10 Rock "Sellout" Albums That Are Actually Really Good

The term sellout always tends to bring up rancor in the minds of rock fans. As much as they may love to listen to their favorite bands night after night, no one wants to see their musical gods phone it in over the course of an entire record. On the other hand, cashing in doesn't always equate to losing the quality.

Across every stripe of rock music, there have been many acts who actually got a bit better after selling out. From the new career directions on some albums to the outright left turns into pop, the hooks on display here are just as good as they were back in the old days. Some of these albums even went so far into the mainstream that they end up eclipsing even the artists' best work, which may or may not sit well with the purists.

Does it feel a little awkward seeing these groups cash their checks in musical form? Yes, a little bit. However, these albums may just be what each of the respective artists needed to reenergize themselves to make even more kickass records. These are certainly a different musical skin for some of our favorite acts, but the end result still ends up working well on them.

It's hard to really see having a hit as a bad thing in the rock world. If anything, it should be an encouraging sign that the public is finally starting to understand your unique brand of rock and roll. On the other hand, when you give it to a band that lost their credibility a long time ago, you get something like Just Push Play.

However, there's a lot to actually like on here aside from the more obvious sellout tendencies on Aerosmith's part. Make no mistake, this album is Aerosmith on soundtrack mode, doing everything they can to replicate the magic of I Don't Want to Miss a Thing. Though hearing them with this much polish is unthinkable for fans of Sweet Emotion and Walk This Way, this is still a decent little slice of pop rock at the best of times.

Across tracks like Beyond Beautiful, you can still hear the badass sonic forces that Aerosmith used to be seeping into the mix, with a surprisingly playful amount of sitar sprinkled in for good measure. Songs like Trip Hoppin and Fly Away From Here are also pretty good attempts at recapturing that larger than life Armageddon feel. And despite it smelling like stale '00s pop now, Jaded is still a pretty good late era Aerosmith song with one hell of a chorus melody. Things have definitely looked better for Aerosmith, but the idea of meshing them into the pop sphere could have been a lot worse than this.