Worst albums of 2011
 

Did your favorite band put out a shit sandwich? Random purchase turn out to be total crap? Let's hear your worst of the year.

Opeth - Heritage

This album was a major disappointment in many ways, not the least of which is that it sounds like a boring attempt at making a Camel record. The production is lacking, the songs are meandering and the entire thing feels like it would've been better off as a side project.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Pretty much alot of pop music that deliberately tries to insult my intelligence.

Prime examples LMFAO, Kesha and Black Eyed Peas.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Queensryche - Systematic Chaos
Red Hot Chili Peppers - I'm With you
Jane's Addiction - Great Escape Artist

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Radiohead's The King of Limbs is the first album of theirs I haven't bought.
Luckily I was able to stream it before wasting any money.

Probably the most disappointing effort from a dependable band since The Flaming Lips' Embryonic.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Both these bands need to seriously consider retirement. Their relevance is about 10-20 years past it's expiration date.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Lulu owns this thread.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Yeah, the obvious answer is Lulu.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Lulu is on listed as someone's album of the year on the Best of the Year thread :lol:

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Radiohead's King Of Limbs is dreadful.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

I'm convinced that KOL is Radiohead's inside joke that anyone will buy their music and call it genius no matter what it is.

I'm With You is horrific, as most of RHCP's work without John F. is.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Not necessarily the "worst album", but the winner of the "Largest Disparity between My Perception of an Album's Quality and General Critical Consensus" for me is Fleet Foxes' "Helplessness Blues". Honestly, I've tried to listen to this thing ten times and each time I wind up switching if off less than three songs in. It's a painful snooze of a record, mixing boredom and twee cutesyness in equal measure. Judging by the critical raves, I'm way off base.

I have to say, I don't get this whole trend towards indie down-tempo soft rock these days. Dawes, Real Estate, Best Coast, Midlake, Mumford and Sons, Iron and Wine, Megafaun, Grizzle Bear etc: they're all various combinations of Jackson Browne, America, Joni Mitchell and a variety of other west coast 70s singer-songwriters as far as I can tell but without the songwriting chops and charm of those artists. To me, they're either narcotically sleepy (Real Estate... snore) or irritatingly precious (Best Coast... puke). Also, to sound like an oldster: Dean Wareham cornered this market 20+ years ago.

These are some of the most acclaimed artistes these days, so obviously I'm wrong.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Helplessness Blues is a fantastic record. I know it's disorienting to hear a band that can actually play their instruments and don't rely on sampling, autotune and rap "guest stars".

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The songs have come to grow on me (through much repetition), but I do agree it doesn't feel like an Opeth record. I was just playing "Grand Conjuration" on Rock Band and itmade me miss that Opeth.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

... OK. That's helpful.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

You're welcome

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

I listened to the samples of Lulu on iTunes out of curiosity. Wow . . . I've never been a metal guy, but that was awful.

Later, I was buying some new Christmas music on there and saw Scott Weiland had a Christmas album. I clicked that out of curiosity. What a stinker. The reviews are funny too.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

I agree with Hiro, Helplessness Blues was the biggest disappointment of the year. Everything that made Fleet Foxes great, especially their melodies, seems to be gone. They still sing well but it's almost like they approached their melody/notes/song structure/singability in a challenging way...on purpose. It has nothing to do with the songs being slow, or soft, or that the drummer only uses mallets when playing...it's just bad.

From what I know they had a whole batch of songs that were great and scraped them. I'd like to hear those instead.

And save the criticism about not wanting challenging music, or only liking sample based rap records. I love records that are difficult and take time to digest. But more importantly I like records that are good.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

LuLu isn't metal, it's crap

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

in my mind Radiohead's music (if you want to call it that) continues a downward spiral into pretentious unmemorable crap - for a band who could at one point write an actual tune (The Bends, OK Computer) the output of recent songs is a nosedive into mediocrity.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

I strongly suggest you revisit the incredible In Rainbows album, and it's "b-sides".

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Nickelback.

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I've never heard anything from it and was frankly unaware they'd even released a new album. But I agree with Dave.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Of stuff I actually listened to this year, Los Campesinos' "Hello Sadness" gets the nod as my 'worst album of 2011'. You can tell from the title that it's not gonna be a giddy rave-up, and they've been heading down this road for a while, but...ack. Joylessly melodramatic...not a single memorable, hooky song in the bunch...the female vox are pretty much gone in this one...seriously sounds like a bunch of Cure b-sides.

As much as I dug "Excuse" by The Ettes, the rest of "Wicked Will" didn't really do anything for me. I think I learned that St. Vincent isn't my thing so much after giving "Strange Mercy" a spin. I felt pretty let down by They Might Be Giants' "Join Us", but I didn't think it was bad so much as...not good. Aside from "Judy Is Your Viet Nam", very little on that album makes much of an impression. I've warmed up to it slightly over the past couple of months, tho'...

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

Biggest disappointments for me include The Aquabats' Hi-Five Soup! and The Dear Hunter's The Color Spectrum. The former isn't an Aquabats album, it's a fucking Yo Gabba Gabba album. The latter was just a spectacular failure of a concept project. Both made me very sad.

Re: Worst albums of 2011
 

In Flames - Sounds of a Playground Fading.

More like the sounds of one of the greatest metal bands fading. What a sad state for this once-amazing band.