NOTE: This is just a list of my personal least favourite albums of 2022. I’m not saying these are objectively the worst albums of 2022. Also, there will be some exaggeration  for entertainment purposes. If you were involved in making (an) album(s) on this list and/or you’re a fan of (an) album(s) on this list, I hope you don’t take it personally. This is not meant as a personal attack on anyone. If you don’t want to read my thoughts on albums I don’t like, you don’t have to. Also, there may be spoilers to my previous year-end lists for 2022.

Hello, everyone. It’s time for the fourth of my six year-end lists for 2022. I know this is later than I planned, but who says it’s too late to make 2022 year-end lists?

Like I said at the beginning of this post, as always, this is all just based on my own personal taste. Yes, I know the title says the ‘worst’ albums, but really it’s just my least favourite albums of 2022, I just think ‘the worst albums’ is catchier for a title. And that also means there will be some controversial picks. Don’t just expect to see all the ‘easy targets’ AKA albums that are most often considered to be the worst albums of 2022. Also, there are a lot of 2022 albums I heard really bad things about, and I usually didn’t take the bait, so if you’re wondering why [insert album here] isn’t on the list, there’s a good chance I just didn’t listen to it. But also, there are some albums that might seem like ‘obvious picks’ for this list which I didn’t dislike enough to put here, some of which I actually like.

Also, I haven’t spent a ton of time listening to these albums because I’d rather do other things with my time, so I might not have the most in-depth explanations. Anyway, I’m excited to post my favourite albums and songs of 2022, but before that, let’s go over my top 10 least favourite albums of 2022:

#10 – Mainstream Sellout by Machine Gun Kelly

Yes, I know I said there would be some exaggerating here, but I’m not going to do that with this one. Yes, Machine Gun Kelly’s newest album is one of my least favourites of the year, but instead of talking about the album, I’d rather just say this: I don’t want to make this about who makes ‘real punk music’ or whatever. Honestly, some of the lyrics here make me worried about Colson Baker the human being, and I really hope he’s okay.

And at the end of the day, he’s an artist making music … and no, it’s not music I like for the most part, but I’m not going to come up with a bunch of reasons why ‘Oh, he’s not making real punk music, he’s a fake punk’ or whatever. I’ll just say he’s someone who’s passionate about music, and I respect his passion for making music, and just because I personally don’t like this album doesn’t mean I’m going to try to be ‘cool’ and pretend that MGK has ‘no potential to make good music’ or any nonsense like that.

Also, there’s one song here I actually like, and that’s “emo girl”. Yes, I said it, I like “emo girl”. Do I think the lyrics are terrible? Yes. But if it weren’t for the lyrics, I would love this song. As it is, I still like it, as it’s got incredible production and great instrumentation and melodies.

#9 – caroline by caroline

I’m not going to say much about this one, because as I was getting ready to post this list, I suddenly remembered this album, and I went back and gave it one more relisten to see if I wanted to put in on this list. And yeah, while I respect the creativity of it, I personally found it to be a slog to get through. I just don’t find much in the compositions that really interested me at all.

It’s getting quite a bit of critical acclaim, so there’s a good chance you’ll like it. It just didn’t click for me.

#8 – Come Home The Kids Miss You by Jack Harlow

I’m not really the biggest fan of hip hop, but even with that being said, the vast majority of hip hop albums I at least like better than this.

After hearing one of the singles, “First Class”, a song I actually like, I was curious to hear the album, only to find out that “First Class” is the only song here that I like … although the closing track is decent in my opinion, I’ll say that.

Aside from that, this is a total snooze fest, with some moments being noticeably bad. For example, that super cringey line on “Movie Star” where Jack says, ‘We don’t need condoms, let’s make a genre.’

Overall, this is the kind of hip hop that bores me so much. If you’re more into hip hop than I am, you might like this, but even a lot of big hip hop fans don’t like this album. Jack has some good flows here and there, but it kind of feels like I’m listening to the same song on repeat. Maybe that’s unfair of me to say, because there’s probably more to this than I realize, but if I find it boring, then I find it boring.

#7 – The Overload by Yard Act

Yes, I know, I put this punk album ahead of MGK’s punk album. I know. While I don’t like either album, I like this one even less.

I think “Tall Poppies” is a legitimately great track, easily my favourite song on any album in this top 10 (or bottom 10, I guess), but outside of that, there is so little here that I find interesting.

There’s probably much more to this album than I realize … actually, no, I do realize there’s a lot to this, but I personally really want to shut it off when I’m listening to it. The instruments sound really disconnected from each other in the production, and the melodies get really annoying at times. Even I feel like I can’t describe exactly why I find this album so annoying to listen to, but I do. I don’t know, it just makes me want to turn it off.

I guess I’ll just recommend that you listen to it for yourself (if you haven’t already) and tell me what you think of it. Because it’s gotten a lot of critical acclaim, so there’s a good chance you’ll like it.

#6 – Country Stuff The Album by Walker Hayes

After the impressively bad “Fancy Like” became a big hit in 2021, my curiosity got the best of me and I decided to check out the album. Even though “AA” was an honourable mention in my Top 10 Best Hit Songs of 2022 post (yeah, it’s a stupid song, and I don’t usually like to make the ‘that’s the point’ argument, but I kind of want to say that here, and I think the song is a lot of fun to listen to), it’s the only song here I legitimately like, and this album has some horrible low points.

“U Gurl” is easily right up there among the absolute worst songs I’ve heard from this decade so far with it’s terrible production and horrible lyrics, and somehow I don’t even think it’s my least favourite song here (although it is extremely close), as “Country Stuff” with Jake Owen is on here, and … I don’t even know what to say.

There are some good moments here and there, but overall the album is a total mess in my opinion. I really don’t like this.

#5 – Honestly, Nevermind by Drake

I was curious to hear this album. Drake made an album that doesn’t have a ton of rapping on it, it’s more of a dance album. So, maybe it was going to be good? Honestly, nevermind.

Sorry, I had to do that. I just had to. Okay, I didn’t have to, but I wanted to.

I already talked about how much I HATE one song in particular on this album by naming it as my least favourite song of the year (it’s not even bad in a funny way, it’s honestly creepy and immature and also sounds like shit to me), and I highly recommend that you don’t listen to that song … no, I don’t mean ‘don’t listen to it’, I mean I actually don’t recommend that you listen to it.

But even aside from that, this has some of the most boring dance music that I’ve heard from 2022. The melodies do almost nothing to stand out to me, and are annoying at points, and these instrumentals sound so bland to me. Even the songs on this album that were somewhat critically acclaimed, like “Massive”, I don’t even like. That’s a song that sounds more upbeat than most of the album, but it doesn’t mean I find it interesting, with that really annoying drop.

The one song here I actually like is “Liability”, but I’m not even sure that’s the biggest positive I can take away from this album … because “Currents” is absolutely terrible, but in a way that I find super funny! I actually would recommend you listen to “Currents” because it’s just too hilarious!

Overall, this has almost nothing to it that I find interesting, and there are some absolutely awful tracks on here. Terrible album in my opinion.

#4 – Dominion by Skillet

If you want a big example of the kind of rock music I don’t like, just listen to this album. I don’t like using words like ‘overdramatic’ and ‘overblown’, and I’m not saying this album is those things, but it certainly sounds like those things to me. The instrumentation sounds like it’s going for this huge, epic sound, but to me it sounds super boring.

There’s not much here melodically that stands out to me, and it feels kind of lifeless, at least to me, which I can’t believe I’m saying considering this is hard rock.

If you find this kind of music uplifting, that’s great, but for me, this just sounds awful.

#3 – Planet Zero by Shinedown

I did a mini review of this album in 2022, and I gave it a 1/10, the lowest score I’ve ever given an album on my website. And the good thing is there isn’t an album from 2022 I would rate lower than a 1/10, even though my #1 pick is probably a pretty light 1/10 (kind of close to a 0.5/10). But anyway, this album was a total slog for me to get through, with production I thought sounded awful, some really annoying melodies, and lyrics which I don’t even want to talk about right now (I can’t even remember much about the lyrics, or whether or not I agreed with the messages … it just sounded kind of ‘fake deep’, which isn’t a term I like using, and whether or not it is ‘fake deep’, it kind of felt that way to me).

In my short, mini review post, I was able to list off pretty much every notable thing I liked about this album. There is so little here that I like.

It seems to be going for this huge story about being on some planet where things are not going well or something like that, I don’t even remember. And it just sounds so uninteresting to me.

Also, it’s almost fifty minutes long, which isn’t super long for an album, but out of the twenty tracks here, I don’t like any of them. That’s right, I don’t like any of these tracks, and there are twenty tracks on this album!

But it’s not even in my top two least favourites of the year. Speaking of which …

#2 – ELEVATION by Black Eyed Peas

All I could think of after listening to this album is: what the fuck did I just listen to?

This album is full of some of the worst instrumentals I’ve heard from 2022, some of the worst lyrics I’ve heard from 2022, and some of the worst rap flows I’ve heard from 2022. The funny thing is, in the middle of the huge mess that is this album, there is one song here that I actually like called “BAILAR CONTIGO”, but it’s surrounded by so many songs that I think sound like absolute shit that despite having a song I actually like, this album still ends up as my second least favourite of the year. If it weren’t for this one song, this would have EASILY topped this list.

If you haven’t listened to the album and you want an idea of how bad I think this album is without having to listen to it, listen to the song “DOUBLE D’Z” and stop reading right now … once you’ve listened to the song, come back and read this statement I’d like to make: “DOUBLE D’Z” is NOWHERE NEAR even being ONE OF the worst songs on here! Yes, you read that right.

This is one of the most annoying albums of the 2020s that I’ve heard so far. I’m not going to say it’s uninteresting, because it’s the opposite of uninteresting. It’s interesting because it’s so fucking annoying … and there’s only one 2022 album I heard that I like less than this one. But before we get to that, let’s go over some dishonourable mentions …

Dishonourable Mentions:

First of all, these are in no particular order, and also, while I tried to make sure I didn’t miss anything I listened to from 2022 for the top 10, these dishonourable mentions aren’t all my least favourites that didn’t make the top 10. It’s not really an extension of the top 10, it’s more just a list of some random albums from 2022 that I don’t like. But I did try to focus more on picking albums that were close to making the list. Anyway, here they are:

Being Funny In a Foreign Language by The 1975: I know, it’s a controversial pick … and there are a few songs I like which kept it off the list, with “About You” being my favourite track here, but as a full album I really don’t like it. I’m not a fan of the production where I just don’t like how the instruments sound together, and it’s why I don’t like “Oh Caroline” nearly as much as most critics do. I’m curious to hear more of The 1975’s music, and they’ve made some amazing tracks that I love like “The City”, but this just didn’t do much for me.

The Other Side of Make-Believe by Interpol: And now an album which I don’t like for very similar reasons to why I don’t like The 1975’s newest album. The instruments just sound really disconnected from each other in the production, with “Fables” possibly being the biggest example of that here. Even some of the better songs here are far from great, like “Something Changed”, which has a lot of the same production elements that hold most of the album back for me. How is this the same band who made Turn On the Bright Lights?

Squeeze by SASAMI: I can tell a lot of effort went into this, and I mostly get the appeal of it, but the production held it back for me, for similar reasons to the first two dishonourable mentions. Also, “Skin a Rat” is a super annoying song in my opinion.

CRASH by Charli XCX: Easily one of the most disappointing albums of 2022 for me, considering how much I liked Charli’s previous two albums. Those albums are both so good, and then she puts out this. I mean, I get why some people like this, but it’s not for me at all. The melodies aren’t nearly as strong, the production is a huge step back for me, too, especially with the percussion sounding so awkward on songs like the title track and “New Shapes”, and there’s just not very much here that really stands out to me in a positive way. Even my favourite song here, “Constant Repeat”, feels like it’s missing something to help it click for me more, even though I still really like that song.

Will Of The People by Muse: Great songs appear on this album, but it also has some terrible ones in my opinion, and I think there are more terrible songs than great songs on here. But I will say, as bad as I think the closing track is, I think it’s bad in a funny way … partially because of the title, “We Are Fucking F****d”. But a lot of the album just comes across as generic musically, at least to me, and the title track made my top 10 least favourite songs of the year, it’s so annoying.

Expert in a Dying Field by The Beths: Of all the albums here, either in the top 10 or in the dishonourable mentions, this is probably the most critically acclaimed. Yes, I know, almost everyone seems to agree that this is absolutely amazing, but it’s really not my thing. I think it’s mostly well-produced, but aside from that, there is so little here that I really like. I just find the melodies and compositions so boring for the most part. “Best Left” is the one song here I truly love, but so many of these songs are just super boring to me, and while the lyrics are probably really well-written, they don’t do much for me personally. Again, that’s a me thing, but this list is about my personal feelings toward these albums. And also, even though I mostly like the production here, that’s not to say I like all the production, and there are some production elements I really don’t like, too, like the mixing on the super annoying “Silence Is Golden”.

IMPERA by Ghost: I’m not super familiar with Ghost’s music, but as someone who absolutely loves their 2018 song, “Dance Macabre”, I was shocked how little I ended up liking this album. These songs feel underpowered in the production and the melodies aren’t doing much for me, either, for the most part.

Superache by Conan Gray: I get the appeal of this album, but it’s just not for me. I like a few songs here, but I mostly find it boring, with “Best Friend” standing out as easily my least favourite song here, with one of the worst choruses I’ve heard from 2022.

Okay, now it’s time for me to reveal my least favourite album of 2022. Here it is:

#1 – So Far So Good by The Chainsmokers

So Far So Awful (as one of my favourite music critics called it) is the newest album from The Chainsmokers, and it’s my personal pick for the worst album of 2022!

To anyone who hasn’t heard this album, do you want a musical experience unlike one you’ve ever experienced before? Well, here it is! The Chainsmokers’ new album is full of annoying choruses and annoying vocal effects, made even worse by awful trap beats!

“Maradona” features some chopped-up vocals which sound absolutely awful and keep showing up throughout the rest of the track, which feels like a six-minute song that’s a total slog to get through, even though it’s not even four minutes, and this track doesn’t stop finding instrumental ideas that make it worse!

“iPad” is full of uninteresting melodies before going into a drop with some reverb that feels really out of place, “Channel 1” starts off as arguably one of the most uninteresting songs of 2022 that I’ve heard before eventually getting to what is probably one of the worst drops I’ve heard in a 2022 song, and “Something Different” is … well, exactly what the title says, but not in a good way, as the production sounds absolutely horrible with the way the vocal effects combine with the horrible instrumental.

But despite how bad nearly every track here is, none of the other 12 songs on this album are quite as atrocious as “Testing”, which is impressively bad!

I’m going to end this off with some positivity by saying that while I don’t like the majority of what I’ve heard from The Chainsmokers, they do have some songs I absolutely love, such as “Paris”, but none of those songs appear on this album. Still, though, this isn’t here because I think it’s ‘cool’ to not like The Chainsmokers. Again, they have songs that I love.

…

As always, this list is just based on my own personal taste in music, and if you love any of these albums, I hope you don’t take it personally. Same applies if you were involved in making any of these albums (even though I don’t think any of these artists are reading this).

Next up, it’s The Top 50 Best Albums of 2022, and then The Top 100 Best Songs of 2022. Feel free to let me know what you thought of this list and/or let me know what your least favourite albums of the year are.

Thanks for reading!