The Roundtable
What is your worst music purchase ever?
Sesame Street taught us that we all make mistakes. Some of them are large ones that make your family hate you, while others are small quips or purchases that you will laugh about later in life. Today we posed the question: What is your worst musical purchase?
Mark Steffen - There are few things worse than witnessing your former ideals get washed down the same drainpipes that have caressed the bile and remains of N Sync and Milli Vanilli. Unfortunately, Green Day managed to forego every aspect of appeal that brought us Dookie and Ker-Plunk when American Idiot hit Wal-Mart shelves in 2004.
While they’d been on the decline for a while, I had kept faith. I clutched on to “J.A.R.” and its B-side strength when Insomniac fell to the bottom of the barrel. I let the vaudevillian antics of Nimrod fly past my brain’s radar of honesty. I even decided to let Warning! slide because of a few choice “shock value” tracks.
But a punk rock opera? Nay, a poor punk rock opera, packed to the shrink-wrap with trite anarchistic clichés and calls to the front of the battle against suburbia by thirty-somethings with children… this simply cannot fly even in my ear’s International Airspace. The album is set up, as one might guess, like every other rock opera. Smatterings of narrative trickle across the hyper-power-chord-only guitars, all of which are set to stun. The album supposedly tells the story of “The Jesus of Suburbia,” the liberation from his home, the return after fighting off his upbringing.
While, in theory, this sounds like a good concept, even a sound and mature viewpoint on the rapidly changing “punk” mindset, Green Day came to us as raucous as possible. They smashed things. They did not smash certain things and then accept a check from a big box retailer. The entire album lacks the punch in the face that made, and still makes, albums from a happier, more honest era so much fun to listen to.
Let’s not forget that this album was offered with the explicit lyrics removed and with a marketing scheme that would put Madonna to shame. American Idiot has no oomph, no balls and no fun… and the simple, formulaic pop punk songs that those ingredients created are all we really wanted from Green Day.
Amy Dittmeier - It’s hard to pick a truly bad music purchase out of my collection of music. There are some albums that I did truly like at one point. I sometimes spin my old Alien Ant Farm CD and remember those middle school days on the school bus, thinking I was so cool because I was listening to Alien Ant Farm pre -“Smooth Criminal” fame. The albums I think that are bad now still have a certain sense of nostalgia. But there are a few purchases that are just downright rancid.
I was dating this guy back when I first started college who was a classical guitar major. I have this awful weakness for musicians, so of course I tried my best to understand what exactly classical guitar was all about while we were together. The guy really liked this classical guitarist Al Di Meola, so on a Borders trip I decided to buy one of his albums to check it out. His album covers are ridiculous. Basically, most of them are him looking like a total molester with his guitar and creepy glasses standing next to a really attractive woman who is usually wearing nothing.
I decided to pick the most ridiculous looking album cover, which happened to be his 1991 release Kiss My Axe. The name alone should have warned me, but at the time I thought it humorous. I got back to the dorms, popped it into my CD player and lay down in bed to give it a listen. It was awful. It was just a bunch of sweep picking and Latin world jazz-fusion bullshit. I don’t think I listened to one full track; I just skipped around hoping for something better. It didn’t get better. The name and cover were the best part of the album. Goes to show you, bad albums covers usually mean the album is just as bad.
Alyssa Vincent - Sometimes, I have dreadful taste in music. However, when I compare my worst music purchase ever to some of the less-than-stellar artists and songs in my collection - like N*SYNC, Ace of Base and Dave Matthews Band - they sound like the best things that have ever hit my ears. So, the award for worst purchase goes to In Advance of the Broken Arm by Marnie Stern. Yeah, she's a genius for most people. Critics really seem to like her. As I write this, I'm listening to it again, desperately trying to find a redemptive quality amidst all the awful noise. The only thing that the album has going for it are decent song titles like "Put All Your Eggs in One Basket and Then Watch That Basket!!!" Yeah, I'll watch that basket. As long as I don't have to listen to you wail and bang on pots, Marnie. It might be progressive and amazing for some, but I'm going to pass on it.
Lisa White - I can honestly say I have never regretted any of the musical purchases I've made in life. I've bought some awful music in my day, including the first Jessica Simpson release; but I was young and naïve. But even the bad stuff gave me insight into the difference between horrible and good music. And when you're really young and your parents get you MC Hammer on vinyl, it doesn't matter. You're still going to love dancing around the basement to "Can't Touch This" even though it's not a shimmering example of good music. So I'll stand by my purchases in the past, even The Space Jam soundtrack, The Moffatts and the *N SNYC Christmas album. For better or for worst, those atrocious examples of music helped make me into the music fan I am today. Although that Jessica Simpson album I mentioned earlier was pretty awful.
Posted by Wes Soltis on Aug 15, 2008 @ 7:00 am
