Great list! Helloween has a couple bad album covers: "Pink Bubbles Go Ape" & "Chameleon" (Both are bad albums as well). REO Speedwagon's "You Can Tune a Piano, but You Can't Tuna Fish" is pretty crappy but its a good album. Razor's "Decibels" is hilariously bad but is a pretty good album.
Excellent video guys. Some truly hideous stuff. Would like to add Earthquake Glue by Guided by Voices. Great music, horrible cover. Oh, and also from GBV, Styles We Paid For.
I'd recommend Swamp Dogg's "Rat on" for a fantastic bad album cover. Swamp Dogg riding a rat with his arms up in triumph, it's glorious. Also Uriah Heep's Abominog is also so bad its good, these might belong on a different tier list though perhaps.
You found a bunch of stinkers! Congrats. This was fun. And you avoided all the beehive ladies and pantsuit men wanting to touch Jesus (yawn). I'm an old guy so never thought about how bad the Frampton or Loggins LPs were -- I just thought it was the 70s I grew up in, everything was needlessly seductive, cosmic, et al. I will say I probably wouldn't have thought the Journey was "bad," but then again, the 70s twisted my brain. The Allman shot, for example, was just about the flying the flag of freakiness, ubiquitous in our days. Great episode!
Ah, yes. I remember the 4-headed Queen monster from your Queen video. I don't remember who brought it up, but I have a feeling that it wasn't too pleased to hear you mention it again. And I'm not too sure about this, but I'm pretty sure that the 4-headed Queen monster ate Kramzer. He will be missed.
The Replacements are my all-time favorite rock group, but hey, that Tim album cover is just head-scratching, and can't believe it didn't make it onto your tier chart.
Emerson Lake & Palmer's Love Beach, because of who they were (had been) It's an honest cover, by the way, because it visually warns how crappy the music is.
Good idea for video, and interesting choices. Well done guys! I’d throw in a few, album covers which really put me off the record itself, or are perhaps by bands whose artwork is usually really good Stuff such as; Heathen Chemistry by Oasis (my fave band - but it’s a rubbish, ugly sleeve - blurry picture of the band standing around with a green background colour - their other albums have such iconic and exciting artwork) Coda by Led Zeppelin (just so basic and boring, uninspired - like something you’d make at primary school during an IT lesson) Good Feeling by Travis (really great album, brilliant debut but the cover is dull and just annoys me - on the cd or tape versions I turn the artwork inside out, there’s a better picture on the inside, I use instead to avoid looking at! - there’s a lot of albums this applies to but cannot think which ones!) I love your videos. May I request one soon, perhaps a ranking list of frontmen/frontwomen. That’ll be good, if you’ve not already done so Keep up the great work ❤
Virgin Killers was reissued almost worldwide with a generic group shot of the band, something they should have done in the first place. Lovedrive was reissued with a drawing of a high-tech scorpion, but the original Hipgnosis cover with the strategically placed sticky bubblegum on the woman's breast is now the official cover once again. Blind Faith was also reissued with a group photo of the band, but now the latest 180g reissues restored the controversial original. Not listed or talked about here but Roxy Music's original cover for Country Life of two scantily clad young German women was banned in the US, originally covered up in an opaque green bag, and then reissued with just a shot of the pine tree branches. When it was reissued on CD in the late 80's, the original cover with the models was restored in the US, and has been used on CD and vinyl reissues ever since.
Hot Dogs on the moon sure feels like an 'A' to me Heavy Petting Zoo is hilarious so I'd give it a 'D' (But the one Joe said not to google is S tier) Fun video
Instant Funk - Instant Funk is a doozie. The back cover is especially eye opening. Great video guys. How some of these got past the record company promotion people is amazing.
This was fun, that Metal Church album cover is one of the reasons the band broke up. Mike Howe their lead singer rightfully hated that album cover, and also grunge/alternative was taking over by 1993 so I'm sure that didn't help. Hope you guys rank that band at some point and Fates Warning.
Special Category: Album Covers w/ Die-Cuts that Rip Easily if Not Sealed: Alice Cooper - School's Out, Emerson Lake & Palmer- Brain Salad Surgery, Alice Cooper- From the Inside.
There are three categories for me: profanity (nudity, potty ...), atrocity (babies at the stake) and bad aesthetics. While profanity and atrocity can fulfill their purpose of shocking an audience, the aesthetically bad ones are offending the audience on another level. That's why the one by Ademe is in a category of its own. I also dislike the CSNY one with w--ners in space. I'll say this about The Scorpions' one. We're doing very well as a society to cancel out child abuse or other variants of s* predatory behavior. But in those days the ideal of the under age virgin was all over the place. Look up David Hamilton: the best of families had a calendar with his "art". So for the Scorpions to reuse that image or kind of smash it, would have been shocking in a less disturbing way than it is today. You can still make it an S today though: that's your prerogative.
Chumbawamba's only ever S tier is for the total crapocity of their album cover. There's something so universally right about this rating ... 😜 The laugh out loud moment, though, goes to Jason and the "asymmetrical butt" comment for the Gentle Giant album cover. I mean, it's bad enough, but then Jason points out the "butt cheeks" are uneven ... rofl!
I expected to see Bruce Springsteen's "The Ghost of Tom Joad" on this tier ranking after the comments you gave when you did the Springsteen discography!
That Lords Of Acid single paved the way for The Teaches Of Peaches 🐱 🍑 Electrotrash to electroclash Respect to Praga Khan, Oliver Adams, & Jade 4U all the way!
Worth it just for the Lords of Acid "Pussy" cover. Too many denizens of the internet type "LOL" when they probably didn't genuinely laugh out loud, but today, I can proudly type "LOL" and know that it will hold up in court.
thought you’d include EJ “jump up”, blue velvet cowboy hat, jacket, shoulder pads😂 Reality cover, kept you from listening, it’s when Anime exploded, BAs’ a Dior cologne ad, he never looked better
I feel like you could've had a font person as a guest, because you did consider it, but not as much as I would've. (e.g. that Crosby album) I think it was a good list though, overall!
The Cover of Y Kant Tori Read by Tori Amos is a strong hint that the contents within aren't particularly good & is one of many reasons it remains deleted.
I’m surprised you missed out on including some of those early Fleetwood Mac album covers … can remember Joe in particular, being disgusted and really put off by some of those monstrosities
Really enjoyed this episode (and your Paul Simon ones have been fantastic too). Nice to see Millie get a mention, shame about the album though. Erasure's Snow Globe was a shocker, in fairness, its a Christmas album and it was their 15th studio album, so I guess it can be forgiven for being utter shite.
Also, yeah, the Gentle Giant cover made me laugh with how a lot prog bands seem to do that same thing. Humanity has a proud tradition of music and art about eating ass, and the fact that of all bands made you think that for a second before it’s revealed to be just a peach is incredibly lame lol 😝
The worst one I can think of is Push Push by jazz flutist Herbie Mann. Title track featured Duane Allman. Cover shows an unnecessary shirtless and creepy as hell Herbie Mann.
Grand Funk Railroad's All The Girls In The World Beware!!!, Talk by Yes, and of course the VERY infamous Love Beach by ELP. Maybe Black Sabbath's Sabotage and those two 2000s-2010s albums by "the Who". Latter one of theirs is just lazy. I could've done it, and considering it was Peter Blake who did it, that's VERY bad. Ha
Rick Derringer's debut solo album "All American Boy" was pretty good, but the ironic (I guess) album cover confused or turned-off many record buyers at the time and it wasn't a big seller. I've always thought Black Sabbath's Sabotoge, while not really a bad album cover, is a bit dorky. Queens of the Stone Age debut has rather distasteful cover art. Crotch shots only worked once with "Sticky Fingers".
The worst cover by a group I love is probably that for Fleetwood Mac's 1974 release 'Heroes are Hard to Find'. Some of Tool's covers have actually made me physically ill, though they're undeniably fascinating, so not bad in the way being discussed here.
The Black Sabbath - Born Again album cover is kinda cool. I wonder how many parents in the 80s confiscated it from their kids. I dont think it mattered if they were religious or not. Its just so unsettling for its time and its not something parents in the early or mid 80s would have understood.
Check out the cover for Push Push by Herbie Mann. It's somehow five times worse than the Orleans cover despite it being just one guy and his big flute.
There’s an image out there of the Iron Maiden “Dance of Death” album cover with all the characters except for Eddie removed. It looks infinitely better and a lot more ominous. That floating baby cut and pasted horribly into the dog is good for a laugh though.
Overall Bad Album Covers / design / art by a Really Really Famous Group : The Rolling Stones . (Not all were terrible - but 70% sucked or were boring OR did not reflect the music)
Ugh, seeing my favourite band there in this list, (Sabbath). It manages to hit a trifecta, bad album cover, bad album with bad production. 😵💫 You guys completely missed Uriah Heep, 'Abominog'. It's in an extremely similar manner to 'Born Again' with the grotesque creature image. But worse that 'Born Again'. Check it out. It however is an excellent Heep album.
Good job, enjoyable. I actually never bought any of these albums or had seen most before. The 1975 album "Daryl Hall and John Oates" has Daryl Hall looking more as a woman, maybe Daryl Hannah? Both guys are femininized and I think the song "Sara Smile" is on it. Hannah is 6 Ft and now married to Neil Young, who is comfortable marrying a big and tall bold-face lie. Wasn't it bad that she seemed to fake all her bruising to make it look like Jackson Brown beat her up? My point is that investigations found there to be no evidence. Maybe a video on rock bold face lies?
@@davidl570 Hard to know with Neil. Neil can be callous and had "target practice" by leaving friends, bands, tours, and record companies by "doing his own thing". As Neil likes to say, "I've got Mine!"
@@oppothumbs1 Good point! I love his music, but he's always had a rep for being difficult to work with. Wouldn't doubt the same thing happened with his marriage (at least toward the end).
scorpions virgin killers is a good album i believe, i have the naughty love drive cover ,,, they did come up with some bizzare album cover choices!! animal magnatism is weird also , but gets a pass from me as the title track is my #2 scorpions song
That closing title track on Animal Magnetism absolutely 💯 rocks hard ! One of the best metal songs ever .. A staple in my car summer ☀️ of 1980 ! No wonder I liked Killing Joke ..they were listening 🎶
just need to note the original David Crosby album (an album that i think is not nearly as bad as it's reputation - as i knew it) did not have a name or title on the front cover - I think the artwork is pretty lame, but that turquoise title in that terrible font is most of the badness for me.
Crash Test Dummies have to be one of the worst Canadian bands of the 90s (or maybe all-time). Their covers of “Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead” and “Androgynous” are horrible. “Mmmm Mmmm Mmmm,” which is their most famous hit, was somehow outdone on every level by the Weird Al parody version. “Keep a Lid on Things” is also shockingly horrible, and was even selected as the lead single for that album. There’s nothing redeeming about that band. Give a listen to “Overachievers” if you want to hear the most pathetic attempt at a grunge song ever recorded. If TLM does a “worst music videos” tier list for March Badness, I wish to nominate the ridiculous video made for “He Liked to Feel It.”
The covers for Supertramp's first two albums were horrible: The debut looks like an art project from a little kid The second album(Indelibly Stamped is the title) shows a topless woman with tattoos
@@spiritualarchitect4276 Except it came out in '94 and didnt fit at all with what was going on in mainstream rock at the time. There was nothing sexual going on with mainstream rock at that time. That album cover stuck out like a sore thumb. It obviously hurt sales since the album only went Gold but even with a different cover the Black Crowes werent going multi platinum at that time or ever again.
Big fan of the show but feel this one was mailed in..... Anything by Budgie - No Alex Harvey Band? I feel its a crime against humanity to make such a list and not have the album cover Hard Labor by Three Dog Night. C'mon man!
Virgin Killer is worse to me than Blind Faith just feels more vulgar. I own the replacement covers of both. VK is my favorite 70s Scorps album. It's a shame it has such a godawful cover that keeps people from listening to it.
glad some of the Mew covers avoided this list. That Yeah Yeah Yeah's cover is bad. Also the Journey album is terrible. I would also include the bloody-art from that 1 Andrew W.K. album along with 1 or more album covers from The Weeknd. So repulsive to look at. Also that 1 Atreyu album with the vampire = awful trash.
Special Category: AWKWARD Album Covers : Boxy , Too Big or Otherwise: Alice Cooper - Muscle of Love, George Harrison - All Things Must Pass , Public Image Limited - Metal Box.
I like George's expression on All Things....................it's like he's reflecting on his life and career and contemplating what should be his next step. (He also could be reflecting on the album title as well). Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but that's what I take away from it.
I clicked on this video for the sole purpose of seeing if you included that Millie Jackson album cover. Thank you for delivering.
OMG ! I HOPE our experts KNOW this album cover !
I love bad album covers and talking about them. Plenty of classics here, so much fun. The analysis of some of these was pretty great lol.
The Nelson cover is in reference to the old joke:
Why do dogs lick their own balls?
Because they can.
Clicked on the video for the tierlist , stayed for shaved Joe
Great list! Helloween has a couple bad album covers: "Pink Bubbles Go Ape" & "Chameleon" (Both are bad albums as well). REO Speedwagon's "You Can Tune a Piano, but You Can't Tuna Fish" is pretty crappy but its a good album. Razor's "Decibels" is hilariously bad but is a pretty good album.
I quite like the REO Speedwagon cover.
My Beauty by Kevin Rowland ( Dexy's Midnight Runners ) is a suprise omission. It was never released in the states so 🤷 perhaps that explains it.
Yeah the picture is appropo for one of his covers .. "Reflections of my Life", ha.
Excellent video guys. Some truly hideous stuff.
Would like to add Earthquake Glue by Guided by Voices. Great music, horrible cover. Oh, and also from GBV, Styles We Paid For.
Hilarious! I would add the Black Crowes "Amorica" . Great album that I can't have up on my screen at work.
I'd recommend Swamp Dogg's "Rat on" for a fantastic bad album cover. Swamp Dogg riding a rat with his arms up in triumph, it's glorious. Also Uriah Heep's Abominog is also so bad its good, these might belong on a different tier list though perhaps.
Damn! Joe lost the beard! I gotta say I like it better! 😁🤙🏼
You found a bunch of stinkers! Congrats. This was fun. And you avoided all the beehive ladies and pantsuit men wanting to touch Jesus (yawn). I'm an old guy so never thought about how bad the Frampton or Loggins LPs were -- I just thought it was the 70s I grew up in, everything was needlessly seductive, cosmic, et al. I will say I probably wouldn't have thought the Journey was "bad," but then again, the 70s twisted my brain. The Allman shot, for example, was just about the flying the flag of freakiness, ubiquitous in our days. Great episode!
GNR - The Spaghetti Incident
REM - Up, Automatic For The People
The Damned - Anything
Prince - 20Ten
Joe just shaved of ten years
I think he looks older.
I think he looks the same age.
I think he looks richer
I think he looks faster
I think he looks colder
Ah, yes. I remember the 4-headed Queen monster from your Queen video. I don't remember who brought it up, but I have a feeling that it wasn't too pleased to hear you mention it again.
And I'm not too sure about this, but I'm pretty sure that the 4-headed Queen monster ate Kramzer. He will be missed.
The Replacements are my all-time favorite rock group, but hey, that Tim album cover is just head-scratching, and can't believe it didn't make it onto your tier chart.
I need to open up a book on classic artwork from the 1800s to clean the visual cortex of my brain out.
Emerson Lake & Palmer's Love Beach, because of who they were (had been)
It's an honest cover, by the way, because it visually warns how crappy the music is.
Good idea for video, and interesting choices. Well done guys!
I’d throw in a few, album covers which really put me off the record itself, or are perhaps by bands whose artwork is usually really good
Stuff such as;
Heathen Chemistry by Oasis (my fave band - but it’s a rubbish, ugly sleeve - blurry picture of the band standing around with a green background colour - their other albums have such iconic and exciting artwork)
Coda by Led Zeppelin (just so basic and boring, uninspired - like something you’d make at primary school during an IT lesson)
Good Feeling by Travis (really great album, brilliant debut but the cover is dull and just annoys me - on the cd or tape versions I turn the artwork inside out, there’s a better picture on the inside, I use instead to avoid looking at! - there’s a lot of albums this applies to but cannot think which ones!)
I love your videos. May I request one soon, perhaps a ranking list of frontmen/frontwomen. That’ll be good, if you’ve not already done so
Keep up the great work ❤
Virgin Killers was reissued almost worldwide with a generic group shot of the band, something they should have done in the first place.
Lovedrive was reissued with a drawing of a high-tech scorpion, but the original Hipgnosis cover with the strategically placed sticky bubblegum on the woman's breast is now the official cover once again.
Blind Faith was also reissued with a group photo of the band, but now the latest 180g reissues restored the controversial original.
Not listed or talked about here but Roxy Music's original cover for Country Life of two scantily clad young German women was banned in the US, originally covered up in an opaque green bag, and then reissued with just a shot of the pine tree branches. When it was reissued on CD in the late 80's, the original cover with the models was restored in the US, and has been used on CD and vinyl reissues ever since.
Alibi - America
Live It Up - Crosby, Stills & Nash
Love Beach - ELP
Chest Hair 😆 🤣 on ELP
Hot Dogs on the moon sure feels like an 'A' to me
Heavy Petting Zoo is hilarious so I'd give it a 'D' (But the one Joe said not to google is S tier)
Fun video
Instant Funk - Instant Funk is a doozie. The back cover is especially eye opening. Great video guys. How some of these got past the record company promotion people is amazing.
I'm surprised Spinal Tap didn't adopt that Wasp cover art.
Was hoping you'd tear into The Band's High on the Hog again. Great video!
This was fun, that Metal Church album cover is one of the reasons the band broke up. Mike Howe their lead singer rightfully hated that album cover, and also grunge/alternative was taking over by 1993 so I'm sure that didn't help. Hope you guys rank that band at some point and Fates Warning.
I was just looking at their discography and they dont have any good covers.
Special Category: Album Covers w/ Die-Cuts that Rip Easily if Not Sealed: Alice Cooper - School's Out, Emerson Lake & Palmer- Brain Salad Surgery, Alice Cooper- From the Inside.
There are three categories for me: profanity (nudity, potty ...), atrocity (babies at the stake) and bad aesthetics. While profanity and atrocity can fulfill their purpose of shocking an audience, the aesthetically bad ones are offending the audience on another level. That's why the one by Ademe is in a category of its own. I also dislike the CSNY one with w--ners in space.
I'll say this about The Scorpions' one. We're doing very well as a society to cancel out child abuse or other variants of s* predatory behavior. But in those days the ideal of the under age virgin was all over the place. Look up David Hamilton: the best of families had a calendar with his "art". So for the Scorpions to reuse that image or kind of smash it, would have been shocking in a less disturbing way than it is today. You can still make it an S today though: that's your prerogative.
Chumbawamba's only ever S tier is for the total crapocity of their album cover. There's something so universally right about this rating ... 😜 The laugh out loud moment, though, goes to Jason and the "asymmetrical butt" comment for the Gentle Giant album cover. I mean, it's bad enough, but then Jason points out the "butt cheeks" are uneven ... rofl!
I expected to see Bruce Springsteen's "The Ghost of Tom Joad" on this tier ranking after the comments you gave when you did the Springsteen discography!
2 things:
- First: Thanks to Joe for getting out of the cave.
- Second: For when a listography of the Red Hot Chili Peppers?!?!?!?!
That Lords Of Acid single paved the way for The Teaches Of Peaches 🐱 🍑 Electrotrash to electroclash
Respect to Praga Khan, Oliver Adams,
& Jade 4U all the way!
ELP - Trilogy
ELP - Love Beach
Type O Negative - the Origin of the Feces
DMB - Everyday
Eh, Trilogy's not THAT bad.......................maybe a little boring but I don't dislike it. Kind of a nice painted image of the trio.
Great video! These were some funny album covers! I got a good laugh at these 😅
Worth it just for the Lords of Acid "Pussy" cover. Too many denizens of the internet type "LOL" when they probably didn't genuinely laugh out loud, but today, I can proudly type "LOL" and know that it will hold up in court.
My favourite bad album cover is always the Faith Tones' "Jesus Use Me". 😂
Silver Side Up - Nickelback
Eat the Elephant - A Perfect Circle
Raditude - Weezer
Hot take:
Nevermind - Nirvana
Your hot take is hotter than the heart of the sun......and wrong.
The second Dry Cleaning album Stumpwork, a bar of soap with pubic hair spelling out the album title. Really puts me off even listening to it.
Bret Michaels’ hand looks like a prosthesis on that album cover 😮
thought you’d include EJ “jump up”, blue velvet cowboy hat, jacket, shoulder pads😂 Reality cover, kept you from listening, it’s when Anime exploded, BAs’ a Dior cologne ad, he never looked better
of course you missed Spinal Tap's Smell the Glove... It's "sexy" - what's the matter with being sexy?
I feel like you could've had a font person as a guest, because you did consider it, but not as much as I would've. (e.g. that Crosby album)
I think it was a good list though, overall!
Joe has only heard tumbathumping or whatever the get knocked down song is called
ELP - Trilogy
ELP - Love Beach
Type o Negative - Origin of the Feces
DMB - Everyday
Not sure about everyday. It’s not good. But it screams corporate interference more than bad. - Joe
The Cover of Y Kant Tori Read by Tori Amos is a strong hint that the contents within aren't particularly good & is one of many reasons it remains deleted.
My favorite Tori album. -Jason
@@TastesLikeMusicYou & Shannon probably disagreed on that !
Matt Sorum on drums. Whats not to love? @@davidellis5141
@@TastesLikeMusic He's a hired hand like a hit man !
Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the Holy. As uncomfortable as watching the camera angle on Plant in the movie Song Remains the Same
I have a totally straight man-crush on Rick Derringer circa 1975.
Too bad Suzi Quattro never looked that cute.
I’m surprised you missed out on including some of those early Fleetwood Mac album covers … can remember Joe in particular, being disgusted and really put off by some of those monstrosities
'Heroes are Hard to Find' has got to be the worst.
@@barrymoore4470 ........................or English Rose..............did we REALLY need to see Mick Fleetwood in drag?? EWWWW!
Thin Lizzy Thunder & Lightning cover was a stinker! Definitely should’ve been on this list 😂
Really enjoyed this episode (and your Paul Simon ones have been fantastic too). Nice to see Millie get a mention, shame about the album though.
Erasure's Snow Globe was a shocker, in fairness, its a Christmas album and it was their 15th studio album, so I guess it can be forgiven for being utter shite.
Also, yeah, the Gentle Giant cover made me laugh with how a lot prog bands seem to do that same thing. Humanity has a proud tradition of music and art about eating ass, and the fact that of all bands made you think that for a second before it’s revealed to be just a peach is incredibly lame lol 😝
Especially given the fact their music is as nerdy and nonsexual as you can get.
The worst one I can think of is Push Push by jazz flutist Herbie Mann. Title track featured Duane Allman. Cover shows an unnecessary shirtless and creepy as hell Herbie Mann.
If I saw that guy walking in a park with that flute, I woukd run like hell.
@@toddhill7483 Pink Floyd FTW!
It's bad enough that ol' Herbie is shirtless, but did he have to be all greased up as well?? DISGUSTING.
Grand Funk Railroad's All The Girls In The World Beware!!!, Talk by Yes, and of course the VERY infamous Love Beach by ELP. Maybe Black Sabbath's Sabotage and those two 2000s-2010s albums by "the Who". Latter one of theirs is just lazy. I could've done it, and considering it was Peter Blake who did it, that's VERY bad. Ha
Rick Derringer's debut solo album "All American Boy" was pretty good, but the ironic (I guess) album cover confused or turned-off many record buyers at the time and it wasn't a big seller. I've always thought Black Sabbath's Sabotoge, while not really a bad album cover, is a bit dorky. Queens of the Stone Age debut has rather distasteful cover art. Crotch shots only worked once with "Sticky Fingers".
Dean Friedman's Well Well Said the Rocking Chair is a classic of terrible album art.
The worst cover by a group I love is probably that for Fleetwood Mac's 1974 release 'Heroes are Hard to Find'. Some of Tool's covers have actually made me physically ill, though they're undeniably fascinating, so not bad in the way being discussed here.
Tier List Tuesday is awesome!
Especially on Wednesday ! 👍
Heaven Forbid - Blue Oyster Cult
Another notoriously bad Scorpions album cover is Fly to the Rainbow
The Black Sabbath - Born Again album cover is kinda cool. I wonder how many parents in the 80s confiscated it from their kids. I dont think it mattered if they were religious or not. Its just so unsettling for its time and its not something parents in the early or mid 80s would have understood.
I was thinking this might have been how Rosemary's baby looked.
@@barrymoore4470 ....................or the It's Alive baby!
Check out the cover for Push Push by Herbie Mann. It's somehow five times worse than the Orleans cover despite it being just one guy and his big flute.
There’s an image out there of the Iron Maiden “Dance of Death” album cover with all the characters except for Eddie removed. It looks infinitely better and a lot more ominous. That floating baby cut and pasted horribly into the dog is good for a laugh though.
Overall Bad Album Covers / design / art by a Really Really Famous Group : The Rolling Stones . (Not all were terrible - but 70% sucked or were boring OR did not reflect the music)
Ugh, seeing my favourite band there in this list, (Sabbath). It manages to hit a trifecta, bad album cover, bad album with bad production. 😵💫
You guys completely missed Uriah Heep, 'Abominog'. It's in an extremely similar manner to 'Born Again' with the grotesque creature image. But worse that 'Born Again'. Check it out. It however is an excellent Heep album.
Very good album. - Joe
Good job, enjoyable. I actually never bought any of these albums or had seen most before. The 1975 album "Daryl Hall and John Oates" has Daryl Hall looking more as a woman, maybe Daryl Hannah? Both guys are femininized and I think the song "Sara Smile" is on it.
Hannah is 6 Ft and now married to Neil Young, who is comfortable marrying a big and tall bold-face lie. Wasn't it bad that she seemed to fake all her bruising to make it look like Jackson Brown beat her up? My point is that investigations found there to be no evidence.
Maybe a video on rock bold face lies?
Lost the majority of my respect for Neil Young when he suddenly dumped Pegi after being married to her for DECADES. The hell was his mindset?? Sheesh.
@@davidl570 Hard to know with Neil. Neil can be callous and had "target practice" by leaving friends, bands, tours, and record companies by "doing his own thing". As Neil likes to say, "I've got Mine!"
@@oppothumbs1 Good point! I love his music, but he's always had a rep for being difficult to work with. Wouldn't doubt the same thing happened with his marriage (at least toward the end).
Hanging in the Balance is indeed a GREAT album.
scorpions virgin killers is a good album i believe, i have the naughty love drive cover ,,, they did come up with some bizzare album cover choices!! animal magnatism is weird also , but gets a pass from me as the title track is my #2 scorpions song
That closing title track on Animal Magnetism absolutely 💯 rocks hard ! One of the best metal songs ever .. A staple in my car summer ☀️ of 1980 ! No wonder I liked Killing Joke ..they were listening 🎶
@@davidellis5141 hey there, yes on that track with the vocals , i always said it was black sabbath meets queen lol
just need to note the original David Crosby album (an album that i think is not nearly as bad as it's reputation - as i knew it) did not have a name or title on the front cover - I think the artwork is pretty lame, but that turquoise title in that terrible font is most of the badness for me.
I think the Nazareth cover is pretty cool.
dont judge the book by its cover tho , as people can guess i love black sabbath "born again" 🐯
Also Aerosmiths Get a grip
I hold a lot of newer, computer-generated covers in lower regard than many of these.
I actually really dig that Crash Test Dummies album.
Crash Test Dummies have to be one of the worst Canadian bands of the 90s (or maybe all-time). Their covers of “Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead” and “Androgynous” are horrible. “Mmmm Mmmm Mmmm,” which is their most famous hit, was somehow outdone on every level by the Weird Al parody version. “Keep a Lid on Things” is also shockingly horrible, and was even selected as the lead single for that album. There’s nothing redeeming about that band. Give a listen to “Overachievers” if you want to hear the most pathetic attempt at a grunge song ever recorded.
If TLM does a “worst music videos” tier list for March Badness, I wish to nominate the ridiculous video made for “He Liked to Feel It.”
Who's the new guy? Voice sounds familiar...
Argh, I looked up NOFX alternate title/cover "Eating Lamb"!
I warned you. - Joe
The Bryan Adams cover has a video that goes along with it , kind of weird.
That Kinks album cover is brutal, haven't seen it before, mostly because I don't like The Kinks
Not one of their better ones musically either.
had to give it a listen, mostly not good, couple decent moments. The Hard way is like proto-devo@@mjhbuckeye
I'd recommend The Beatles butcher album cover as one of the choices. What do you think?😀
Love that one. Even though it’s grotesque and makes zero sense for the band. - Joe
The covers for Supertramp's first two albums were horrible:
The debut looks like an art project from a little kid
The second album(Indelibly Stamped is the title) shows a topless woman with tattoos
That Indelibly Stamped cover almost made my food come up when I saw it!
The Blind Faith sleeve design was a terrible idea
Eric Clapton wasn't the most pleasant person
It's bad enough that it had an underage topless girl, but her expression of extreme boredom makes it even worse!
Surprised that Amorica by the Black Crowes is not on here.
That's the greatest album cover EVER!
@@spiritualarchitect4276 Except it came out in '94 and didnt fit at all with what was going on in mainstream rock at the time. There was nothing sexual going on with mainstream rock at that time. That album cover stuck out like a sore thumb. It obviously hurt sales since the album only went Gold but even with a different cover the Black Crowes werent going multi platinum at that time or ever again.
one album i know is always talked about is ELP "love beach" and the album is poor also, not sure what was going on at the time🐯
Joe shaved!!
Watching you guys react to the NOFX cover made me laugh to beat the band 🙂
I love SCORPIONS, but Virgin Killer and Lovedrive have the worst album covers of all time
BORN AGAIN is a GREAT cover and a KILLER album!
I like how you guys don't bother to name the tiers like most TH-camrs do.
The Crosby solo album cover is a bit of a weird inclusion in this list - nothing weird about that one at all
A sweet baby being born is S tier?? How dare you degrade such a beautiful, natural thing. 😜
We put it in S for having the word Chumbawamba on it. Had nothing to do with the lovely photo. -Jason
Big fan of the show but feel this one was mailed in..... Anything by Budgie - No Alex Harvey Band? I feel its a crime against humanity to make such a list and not have the album cover Hard Labor by Three Dog Night. C'mon man!
cloud 9 by george harrison
Joe looks 67% more like Billy Joe Shaver, no??
One things for sure, he’s definitely a shaver.
Genesis 80s album
ELP love beach
Floyd final cut
Uhhh no. Floyd Final Cut has a fantastic album cover. Genesis’ 80s stuff is mediocre at best. But not all-time bad. - Joe
Leather Jackets by Elton John maybe. A lot of his 80's and 90's album covers are really poor.
Interesting. Joe's still going with the tight trim. Thought he would have returned to full lumberjack by now.
Recorded same day as the tight trim reveal
@@TastesLikeMusic Joe needed to tame it down. He was at full Civil War general.
Joe looking fresh
This was awesome.
Thrillington. By Percy Thrills Thrillington. That was dreadful
Virgin Killer is worse to me than Blind Faith just feels more vulgar. I own the replacement covers of both. VK is my favorite 70s Scorps album. It's a shame it has such a godawful cover that keeps people from listening to it.
glad some of the Mew covers avoided this list.
That Yeah Yeah Yeah's cover is bad. Also the Journey album is terrible.
I would also include the bloody-art from that 1 Andrew W.K. album along with 1 or more album covers from The Weeknd. So repulsive to look at.
Also that 1 Atreyu album with the vampire = awful trash.
Special Category: AWKWARD Album Covers : Boxy , Too Big or Otherwise: Alice Cooper - Muscle of Love, George Harrison - All Things Must Pass , Public Image Limited - Metal Box.
That REALLY huge Chicago boxed set !
I like George's expression on All Things....................it's like he's reflecting on his life and career and contemplating what should be his next step. (He also could be reflecting on the album title as well). Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but that's what I take away from it.