10 Famous Albums You Didn't Know Were Almost Completely Different

The best case scenario for any band is that they get to enter the studio in their own time with no restrictions, writing and recording whatever music they feel is their best and then that music is eventually released to the public. Unfortunately, however, things don't always work out that way, and there are nearly always factors governing what's taking place in the studio, whether that's time constraints or external pressure.

This is what happened during the recording of System Of A Down's follow-up to 2001's Toxicity. While still in the studio, the band's in-progress album was leaked onto the internet under the name Toxicity II. The band were incredibly disappointed for several reasons, one of the main being that the tracks were unfinished, featuring rough mixes, draft arrangements, incorrect vocal melodies and sometimes just missing elements.

This forced the band to try and finish the record as soon as possible, but it drastically altered the record's content. For a start, the songs Virginity and Outer Space were scrapped and never finished.  Several songs were completely reworked, raising the question as to whether or not these represent the “definitive” versions of the songs or if they were changed by necessity owing to the fact many people had already heard them. Other songs were added and removed in an attempt to put out a record distinct from the leak, but with under a year in which to do it, it's tough to say how happy the band was with the situation, and what their original vision for the record was.