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10 Terrible Albums By (Sometimes) Great Bands!

What were they thinking?!

Xentrix – Scourge (1996)

Xentrix – Scourge (1996, CD) - Discogs

Where do you start with this absolute abomination of an album?

From the bay area inspired thrash of their first two albums, to the Black Album inspired blandness of 1992’s Kin, UK thrashers Xentrix were never the most original sounding of bands but come 1996 – and the death of thrash – everything about Scourge reeked of desperation.

It’s hard to imagine the band themselves having any faith in this material. Throw in a bit of god-awful rapping and some terrible attempts at Pantera style groove metal and you end up with a hodge-podge of shite from a band who’d missed the boat entirely.

What you should be listening to: Shattered Existence or For Whose Advantage? are worthy UK thrash albums but, perhaps surprisingly, it’s 2019’s comeback album, Bury The Pain, we’d recommend the most!


Machine Head – Cartharsis (2018)

Machine Head · Catharsis (CD) (2018)

Having bravely battled back from their near implosion after the release of the risible and nu-metal inflected Supercharger, Machine Head put out a string of strong albums (Through The Ashes Of Empires, The Blackening, Unto The Locust, Bloodstones and Diamonds) predominantly featuring the rock solid line-up of Dave McClain (Sacred Reich) and Phil Demmel (Vio-lence) that saw them claw back their respectability and credibility.

However, in 2018 Robb Flynn had other plans and bravery / foolishly (delete where applicable) decided that he knew better than his bandmates and that the world wanted to hear him rap again. Funnily enough, the vast majority of us didn’t and neither did we want his Nu Metal faux bravado and boring riffs. Who knows what direction he’ll go in next but chances are it can’t be any worse than this lowest common denominator blandcore.

What you should be listening to: 1994’s debut Burn My Eyes (obviously) and The Blackening (2007) would be good for starters!


Slayer – Diabolus In Musica (1998)

Slayer – Diabolus In Musica (1998, Vinyl) - Discogs

Slayer are a band that could usually be counted on to deliver a massive dose of thrash metal goodness so, needless to say, when Diabolus In Musica dropped into our laps our flabber was well and truly gasted!

Was that hints of alternative metal we could hear? Why, yes it was. Nu metal? Sadly, yes.

For the most part the songwriting – fundamentally the work of the late genius that was Jeff Hanneman – was uncharacteristically tired and hardly to the high standard Slayer usually delivered. Even worse, the band sounded as if they’d gone from being pioneers to mere copyists.

It’s not all bad news though as “Bitter Peace”, “Deaths Head” and “In The Name Of God” are worth a blast every now and again but, for the most part, Slayer‘s 8th album was more ‘Boredom In Musica’.

What you should be listening to: Reign In Blood, Hell Awaits, Seasons in the Abyss, South of Heaven….pretty much every other album Slayer ever released!


Megadeth – Super Collider (2013)

Super Collider: Amazon.co.uk: CDs & Vinyl

It’s a well know fact that Megadeth are shite at doing cover versions (“Anarchy In The UK” is balls, end of story), so when a cover of the Thin Lizzy track “Cold Sweat” is one of the best songs on an album…..you know we’re in trouble!

It’s fair to say that nothing found on Super Collider is as terrible as the aural diarrhoea that was “Crush Em” but at least 1999’s Risk was interesting in parts, unlike the vast majority of uninspired, made for radio drivel that make up this stink-fest of an album.

Super Collider, more like fucking Pooper Collider!

What you should be listening to: Rust In Peace, Peace Sells… but Who’s Buying?, Endgame, Dystopia….anything but Super Collider!


Metallica – St . Anger (2003)

Metallica – St. Anger (2003, Edited Clean Version, CD) - Discogs

There’s no way we could have a list of terrible albums without including this god-awful shit attack of a release.

The question is, where do you start with this fucking abomination?

Is it Lars’ biscuit tin drums?

Can blame be laid at the fact there’s no solos to break up the sheer monotony of most of the music?

Or was it the terrible, self help lyrics that seem to have been penned by a teenager who’s been grounded over the weekend by his parents? Frantic, tick, tick, tock indeed.

Who fucking knows? But the results were abysmal.

In their haste to stay relevant, and by swaying towards the popular trends in metal at the time, this is probably the Metallica album that has aged the worst and to listen to St Anger, from beginning to end, is an endurance test to be attempted by only the strongest or the most idiotic.

The likes of “Dirty Window”, “Purify”, “Some Kind of Monster” etc are easily amongst the worst things Metallica have ever penned and the fact that this utter pish sold several million copies just goes to show that Metallica could probably record their bowel movements and muppets would still buy it (they did, it was called Lulu)!

What you should be listening to: Kill ‘Em All, Ride The Lightning, Master Of Puppets & …And Justice for All, of course!

We’ve finally come to the end of our marathon of mediocrity. Feel free to tell us whether you agree or disagree with our 10 Terrible Albums By (Sometimes) Great Bands in the comments below! 

About Gavin O'Connor (161 Articles)
Lifelong Heavy Metal fan. First got into Quo and Leppard, when I was 9 or so I first heard Megadeth and that was me hooked

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