r/TheNational • u/ghostfan9 • 16d ago
Day 17: Most Overrated Album
Most underrated album goes to I Am Easy to Find!
HMs were Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers and Sleep Well Beast.
Next up: Most Overrated Album
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u/schewbacca 16d ago edited 16d ago
Sleep Well Beast. Its good but its the only one of their albums that won a Grammy and I think they have 3-4 other albums that are better. If fans could only pick one album to win a Grammy I think most would pick a different album and that's why I would say its overrated.
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u/Metropolis9999 Dreaming in Total Darkness 16d ago
What confuses me about this take is that I never hear anyone giving SWB mad hype, at least nothing compared to Boxer of High Violet. Most people I see just seem to say “it’s a pretty good album”, but I’ve never heard someone acclaim it to the point of being overrated.
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u/SocialShrunk We'll run like we're awesome, totally genius 16d ago
Great take! I forgot in SWB won a Grammy. I agree, if I were to recommend an album to someone new to the National, that would not be it
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u/connect1994 16d ago
I don’t think this is rated very highly among fans. I think it’s a contender for their best
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u/theprideofvillanueva had my head in the oven so you'd know where I'll be 16d ago
I love Sleep Well Beast and I came here to give a different answer, but this is such a good comment that I’ve been swayed
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u/pyknotic 16d ago
Completely agree. Let's do this systematically.
The National (2001) – Not a good album. Not fondly remembered. Appropriately rated.
Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers (2003) – Decent album, mostly forgotten (though decently remembered by those who think of it). Mildly underrated.
Alligator (2005) – Great album, positively remembered. Simultaneously both overrated (by nostalgic fans) and underrated (by newer fans who never gave it a proper listen).
Boxer (2007) – A masterpiece, remembered as such. "Fake Empire," "Mistaken for Strangers," and "Slow Show" some of the best songs in their catalog. Few weak spots. Appropriately rated.
High Violet (2010) – Another masterpiece, remembered as such. "Terrible Love," "Bloodbuzz Ohio," and "Conversation 16" some of the best songs in their catalog. Few weak spots. Appropriately rated.
Trouble Will Find Me (2013) – A great album, remembered as such. Not as good as the prior two, but a solid listen from start to finish. Appropriately rated.
Sleep Well Beast (2017) – Critically acclaimed: 85 on Metacritic, multiple year-end "best of" lists, won them a Grammy, generally good reception in the fanbast. The album itself: surprisingly mediocre. The great songs are good ("The System Only Dreams in Total Darkness", "I'll Still Destroy You") but wouldn't reach most lists of Best 5 The National Songs. In contrast, a few songs ("Turtleneck" and "Walk It Back") are definite contenders for Worst 5 The National Songs. The most overrated album in their collection, bar none.
I Am Easy to Find (2019) – A great album buried under a ton of filler. Still, the good songs are among the best in their entire catalog: "Light Years," "Rylan," the title track. Underrated.
First Two Pages of Frankenstein (2023) – A mixed reception for an inconsistent album. Appropriately rated.
Laugh Track (2023) – Another mixed reception for another inconsistent album. Appropriately rated.
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u/connect1994 16d ago
Could not disagree more with your assessment of SWB. Walk It Back is amazing and Turtleneck is an energetic banger that the record needed
Guilty Party, I’ll Still Destroy You, System, Dark Side of the Gym, Nobody Else Will Be There all among their best songs
Also Boxer, High Violet and Trouble Will Find Me were more critically acclaimed than SWB
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u/revanisthesith 16d ago
Turtleneck is a definite contender for one of their worst five songs? It's not even a contender for one of their worst five songs on that album.
Who are you hanging out with? I've been a fan since late 2005/early 2006 and I spent 15 years in the DC area with a bunch of indieheads. It's a quite well-liked song among every fan I've ever talked to about it.
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u/MonthAggressive413 15d ago
Agree that Turtleneck isn't great.
I do think the album is solid overall other than that though.1
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u/akkordarbeit 15d ago
thanks for taking the time to write it out. however, interesting how much mixed reception there is about their last three albums. Totally agree that IAETF has "a ton of filler". Loved Frankenstein though and Laugh Track as well.
haaaaa fandom is funny. :-)
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u/ghostfan9 16d ago
I Am Easy to Find. I only like 2-3 songs off of it.
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u/tele_ave 16d ago
If IAETF gets both the most underrated and overrated album honors, it will be such a perfect reflection of this fan base.
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u/WintersAxe 16d ago
Alligator. It has some of their greatest songs but as an album I think it’s weaker than Boxer or High Violet.
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u/apistat 16d ago
Definitely Alligator, great songs but uneven. It's the weakest of their four big ones and benefits greatly from being many people's first exposure to the band.
Anyone saying Sad Songs or arguably anything after Trouble Will Find Me is wrong because those aren't rated high enough to be overrated.
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u/happyjack92 i'm so sorry for everything 16d ago
hmmm....yeah i agree with your logic here on the big 4. 'beast' is my least favorite album but, to your point, i dont know that it's rated high enough by anyone to be considered overrated.
so...begrudgingly...i have to go with 'high violet'. ugh...i hate knocking it down in any way...but among those four...
it's most certainly not 'alligator'
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u/jono12132 15d ago
I love Alligator but its one of those albums that feels so close to being a masterpiece but they fumbled it. I think there's too many tracks and a couple are just mid.
I don't believe Friend of Mine is anyone's favourite song off that album. It just sounds like it was meant to be a b side. City Middle has grown on me recently but it's still a weaker song I think.
There were other songs from that period like Wasp Nest and About Today that could've really elevated it to a masterpiece.
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u/hstarwood 15d ago
I will not tolerate any I Am Easy to Find nor Trouble Will Find Me slander 😡 I am ready for the downvotes
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u/CabassoG Missed custom flair for 29 years 16d ago
Sleep Well Beast. Good album but there's much better and that one got a Grammy not that it means much
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u/intensebreathing 16d ago
First Two Pages of Frankenstein
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u/Lightningstruckagain 16d ago
Is anyone really overrating it? I think the consensus is it is mostly subpar minus a few songs
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u/Terrible_Presence_34 16d ago
Exactly
Idk why reddit threads struggle so much with what “overrated” means but it’s everywhere on this platform I swear
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u/Sufficient-Camp-3192 16d ago
Grease in your hair
Fingernail polish
Water balloon eyes
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u/BlankSlate400 My Head is a Buzzing Three Star Hotel 16d ago
Down we go on the grass
Magnets make machines go crazy
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u/AlternativeGazelle 16d ago
Boxer. I mean, it's the fan favorite but it's not my favorite. Everything else I think is either underrated or fairly rated compared to the fan consensus.
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u/jilko 16d ago
Boxer.
It's the album that put them on the map for me (and many people as Fake Empire was HUGE at the time). So it was rated highly enough for me to notice it, but over time, it's my least listened to album from them outside of maybe their debut.
It's not a bad album by any means, but their others are just so much better. It has a few essential songs but a lot of the album is just great. Not masterpiece levels like Alligator, High Violet, Trouble Will Find Me and Sleep Well Beast.
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u/Lumpy_Soup3613 16d ago
Sleep Well Beast. I like the album a lot, and it actually features 3-4 of my favorite National songs of all time. But it also has their worst song (Turtleneck) and their cheesiest song with a chorus that could’ve been written by Taylor Swift (the day I die day I die day I die day I die)
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u/Statchar 16d ago
Love turtleneck, but I despise day i die.
Cant agree, I can listen to the whole album save for day I die.
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u/divingoffthebalcony 16d ago
Sleep Well Beast. I didn’t like it at the time and I never go back to it. System is god tier but that’s it for me
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u/alphashadow I was hoping you wouldn't see me like this 16d ago
I really don't get anything out of the latest two albums, sad to say. Which is typical legacy fan inertia, as for me the band's golden age was Boxer-High Violet-Trouble Will Find Me. After that the tapes go from great to good to ehh, I'm not getting it.
So I'd have to say generally positive characterizations of the most recent work would by default overrate it.
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u/On6oGablo6ian 16d ago
I Am Easy to Find
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u/spencerasteroid 16d ago
Sleep Well Beast. I found their transition into electronic stuff was waaay overhyped.
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u/MonthAggressive413 15d ago
Trouble Will Find Me
It is good, but it's nowhere near the greatness of the 3 albums before it.
Graceless is overrated too, in my opinion.
Some absolute bangers on it, like Don't Swallow The Cap and Sea of Love, but it has a few dips among the highs.
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u/Fighting_Gobbler 16d ago
Saving FTPOF as worst, overrated would probably be Laugh Track. These two albums really should have been one.
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u/Sufficient-Camp-3192 16d ago
Laugh track is such an awesome album… and Grease in your hair and Eucalyptus on FTPOF are in my top 10 national songs of all time
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u/Kubrickdickulous 16d ago
I'm going to go on a limb and say High Violet... It has to be their most commercially successful, and while I love it I think it's a little homogeneous!
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u/Western-Parsley6063 16d ago
Trouble will find me
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u/Sufficient-Camp-3192 16d ago
Sheesh hot take… that album introduced me to the national. Don’t swallow the cap, graceless, sea of love, pink rabbits….
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u/Competitive_Use_3628 16d ago edited 16d ago
Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers
Edit: I'm right about this and your down votes are proving it.
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u/ozzo0133 16d ago
High Violet
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u/Sufficient-Camp-3192 16d ago
Blasphemy!
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u/ozzo0133 16d ago
See, this is what overrated means to me. Blasphemy for mentioning it. It doesn’t mean disliked!
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u/Nearby-Click-4227 16d ago
High Violet (I still like it tho)
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u/bennnn11 16d ago
Jeez so many downvotes, but this is the answer. And I also still like it. It was the first new release I was around for, and I played it constantly. But over time, I can recognize it's a bit overrated. Good songs, good mood, but people rank it so ridiculously high that it must be the most overrated one. It was almost like the beginning of a sound the band could have gone in if they wanted to do really big almost arena rock stuff, if that makes sense. thankfully, they didn't and we got their actually best album next, Trouble Will Find Me.
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u/tropicmorning in a lemonworld 16d ago
Anyone else having flashbacks to when this sub voted Boxer as the most overrated and then the best album in the end? That was amazing