When awesome bands make shitty records

Many years ago I interviewed Brian Baker, who you may know from such bands as Minor Threat, The Meatmen, Bad Religion, and Dag Nasty. I asked him how it happened that even though Dag Nasty was such a great band, they wrote some absolutely fucking terrible songs. His answer was, "Hey, you can't win 'em all," which I thought was pretty insightful. Nobody bats 1.000, and even the best bands go wrong from time to time. Here are some examples of just that...

There is a clear, positive correlation between the passage of time and Suicidal Tendencies being shitty. Note the inflection points at the release of extra shitty albums.

Suicidal Tendencies - The Art of Rebellion
OK, to be fair this is more of an example of shark jumping than an aberration or outlier. Any way you slice it, though, this record fucking sucks like crazy. I mean I liked "Lights Camera Revolution" when it came out, but this was a dealbreaker. Even though it was kind of gay and crappy too, it had some great songs like "You Can't Bring Me Down" and "Lost Again." Then Mike Muir got too far up his own ass and tried to be an artist or whatever. I don't mean to be the "I only like the demo/first album" guy, because those people are the worst, but Suicidal is really the perfect example of a band that just gets worse with every album.

What is this shit?! Where did the NOT! banner and bermuda shorts go?! In the words of Discharge, "why why why why why"?

Anthrax - The Sound of White Noise
Remember the part in Lords of Chaos where one of the Norwegian BM dorks is talking about how he saw a picture of some band "wearing jogging suits and riding skateboards" and got very angry and confused? I'm pretty sure he was talking about Anthrax, and I can only imagine how difficult it would be for some Scandinavian hick to understand the nuances of five Jews from Queens imitating Iron Maiden, Agnostic Front, and Public Enemy all at once (by the way, my father is from Norway, so I have a bit of Scandinavian hayseed in my veins). But that's why we loved Anthrax: their whimsical, fun loving brand of thrash made you forget your troubles and whisked you away to a magical land where the streets were paved with mosh riffs.

In any case, a lot of people thought Persistence of Time was the beginning of the end for Anthrax, but I disagree. I thought PoT was pretty great. TSOWN is when Anthrax officially began their shockingly rapid descent into a state that would make being a laughingstock positively dignified by comparison. Why did they get rid of Joey and start writing lame, boring songs about fucking ski lodges or whatever? What happened to the jogging suits and skateboards? Why not just urinate on the sodomized corpse of everything your once-great band stood for?! Arggghhh!

At this point they were barely even phoning it in.

S.O.D. - Bigger Than The Devil
Obviously I am a big SOD fan. When I discovered them in 1991 or so, it was as though I was Christopher Columbus, piercing the fog to reveal the pristine shores of a whole new world before me, full of riches the likes of which even the most avaricious man could only dream of! Also, it was the closest thing to wigger slam that existed back then, so needless to say I was happier than a pig in shit.

Apparently they blew their load with "Speak English or Die," though, because SOD became one of the most absolutely wretched bands to ever disgrace the planet quite shortly after releasing it. They turned into basically the thrash metal version of Weird Al, even sinking so low as to write cringeworthy novelty/parody songs like "Seasoning The Obese" and "Celtic Frosted Flakes" on their 1998 album "Bigger Than The Devil." It's not just bad, it's awful on a level rarely approached by mere mortals. You have to scour YouTube for clips of John Cena rapping aggressively at Brock Lesnar before you come close to these levels of douchebaggery.

I am about to show you something so horrible that I must warn you before you go any further. Do not scroll down if you have a heart condition, are prone to fainting, or if you are eating. It is a spectacle so hideous that even the dark and twisted mind of HP Lovecraft could not have spawned it; even the slimy tentacles of Cthulu cannot inspire revulsion such as the following video can. With that warning in hand, click at your own risk! Recoil in horror at the atrocities that are birthed upon the world when Billy Milano listens to The Offspring too much!!



What other awesome bands made a shitty record?
As always, it is now your turn. There are many more great bands who put out crap, please help us list every single one of them!