10 songs that ruined an artist’s legacy

‘Drowning in the Sea of Love’ – Ringo Starr

There’s a good chance that nothing could have put a dent in The Beatles’ legacy. They had already made some of the most celebrated music in rock and roll history, and even if they released one album after their time in the spotlight, they would still be considered legends in their field. Most people knew to tamper their expectations when it came to Ringo Starr, and when he got a dose of Saturday Night Fever, most people could feel their hearts sink listening to him butcher ‘Drowning In the Sea of Love.’

But let’s get one thing straight: disco didn’t suck. The entire genre gave us some of the best dance music the world has ever heard, but hearing him don his finest leisure suit and try to be a smooth lover man is all wrong. He was always meant to be the good time spirit of his old band, so hearing him try his hand at sounding like a disco king is like watching an even worse version of Rod Stewart’s ‘Do Ya Think I’m Sexy,’ only this time with Start straining his voice over sweeping strings.

Most of Starr’s best albums relied on the wide variety of guest stars, but since there are none to be found, this was the moment his peace and love doctrine began to stall out. He might still be known as one of the greatest drummers to ever step behind the kit, but if the only thing he had to offer next were albums like Bad Boy, we all knew that he wasn’t going to be competing with his old mates on the charts again.

‘The Miracle of Joey Ramone’ – U2

U2’s reputation had already suffered a few dents even before Bono decided to partner with Apple. The idea of them “selling out” by putting their song in an iPod commercial may have rubbed some people the wrong way, but given all of the relief efforts that the frontman was using it for, refusing to take any of the money did at least show his hospitality a little bit more. If that was the worst of it we would have been considered lucky, but the Irish legends had other plans to force their music onto people.

As if the omnipresence of songs from The Joshua Tree on the radio wasn’t quite enough U2, their partnering with Apple to forcibly put their album onto everyone’s iPhone was the most PR move anyone could have made. Which is a shame because ‘The Miracle of Joey Ramone’ is a good song, and yet all anyone ever thinks of is the moment that it suddenly appeared in their iTunes library without any say in the matter.

U2 were still capable of making great music, but looking at the way they continue to interpret their new material on Songs of Surrender, this felt like the downward spiral they have yet to recover from. They are still a great band and could very well come out with a stunner later down the line, but there’s a massive uphill battle that comes with being part of the post-punk movement and then becoming musical Big Brother.

Unplugged interlude – Lauryn Hill

It’s not often that most people employ the speed-running tactic for destroying their career. Even though some people like the idea of building momentum and going along for the ride as far as it will take them, there are those few moments when artists realise this life isn’t for them and get out of there as fast as they can. But in the case of Lauryn Hill, listening to Unplugged 2.0 feels like watching someone fall apart in slow motion.

While we were graciously spared any acoustic versions of ‘Doo Wop (That Thing)’ during the evening, her decision to go on multiple vocal interludes throughout the night is still uncomfortable to listen to. Because they aren’t messages as much as they are TED Talks about the horrors of the world and enough spiritual messages to make many people start questioning their beliefs regarding whether they’re going to get another good song.

If anyone bothers to sit through the sermons, though, it makes a lot of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill look a little worse, with Ms Hill sounding like a middle school teacher telling all of the kids how to behave and how to get the best out of life. There are a lot of moments that have good food for thought, but to anyone who has listened to Hill’s solo debut and The Fugees, you’d be doing yourself a favour pretending this doesn’t exist.

‘Behind Blue Eyes’ – Limp Bizkit

It’s a bit weird to include a band like Limp Bizkit in a list such as this. The whole point in someone ruining a legacy implies that there was one there, to begin with, and looking at what Fred Durst brought to the world, he was more concerned with breaking stuff and causing as much mayhem as he could rather than being a true god of rock and roll. But at least they were mindless fun back then, and with the release of Results May Vary, we got a glorified karaoke version of a classic rock song for every hurt nu-metal kid.

While we are going to exclude The Who in this conversation, the fact that this cover doesn’t work makes less sense given their reputation. Durst was able to make George Michael’s ‘Faith’ sound like a meatheaded headbanger back in the day, but now without core bandmates like Wes Borland, this feels like him singing his heart out in the middle of an enthusiastic Buffalo Wild Wings as his table waits to get served another round of drinks.

There are many ways in which bands can screw up their covers, but hearing Durst croak out every word of this tune makes him sound more than a little bit desperate. Him playing the musical equivalent of a high school bully was entertaining back in the day, but the biggest way for any clown to fail is the moment when they try to be taken seriously.

The Beach Boys – ‘Kokomo’

There has always been a slight asterisk next to the history of The Beach Boys. Despite being the band behind some of the greatest rock and roll songs of the 1960s, the years without Brian Wilson had always been anywhere from passable to completely forgettable pieces of nostalgia to remind everyone that they are, in fact, still a thing. But right when the 1960s nostalgia started coming back, they hit upon the kind of hook that made all families sing along and every rocker facepalm.

Purely from an instrumental perspective, though, ‘Kokomo’ is fine. It’s a perfectly serviceable 1980s song for the time, but listening to what the other rock giants of their time had been doing, this feels like the neutered version of what the band did best, with a chorus that’s so simple it may as well be a nursery rhyme sung to babies by parents who want to have another margarita out on the patio.

Whereas most other artists were trying to make the 1980s a great time for the glory days of rock and roll, all this reminded us of was that some artists belong in the past for a reason. Because if this is what they have to offer, they are less suited to be leading the next generation and are far more inclined to be soundtracking the most glorious yacht rock trip anyone has ever taken. The rockers were snubbed, but to anyone who sticks to wearing exclusively Hawaiian shirts, feast your ears on your national anthem.

‘I Don’t Want To Miss a Thing’ – Aerosmith

Aerosmith has always tried to switch things up throughout their tenure. While there’s no telling what the future holds for them with Steven Tyler’s vocal condition these days, hearing them continue to take chances in the 1980s and even gain the biggest ballads of their career in the 1990s is still mind-boggling for a band that seemed dead in the water by the late 1970s. As it turned out, a band that was that indestructible throughout every step of the way was only a danger to themselves all along.

Outside of albums like Nine Lives, which had them work with outside songwriters, ‘I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing’ is one of the most cursed hit songs any rock band has had. Despite being one of their biggest successes and having a bulletproof melody, Just Push Play is still the sad byproduct of everything, with half of the record sounding like Tyler wanted to have another hit and forgot about what it took to be in a badass rock and roll act.

And considering how little the band have put out since, it’s safe to say that their big hit permanently messed up their formula, especially listening to Music From Another Dimension and hearing what sounds like two different sides of the band fighting with each other as to who they’re supposed to be. Aerosmith were always proud to be the bad boys of rock and roll, but considering how glossy everything got later, it’s safe to say that there was more than a little bit of an identity crisis throughout the 2000s.

‘We are The Clash’ – The Clash

The Clash have always been the gold standard for many as to what punk rock should be about. John Lydon may have been in it for the pure posturing and using everything as a costume, but Joe Strummer and Mick Jones meant every word they said, taking on everything from government corruption to sharing new sounds with the world that no other rock band considered. So when everything came to a halt with Jones leaving, the gall they had to make ‘We Are The Clash’ felt like them personally slapping every single fan in the face.

Let’s get one thing straight: This band is NOT The Clash. Strummer may have still been in the group and was probably mandated to put out an album with Bernie Rhodes at the helm, but seeing him get two random uber-Clash fans to sit in for Jones and play the most ear-piercing football chant for a chorus is the antithesis of what they were about, especially when all of their previous anthems were about standing up for what was right.

‘This is England’ is the only thing that makes Cut the Crap worth buying, but there’s enough spite in ‘We Are The Clash’ to make people want to burn their old copies of Combat Rock in protest. There was a band that was once known as The Clash where they stood, but no one listening to this tune is having the wool pulled over their ears after hearing ‘London Calling’ or ‘Complete Control’.

‘Fack’ – Eminem

Eminem has always had a complicated relationship with the world of hip-hop. Despite still being one of the greatest to ever do it, he has more than a few questionable entries in his catalogue that have made people cringe, nauseous, or both at the same time. Although Encore was the first time that most of us learned that Slim Shady was fallible, having this included on a greatest hits album is still one of the most rapid downsides anyone has ever made.

Because even if Encore was a fluke, ‘FACK’ is a sickening look into his twisted mind. We all knew that Eminem could be a little racy, but this is like a bottom-of-the-barrel South Park episode with all of the annoying voices and no good jokes, culminating in the last verse where he has more complicated feelings about being called gay and insisting someone to shove a gerbil up his ass and have it nibble inside.

I didn’t have that much fun typing that, so it’s hard to imagine having to listen to someone enthusiastically talk about the wonders of warped sexual fetishes. It’s easy to appreciate a lot of Eminem’s music from a pure craftsmanship level when it comes to rap music, but this is the kind of line that doesn’t only make people question his standing in the game. It makes you genuinely concerned if he has himself together.

All of ‘Chinese Democracy’ – Guns N’ Roses

The beauty of Guns N’ Roses’ Chinese Democracy was that, for the longest time, we never needed to know what it sounded like. The band had been one of the most badass things to come out of the 1980s, and even if they got bloated on Use Your Illusion, seeing them flame out by the end of the 1990s was like a damn fireworks show going off towards the end. In fact, it was probably best to keep the album a strange secret to keep fans in anticipation, but once we heard what it really was, all we came away with was how much millions of dollars would do to someone.

But it’s not like you can’t hear the money when the tracks come on. Axl Rose did put a lot of effort into making sure this was one of the best things he could possibly deliver, but when listening back to ‘Shackler’s Revenge’ or the title track, it’s hard not to hear the potential that was squandered over the years, including the millions of guitar players coming and going throughout the lineup and vocal takes that don’t even feel like they are from the same person from one tune to the next.

Even though Velvet Revolver was putting out the kind of badass rock and roll that most Guns N’ Roses fans had been clamouring for, going back to this record really makes fans of the Appetite lineup sad. Rose might still be capable of making music on his own terms, but this is an example of being promised a star-studded affair and only getting a few hits. It’s not bad, but with the level of anticipation, it’s catastrophic.

‘Money’ – Roger Waters

Roger Waters usually never had a problem talking about how he was screwed over by Pink Floyd. While a lot of the legal disputes are water under the bridge, that doesn’t mean that David Gilmour is willing to welcome him back with open arms, either, especially considering their verbal jabs at each other in the press. Waters is still one to get nostalgic, though, but if there was anything to be learned from his version of ‘Money,’ it’s that the classics should really be left alone.

While it’s hard to fault all of the backing musicians behind Waters for doing a serviceable job creating a version of Dark Side of the Moon, hearing Waters update it for modern times is still a surreal nightmare to endure. He does make some valid criticisms of capitalism, but hearing the song without Richard Wright’s brilliant keyboard work or Gilmour’s trademark guitar solos is enough for any Floyd fan to turn it off in protest.

Despite many others trying their hand at revisiting their old material, this feels like Waters is unintentionally taking Dark Side of the Moon and breaking it to pieces in real time. Most people might still hold the original as the gold standard for what vinyl could be, but that was because of their collaborative spirit, whereas Waters seems more concerned with rambling on over passable rock jams.