Bands / artists with NO "clunkers"

Toughie. I'm going to say The White Stripes, though.

The Zombies did a handful of rather pointless cover versions at the beginning of their career.

Steely Dan - even including solo material - have been pretty consistent through the years.

Neutral Milk Hotel.

Led Zeppelin.

And, uh, Lynyrd Skynyrd, if you mean actual non-outtake studio albums (and discount whoever pretended to be Skynyrd long after the plane crash.)

But are "clunkers" songs, or albums?

And I've heard plenty of Zombies stuff that I had no interest in hearing again. Not bad -- just so-what.

The Smiths

Every post in this thread is wrong (except this one)

Sleater-Kinney.

The Smiths' entire career was a clunker

So far Steely Dan comes closest after the two I mentioned

and we're talking songs, not albums. A great album with a bad song excludes that band. Really hard!

I love The Smiths, but....REALLY?? Frankly Mr Shankly, Rubber Ring, You Just Haven't Earned It Yet Baby, Unhappy Birthday....??????

Sleater-Kinney - Ballad of a Ladyman

White Stripes - about half of "Get Behind Me Satan"

The White Stripes have tons of worse-than-clunkers.

A lot of hyper-consistent metal bands fit in this category, like Anneke-era Gathering or Opeth. Barring those, I'm tempted to say Okkervil River - four albums and a bunch of EPs in and no songs I actively dislike.

The last few Gathering albums are pretty spotty, actually. But this is a goofy question, and not one anybody will ever agree on, obviously. The only real answer would probably be a band who quit after their first great single (assuming it had a good B-side.)

The Breeders.

Vom.

Actually, the Angry Samoans come pretty close, though! AND they fit their first four releases onto one CD. So I pick them instead.

VU, if you're only counting studio albums.

DFX2.

Oh, yeah, the obvious answer: Low. (At least if you're not a Great Destroyer-hater.)

Laura Nyro never once phoned it in...

Rocket From the Tombs.

Hi Sherrifs of Blue.

Strafe.

Dinosaur L.

Spoonie Gee.

Funky Four Plus One (More).

Treacherous Three.

VU would own this thread if not for "The Murder Mystery"

Meshuggah

Sticking to bona fide studio releases: Jimi Hendrix, Ryoji Ikeda, Boards of Canada (haven't heard some stuff like Twoism), Nirvana (haven't heard all of Incesticide), maybe Django Reinhardt, maybe Steve Reich (though Three Tales hasn't aged as great as I might have hoped)

Never heard anything bad but haven't heard it all: Luciano Berio (might come closest to "Everything I've heard is great" as opposed to "nothing that needs skipping), Pierre Boulez, Ornette Coleman, James 'Blood' Ulmer, Alice Coltrane

I think the earliest Smiths stuff, 1st album esp, is really hit-and-miss, mostly due to Morrissey's voice. He got a lot better with time. (I think "Frankly Mr Shankly" and "You Just Haven't Earned It..." are really good though and "Unhappy Birthday" and "Rubber Ring" are not bad.) I might agree with Zep, if we're sticking to non-outtake studio releases.

GBMS is actually my favourite White Stripes, out of the last 3, which are all I've heard. I'd say Icky Thump is more inconsistent but they might be a contender based on these 3 albums.

Poss. Bill Frisell too.

Husker Du

The Raincoats. Also, Sonic Youth.

daphne & celeste

Do newer acts count? If so, M.I.A., Escort, Wide Right. The New Pornographers definitely counted before last year.

Also:
The New York Dolls
Tantra
Roxanne Shanté

I suppose X-Ray Spex shouldn't count. Neither should Tantra really...

Sex Pistols

VU would own this thread if not for "The Murder Mystery"

Have you ever heard the Doug Yule-helmed Squeeze?

Also, Sonic Youth.

Oh good lord that's incorrect.

Incidentally, I'm taking "clunkers" to mean whole albums, not individual songs.

Even the worst SY albums are still charming. Okay, maybe they're not all good all the way through, but all of their albums have something that keeps me coming back to them.

Yeah, this is the worst thread ever.

The Ramones and The Cramps. Some of the albums may be less great than others, but they're all great.

My man, I love the Ramones more than members of my own family, but they have clunkers galore.

jesus, who calls out Rubber Ring and Unhappy Birthday? Rubber Ring earned its place by being used as the intro into What She Said on Rank. And I'm not even kidding when I say I've just happened to be really into Unhappy Birthday for the last week and it's my current favorite Smiths song.

fugazi.

ween.

terris

The Birthday Party

Basshunter are in the wrong thread. They belong in the "Bands/artist with NO decent songs - ever" thread.

Like, all of it? Including, say, "Raga by Ravva"?

xpost

(His best work is great, and I don't want to bait anyone, but I do think LMY has done his share of non-essential material.)

No Clunkers?

Portishead.

Basshunter are in the wrong thread. They belong in the "Bands/artist with NO decent songs - ever" thread.

Maybe if everything is a clunker, nothing is a clunker (this is the only reasoning I can think of behind the DMB mention, at least).

High on Fucking Fire.

"Led Zep's last couple of album surely contained their share of clunkers, didn' they?"

Absolutely they did. This is an understatement of outsized proportion.

Did nobody say Roxy Music upthread? From the debut through Avalon, even the songs I don't like as much as other songs, I can't think of one that I would call a clunker.

swervedriver were pretty consistent. easier when you have only 4 proper LPs.

Portishead.

Yes. Wait a couple of months though, and we'll see...

I would say Chemicals. Some people have critized them lately of not enough musical development, but none of their works can be defined as "clunkers".

Alex I was gonna mention Kraftwerk until I remembered that remix album from the early 90s :-/

Yeah, I kinda (purposely) forgot about that one.

the mix is so underrated

Like, all of it? Including, say, "Raga by Ravva"?

xpost

-- Sundar, Sunday, January 27, 2008 4:01 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

(His best work is great, and I don't want to bait anyone, but I do think LMY has done his share of non-essential material.)

-- Sundar, Sunday, January 27, 2008 4:09 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

I agree with you but I LOVE "Raga".

now "Two Sounds/Poem", that is a clunker.

Galaxie 500. Only 3 albums there though, and although, as much as I love them (and I really do love them) their b-sides disk veers within the realm of passable.

Personally The Pixies take this for me, completely clunkerless with many records.

i cant think of any bad bob marley songs, even the crappy early versions of songs are better than most peoples' finished versions.

Big Star. But I suppose if you only put out 2 or 3 albums, it's easier.

I would say The Residents from 1972-80, but not many other people would.

Consistency is overrated. Every band (or novelist or film maker) I've ever loved has been wildly inconsistent.

Ornette Coleman. He's put out a fair few average albums but none that are actively bad; even on records which aren't so good as the masterpieces he's always interesting.

I agree with Zelda. My favorite bands have had some epic disasters (see, for example, Club Ninja, Go to Heaven and Tyr).

indeed, a truly great band is one that either hits the heights or fails spectacularly...god knows there's enough mediocrity out there...

If they fail spectacularly, however, and we love it, does that mean that technically speaking they didn't fail?

What, like "Consequences" Godley/Creme?

Did we love that?

I still do!

"If they fail spectacularly, however, and we love it, does that mean that technically speaking they didn't fail?"

No.

Why?

well, Metal Machine Music is certainly an example of a record by an established/respected artist that can be said to fail on a number of levels, yet it's probably as important as any other Lou Reed record, to a fan...I personally did not like Tilt when it first came out, it doesn't have a great deal of use-value for me, but I'm glad Scott Walker recorded it, and I'm glad I own it...

How and why does Metal Machine Music fail?

Use-value? Pop isn't a bankruptcy court!

Metal Machine Music and Tilt are in no way failures. Something like Bowie's Never Let Me Down is a failure. But Bowie's fall from grace is somehow part of the story now, and doesn't ultimately diminish him.

I would say Chemicals. Some people have critized them lately of not enough musical development, but none of their works can be defined as "clunkers".

Agreed; they've always been solid, and never awful (look, I *liked* "The Salmon Dance", dammit!) - but rarely outstanding.

indeed, a truly great band is one that either hits the heights or fails spectacularly...

I'd wrap that statement up in several layers of conditional language, but... yes, valid point.

"indeed, a truly great band is one that either hits the heights or fails spectacularly...god knows there's enough mediocrity out there...

-- henry s"

im not interested in people putting out spectacular failures. Common's "Electric Circus" album was a complete failue (both on his and Dilla's part) but i dont like either of them more for having put out a crap record. in fact, i still want my money back.

NObody's saying they like the failures, it's just that if an artist is striving for greatness, sometimes they fall flat on their face.

"NObody's saying they like the failures, it's just that if an artist is striving for greatness, sometimes they fall flat on their face.

-- Bill Magill"

i'm not convinced that is the reality. aside from some completely crazy people (sun ra, lee perry, etc) who were trying all sorts of nonsense and had a track record of as many direct hits as complete misses, i feel like way more bad albums were made by people who just couldn't hack it any longer or who had a period of just not knowing what sounded good anymore. i wish it were deeper than that, but it's not. most artists just don't have that much to say, and once they've said it they just start to suck. this happens to almost all artists, unfortunately.

posters, too.

i feel like way more bad albums were made by people who just couldn't hack it any longer or who had a period of just not knowing what sounded good anymore

see, I just don't think there are enough "bad" albums out there..."average", yes..."meh", sure...but well and truly "bad"?...gimme more!

"see, I just don't think there are enough "bad" albums out there..."average", yes..."meh", sure...but well and truly "bad"?...gimme more!

-- henry s"

to me, most albums (or even songs or artists) are bad, just like most films are bad and most books are bad. i actually find very few albums that i feel "average" about. either i love them and listen to them often (some of the best more times than others) or i listen to them once (or less) and then never again. sure, there are few outstandingly terrible albums, but those might even be more rare than the great albums.

sure, there are few outstandingly terrible albums, but those might even be more rare than the great albums.

hallelujah!

However:

http://www.artistdirect.com/Images/Sources/AMGCOVERS/music/cover200/dri500/i558/i55848x32fq.jpg

vampire weakend

big star is a good choice

Bohannon!

sexual harassment

Responses to this thread depend on what you mean by "clunker"; i.e. a bona fide BAD song, that makes you squirm, or just a song that's not great? I've not heard Spoon's very early material, and not really that familiar with A Series Of Sneaks, but I can't think of a song on their last four albums that I think is BAD. I'm loathe to call them as a band with no clunkers, though...

And anyway, taste is so subjective that no one can or will ever agree 100% on whether a song clunks; you only have to look at any one of a million conversations about The White Album to realise that some people thing Bungalow Bill or Rocky Raccoon are amazing and some people think they're utter shite.

A lot of hyper-consistent metal bands fit in this category, like Anneke-era Gathering or Opeth.

Opeth were poor from the beginning and The Gathering have had their share of snoozers. Not many metal bands have pulled it off actually, the only one I can think of is Immortal. Seven albums, not a single weak track among them.

Did Joy Division do a bad song?

Their response song to Captain & Tenille's "Love Will Keep Us Together" wasn't particularly inspired.

Joy Division didn't do a good song either though.

http://www.gonemovies.com/WWW/WanadooFilms/ScienceFiction/AliensNewt2.jpg

"He's dead, alright; can I go now?!!!"