Why Do Bad Records Get Made?

"absolutely" should mean "objectively" there FWIW

Most Mission records I could never figure out. I mean, Wayne Hussey *knew* they were cliches but invested everything with such depth.

(Depth in *his* mind, I should say -- I'm a fan, but I was groaning most of the time.)

For that matter, all Sisters of Mercy records after they stopped making 12"s and started making albums. First and Last and Always is O.K., but can't hold a candle to the Alice/Floorshow EP, or the Body Electric 12", or even to the Walk Away EP, despite the presence of Walk Away on First and Last and Always. Eldritch's lyrics go down the pipe; once-interesting production goes flat; and then there's Floodland: eek! I think artists make bad records because you have to keep making records to "remain viable," and if you haven't got a good one in you at a given time, you just do whatever you're capable of at and hope it's at least interesting. Why Andrew Eldritch never wrote a good lyric after 1984 remains a profound mystery.

What's with the recent deluge of totally mediocre Robert Pollard product? I'm hesitant to place the blame entirely on some sort of mid- life crisis sort of thing (because I'm not sure those even exist), but there has to be SOMETHING motivating him into besmirching GBV's good name with mountains of bland lo-fi crap. That said, I can usually grasp the reasoning behind most records I think are bad or mediocre or whatever--it's sometimes an attempt at appealing to wider audience (the myth of the sellout) or a bid for acceptance as an "artiste" or an artist trying to rebuild a fading or crumbling personal image by making drastic and ill-advised changes. Bad records are easier to dismiss when one can categorize them that way--"Oh, yeah, that's their Disco record," or "Michael Jackson just needs to quit." It's when a bad record comes out of nowhere (a la "The Boy with the Arab Strap") that my faith in an artist is truly shaken. Is that rockist of me? (The concept of "faith" in a band or whatever, I mean.)

PS And the concept that said "faith" that was invested in a whole body of work can be shaken or destroyed by a single crappy record?

why do bad movies get made???? KUNG POW ENTER THE FIST! wtf??

Why Andrew Eldritch never wrote a good lyric after 1984 remains a profound mystery.

But John, it's easy -- he directed his brain towards the interviews he gave. Those are uniformly great.

"Ribbons" was released after 1984, as were "Flood I" and "More". (Much as I like them, not even I am foolish enough to defend "Dominion", "This Corrosion", or "Lucretia My Reflection" on their lyrical merits.)

Much as I like them, not even I am foolish enough to defend "Dominion", "This Corrosion", or "Lucretia My Reflection" on their lyrical merits
HEY now. Hey now now.

(a) I think a split develops between how much the artist imagines people are interested in the music and how much people actually are interested in the music, especially in the case of prolific mediocrity like Pollard's. Artists are tricked into thinking that the bulk of their fans are discerning listeners, when in actuality the core of any fan base consists of dedicated clinging fanboys; but the artist, imagining these folks to really be his/her critical audience, starts releasing material that is marginally interesting to them, the already-invested, as a document of What The Artist Is Up To Now, but completely useless to the teeming hordes who don't really care What The Artist Is Up To Now unless the artist is up to something that's actually good.

(b) I think there's this Venn Diagram thing that happens, where portions of an artist's aesthetic are really spot-on and wonderful, whereas other portions are just straight-up bad from the beginning. Some artists start within that good portion but then evolve over into the portion of their aesthetic that doesn't overlap with any recognizable sort of goodness. This is most obvious when artists try to "incorporate" other genres into their work and wind up displaying their complete incompetence in said other genres.

(c) Most importantly: big studios are stressful and expensive places, which is why I think pop artists are a bit more likely to accidentally make unredeemed ridiculous crap. Imagine an artist stuck in a big studio with a disagreeable producer and a label on their back and aesthetic in-fighting between musicians who are already on too many drugs to have a very clear picture of what they're doing. . . And then imagine the call coming down that a whole lot of money has been spent, and something better be done damn soon. (This is the major-label rocker ghetto, basically.) I think we all know the kind of messy, ridiculous records that come out of this. . . . "Experiments" that fail, but which the artist is still into based on their having been "experimental." . . . Half-assed rockers where two weeks were spent on the guitar tone, but then they had to borrow a bridge from an unrelated song so they could wrap it up on time. . . . And basically every other kind of thing that you can convince yourself sounds okay at the time, but you'd realize the crappiness of if you just waited a day and played it again.

(d) I think ego has a lot to do with that, which goes back to the fan base issue. "I'm a great artist!" the artist thinks. "Look at all these fans who like me stuff!" The artist thinks this greatness is some inherent soulful thing that has nothing to do with studious quality assurance, as actually questioning the goodness of your product is so not rock'n'roll, right? And when everyone says the record is crap, the artist looks at that central core of slavish fans and says, "Hey, I'm doing this for the fans. The fans understand."

"French Rock'n'Roll" by Black Box Recorder. What was Haines thinking?

In order for bad records to have existence, they have to be made. One cannot speak of "bad records" as something which actually exist, unless they have in fact been made. It is futile to ask why they are made, once you have acknowledged that they exist; if they had not been made, they would not exist.

Maybe the musicians in question think what they're doing is good. Or at least they think that at the time. Whether you're a musician or not, most everyone has made a bad decision or had a moment of faulty judgement. It's not difficult to imagine how a "bad" record could be made. Humans aren't perfect.

And I say that about musicians AND the critical consensus. Works of art often fall in and out of favor with time. How much work initially released to indifference or scorn later became revered (or the opposite)? How many of us, personally, have come to like something we initially didn't like? How do those "bad" judgements get made?

Most people--and ESPECIALLY most musicians, who are (understandably) apt to get lost in the sheer fun of creating sounds and writing tunes- -have lousy bullshit radars. I know that sounds terribly snobby, but what else makes, for example, some jam band put mediocre eight-minute wankathons in almost every song they do (besides weed)?

I'm a music director at a college radio station, and I get a shitload of records every week for which I cannot even fathom the thinking behind. I marvel at their shittiness on a daily basis, and leave the station feeling almost physically ill sometimes. You would not believe some of the offensively mediocre shit that comes our way--it really is depressing. I'm constantly asking myself: "What drives these people to create this stuff?" It's not as if I expect a deep answer or something; "to score chicks" is fine, but if it were true, you'd think the music would be a little better in order to accomplish said goal.

Someone asked me the other day: "Clarke, why do you like drone-y ambient stuff so much?" After I thought about it for a while, something hit me. I think that stuff is therapy for me--it's not some "immersive bath of meditative bliss" (well it can be but not always), it's functional. After having so much bullshit pumped into my ear canals on a daily basis, I need something to clean them out, something to make ME feel clean and fresh.

They want beer/drugs and sex! and bad records get beer/drugs and sex. So, why put the effort in making a good record if that wouldn't even get you beer/drugs and sex. (This is a gross stereotype and probobly doesn't apply to most bad records)

...then, they injest the drugs they got by making their bad record and make another bad record while under the influence.

Regarding Nitsuh's Venn Diagram thing, when good artists make bad records, it seems to me it's usually due to the pressure to always do something new and different. The need to make it good simply gets overlooked.

Regarding Nitsuh's Venn Diagram thing

It really is this thing, isn't it.

Lots of interesting reasons for crap records, but I think they're all a bit lofty, when the main reason records are crap are far more mundane. If an artist attains a degree of success, they get distracted. Simple as that. Keeping music interesting is hard bloody work, dammit! (Of course, sometimes great things are made with no effort, but if it's the same auteur or unit over a period of time, some effort is required to not fall back on patterns.) Once the artist spends time taking drugs (which after all is purely a coping strategy for musician's bizarre work schedules - any 'inspiration' resulting is a secondary effect that is often mistaken for a primary one), or in divorce court, or saving the Amazon or whatever, the level of though (or emotional investment) they put in their product is going to decline precipitously. (If the artist has been conspicuously unsuccessful, the product suffers because they start to doubt themselves and get desperate.)

bad records, or any bad art for that matter, when the creative process becomes merely a job. so a band has been making records for a while, maybe they were inspired and commercially successful for a time, but now the inpiration is lacking, but there is still a contract, a need for an album to tour for, etc etc. I mean, if I am making music for myself or in a band that is basically just for fun, if the material is going nowhere I can just dump it and start fresh. If i depend on it for my lively hood or because it's ALL I KNOW HOW TO DO, I would probably be a lot less inclined to wait around for true inspiration to strike. I think a lot of artists know whne their work isn't that great, but it's hard to admit it. There is a bit of the subjectivity Tom spoke of in the original question, however in my experience it is usually negative. That is, the artist is more likely to undervalue their own work rather than to think it is great. Since it's the producer's job to deal with these issues for the most part, you can blame a lot of bad records on the producer. he only reason for releasing an album like Waking up with the house on fire after the first two records (culture club), or Autoamerican (good singles aside), was that the producer said don't worry, it's good enough (sadly Mike Chapman in the case of Blondie, but he was getting to the end of his own rope around that time i think). This pretty much only applies to bands that started out good and then lost it, and major lable or big indie bands, the real indie bands tend to call it quits when they run out of ideas rather than continue...

>bad records, or any bad art for that matter, when the creative process becomes merely a job. so a band has been making records for a while, maybe they were inspired and commercially successful for a time, but now the inpiration is lacking, but there is still a contract, a need for an album to tour for, etc etc.

Maybe this is where concept records come in? The concept as a crutch for artistic development?

Why Do Bad Records Get Made?

Because the Shaggs Dad wanted to "get 'em on tape while they're still 'hot!' "

Hey...in Billy Joels own mind, every album he does is a work of transcendant genious.
Even Milli Vanilli thought they were totally pimp. One of them even said "We are better than your Bob Dylan or Elvis. And your Beatles aren't as good as us." And if you listen to his voice (if it IS his voice) he sounds utterly sincere. He *actually* honestly thinks he makes fantastically amazing music that is beyond reproach.

Why Do Bad Records Get Made?

To get a $28million payout for your label to get the fuck rid of you.

I knew I could get another "Glitter" reference in before the weekend!

.. although I gotta give kudos to Lord Custos for the Shaggs answer.

Maybe the musicians in question think what they're doing is good. Or at least they think that at the time. Whether you're a musician or not, most everyone has made a bad decision or had a moment of faulty judgement. It's not difficult to imagine how a "bad" record could be made. Humans aren't perfect.

And I say that about musicians AND the critical consensus. Works of art often fall in and out of favor with time. How much work initially released to indifference or scorn later became revered (or the opposite)? How many of us, personally, have come to like something we initially didn't like? How do those "bad" judgements get made?

Why is it that this kind of reasoning never gets anywhere in intellectual discussion/debate? Anyway, seems otm to me.

I submit that the "filler" on Autoamerican is different enough, and produced interestingly enough, and the singles were so very good, that the album is a success. There's still filler on it, though. And wait! Another chance for me to mention the outro again! "You're not really gonna put that on the album, are you?"

― Sean, Friday, 25 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

No, I know I closed that tag.

No doubt, but there's this thing called the shift key...

This question still seems an interesting one to me - dunno if there's anything to add to the good answers that were posted already but let's see.

Well, from seeing the team that surrounded Alanis Morissette during an internship, part of it is really that to be an excellent manager or publicist or whatever, you really have to believe in the indivisible talent of whoever you're with (a bit like joining a cult). So you get a lot of people around you that you trust always going "This is GREAT! Best album ever!" and you begin to believe your own press. There's no outside, and the praise really is sincere; it's just misguided. Beyond that, there's the fact that a lot of these people have really shitty taste in music, which allows them to swallow whatever and praise, say, Big and Rich to the sky.

Because most people who buy music don't care if it's good. They're barely even paying attention to anything besides the beat and the mix (read-*loudness*) anyway, so why should the labels? Frankly I blame the consumer. They fucking buy anything.

i.e.c otm

sometimes people try to do their best, but they fail anyway

This is nonsense, Kitty, because a lot of bad records don't sell very well at all, or only to devoted fans. Of course it's not unlikely that bad records wouldn't sell well: most people aren't idiots. But that doesn't answer the question of why they get made.

Because when you are actually *writing* a piece of music, it is almost impossible to judge how others will react to it.

I think an artist tends to value the work they have the most invested in. And the irony being, in my experience, the more you sweat over a piece and work on it, the less immediate it becomes - people often swoon over the most effortless things while ignoring the ones you sweated blood over.

x-post. maybe a little. but we're talking about different things here. I mean some "bad albums" are actually really interesting and some really popular ones are total lameness. I was really talking about the ultra-popular-yet-couldn't-be-any-worse albums out there. In that instance, i still blame the consumer.

Like what?

the consumers didn't make the bad record

Kitty yes but the question isn't why do bad albums get bought, but why do bad albums get MADE? "Because the makers know people will buy them" is one answer I agree, for some very popular records - but not that many! Even then, you'd think that making a record as good as possible rather than less good would mean a higher chance of a subsequent record getting made.

Actually I should have clarified something: I'm not asking "Why do records that I think are bad get made?". The answer to that is usually pretty obvious - they get made by men who have bought other records that I think are bad and want to copy them. I'm asking "Why do records get made that are disliked by people predisposed to like them?". So "Why do records fail their audiences?" would be closer.

not that i've necessarily made a good record, but my band, which released our first record last summer is thinking about recording.

this time it's a lot tougher...the first one represented all the time since we'd been a band, i guess close to 3 years by time it came out...so we wrote tons of songs and eventually discarded the bad ones...this time, if we do end up doing something this summer, i'd imagine we'll only have about 10 or 12 finished songs to choose from that are written, instead of 20+ and cutting down to ten...

"Why do records fail their audiences?"

Bands try to "branch out" and fail because they've overextended themselves; bands try to "stick to the formula" and fail because they're rehashing themselves; bands dry up creatively because of changed personal circumstances or because they only had X good records in them; bands receive all kinds of conflicting feedback and responses to their work, and sometimes they focus on the misguided ones and let it affect their work with unfortunate results.

Early press reactions to weezer's Pinkerton and Rivers Cuomo's subsequent descent into bland shittiness is a nice illustration of the last one.

what the fuck with this thread, "this corrosion" and "lucretia" bad? "french rock and roll" bad? surely there are millions of worse things than these.

I get a little offended anytime I feel like someone put out a record that they themselves don't particularly like or think is any good, that they'd have the balls to waste everyone's time whether for the sake of career momentum or irony or whatever. But at the same time, anyone who thinks they can just will a good/great record into existence through sheer will and good intentions is kidding themselves. In my limited experience making music, I've found that it's best to just follow through on an idea you have and try to do it justice, rather than worrying about whether it's objectively "good." Great records are probably more often inspired by a muse more unique and subjective than merely the desire to make a great record.

OTM

Bad records get made because of:

Bad producers
Bad record labels
Bad drugs
"Devil may care" mentality by arrogant rock stars
Bono

Shall I go on?

interesting intersection with "artistic development" here, as in, group is on a particular path that they've put themselves on, trying to make something concrete out of whatever ideas they have. and they get better at it, or more elaborate, or it gets more routine, or whatever.

but then, after a while, maybe they get "good" enough that their idea(l) starts to be much clearer, and you are like, "oh, that's what you were after all this time? huh, ok." not just "branching out" or "getting experimental" but actually getting that thing they were always reaching for, and it being not nearly as exciting as hearing them struggle and not get it.

but in writing this I can't think of any concrete examples. um ok feargal sharkey solo records?

Some records fail their audiences because the artist wants a new sound or is unable to capture the spark next time around. Call it creative differences. But gff OTM: some fail for creative similarities, when the artist is treading worn ground and the audience is ready for something more. "What, you've made another Coldplay record?"

that's not really what i said

I was reading earlier about the subject of the movie "The Hoax", the guy who wrote Howard Hughes "autobiography" without consulting Hughes, and successfully got it published. He said, "You make a commitment to an act that is self-destructive and you stick with it. It's not only the Bush Administration. It was Vietnam, it's a lot of things. You get on a train and you can't get off because it's going so fast. If you jump off, you hurt yourself and look stupid."

Granted, that man is a fool and he wasn't talking about recording terrible albums, but I think that it might be instructive to view some bad albums, particularly bad albums by artists that normally can be counted on for high quality work (an example for some people might be Neil Young's Trans, even though I don't mind that album).

Maybe David Bowie's mid-80s records would be a better example. In the 33 1/3 book on Low, it mentions that even by the time of recording Station to Station and Low, Bowie was already on this seemingly unstoppable wave of momentum. By 1983, I'm sure he'd been called a genius so many times that he began to really believe it. When he was shitting out Tonight, it must have occurred to him that it wasn't going to stand up to his past work. What made him say, "OK, it's finished", and release it? I don't really know, but maybe it had something to do with the disintegration of his internal editor, wiped out by a decade of overwhelming praise?

gff xpost: Yeah, caffeine has that effect on me sometimes. On re-reading, are you saying that part of what makes it interesting is watching the artist go through the process of getting there, but sometimes the arrival is a disappointment? Seems to me that's likely to be more true for hardcore record consumers, and the general public usually wants to hear the result and not the journey.

I think many artists/bands have good song in them. Very very few a worthwhile album. Lightning doesn't strike twice that often. Or to put it another way, 99% of everything is crap. (Across all the arts). If there was proper quality control there wouldn't be an industry.

The artists think, We've written a good song, Let's make an album, could be some money, women, rock and roll hi-jinks, a career here!
The record company thinks, they've written a good song, let's let them make an album, we can make some money here!
The public thinks, I like that one song they had, I'll buy the album!
And so the thing perpetuates.

I think part of the problem is when a band tries to go out and make a "great record". In my experience, the best bands/artists have unified visions for their song and manage to see these ideas through to completion. When a band begins to rely on the approval of others (making a "great" record), it starts to censor its own ideas because of outside pressure-a sure path to failure.

I don't think most acts ever have a particularly clear picture of what people like about them. I used to find that really strange -- it was odd watching some band who didn't appear to "get" things about themselves any fan could have explained -- but I suppose it's fairly natural: most people couldn't explain precisely why their friends like them, either, or why they're attractive to others. A lot of bad records would seem to operate along the lines of getting an adventurous haircut that just doesn't look good on you.

And for the same basic reason -- it's completely different to judge these things when they're you. A lot of bad records ... you start to feel like you can actually triangulate psychological stuff about the artists, how they see themselves, and how they're completely wrong. E.g. the standard over-the-top star trip record, where people's heads have clearly gotten ludicrously huge! Some of these things seem like way huger dangers in the pop world, where the artist is just infinitely removed from the social world of the people who'll buy the record -- but even for, say, a low-level indie-rock band, that's totally socially immersed in their own audience ... it's hard to figure out what precisely works about you, especially when you're busy doing it.

See also: contempt for audience, too much focus on the one aspect of music you're involved in (e.g. the great singer who thinks you'll buy her otherwise-horrible Christmas record just for her great voice), not understanding what other people involved are doing, dearly wanting to be something that's not actually what people like about you (e.g. you want to be a soul shouter but it's actually your failure to pull it off that's interesting to people), etc.

what the fuck with this thread, "this corrosion" and "lucretia" bad?

He didn't say they were bad songs, just songs with bad lyrics! (I mostly agree about "This Corrosion," but Lucretia's lyrics really make the song. "I HEAR THE ROAR OF A BIG MACHI-INE.")