Every year produces great music and a nearly equal amount of
terrible music. Then there's the not-so-creamy middle, the albums that have no
real reason to exist, but nonetheless find their way to music-store shelves and
online music stores. Why? The A.V. Club has no answer. We're just here
to document them in all their inglorious splendor. So, behold, the utterly
puzzling, almost-already-forgotten Least Essential Albums Of 2007.
Least
Essential Album From A Guy Who Once Made Essential Albums
Perry
Farrell's Satellite Party, Ultra Payloaded
Every time Perry Farrell makes new music, he
forces old fans to question why they loved him so much to begin with. Could a
guy capable of making a record as flat and uninspired as Ultra Payloaded even be the same person who
built such passion into Nothing's Shocking? (Answer: apparently yes.) Payloaded isn't even terrible, for
the most part (okay, some of it's terrible), it's just shocking that it feels
so completely manufactured, like a guy trying to synthesize an album in a lab
instead of trying to make visceral music. Oh, and those lyrics… "We are fresh
berries / Dip us in chocolate / Stripped and strewn around the room / Whatever's
in your closet set it free." Ugh, ugh, and more ugh.
Least Essential Souvenir From A Benefit-Concert
Sequel That No One Seemed All That Jazzed About To Begin With
Live Earth: The Concerts For A Climate In
Crisis
(Warner Bros.)
Let's say you're a huge fan of the Beastie Boys.
You own all their studio albums. You even picked up the greatest-hits disc,
just to have the artwork. You've seen 'em perform. But are you willing to throw
down the dough for a double-DVD/single-CD compilation just to get "Intergalactic"
in both audio and visual form? You aren't. Ditto for the other bands on this
collection of live gunk from the Live Earth concerts. Hey organizers:
Why don't you take all the money you spent manufacturing these piles of paper
and plastic, and just give it to a worthy cause? Seriously, no one is going to
learn from between-song crap like "Let your civic leaders and representatives
know that polar bears aren't the only ones sitting on thin ice!" (Last we
checked, 4-year-olds don't buy Live Earth compilations.)
Least Essential Album Recorded For A Great
Cause
Instant Karma: The Amnesty International
Campaign To Save Darfur
Bless the good people at Amnesty International for
trying to stop the tragic genocide in Darfur. However, an international peace
organization should have stepped in to prevent the making of Instant Karma. This collection of woeful
John Lennon covers is a devastating act of violence against the ex-Beatle's
solo catalogue. With a few exceptions—you're excused, Regina
Spektor—the 23 participating artists engage in a highly competitive game
of inessential one-upmanship. Just when you think it can't get any worse than
pop-reggae bozo Matisyahu doing "Watching The Wheels," here come Big & Rich
with "Strange Days"! Jack Johnson's "Imagine" is pretty bad, but Avril
Lavigne makes the same song sound even more callow and simplistic! Christina
Aguilera turning the gut-wrenching "Mother" into a Mariah Carey song is
offensive, but wait 'til you hear Black Eyed Peas take a dump on "Power To The
People"!
Least Essential Reissue
Blondie, No Exit
Before this year, Blondie's 1999 comeback record, No
Exit, was available only at
every single used-CD store on the face of the planet. Thankfully, it's been
reissued, enabling Blondie completists to once again pay full retail price for
the band's legendary collaboration with Coolio and the slinky would-be sex
anthem "Boom Boom In The Zoom Zoom Room," among other forgettable examples of
why the band should have never put this album out the first time.
Least
Essential Album By An Actor
Juliette
& The Licks, Four On The Floor
So
many choices this year. Another dull album by Billy Bob Thornton? Or how about
another dull album by Minnie Driver? But while there's nothing blazingly
essential about either, neither is as unnecessary as Four On The Floor, the second album by the
Juliette Lewis-fronted band Juliette & The Licks. Why? Because what's wrong
with it is what's wrong with so many albums: The songs just aren't there. Lewis
has an adequate-enough rock voice, and she's surrounded herself with decent
players (and a ringer in album drummer Dave Grohl) but there's nothing here that
isn't done better by that local band that plays well enough, but offers nothing
the least bit special. (You know the one.) It exists only because of Lewis, and
that's just not reason enough.
Least
Essential Musical Necrophilia
Dean
Martin, Forever Cool
When
Natalie Cole recorded a "duet" with her late father, did she know she was a
pioneer? A horrible, horrible pioneer? On Forever Cool, the disembodied voice of
Dean Martin is joined by Joss Stone, trumpeter Chris Botti, Robbie Williams,
Kevin Spacey (?), and others. At last, someone figured out a way to improve all
those crappy Dean Martin recordings! Here's the deal: If Martin wanted to
re-record "You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Loves You" with Shelby Lynne and Big Bad
Voodoo Daddy, he would have clawed his way out of the grave and into Capitol Studios.
Least
Essential Cover-Art Photoshop Abuse
Steve
Vai, Sound Theories Vol. I & II
Hey,
how do you illustrate that Steve Vai has theories on sound? Hmm… How about by
showing music floating in one ear, through his brain, and then out the other
ear in crazy loop-de-loop patterns? Brilliant!
Least
Essential Covers Album
Poison, Poison'd
There
are probably enough Poison fans out there interested in buying a new album of
Poison covers. (We don't know them, but we at least suspect they're out there.) But
do they want to buy a Poison covers album that isn't even all-new Poison
covers? After the first eight tracks, it's all from-the-archives stuff,
including the version of "Your Momma Don't Dance" from Open Up And Say… Ahh!, an album anyone
interested in Poison'd doubtlessly already owns. (Want a ninth new track? You'll
have to go to Wal-Mart to get the version with "SexyBack." Hope it's worth the
trip!)
Least
Essential Spoken-Word Framing Device
Mudvayne, By The People, For The People
For
this rarities collection, Mudvayne polled its fans to ask what tracks should be
included. Then the bandmembers chose the versions they liked best from their
collections of demos, live tracks, and acoustic performances. That's fine,
especially if you like Mudvayne. But did each track need an introduction from
the band? (The intro to "All That You Are": "This is 'All That You Are,'
recorded in Watsonville before the Lost And Found writing session. Enjoy 'All
That You Are.'") That's what liner notes are for, guys.
Least Essential Christmas Tribute Album That
Isn't Nearly As Fun As You Might Hope
Monster Ballads Xmas (Razor & Tie)
The only thing worse than a constant barrage of
classic Christmas songs is a barrage of Christmas covers. And when washed-up
metal bands dust off their cocks to rock out for Santa, a great sheen of
sadness falls over the North Pole, and elves start dying off by the hundreds.
If you wanted to hear Skid Row play "Jingle Bells" or Nelson barf all over "Jingle
Bell Rock," you could just smash your head into the ice half a dozen times.
Percentage of Monster Ballads Xmas purchases that will be made ironically: 97.2.
Least Essential Christmas Tribute Albums That
Make Those String-Quartet Tributes Seem Awesome By Comparison
Wreck The Halls' Holiday Tributes To Metallica,
Green Day, And AC/DC (Christmas Rock Records)
This series should get a secondary award for not
making any damn sense. Essentially, the Wreck The Halls players turn in
Muzak-like versions of heavy-metal songs—like that's never been done
before—and Christmas-ify them by adding Christmas-y sounding instruments,
like sleigh bells and organs. And nothing else. No Christmas melodies, no Santa
Claus singing "For Whom The Bell Tolls," just lite-instrumental versions of
songs you've heard a million times before. You'd never even guess they were
holiday-themed; you'll never want to listen to them twice.
Least
Essential Christmas Album, Period
KT
Tunstall, The KT Tunstall Holiday Collection
Scottish
pseudo-folkie Tunstall at least deserves credit for choosing good material. The
Pretenders' "2000 Miles" is a great Christmas song that's somehow avoided
getting overplayed over the years. But she doesn't cover it so much as recreate
it, doing her best Chrissie Hynde impression. But the worst comes later.
Covering "Fairytale Of New York" with UK semi-star Ed Harcourt, the pair simply
imitates Pogues singer Shane MacGowan and the late, great Kirsty MacColl. And
not well. Or accurately. The last part of MacColl's original string of
insults—"You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot"—gets
changed to "You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy blagger." At least we
think that's the word. But at least this Target exclusive is only $6.99 at Target.
Cheap, lousy blaggers need look no further for the perfect stocking-stuffer.
Least
Essential Album Of 2007
Original
Motion Picture Soundtrack, Alvin And The Chipmunks
This
might seem like a too-obvious choice, but to fully understand the
least-essentialness of this item, you have to burrow through several layers.
Not only is it a Chipmunk album in 2007, it's a Chipmunks album to accompany a
half-assed attempt to revive the Chipmunks for the CGI age. But the inessentiality
doesn't stop there. There are a few Chipmunkized covers of recognizable songs
here ("Bad Day," "Funkytown"), and a couple of classic tracks from the
Chipmunks' heyday, but most of the tracks are generic dance-pop written and
produced by a production team billed as "The DeeTown Syndicate."
But
there's more: Not only are tracks like "Get You Goin'," "Get Munk'd," and "Ain't
No Party" ("Ain't no party like a Chipmunk party 'cause a Chipmunk party don't
stop…") uninspired, C&C; Music Factory-derived dance schlock, they're
actually disparaged in the movie itself. This is the music the Chipmunks make
after they sell out to evil music exec David Cross, and it's presented within
the film as awful, corporate sell-out music. And here it is for you to listen
to. But why would anyone ever do a thing like that?