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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
nrchy's avatar
nrchy
2,124 posts
 
Everything reveiwed by stereophile (well almost) sucks.
Anything that passed for grunge sucked!
Led Zeppelin IV was so overrated it is impossible to go into detail that would cover all of it.
The Eagles-Hotel California, if only they would step inside and someone would have followed them with a match!
U2s Joshua Tree was pretty sad but their previous outings were listenable
AC DC metalica iron maiden: all metal for the mindless.
Pink Floyd The Wall. I like Pink Floyd but it possible to hear on Animals (one of my favs) that Roger is running out of theings to say. Unfortunately he had to record a double album to prove how little he had to say!
Jethro Tull Aqualung I am a huge fan of this band. I've seen them live more than any other band. Everyone can be excused a few lapses in reason. They did so many other albums which were good.
ben_campbell
1,169 posts
 
Nrchy whatever faults The Wall has (and it has a few imho)I don't see how you can accuse Waters of having not a lot to say-there a number of elements in this piece that he clearly hadn't explored before and a number that he expanded on,in fact as you point out lyrically Animals is "the" album that has stereotypical Waters themes.
And of course Jethro Tull are much better than the bands you mention........good grief.
nrchy's avatar
nrchy
2,124 posts
 
Listening to the wall is like listening to a primary school student provide social commentary of the British Empire. The album is self indulgent and sophomoric. Roger Waters seems to be of the opinion that because he has MONEY he has an opinion worth hearing. I disagree!
ben_campbell
1,169 posts
 
Nrchy I think now you are changing the argument but I agree up to a point but the main themes of the album are about Waters life.
I think Waters ego might be the main problem on this album but most of that is probably to do with the group dynamics at the time
As for your comment that it is social commentary about the British Empire?
That probably fits The Final Cut better in terms of description.
It's quite a brave record in a way,I agree some of it is simplistic but some of it is excellent too,to me it is flawed and signals the end of Floyd but it is too in many ways the apex of the concept album and that inevitably signals levels of pretension and conceit.
As for rock stars only thinking their opinions are valid because they are rich(and powerful), isn't that one of the themes he tackles on the record?
nrchy's avatar
nrchy
2,124 posts
 
I'm not sure if he tackled it or was driven into the dirt by it! You're right about the Final Cut comments. I think we might have flailed this dead horse into submission, but the journey is its own reward.
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