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With apologies to Jim Derogatis for aping his title and concept, this is a thread where you share which piece or art, of if it makes you more comfortable, ‘entertainment’, consistently receives accolades it does not deserve. Perhaps time hasn’t been as kind to it as people may think. Or perhaps proponents are simply neck-deep in nostalgia, and lack the humility to admit that something they hold very dear sucks. However, if you are like me, sometimes it just feels like you are snorting crazy powder because you cannot understand why people love a particular piece of art with such intensity. Before I get the ball rolling, I am going to be clear that I am not just going to pick on any piece of popular entertainment. Commercially driven entertainment, which is entertainment that seeks to reach the broadest possible audience in order to profit those who create it, are often insipid and nauseating. There are exceptions, of course, but for the sake of simplicity, I am going to just tackle critical darlings. Movies, games, books and albums that top “best-ever” lists will be in my particular line of fire, but of course you are free to tear apart whatever you wish. Also, if any of you cretins say Citizen Kane, I will lose my shit. Overrated Album: The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band I love The Beatles. This is not an anti-Beatles post. However, this is consistently ranked as their best record, and I couldn’t disagree more. If anyone took the time to go track-by-track and judge every track by its merits, you will see that it’s actually a bit of a misstep from the band. Firstly, it’s not their best record- that honour goes to Revolver, which synthesises psychedelic exploration and melodic pop better than anything else they have ever done. Secondly, there are a buttload of shitty tracks on this record. While the album opens strong with its title track, ‘With a Little Help from My Friends’ is the first sign that this isn’t an A-Grade Beatles record. Notably, it’s very cruel to get your personable but not exceptionally talented drummer to sing a song about how he would struggle to survive without his friends. The song has that bullshit nursery rhyme tone that plagues this album and a lot of McCartney’s future work. ‘Getting Better’, ‘When I’m Sixty-Four’, ‘She’s Leaving Home’ and ‘Fixing a Hole’ are utterly forgettable, and if you do remember them, it could be because they sound like childish sing songs as opposed to listenable pop music. That is not to leave Lennon off the hook, here. Many of his songs sound undercooked and lack anything tangible to hold on to as a listener. ‘Good Morning Good Morning’ is his worst song on the record, but ‘Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite’, much like the album in general, relies on its neat concept rather than anything from its own merits. The song that coincidentally initialises as ‘LSD’ is a solid track, but it cannot support the album on its own. Strangely, the best song on the record ‘A Day in the Life’, might be the best Beatles song ever recorded. It has everything that is great about the band: the willingness to experiment, the clash of musical styles, the wonderful dynamic between Lennon’s hazy wails and McCartney’s jolly hooks… it sounds like a band that were trying to blow minds. They succeeded. This album has a wonderful concept, was extremely ambitious and culturally important, and sounds like a band free to do what they please. However, in the end, there isn’t that much worth listening to here. Sorry. Overrated Book: Jack Keroac’s On the Road This book is a great example of an author failing his obligation as a story teller: Keroac simply does not properly explore the relevant dimensions of his subject matter. On the Road glorifies a free life without commitments, without the grind, without a plan, and to live life one step at a time to maximise how much you can see or do. However, it is horrendously irresponsible, ignoring emotional inconveniences and creating motivation without a source. Firstly, it is a travel book where you don’t see anything. For a book about travel, with characters that enthuse about the open road, there is nothing to see as a reader. While Sal Paradise bounces between city to city with feverish drive, the locations themselves lack any sort of defining character. As a reader, we cannot understand his enthusiasm about being in Denver because we can’t see how it is any different to California. For a book about locations and cultures, On the Road’s backdrop is incredibly lifeless. Secondly, the hardships of travel are not fully expressed. Sal often goes hungry, sleeps in public and feels despondent as he feels like he is a ship without a rudder. Yet, Keroac brisks past these emotions, as if they are minor inconveniences to living on the open road, and therefore not worth detailing properly. While the book dedicates pages to how exhilarating it is to sit in a pick-up truck in the middle of the nowhere, severe hunger pains only merit a single line. Have you ever gone 24 hours without food? It fucking sucks. You would complain about it a lot. Keroac doesn’t think so. It’s like reading a book on the joys of binge drinking without any mention of hangovers. Also, Keroac has an awkward, stilted writing style. His prose continuously manages to circle around his particular points without ever getting there. While some could argue that this ties in with the theme of the text, as the characters are simply drifting to avoid getting at their real problems, I think that is giving Keroac too much credit. I was going to write why Grease is such a terrible film, but I just don’t have the energy after that. Maybe later.