island, their shirts open all the way to their navel. It’s an absurd makeover for one of rock’s most self-serious bands, a sign that they’re ready to leave behind their orchestral ambitions and compete with the likes of Ambrosia, an outfit that left art-rock behind for yacht rock. Unlike Ambrosia, though, ELP never feels comfortable playing mellow melodic hooks, so this has the sense that the group believes they’re slumming it by even attempting to crossover.

Genesis, Calling All Stations (1997)

Don’t blame Calling All Stations on Ray Wilson, the singer who had the thankless task of stepping into the shoes of Phil Collins, the Genesis drummer who departed in 1996. Wilson may be too much of a conventional husky rock singer for Genesis, but he’s game to sing whatever Tony Banks and Mike Rutherford send his way. The problem is, the two surviving Genesis members jettison the group’s pop aspects in favor of a self-serious hybrid of the band’s early ’80s art-rock and the modern arena rock of Rutherford’s Mike & the Mechanics, a blend that’s so somber it sounds gloomy.

George Harrison, Dark Horse (1974)

Robert Christgau famously quipped George Harrison was a “hoarse dork” on this 1974 album and he wasn’t wrong. Blown out physically and mentally, his voice a husk of what it once was, Harrison tries to come to terms with his impending divorce from Pattie Boyd by writing poison letters tempered by half-hearted odes to love, wrapping it all up in an outsized production he cribbed from Phil Spector. A star-studded cast featuring Billy Preston, Jim Keltner, Ronnie Wood, Alvin Lee and Ringo Starr doesn’t make this a party: it’s a chore to hear.

Billy Idol, Cyberpunk (1993)

Perhaps Cyberpunk was prescient, predicting a world where the internet dictated the rhythms of life in a way it certainly didn’t back when Billy Idol wrote and recorded the album in the early 1990s. Back in 1993, the album was greeted with a sneer, yet listening to it now, the combination of digital effects, dance music and rock did seem to foreshadow some of the rock of the new millennium. The problem isn’t the concept, it’s the execution. Filled with pompous spoken word snippets, percolating synths, overheated noise, warmed-over house and an incongruous Velvet Underground cover, this is a mess of a production that keeps shooting itself in the foot.

Michael Jackson, Michael (2010)

An attempt to refashion Michael Jackson outtakes and leftovers into an album that could compete in the pop charts of 2010, Michael was forever dogged by the presence of three tracks alleged to not even feature Jackson’s vocals. Those songs—“Keep Your Head Up,” “Monster,” “Breaking News”—have been cut from subsequent editions of the album. Sony has never admitted they don’t feature Jackson, but their very presence suggests what a terrible mess the record is.

Jethro Tull, A (1980)

Perhaps if A came out as it was intended, as the solo debut of frontman Ian Anderson rather than the 13th album from Jethro Tull, it would not seem quite so odd and disappointing. True, it would still have an inordinate number of synths interwoven with some expected flute excursions, but it would be understood to be a departure. Heard as a Tull album, though, it seems as if one of the most eccentric British rock bands of their time has been consumed by the overwhelming desire to be a soft rock group in search of easy listening hits.

Jewel, 304 (2003)

Savoring a little taste of dance club success when a remix of her 2001 track “Serve The Ego” unexpectedly became a club hit, Jewel decided to dive headfirst into dance-pop on 0304. Arriving in the thick of the TRL era, 0304 couldn’t help but be interpreted as the sensitive singer/songwriter’s attempt to go pop—which it inarguably was. No matter how hooky some of these songs are, there’s a curious feeling of a singer/songwriter playing against her own strengths, a problem Jewel seemed to acknowledge by her immediate return to the sound of her career-making Pieces Of You on her subsequent album.

Elton John, Leather Jackets (1986)

The first Elton John album since 1970 that didn’t produce a hit single on either side of the Atlantic, Leather Jackets finds the rocker at a professional and personal nadir. Strung out, he found that he could not rely on the one thing that saved him through his entire career: his gift for melody. Producer Gus Dudgeon, usually a man of consummate taste, throws every mid-’80s production trick into the mix in an attempt to make this seem lively. But the opposite happens, and John has never sounded as knackered as he does here.

Kiss, Music From The Elder (1981)

Working with Bob Ezrin, the producer of Pink Floyd’s The Wall, Kiss concocted their own absurd concept album with Music From The Elder. Titled as if it was a soundtrack—there were hopes for a movie but it never materialized—Music From The Elder is simultaneously undercooked and overblown because Kiss took the opera in “rock opera” a shade too seriously. Larding the record up with fanfares and pompous choruses—the latter undercuts the rampaging “The Oath” by a factor of 10—Kiss never misses a chance to take the silliest possible choice, such as when they steer the ballad “A World Without Heroes” straight into adult contemporary territory.

John Lennon & Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band, Some Time In New York City (1972)

Immersed in the rock underground while in the throes of processing the Beatles’ breakup, John Lennon and Yoko Ono moved to New York City and cut a bunch of protest songs with Elephant’s Memory, a minor counterculture group with no discernible personality—all the better for John and Yoko to lead them through tracks written as news bulletins. The songs are as timely as yesterday’s papers and the execution is stoned sludge, which means the hodgepodge of live material—some stuff with the Plastic Ono Band in 1969, some other stuff with the Mothers of Invention in 1971—has more character, but it’s equally sludgey, making the entire record a monotonous drag.

Madonna, American Life (2003)

Hot on the heels of Music, the 2000 album that proved the mature electronica makeover of Ray Of Light was no fluke, Madonna retained her collaborator Mirwais to record a provocative pop album of social commentary. Arriving when 9/11 was still a fresh wound that the Iraq War was salting, Madonna’s timing was off, but not as off as her ear. Where Music flowed free and easy, American Life was a cloistered, confused record filled with murky beats and lyrics that were too on the nose, a combination that amounted to Madonna’s first real musical stumble.

Meat Loaf, Dead Ringer (1981)

Dead Ringer belongs to a rare class of record: it stopped a career cold. Of course, Meat Loaf didn’t do a whole lot to help himself in the early 1980s, choosing to indulge in every opportunity that came his way. He partied so hard he lost his voice, leading his partner Jim Steinman to record Bad For Good, the intended sequel to Bat Out Of Hell, on his own, which in turn led the songwriter to bash out the tunes on Dead Ringer. Steinman was in better form than the still ragged Meat Loaf but everyone involved sounds as if they’re running on fumes—a decided contrast to the overwhelming bombast of Bat.

Metallica, St. Anger (2003)

Very few albums have an accompanying feature-length documentary about their creation and fewer still have a film as candid as Some Kind Of Monster, the doc that chronicled Metallica’s tumultuous time recording St. Anger. Watching the film, it’s easy to see how therapy speak wound up in James Hetfield’s lyrics and it’s also apparent why Metallica made the bewildering decision not to make room for any guitar solos. But there’s never an explanation for the grating ping of Lars Ulrich’s snare drum, a pummeling sound that turns a muddled record into a maddening one.

Motley Crue, Generation Swine (1997)

Vince Neil returned to the fold for Generation Swine, Motley Crue’s second successive attempt to navigate the alt-rock wilderness of the 1990s. The first, an eponymous 1994 album, had the benefit of Neil’s replacement John Corabi making it feel like a somewhat different band. But with Neil on board for Generation Swine, the group’s stabs at grunge and industrial are even clumsier. They sound like the old guys at a party who look older because they’re wearing newer styles, a point hammered home by the group updating their signature “Shout at the Devil” as a post-grunge slurry.

Paul McCartney, Give My Regards To Broad Street (1984)

Paul McCartney was riding high in the early 1980s, so high that he decided to make a feature film—a trifle about stolen master tapes that allows for a surplus of musical numbers. Instead of writing new songs, McCartney decided to re-record a host of Beatles and Wings numbers, along with some solo cuts—some not more than a year or two old—with the stiffest pseudo-new wave production imaginable. The fact that the film’s signature song, “No More Lonely Nights,” is one of McCartney’s loveliest ballads—and that it has a gorgeous guitar solo by David Gilmour—only serves to remind that everything else, save the goofy rocker “Not Such A Bad Boy,” is inconsequential.

Stevie Nicks, The Other Side Of The Mirror (1989)

A concept album loosely based on Alice In Wonderland, The Other Side Of the Mirror captures an uncomfortable period in Stevie Nicks’ career—a time when Fleetwood Mac was imploding and her personal life was spiraling out of control. Prescription meds wreaked havoc with her voice and kept her at a distance during the sessions produced by Rupert Hine, leading to a convoluted, overstuffed record lacking the melodic structure to support a busy purple production.

Pink Floyd, The Final Cut (1983)

A Roger Waters solo album in all but name, The Final Cut is effectively a coda to his time as the leader of Pink Floyd. Returning to the same source trauma as The Wall—his father’s death in World War II—Waters writes songs that play like prose pieces: they’re still and indifferent to either melody or movement. The somber mood piece demands attention but it doesn’t necessarily command it; it’s a gloomy, foreboding record that wears its dourness proudly.

Prince, NEWS (2003)

Finally free of his Warner Bros. contract, Prince flooded the market with music in the early 2000s, releasing a series of records on his NPG imprint that winnowed his followers down to fanatics only. He’d get tired playing to the converted, mounting a deliberate comeback with the 2004 album Musicology, but the records that arrived just prior to that were indulgent in unexpectedly dull ways. Nowhere is that truer than NEWS, an instrumental fusion album with shallow grooves and improvisation where each track clocks out at 14 minutes: it sounds like music designed to be played at a DSW.

Queen, The Cosmos Rocks (2008)

Former Free and Bad Company singer Paul Rodgers always was an awkward fit for Queen: his talent for bluesy bluster and gruff arena rock ran counter to Queen’s theatrical pomp. That always was evident whenever Rodgers was filling in for Freddie Mercury, but on The Cosmos Rocks, the only studio album Queen and Rodgers made together, the chasm separating the two camps was gaping. Nowhere is that truer than on “C-lebrity,” a swipe at 2000s tabloid culture that finds a Brian May riff flattened by a huffy Rodgers sneering at the very excess Queen used to celebrate.

Red Hot Chili Peppers, One Hot Minute (1995)

Sliding off the rails after the triumph of Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Red Hot Chili Peppers entered a down period after losing guitarist John Frusciante. With him gone, the group lost their sense of purpose. His replacement, Jane’s Addiction axeman Dave Navarro—the first in a long line of high-profile pinch-hitter assignments for the guitarist—made the Chili Peppers sound a bit too straightforward in every regard, turning the funk-rock into murk, making their sentimental streak saccharine and transforming such trifles as “Aeroplane” into grating alt-bubblegum.

Lou Reed, Mistrial (1986)

Another contender for the most 1980s album of the 1980s, Mistrial found Lou Reed breaking away from the autobiographical muse of his early ’80s albums and choosing to write a quick-and-dirty record. Reed penned some relatively playful back-to-basics rockers—including the hip-hop send-up “The Original Wrapper”—but his grand plans were undone by a production that’s sequenced within an inch of its life and draped in clanking electronics that grind a listener down by the third track.

Bruce Springsteen, Only The Strong Survive (2022)

Bruce Springsteen populated his first-ever covers album with a thoughtful, purposeful selection of songs that spoke to the golden age of soul—a period where he cut his teeth in bar bands on the Jersey shore. He’s smart, so he extends the tradition into the 1980s, singing a tender version of the Commodores’ elegiac “Nightfshift” that plays into his weathered voice. The problem is, Only The Strong Survive is assembled track by track by producer Ron Aniello, turning what should’ve been a soulful celebration into something stiff and stuffy.

Ringo Starr, Ringo The 4th (1977)

The place where Ringo Starr’s good times curdled, Ringo The 4th tries desperately to keep the party going but the crowd has already left. The studio gloss has turned anonymous, which dampens Ringo’s natural gregariousness. Compare Allen Toussaint’s “Sneakin’ Sally Through The Alley” to the funky version Robert Palmer delivered three years earlier to realize how Starr sounds down in the dumps, a revelation underscored by the single “Drowning in the Sea of Love,” where Ringo’s voice seems shredded from excess.

Kanye West, Ye (2018)

The beginning of the downfall, Ye sounds as if it was assembled by Kanye West hours before its release—which is more or less what happened. Ensconced in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, West brought out a number of collaborators, planning to release a new album on a weekly basis. Kanye wound up scrapping his original version of Ye then rushed through the finished product in two weeks, winding up with 23 minutes of murky, shapeless music that’s dispiriting to hear: it sounds like somebody losing grip with themselves.

U2, Songs Of Innocence (2014)

So much of the chatter surrounding Songs Of Innocence surrounds how it was force-fed to everybody with iTunes—a notorious PR blunder that nevertheless suited an album that worked too hard to be everything to everybody. U2 dresses the elements of an interesting record—Bono wrote a set of songs meant to reconnect with the group’s beginning—in an overly massaged, formless production that attempts to freshen their signature arena rock by working with such hitmakers as Ryan Tedder and Dangermouse. The result is confused, and too desperate to please.

ZZ Top, Recycler (1990)

Give ZZ Top credit for this: by calling this 1990 album Recycler, they acknowledge that they’ve reached the end of the line with the synthesized blues-rock that turned them into superstars with Eliminator. The bigger production makes the sequenced rhythms sound slicker and makes the computerized production even glossier, elements that turn grating as the group runs through the motions. “My Head’s In Mississippi,” the one time they kick up a head of steam, is good enough that it makes the rest of the record sound that much worse in comparison.