Ten Worst Albums of the 80's? Do you agree?

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I mean "Sportin' a Woody"? Haha!

There wasn't much I wouldn't/didn't wear in the late 80's but Dangerous Toys' t-shirt with that emblazoned across the back was the lone exception.  Interestingly enough my friend Kyle had no such reservations.  He was a big heavy guy and the shirt was a size too small, but damn did he wear that thing proudly.

I would be perfectly happy stuck on a deserted island with just those ten discs.  I'd love to see the dude's ten best list.  I'm a huge fan of lists but I'll admit I get more entertainment from ones that my opinion differs.

thejokeriv wrote:

TheGreatDuck wrote:

A list of worst '80s metal albums without any '80s metal albums. Nice.

As I mentioned, in the 80's, every single one of those albums were consider to be metal albums.

By you maybe! I can't think of a single person who considered Hysteria or The Final Countdown to be metal. It was music that you could just about put up with because your girlfriend liked it (not me, mine was into The Sisters of Mercy & The Cult   )

If Hysteria was only aimed at pop-loving teenage girls, then what was "Gods of War" doing on that album?

Hadley wrote:

If Hysteria was only aimed at pop-loving teenage girls, then what was "Gods of War" doing on that album?

I have no problem with people who like that record, but metal? C'mon now!

Def Leppard and Europe were certainly marketed as metal back in the day. They were in the metal section of record stores,on the Headbangers Ball on MTV, etc. Same goes with the alternative/grunge movement when it first came out.

007 wrote:

Def Leppard and Europe were certainly marketed as metal back in the day. They were in the metal section of record stores,on the Headbangers Ball on MTV, etc. Same goes with the alternative/grunge movement when it first came out.

Exactly.  

Some bands I first saw on Headbangers Ball (or possibly USA's Night Flight for a couple of them):  King's X, Soundgarden, Faith No More, Ministry, Living Colour, Europe, Helmet, Nine Inch Nails, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, etc.

and let's not forget all the stuff like Bon Jovi and Poison were regularly featured as well.

Yeah I suppose, but this was the decade when Jethro Tull won a Grammy for best Hard Rock/Metal performance, so I guess they are metal too.

In the mid-20th century non-whites were 'coloreds' and other words.


Just saying...


Lazy philosophy is no kinda philosophy..

Boris2008 wrote:

Yeah I suppose, but this was the decade when Jethro Tull won a Grammy for best Hard Rock/Metal performance, so I guess they are metal too.

No, that was widely ridiculed at the time (including Ian Anderson who thought it was hilarious).

You have to realize that this whole "genre nazi" bullshit really kicked into gear with the internet and all the f*cking "EXPERTS" that supposedly exist there. Rampant categorization does nothing except stifle creativity and intelligent thought.

S.D. wrote:

Boris2008 wrote:

Yeah I suppose, but this was the decade when Jethro Tull won a Grammy for best Hard Rock/Metal performance, so I guess they are metal too.

No, that was widely ridiculed at the time (including Ian Anderson who thought it was hilarious).  

You have to realize that this whole "genre nazi" bullshit really kicked into gear with the internet and all the f*cking "EXPERTS" that supposedly exist there.  Rampant categorization does nothing except stifle creativity and intelligent thought.  

Slight digression:

One thing I've noticed in modern metal/rock as opposed to older strains is a trend towards specialization. For example, a "power" or "thrash" metal band is expected to only really play within their genre. But if you go back to bands like Sabbath or Zeppelin, or even Priest and Metallica, they felt perfectly ok with more experimentation. I realize this is a painting with too broad a brush, but do you think this is a discernible trend in music today by and large?

Doesn't it make more sense that people are just trying to communicate better?

Logic kind of dictates that if we spend time coining a term, and one or more people are speaking about it, there is going to be some conflict and confusion if the term is loose or relative enough. If it's too far out there it eliminates the point of coining a term altogether.


No sense in getting upset over people who want to be able to communicate more effectively and want to know what they are talking about...

Keep in mind a lapse in that kind of effort is the same lapse which makes the "religion" topic such a s***storm..... nobody knows what anyone is talking about because everybody has their own thing, yet the same wordage is used...that's a fail by any measure.

S.D. wrote:

Boris2008 wrote:

Yeah I suppose, but this was the decade when Jethro Tull won a Grammy for best Hard Rock/Metal performance, so I guess they are metal too.

No, that was widely ridiculed at the time (including Ian Anderson who thought it was hilarious).  

You have to realize that this whole "genre nazi" bullshit really kicked into gear with the internet and all the f*cking "EXPERTS" that supposedly exist there.  Rampant categorization does nothing except stifle creativity and intelligent thought.  

I think that you know me well enough to know that I'm not a genre nazi (or any kind of nazi!   ) I also have no problem with the likes of Nirvana, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Ministry, Helmet, NIN being included in the metal category, (a lot of those bands supported the likes of Slayer, Anthrax, Voivod and such early on and it was decent, heavy music. But Def Leppard and Europe was something that I never, ever could relate to as metal, yes MTV and the radio had them as their mainstream 'metal' bands and that in itself was telling because British radio NEVER played metal, ever! Not even Iron Maiden who were regularly having top 5 hits, but they played Def Leppard (Hysteria onwards, nothing before that) and The Final Countdown like crazy, and the fans who listened to it were a different breed (mostly my mates little sisters) Even the guys who were into Crue, RATT, Cinderella etc wouldn't touch it. That's why I wouldn't include Bon Jovi with them really as I knew plenty of metal fans who had been fans for a while by the time that Slippery went stellar.

I don't want an argument, nor do I want to disrespect others opinions but that's mine.

I will always prefer an era when bands playing wildly divergent styles could be featured back to back on the radio or even tour together. When bands had the freedom to record an album and not have to worry whether they were straying outside their "allowed sub genre designation". When a fan could get an album where the group jumped around stylistically and have the open mind to appreciate it instead of nerd-raging on some internet forum about how dare they experiment!

Yes, I hate this pre-packaged, categorized, pigeon-holed, narrow-minded, devoid of free thought world we exist in now.

When I was a teen all those bands you mentioned Def Leppard, Bon Jovi, Europe, and others such as Whitelion, Whitesnake, were labeled and marketed as pop metal bands.

In the case of Whitesnake it was based on one album and one album only, that was their self titled album, ignoring their 9 years of recording history before that.

Aerosmith, KISS or Alice Cooper if had come out as new artist today, doubtful they would have been shoehorned into the metal genre but they were in the 70's and 80's, and that is the way I still think of them, even if all three artists for example, have little to nothing in common with what metal has morphed into

Also you could play a set longer than 30 minutes. For us that's 4 songs, and they expect ..what of us?

Orion Crystal Ice wrote:

Doesn't it make more sense that people are just trying to communicate better?

Logic kind of dictates that if we spend time coining a term, and one or more people are speaking about it, there is going to be some conflict and confusion if the term is loose or relative enough. If it's too far out there it eliminates the point of coining a term altogether.


No sense in getting upset over people who want to be able to communicate more effectively and want to know what they are talking about...

Genre-nazi shaming is S.D.'s favorite thing.  He'll ride that hobby horse forever.  I've tried the argument that it's merely more precise use of language, but he's not having any of it.

S.D. wrote:

I will always prefer an era when bands playing wildly divergent styles could be featured back to back on the radio or even tour together.  When bands had the freedom to record an album and not have to worry whether they were straying outside their "allowed sub genre designation". When a fan could get an album where the group jumped around stylistically and have the open mind to appreciate it instead of nerd-raging on some internet forum about how dare they experiment!  

Yes, I hate this pre-packaged, categorized, pigeon-holed, narrow-minded, devoid of free thought world we exist in now.  

You're missing my point. If a previously heavy band wants to make a pop, rock, soul or jazz record, or a mixture of a hundred different styles of music, then    go for it, I'll be interested to hear the results. Just don't call it heavy metal because heavy metal is a categorization, just like Jazz, Hip Hop or any other genre. Most of my favorite bands refuse to get pigeon holed by these genres and even Def Leppard themselves have said that their music has never been metal, it's actually the internet experts who insist on plonking them in the metal category because they saw them on headbangers ball once, so now they can disregard the opinions of the creators of the music.

Someone on here once said that there were only two genres that mattered to them, stuff I dig and stuff I don't and i agree with this and none of this really matters, you talk about liking the times when bands were free to experiment with different sounds but that time is right now and there are a ton of bands doing just that. It's the fans that see this stuff as super important.

Boris2008 wrote:

you talk about liking the times when bands were free to experiment with different sounds but that time is right now and there are a ton of bands doing just that. It's the fans that see this stuff as super important.

You're right, there are a lot of interesting albums out there now fusing many stylistic traits together, I love it.

Problem is, there is always some moron who feels the need to invent a new sub genre to pigeonhole them in, can't have something not fit a neat little description! Blasphemy!

S.D. wrote:

Boris2008 wrote:

you talk about liking the times when bands were free to experiment with different sounds but that time is right now and there are a ton of bands doing just that. It's the fans that see this stuff as super important.

You're right, there are a lot of interesting albums out there now fusing many stylistic traits together, I love it.

Problem is, there is always some moron who feels the need to invent a new sub genre to pigeonhole them in, can't have something not fit a neat little description!  Blasphemy!

And on that point, I agree entirely

S.D. wrote:

I will always prefer an era when bands playing wildly divergent styles could be featured back to back on the radio or even tour together.  When bands had the freedom to record an album and not have to worry whether they were straying outside their "allowed sub genre designation". When a fan could get an album where the group jumped around stylistically and have the open mind to appreciate it instead of nerd-raging on some internet forum about how dare they experiment!  

Yes, I hate this pre-packaged, categorized, pigeon-holed, narrow-minded, devoid of free thought world we exist in now.  

  

Just a little test......

Forget anything that came afterwards....go back in time and ask a bunch of people what they'd call the bands on that list and see what the general consensus would be.  I'd say what 80 % or so would call them metal bands ?

Might as well go back to ancient Greece and ask a bunch of people if the Earth was flat while we're at it...

I liked the Earth better when it was flat. If I wanted to leave I could just go.

TheGreatDuck wrote:

Might as well go back to ancient Greece and ask a bunch of people if the Earth was flat while we're at it...

Those of us old enough to have been alive in the 1980s and experienced it (and thus we know what the F*ck we're talking about) look at the above comment, shake our heads and then extend our middle finger salute squarely in the direction of the youngster making jokes about people older and most likely wiser than himself.