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What are the 5 most overrated rock albums?

1. The Beatles: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band. The songs on this album are nowhere near as memorable as those on "Revolver" and "Rubber Soul". For that matter, this album is nowhere near as innovative, nor ultimately as influential, as either "Pet Sounds" or the first Velvet Underground album. I'm not the first to point out that blame for such artless excess as all seventeen minutes of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida rests primarily with Sgt. Pepper.

2. Pink Floyd: The Wall. All of the criticisms usually applied to late 70's stadium rock, i.e., that it was pretentious, bloated, pseudo-intellectual,and self-indulgent; apply doubly to this crock opera. If you want witty and insightful philosophizing on the human condition, read Nietzsche, H.L. Mencken, or Michel Foucault. To seek such wisdom from pop music, a genre defined by its righteous Dionysian folly, is the greatest folly imaginable.

Pearl Jam: 10. Johnny Rotten was bang on when he described Pearl Jam as "bloody awful" and as sounding like "Joe Cocker singing for Black Sabbath." To my ears, this sounds like so much bland 70's rock (e.g., Bad Company). As The Monkees are to The Beatles, so are Pearl Jam to Nirvana.

4. U2: The Joshua Tree. I don't know where to begin. These guys plagiarized Joy Division, and set their sublime riffs to dumbass lyrics bespeaking the most niave sort of Oprah Winfrey meets Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farms bourgeois liberalism. I've said it before, I'll say it again: If you make me listen to a record by someone named Bono, his first name better be SONNY.

5. Bob Marley & The Wailers: Exodus. Not only was Bob Marley not, by a long shot, the best pop music figure to come out of Jamaica, he wasn't even my favorite member of The Wailers. The monomaniacal cult of personality surrounding the deceased Robert Nesta Marley comes at the expense of all the other, far more exciting, music to come out of that poverty-stricken island. As Lester Bangs put it:

"Toots and the Maytalls, who never got promoted properly, are the real heat from a Stax/Volt kitchen, whereas Marley always struck me as being so laid back he seemed almost MOR. Rastaman Vibration was the last straw: an LP obviously calculated to break Disco Bob into the American Kleenex radio market full force, complete with chicklet vocal backdrops chirping 'Pos-i-tive!'
tweakgeek

Showing 6 responses by tweakgeek

tweakgeek OP
76 posts
 
Thanks for your responses. I'm glad that I was able to stir up some discussion. I'm even more glad that eveybody seems to be able to kvetch about LPs that annoy us, without getting nasty and abusive. Some of your choices for inclusion on this list are truly inspired, especially those from Kthomas.

Truth be told, a fairly comprehensive top ten list of the most overrated rock albums of all time might consist of Hotel California in the #1 slot, and everything The Smiths ever did in positions 2 through 10. I am also glad to know that I am not the only punter who thinks that Green Day bite the proverbial big one.
tweakgeek OP
76 posts
 
Ok Ben,
I'll accept your challenge, sort of. First rule of any best album list is that greatest hits packages and compilations must be left off. To include them would be cheating. Second rule is that there is only one entry per pop star (I'm not going to dignify this silly stuff with the term "artist"). Also, none of my beloved Jazz & Classical recordings are included here. They play ball in a different league. Everything before about 1965, and almost everything from Jamiaca is excluded. The LP as a genre is largely irrelevant both to the 50's and to Reggae. You'll have to see my singles list for these. For the same reason, Soul and R & B are underrepresented here.

Ben, you are giving me a sort of Sophie's Choice. I cannot edit the list down past 18 entries. Here are Tweakgeek's fave pop music albums (in no particular order)

Joy Division-Closer
Clinic-Internal Wrangler
Van Morrison-Astral Weeks
The Pogues-Rum, Sodomy & The Lash
Roxy Music-Siren
Pere Ubu-The Modern Dance
The Stooges-Funhouse
Curtis Mayfield-Curtis
Black Sabbath-Sabotage
AC/DC- Let There Be Rock
Abba-Super Trouper
The Cramps-Gravest Hits
Killdozer-12 Point Buck
David Bowie-The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust
Bruce Springsteen-Nebraska
The Rolling Stones-Exile on Main Street
The Stone Roses-The Stone Roses
Led Zeppelin-Physical Graffiti

Now folks, can we get back on topic?
Let the abuse of my faves begin!
tweakgeek OP
76 posts
 

I find Rush to be wildly entertaining, and consider them to be the funniest Rock band in the business. Your post brings to mind one of the most common criticisms of the film "This is Spinal Tap." Everyone can name at least a dozen real-life rock bands that are way funnier than Spinal Tap. Did anyone else catch that hilarious VH-1 "Behind the Music" segment on Styx? It was everything "This is Spinal Tap" should have been, but wasn't.

Yes indeed, Rush wouldn't be Rush, and Rick Wakeman wouldn't be Rick Wakeman, without their signature over-the-top pomposity. Our world would be a more somber place without them.
tweakgeek OP
76 posts
 
Ben, about The Pogues,
when I was hanging out in London in the late 70's, I knew Shane Mcgowan as an impossibly ugly obsessive Clash fan. His Gaelic sensibilities apparently came to him later in life: his t-shirt of choice back then usually bore the Union Jack.

In 1992 I was at a Pogues concert at the Town & Country. This was when Joe Strummer was singing for them. The experience was a bit of a mise-en-abime. I was standing by the bar watching Joe Strummer immitate Shane Mcgowan imitating Joe Strummer. In the midst of it all, Shane McGowan & his wife walked right up to the bar next to me. Very wierd.

That being said, I nevertheless nominate The Pogues for the dubious distinction of the best band of the 80's. There is hardly fierce competition for this honor (the Jam? Run DMC?)

While I'm at it, the following albums also deserve a place on my all-time best list:

T-Rex-Electric Warrior
The Residents-Commercial Album
Primal Scream-Screamadelica
Captain Beefheart-Trout Mask Replica
MC5-Back in the USA (do not attempt to play this one on a high-end system)
Tom Waits-Heartattack and Vine

Let's get back on the topic of trashing crappy rock albums that somehow enjoy outsized reputations. Does anybody else get an uncontrollable urge to take an axe to any speaker from which emanates the saccharine sweetness of Supertramp's "Breakfast in America"?
tweakgeek OP
76 posts
 
Alanis Morissette- Jagged Little Pill
I think this beats all! Every song on this stinker is worthy of heavy rotation on NPR's "Annoying Music Show."

For that matter, how about:

Joni Mitchell- Court & Spark
After listening to "Tears of Stone" only 2 or 3 times, I decided that this disc by the otherwise reliable Chieftains was due for a trip back to the used cd store. However, I gave it one last listen; this time programming the song delivered by Joni Mitchell out of the track sequence. This trick revealed a collection of remarkable and beautiful songs that I still listen to with great frequency. If you don't believe that Joni Mitchell is overrated, you should read her self-appraisal of the value of her own work. She credits her music with artistic merit, not on a par with such contemporaries as Joan Baez or Melanie, but rather with Ludwig Van Beethoven and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart!

Has the English language any phrase more horrifying than "Canadian singer-songwriter"?
tweakgeek OP
76 posts
 
Something we can all agree upon:

It gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling to know that we can all speak as one voice, in a united virtual community, and declare, without doubt or hesitation, that Creed sucks, as my Intro to Philosophy Professor was fond of saying, in all possible worlds.
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