Song You Like From an Album You Don't

the Allman Brothers Band-Win, Lose, or Draw ---album's a piece of shit, but "High Falls" is a fantastic Dickie Betts composition/ instrumental jam

Down with the Sickness from Disturbed's "The Sickness"

Bullet the Blue Sky (cover obviously) from Sepultura's "Roorback"

Until It Sleeps from Metallica's "Load"

She-Wolf and Trust from Megadeth's "Cryptic Writings"

And I'll see your Frantic and raise you St. Anger, Some Kind of Monster and The Unnamed Feeling.

"My Own Worst Enemy" by Lit, on whatever that album was called. I bought that album like an idiot, after totally misreading what there sound was from MOWE. The album sux, and I'm sure my subconscious forced me to loose it during a move, but I still rock out to that song when it comes on the radio (which isn't infrequent).

"Meant to Live" on Beautiful Letdown by Switchback. When I found out the band is basically a contemporary christian band, I realized why the rest of the album came off so bland.

I pretty much couldn't stand Fountain of Wayne's last album, but, holy hell, is New Routine a great song.

"Paper Planes" - Just can't get into the rest of the album.

"Acceptable in the 80's" from Calvin Harris' I Created Disco.

I feel a bit better about my guilty enjoyment of "Frantic."

I thought I was the only one. I've been playing Kala in my car over the last week, giving it another shot, but end up replaying 'Paper Planes' every time.

'Jesus of Suburbia' from Green Day's 'American Idiot'
'Landed' by Ben Folds from 'Songs for Silverman'
'Guns are for Pussies' from 311's self-titled album.

Oh, and fourth'd on 'Frantic''.

Any number of albums from the boy band/pop tart explosion of the late 90s, including, but not limited to, "I Want It That Way"*, "Lucky", and, so god help me, "Summertime Girls."

*Psych rock band Vanilla Fudge released a cover of this on one of their "comeback" albums that's seven minutes and features an organ. It, too, is the one good song on the album.

Wow. I don't think there's a song on that album I skip.

"Plowed" from Sponge's Rotting Pinata. Bought that album thinking the rest of the songs would sound like "Plowed". Um, no.

I usually skip "Whatsername", because a) I think "Homecoming" really wraps up the story of the album and b) it's really jarringly out of place next to the rest of the album.

Same her. PP is hypnotic and her voice is perfect. I can't enjoy the rest of the album.

Same here with "Frantic".

Also, even though I don't care for Slipknot at all really, I do like the "Vermilion" songs off of Vol. 3 (The Subliminal Verses).

"Drop Dead Gorgeous" on Republica's self titled album.

"Perfect Situation" on Weezer's Make Believe.

"That's the Way" on Smashing Pumpkins' Zeitgeist.

"Wrecking Ball" on Interpol's "Our Love to Admire."

It's been overplayed to fuck, so this more applies to when the song/album first came out, but "Hey Man, Nice Shot" is the only thing worth a damn from Filter's first album Short Bus. Awful CD.

"My List" From Sam's town. The Killers absolutely lost me with that record, but I dig that song something fierce.

Troublemaker from the shitty new Weezer disc.

I remember riding along with a friend on the way to the airport to pick up his sister. He played Limp Bizkit's Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water album, and "Hold On", the Durst/Weiland duet, is actually a good song buried amidst a ton of shitty rap-rock crap.

"Peacebone" from Strawberry Jam by Animal Collective
"I'm On Fire" from Born in the USA by Bruce Springsteen
"Song Against Sex" from On Avery Island by Neutral Milk Hotel
"Cheated Hearts" from Show Yer Bones by Yeah Yeah Yeahs
"Beautiful People" from Antichrist Superstar by Marilyn Manson
"15 Steps" from In Rainbows by Radiohead
"Burn the Witch" from Lullabyes to Paralyze by Queens of the Stone Age
"Professor Nutbutter" from Tales From the Punchbowl by Primus

"Drivin' Me Wild" featuring Lily Allen, from Common's Finding Forever

And again ... wow. Even if you want to bypass the biggest hits citing overexposure, that album still has "Darlington County" and "No Surrender" on it.

"Bingo" is great and anyone would probably like it. But I think "World Town" is the best song on Kala, so don't listen to me.

I like Arular. The hype that album received when it was first released is almost justified. Hence my initial (and continuing) disappointment with Kala. M.I.A. is a huge, interesting, viable talent, I just think she needs to keep her ambition and ideas in check. Kala's awkwardly unsatisfying.

I'm not saying that's the only song I like, I'm just saying I don't like the album.

And I love the song "Born to Run", so it's not about over-exposure.

"I Believe in a Thing Called Love" and "Givin' Up" from Permission to Land by The Darkness.

"Good" from Deluxe by Better Than Ezra

and "Boston" from All the Stars and Boulevards by Augustana.

Those are all I can think of off the top of my head.

Yeah, my inner music OCD-snob has to point out that Bamboo Banga and Jimmy are better than Paper Planes and that Peacebone has nothing on "For Reverend Green" or "Fireworks".
Also, "This Blood Is Love" is the better track from Lullabies to Paralyze.
And I could probably continue...

But on topic, I like Murder We on The Bug's London Zoo but can't get into the album. Don't mind it if its on.
Also, Choke by Hybrid is awesome (from The Spirit trailer*), but I couldn't get into the album. Also, Fascination by Alphabeat, the album is pure unadulterated meh.

That was the first song that I thought of too. It truly is an awful album, otherwise.

Queensryche: 'Tribe' - Terrible, uninspired album. The song 'Open' is the only song worth listening to, and even THAT would be a filler song on one of their best albums. I still find myself listening to it on my iPod, though.

The Scorpions: 'Face the Heat' - Another terrible album. 'Alien Nation' was the only hit, deservedly so.

A Praise Chorus, Jimmy Eat World, Bleed American.

That record is just bad.

"Ghost of a Texas Ladies Man" off Concrete Blonde's otherwise dreary "Walking In London."

"Stop!" and "Three Days" are the only songs on "Ritual De Lo Habitual" that I could ever care much about. I even sold my copy of the album when cash got tight in college.

Oh, man?! But every song on the album is outright CLASSIC. I can even recognize this being partly burned out on it from overplaying it to death back in the '90s. Even most of my favorite albums have a couple of throw-away tracks, but not this one. All my opinion, of course.

How many rock bands out there today are recording anything as strong/memorable as the two songs you mentioned above or any of these? -->
- No One's Leaving
- Ain't No Right
- Then She Did...

Not many, I dare say.

As for songs I like on albums I don't, hmm... I guess my iPod is trying to change this, but I'm still pretty much an album guy. I typically like an album or I don't. There are a few exceptions, though. I like "Nothingness" from Living Colour's Stain, which is a pretty mediocre album overall. Zwan's Mary Star of the Sea comes to mind as well. Somehow I get in the mood to listen to it every now and then, but not often. Regardless, I've always liked the first single from that one, "Honestly". I almost agreed with Patrick on "Burn the Witch" from Lullabyes to Paralyze, but I just looked at the track listing for it and see I like about half the songs on there pretty well. Oh, and I could probably list several Foo Fighters albums here. The first example that comes to mind, though, is "Have It All" from One By One. I can enjoy a couple of other tracks on there too, but something about the album (and the group in general, for that matter) rings hollow. But I've loved "Have It All" since I first heard it.

"In the Meantime" from Spacehog's "Resident Alien".

"Lakini's Juice" off of Live's "Secret Samadhi".

I know, I know. And I recognize that something is wrong with me on this one, but there it is. I keep thinking I'll try again someday.

And I agree with the 2nd point, this exercise shows me that with the exception of the occasional pop song (and it's not like I'm even trying an entire Christina Aguilera album - maybe I'd like it!) I don't experience the good song/bad album thing much.

Me either. I can think of albums on which I only like a few songs, but just one? Maybe "Maps" on Fever to Tell, but I was so annoyed with the majority of that album that I really didn't own it for very long. I might have eventually warmed up to more of it, but it didn't seem worth the trouble.

I'll cop to attempting to make it through an entire Christina Aguilera album - a double album, at that. "Ain't No Other Man" was the only song I really liked, although there were other parts that weren't bad. I also took Kelly Clarkson's Breakaway out from the library on the strength of "Since U Been Gone." That's the only song I liked lots (and, yeah, I know it kinda sorta shares a bridge with the example in my first paragraph) - the rest was... well, kind of what you'd expect, I suppose.

DaveB seems a little more human now, with the Kelly Clarkson thing. I mean that in a good way.

For realz, "Since You Been Gone" and "Ain't No Other Man" were the two songs I had in mind (and on my ipod) when I gave the pop song caveat.

Battleflag by Lo-Fidelity All Stars.

Awesome fucking song. Serioulsy, a good track. Went to see them for free at the Metro in Chicago, primarily going because I loved that song so much, and I was absolutely shocked at how awful the rest of their music was. Turns out the bass player does the lyrics on Battleflag(not the chorus), and the rest is handled by some guy who looked like a pale imitation of Jesus Jones.

When the "singer" kept yealling "Disco Machine GO!!!!!!!", I couldn't stop lauging. In fact I'm laughing just thinking about it. Didn't even make it to the buying the album/regretting my purchase phase, it was that bad.

I own Clarkson's Breakaway. And still listen to it. One of the very few pop albums of the decade that I truly enjoy from beginning to end. It's not perfect by any means, but there's a lot to like.

The funny thing about Paper Planes is that it's a song I love in isolation but I think it just doesn't work in the context of the album. I think it's because it's a known sample in the midst of songs which are musically quite diverse and esoteric.

On another note I love the song 'The Sound Of Settling' by Death Cab for Cutie but can't stand anything else they've ever created. I blame the handclaps.

It's a little poppier than some of the other stuff, but I don't find there to be all that considerable a gap between "Paper Planes" and the rest of Kala. "Jimmy" is really straightforward and tuneful, "20 Dollar" references a couple songs that are probably even more well-known than "Straight to Hell," and "Boyz" is pretty catch in its own right.

Is it that the instrumentation is less dense?

If you haven't already, you might want to give The Photo Album or the new one a try. I love a lot of their stuff, but those albums are particularly heavy on the midtempo to uptempo pop songs like "The Sound of Settling," which are more amomalous on Transatlanticism and Plans.

I think more than anything else Highway to Hell is a song that I used to love as a teenager and so the sample sticks out a lot more than any of the other songs. Will have to give those Death Cab albums a go though.

This made no sense to me when I first read it. I think you meant "Straight to Hell," right? Although now I'm trying to imagine what "Paper Planes" would sound like with an AC/DC sample. It just might work...

I meant Straight to Hell, but an AC/DC MIA mashup would be something to behold.

"Animals" by Nickelback. No idea what album it's from. I heard the song on some digital music channel and thought it rocked pretty hard.

I'm sorry.

You should be.

"Forecast Fascist Future" from Of Montreal's "The Sunlandic Twins" is the only reason why I haven't deleted that album from my iPod, although "Wraith Pinned to the Mist..." is good too.

Also, "Romulus" by Sufjan Stevens, from "Greetings From Michigan". I actually did delete the rest of that album.