10 Legendary Rock Bands With Sophomore Slump Albums

One of the biggest stumbling blocks for rock fans getting into U2 is the preachiness that comes off whenever Bono opens his mouth. There have been many rock bands that try to have a deeper message in their music, but what Bono does onstage almost feels like he has some sort of Messiah complex half the time. Although that's not true from one album to the next, no one should ever make their first U2 album be October.

That's not even to say that this is a terrible record. When you look at the production in comparison to their debut Boy, there's a lot of growth here, as the Edge comes into his own trying to tinker with his guitar sound and the entire production having a lot more space this time around. What really kneecaps this one is the lyrics, which will tune most listeners out from the first note. Being centered around God and man's relationship with him, this feels like it was designed to not sell that well, especially when you open the whole thing up with the song Gloria.

This may have been a good sign for where U2 would go later, but even Bono has called out the band's management team for how tough they had it trying to sell the rock world on a religious record like this. You can claim to not be preachy all you want, but it's hard to get people onboard when you're literally talking about preaching from a pulpit.