When Legends Flop: Great Artist, Terrible Album

Grphics by Ailani Wong

It happens to the best of us. We do something we’ve done a million times before, we think we have it in the bag, and it completely blows up in our faces. We all mess up sometimes. Normally, though, millions of people don’t have to listen to us shit the bed.

Unfortunately for these talented folks on this list, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Here are 5 albums made by the musicians we love that were so bad, so offensive to the cochlea, that we really never forgot it. But don’t worry, we still love you anyway.

Portals – Melanie Martinez (2023)

After the indie darling smash-hit Crybaby hit the airwaves in 2015, Tumblr girls were never the same. Named in conversations and sad girl playlists alongside titans such as Lana Del Rey and Halsey, everyone thought Martinez was the next big thing to take over alternative culture. Her follow-up K-12 did well, though she was marred by controversy during this time period.

In any event, her third album Portals is ambitious in style, but not in sound. Killing off the character of Crybaby and creating an entirely new persona is a welcomed change—any pop artist needs to evolve. But man, this album is aggressively mid. It lacks the same punch her earlier work had. If you’re going to go all out on prosthetics and mushroom-fairy aesthetics, the substance behind it has to be equally compelling. This off-brand Björk schtick is all bark and no bite, like if Tinker Bell dropped acid and discovered GarageBand.

Lulu – Metallica & Lou Reed (2011)

Listen, I love Metallica as much as the next Coors Light-drinking, Marlboro-smoking, truck-driving, mutton-chops-having guy. But Lulu? What in the seven-stringed hell was this?

A collaboration with the late, great Lou Reed sounds intriguing on paper. In practice, it’s an unholy marriage of James Hetfield growling “I AM THE TABLE” while Lou Reed recites spoken word poetry like he’s having an existential crisis in a Denny’s at 3am (which I have done, but I don’t want to necessarily hear again you know?). It’s the audio equivalent of two drunk uncles fighting over the aux cord. Reed’s avant-garde leanings never mesh with Metallica’s thrash roots, resulting in a chaotic mess that alienated pretty much everyone. It’s like watching your parents try to sext….brave, maybe, but deeply disturbing.

Scream – Chris Cornell (2009)

We lost a legend when Chris Cornell passed, but even legends have their low points, and Scream is one hell of a nosedive. Produced by Timbaland—yes, that Timbaland—this album is the sound of an existential crisis set to a club beat.

Imagine the iconic, brooding voice behind Soundgarden and Audioslave whisper-crooning over some leftover Justin Timberlake B-sides. That’s Scream. It’s a bizarre mismatch, like if Trent Reznor suddenly joined the Black Eyed Peas. There’s a faint trace of Cornell’s brilliance in the vocals, but it's buried under enough auto-tune and synths to make you wonder if your Spotify glitched.

This album is proof that not all genre-bending experiments are worth conducting. Some are best left in the lab. We still miss you, Chris.

Glitter – Mariah Carey (2001)

Okay, this one might not entirely be her fault. With a release date of September 11, 2001, Glitter never stood a chance. But even if it had dropped in a less apocalyptic moment, it still would’ve been... well, Glitter.

Intended as both a soundtrack and a comeback, it ended up being a glitter bomb of dated production, confusing direction, and some of Mariah’s least inspired vocals. The acting? We’ll be kind and say it was enthusiastic. The music? Like a cursed time capsule of every bad late-90s club trend, from tinny synths to inexplicable Ja Rule features.

To her immense credit, Mariah rebounded with the incredible The Emancipation of Mimi, and we all collectively agreed to pretend Glitter didn’t happen. But oh, it happened.

143 – Katy Perry (2024)

As a Katy Perry fan who belted out every word to Teenage Dream when I was eight to anyone who would listen, Perry’s fall from pop grace has been like watching a fireworks finale sputter into a wet fart.

143 —a number that literally means “I love you”—is the musical equivalent of a “Live, Laugh, Love” wall decal. It tries to recapture the sugary magic of her earlier hits, but ends up sounding like AI-generated bubblegum pop with the emotional depth of a Hallmark card. The lyrics are hollow, the production feels like it was done on a deadline, and worst of all, it’s just boring.

Katy used to serve candy-coated bangers with a wink and a bite. Now it’s like she’s serving leftovers from the Smile sessions, reheated and sad. And look, every pop star gets a dud, but this one is more like a balloon slowly deflating in a Target parking lot.

Every artist has their flop era, but it takes true talent to bounce back from it. These albums may have left us with whiplash, eardrum trauma, or existential confusion, but the people who made them? Still legends. Just... not on *these* days.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go cleanse my palate with some Teenage Dream and pretend Lulu was a bad dream.