The 10 Worst Albums of 2022
To be clear: these are not the absolute worst albums of the year. If that were the case, it’d be stacked with YUNGBLUD and Machine Gun Kelly and Jack Harlow, the apotheosis of dreck. Rather, these are the ones that were lauded and salivated over, receiving critical and commercial praise, while being antithetical to compelling art. There are even artists on here that I like, that have released albums unfortunately untenable for repeated listening. But by and large, what this list contains is objectionable music. Stuff that actively solicits good taste yet is so far removed from it there might as well be radiation warnings around them. I’m tired of these records; they deserve less.
10. Mitski - Laurel Hell
The theory I’d like to believe here is that, supposedly, since Laurel Hell is her last contractually obligated record on Dead Oceans, she just used loosies in order to fulfill that contract and get the album out. That’s the only explanation I can muster for how terribly mid this album is. No memorable toplines compared to Be the Cowboy and Puberty 2, and a plethora of songs that sound as if they selected “80s-style” production on the DAW and called it a day. What happened Mitski?
9. Charli XCX - Crash
I wanted to like this so bad. How I’m Feeling Now was a hit on arrival, and the Cronenberg homage with the presentation is my kind of catnip. She unfortunately preceded to give us yet another goddamn 80s pastiche that is somehow getting worse and worse with every pop star wearing it thin. Charli had an adventurousness that was so captivating for the TMT crowd such as myself and to see that dissipate on Crash is tragic.
8. Beyonce - RENAISSANCE
Wrote about this for No Bells.
7. Black Country, New Road - Ants From Up There
Reads as Mercury Prize bait, but underneath that critic trap typology is what amounts to repackaged folk punk. Oh yeah it’s big and sprawling and full of ideas, that doesn’t mean we should re-litigate Andrew Bird and Thanksgiving and Foot Ox for the Zoomer generation. black midi clears these guys so hard.
6. Hurray for the Riff Raff - LIFE ON EARTH
The insufferable hippie stereotype exists for a reason. True Starbucks-core music that is inoffensively offensive, Hurray for the Riff Raff is an exercise in what happens when you make being a train hopper your entire personality.
5. Harry Styles - Harry’s House
How dare you invoke Haroumi Hosono’s name for this. It’s almost barely music. We need to put out a moratorium on “tasteful pop” forreal, too many acts who are doing bad versions of Prefab Sprout and David Sylvian littering Spotify playlists. Harry is the worst offender because he doesn’t have an identity, he is simply Harry Styles, Maturing and Growing as a Respectable musician. Lab-grown adult contemporary for the soul.
4. Girlpool - Forgiveness
Ah hell nah Girlpool trying a fucking hyperpop turn 😭 Can’t lie, I respect trying such a bold reinvention after being tenderqueer icons for 7 years. Only a little though, this shit is straight garbage. Y’all trying to craft dark, muted pop without any of the songwriting chops necessary to actually pull it off. And with this, Girlpool is over. Good riddance!
3. MUNA - MUNA
I’m glad that queer people can also have music tailored to them specifically that sucks ass. Usually bad queer art is solo pop artists like Sam Smith and Kim Petras, and only now are we starting to see queer bands that suck in the mainstream. That truly bodes well for an inclusive future in music, one where we aren’t bigoted against people for who they love, rather we’re bigoted against them because their music is insipid and wholly insufferable.
2. Bartees Strange - Farm to Table
In 2022 more music than ever is genreless, straddling boundaries and refusing to conform to the standards imposed on what music can be. Bartees Strange seemingly took that as a challenge and decided to cram as many genres as possible on Farm to Table, all to the worst effect imaginable. The piece de resistance of this shittiness is “Cosigns”, wherein a Travis Scott ripoff, Bartees shouts out hanging out with Phoebe Bridgers and Justin Vernon in what is perhaps the lamest flex ever. You are truly one of a kind Bartees.
1. Taylor Swift - Midnights
Of course, I couldn’t resist. The self-importance, the reused motifs, the grandiose rollout, it is all so, so tiresome. Not that I haven’t done this before but there was a different air about folklore/evermore that tried to signal a faux-evolution from pop into folk I found disingenuous. This, however, is simply farce. The fucking Taylor Swift Cinematic Universe, tweaked music ran through an AI and filtered so it’s a different Taylor this time we swear it. The most creatively bankrupt artist of a generation and she has scores around her finger. Marvel, Disney, Elon, Taylor; the rich get richer and we all fucking lose.