Eager to Be Held

I'm stunned that someone has been payed to sit down and compile a list of the top 10 most overrated albums ever, and they have come up with this, frankly bizarre list.

Original Source:

1. Oasis - (What's the Story) Morning Glory?



Let's face it – it's been long enough that you can say it without fear of a glassing. While Definitely Maybe may have been a brilliant debut, filled with classic guitar pop songs, Oasis' follow-up was a "will-this-do" effort cobbled together around half-a-handful of great songs. Some Might Say was glorious, Don't Look Back In Anger something Rod Stewart might have grunted his way through in the late 1970s. But it's not just Be Here Now people should be shaking their heads over – this is an average effort elevated to mystifyingly mythic status.

OK, maybe this album is a bit overrated and maybe number 10 would be more appropriate But every track is great in it's own way, and Be Here Now was waayyyy more overrated. Beside, any Oasis albums would be inferior compare with their stellar debut. The material and also not to forget, the timing of Definitely Maybe was just perfect.

2. The Stone Roses - The Stone Roses



Before the cocaine and the recriminations, The Stone Roses managed just one album. After The Smiths and before Britpop, Britons had to have something to call their own, and so duly bestowed the Mancunians' debut with classic honours. The fact that it's an atrociously-produced racket with some pleasant jangly pop songs butchered by a scally chancer doing a fair approximation of a foghorn seems to have been forgotten.

Ian Brown can't sing, we all know that, but his voice sits perfectly atop Reni, Mani and John's jamming, and there should be no doubting that. I can't imagine anyone else singing Stone Roses songs. One of the best guitar solos ever are in I Am The Resurrection and some of the guitar playing is jaw dropping. And it's all pure skill. They don't use (or even have) any gimmick or technology at that time. They rehearsed for 5 years before they even went to a studio.

3. The Doors - LA Woman



The Doors' place in the pantheon of over-rated artists is assured. Jim Morrison's final album with the band before his death in a Paris hotel room made this record his last artistic statement. Speaking ill of the dead isn't clever – suffice to say Morrison's passing may have had something to do with this record receiving its plaudits.

I only own The Best of The Doors and The Doors self-titled. Own here as in own a physical copy of course. So I can't really comment based on my listening experience. But would anyone who has heard and live through this album would put it in the top 10 of the most overrated album ever?

4. Patti Smith - Horses



Influential? Of course. The work of a genuine artist? Absolutely. Worthy of the slavering attention it has got in best-of lists ever since? Not quite. Sure, it may have lit the fires of inspiration in the heads of Michael Stipe et al, but can you name any track on it apart from Gloria (a cover, natch)?

I wouldn't waste my time reasoning with someone or something written by someone which doesn't allowed any reasoning in the first place.

5. Alanis Morissette - Jagged Little Pill



Gazillion-selling navel gazing from a former Canadian child star which wrote the rulebook for a generation of Starbucks-folk pretenders and whinnying pseudo-psychologists.

Don't really care for this album to be honest. I just don't the see the overrated part from this. Is it because Alanis sold shit-loads of it? Or is it because Alanis' career went downhill afterwards? Whatever. But this is the first (and unfortunately also the last) time Alanis was a true rock icon for me. She also has the best live band that time. Taylor Hawkins on drums? Jesse Tobias guitars? Go figure.

6. Coldplay - X & Y



Parachutes was a few good singles stitched together with filler, A Rush Of Blood To The Head a genuinely classic follow-up confident enough to have Radiohead and U2 looking over their shoulders. You can't help feeling, however, than 2005's X&Y was inferior stuff. Talk's haunting melody, after all, was courtesy of Kraftwerk, and Speed Of Sound is head and shoulders above everything else here. A case of slightly-delayed second album syndrome.

Don't see why they leveled and pointed their criticism at Talk? Because they used (and got permission for) Kraftwerk's melody? Pffttt... Maybe Kraftwerk is a messiah for the writer. And thou shalt not used their melody. EVER.

7. The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band



The gaudy music hall cover says it all; messy and overblown. Sandwiched between the experimental ballsiness of Revolver and The White Album's lysergic grandeur, Sgt Pepper's can't help but pale in comparison.

Sgt Peppers - messy and overblown? The White Album could easily have been made into one disc (aside from 2 or 3 tough choices fitting them on). Sgt. Peppers is as experimental as Revolver, and is a great album. Just because lots of people hailed this album as their best ever, doesn't mean we need to look for imaginative and witty excuses to disagree just to look "different".

8. Keane - Hopes and Fears



No guitars, they boasted, as if the absence of six strings was akin to Never Mind The Bollocks. No, it just makes you sound like Queen without Brian May.

Eh? Keane? Seriously? I didn't even think this album, or Keane themselves for that matter, have made such an impact at the time when this album released. Nor for it would have even been considered in the top 10 most overrated albums ever.

9. The Streets - A Grand Don't Come for Free



Mike Skinner's debut, Original Pirate Material, was an evocative, stripped down affair, giving UK garage the kick up the backside that it so desperately needed. His follow-up, however, was the sound of a man entranced by his own hype; a "concept" album, its kitchen sink lyrics were bogged down in the mundane, and its laddish tales of drugs, girls, gambling and break-ups more clichéd than the gushing music press ("An essential listen for anyone interested in where music might take them", Uncut) were prepared to acknowledge.

Big disappointment after Original Pirate Material, yes I fully agree. But the 9th overrated album EVER? I own many albums that are worst than this.

10. Jeff Buckley - Grace



Vocal acrobatics worthy of Mariah Carey here; Tim Buckley's son takes on his father's mantle of wracked self-absorption (and also, tragically, a similarly early death). Rolling Stone mag were right when they gave it three stars – you can't fault Buckley's pluck, but Grace is an album that only hints at greatness.

There is just NO WAY on this planet that Grace would EVER made it into an overrated album list. Only hints at greatness? Maybe only hints at Jeff's greatness. And that comparison to Mimi is just laughable really. Also, no one seems to mention Jeff's guitar playing skills when talking about this album. Some of the guitar parts are amazing and surreal. This album is a joy to play even if you can't sing it. Ask anyone who can play more than 3 chords if you don't believe me.

This list is bullshit. End of.

Personally, I don't even understand what is meant by overrated. What are the requirements? The factors to make a certain entity eligible to be label overrated?

Sorry for the rant people. Blame pills, thrills and bellyaches for these words of idiocy.

oh by the way, all you lucky American citizen. You all will get a free Dr. Pepper isn't it? Since the almighty W. Axl. Rose has finally finished and submitted Chinese Democracy. Yay! Now that's overrated.

cheers,
/jp