WTF Album Covers: Ronnie Ronalde

by Joe Wallace

Sometimes, these WTF album covers are chosen simply because I haven’t had enough caffeine yet when I see them and they just…set…me…off. This one was discovered during a particularly bad decaffeination headache. I snarled at the computer screen. “Yodel…OR whistle. You can’t do both at once, jackass”.

I’m on my second cup now and feeling much better. But this record still sucks. If you listen to this after seeing both the word “yodeling” and “whistler”, there’s simply no hope for you.

Our First NSFW WTF Bad Album Cover

This edition of WTF Bad Album Covers is NOT SAFE FOR WORK. Now that we have that formality out of the way… … Continue Reading

WTF Bad Album Covers Lil’ Flip The Leprechaun

What in the world were they thinking on THIS one? One music blogger writing for the Houston Press declares this the WORST hip hop cover in the history of the Houston scene. We’ll go that one better and say that this is simply one of the worst album covers, like, ever. Nothing says, “Hey, take me seriously” like a guy dressed up like the Lucky Charms mascot.

Gotta give Lil’ Flip points for originality in one respect–he’s not pointing a gun at the cover, standing against a brick wall with his arms folded and his chin stuck in the air like a weathervane, or making some ding-dong finger exercises that are supposed to indicate which side of the street he lives on. So good on you for that.

Ever since Lil’ Kim gained traction in the music industry, hip hop and related sounds has suffered from a veritable flood of “me too” rappers and hip hoppers all trying to get some of that “lil” magic to rub off on them. Seems pathetic, doesn’t? Lil Flip is only one of a shameful crop of intellectually bankrupt me too-ers. My question for all these Lil’ guys–do you want to be known as Lil ANYTHING when you’re FORTY? I didn’t think so. We can NEVER forgive Lil Kim for unleashing this torrent of Lil knockoffs.

Behold the list of the damned, courtesy of Wikipedia.

• Lil’ 1/2 Dead, American rapper
• Lil Bastard, American wrestler
• Lil’ Boosie, American rapper
• Lil’ Bow Wow American rapper and actor
• Lil’ Brotha, American rapper
• Lil’ Cahill, Garage MC in Jersey, Channel Islands,
• Lil’ Cease, American rapper
• Lil’ Chris, British pop singer
• Lil’ Flip, American rapper
• Lil’ Fizz, American rapper and actor
• Lil’ J, American rapper
• Lil’ Jon, American music producer
• Lil’ Keke, American rapper
• Lil’ Malik, (today Mr. Malik) American rapper
• Lil’ Mama, American rapper
• Lil’ Mo, American singer
• Lil Poison, Professional video gamer
• Lil’ O, American rapper
• Lil Rob, American rapper
• Lil’ Romeo (today only Romeo), American actor and rapper
• Lil’ Ronnie American music producer
• Lil’ Scrappy, American rapper
• Lil’ T, Danish rapper and singer
• Lil Wayne, American rapper
• Lil’ Will, American rapper
• Lil’ Wyte, American rapper
• Lil’ Ye, American rapper and all-around entertainment mogul
• Lil’ Zane, American rapper and dancer
• Lil’ Buster, Moroccan rapper , From 4Styles Crew

Hows about somebody calling themselves Lil Dumbass?

WTF Bad Album Covers: Jay Ferguson Thunder Island

More like “Hall and Oates Island”. How can you look like BOTH of them at the same time?If Thunder Island were the last remaining safe haven in the zombie apocalypse, I’m not sure I’d go there with Jay Ferguson, even if he promised to let the survivors eat his corpse.

Sorry, Jay…but this is a matter of style–your choice of footwear leads one to believe that you’d be completely useless in a Charlton Heston-style end of the world context. Even on Thunder Island. ESPECIALLY on Thunder Island.
… Continue Reading

WTF Album Covers: Jerry Colonna Music For Screaming

This wretched album cover for the Jerry Colonna album Music For Screaming couldn’t be accused of false advertising; this album cover is an accurate depiction of the mental state you’ll be in once you’ve listened to a track or two. But this record couldn’t possibly hold a candle to the promise of Dexy’s Midnight Runners Frontman Kevin Rowland, who on My Beauty barfs up versions of Daydream Believer, The Long and Winding Road, and The Greatest Love of All. In short, music for screaming–and a stunner of a bad album cover to boot!

Some would call it homophobic to make fun of this album cover as it might represent someone’s attempt to come out of the closet or come to terms with their sexuality…but I put it to you that Pete Burns, Boy George, hell even Jayne County had album covers sexier than this.

Instead of some kind of bold statement, the expression on THIS guy’s face is one of somebody who got caught playing “Silence of the Lambs” in front of the mirror ala Buffalo Bill.

“Um, er…I wasn’t actually doing THE TUCK, lads. Really.”

There is more raw sex appeal in an album cover by The Mentors than this. If you’re really into the Pete Burns gender bendy concept (and why not?) here’s a VERY important tip–DITCH THE SIDEBURNS. You wouldn’t catch Annie Lennox with a pair of chops like this, and if Lemmy ever decided to give an alternative lifestyle a whirl I guarantee you he’d shave the fuzz off and never look back. Though he would look right scary in a set of pumps–Lemmy would need a pair of cycle boots regardless of which side of the street he decides to work.

WTF Bad Album Covers: The Best Heavy Metal Album Ever

It’s not the artwork that makes this one of the worst covers we’ve seen all month, it’s the last word printed on the cover.

There’s only one thing sillier than putting a nancy-boy glam band like Poison on a heavy metal compilation album…and that’s putting a nancy-boy whine-rock band like NICKELBACK on a heavy metal compilation album. That this piece of crap is called The Best Heavy Metal Album In The World Ever AND features a Nickelback song is proof positive that morons rule the world, and we are their slaves.

OK, not ALL of us, but at least the suckers who actually BOUGHT this. Sorry, but the fact that Motorhead shows up here does NOT redeem the album. The Best Heavy Metal Album Ever is, in all possibility by Motorhead…so ignore this and go listen to March Or Die instead.

I hate to go on and on here, but Nickelback? METAL? The very name is the stupidest thing you’ve ever heard. Nickelback is by far one of the absolute worst of the whiner bands in recent memory. They started off as unlistenable angst-whiner rock and went downhill from there to balladeering craphounds. All whiners, all the time. What a bunch of tossers. And now…this. Rock on, dudes. And Nickelback.

Wow, that was a lot of venom directed at the gents in the N-word band. I feel better now. Lighter.

J. Wallace

WTF: Batman For Mature Audiences Only

This bad album cover is brain-meltingly perverse in all the right ways. There’s no real commentary on this one, simply because…well, just LOOK at this! It’s a masterpiece of surrealism, OR it’s the dumbest piece of art designed to sell products ever.

The longer I stare at this, the funnier and more incomprehensible it gets. This is the El Topo of album covers. … Continue Reading

WTF: Cartoon Disco

To be fair, the bad album art is really not the main event here, though if you were going to try to sell an LP full of already unlistenable crap repackaged as disco dancefloor hits, you’d probably want to show some people actively engaged in, oh, I don’t know, DISCO DANCING?

The cover photo for this looks like the woman just brushed off a drunken groper in some sleazy snack bar; if these two are supposed to be having a good time listening to a disco-fied “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah” it’s impossible to tell. The grimace on her face alone says “bowel surgery” instead of “hot disco fun”.

Now to the realy question. WTF made ANYONE think an album of disco versions of The Woody Woodpecker song would actually SELL? “Hey guys, here’s a great one, let’s spend $70 grand reworking Popeye The Sailor Man into a Studio 54 staple.”

The group that recorded this musical death rattle? Disco Band. they thought so much of themselves that they took the first name that came out of the engineer’s mouth. “Hey, Charlie, what do we call ourselves on this piece of crap, anyway?”

For my money, the song to kill yourself to on this record would be Chim Chim Cheree, which I’ve hated since the first time I heard it as a child. But then again, I hated cartoons at an early, early age (single digits, folks) because–get this–they weren’t VIOLENT ENOUGH.

No wonder I hate THIS with such a passion. And I LIKE disco cheese. But the idea of listening to ten seconds of Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah for any reason at all gives me the makings of my very first seizure.

-Joe Wallace