10 Artists Who HATE Their Own Albums
When artist becomes critic.
Putting an album together is no easy feat. From one track to another, you have to bring together a bunch of songs that stand on their own, while also working great within the context of a single listening experience. Oftentimes, artists have to put their heart and soul into what they do, but that doesn't always mean they will be satisfied in the end.
Across every single genre of music, there are albums that artists have looked at with disdain in retrospect. Whether it's because of the intense period in a band's development or just the raw feelings still present in the music, these songs can often be hard for some of their creators to look back on.
Other times it may just come down to the fact that the music is uninspired, but these artists haven't minced words about their personal hatred towards their work.
What makes these arguments even more insane is when you realize that some of these records are among the best work the artist has ever put out. Though these songs may have left an impression on legions of fans over the years, no song is safe from the harshest critic of them all: the person who wrote it.
10. Relationship of Command - At the Drive In
Anyone remotely interested in heavy music owes it to themselves to listen to Relationship of Command by At the Drive In. Blending all the abrasive soundscapes known to man, the riffs of Omar Rodriguez Lopez make for some of the most caustic sounds that post hardcore has ever seen. The whole record is a blast to listen to, but Lopez himself has not brought himself to listen to it in years.
Make no mistake, Lopez is still incredibly proud of the work he was able to accomplish on this record, but the main reason he hates it has more to do with the mix than the actual songs.
When speaking about the production of the record, Lopez has stated that the entire album was much more chaotic than it became, and instead blames engineer Andy Wallace for making the record more radio-friendly.
This is a bit of a strange complaint to have considering the album that we ended up getting was some of the most brilliant displays of anarchy in the entire rock world. While he doesn't outright call the mixing terrible by any means, Lopez has said that Wallace's mix of the record is much too glossy for its own good. There's a lot to love about Relationship of Command, but this might be the one record that Lopez loves to hate.