Image via Complex Original
Even great albums have moments of weakness. There's usually at least one song on an album you love that you could do without. It's not that the song is bad—in fact, on a bad album that song could be a standout—but it's one that you just...don't need. It's what separates the great from the perfect, and what makes you reach for the skip button every time you throw it on. 2016 was an amazing year for music, and these are the songs that we maybe would have kept off some of our favorite albums.
Aquemini had "Mamacita," you know?
Beyoncé "All Night"
Album: Lemonade
Remember, this a list of the worst songs on the best albums of the year. So I'm not saying "All Night" is a bad song by any means. But it's the relative weak spot—key word: relative—on a mostly flawless album. One of the things that makes Lemonade so great is that it features angry, scorned, no-fucks-given Beyoncé, fully unleashed for the first time. Especially in the first half of the album, when she's swinging a baseball bat and stalking after-hours spots in six-inch heels. By the time we hear "All Night" at the album's close, she's forgiven Jay Z, everything is wrapped up with a happy-ending bow, and she's back to lighters-in-the-air pop-ballad Beyoncé. Now, all Beyoncés are great, for sure—but "suck on my balls, pause" Beyoncé is the best.
Anderson .Paak "Silicon Valley"
Album: Malibu
This is part of the chorus to "Silicon Valley": "Open your heart/What's behind those tig ol bitties?" Get it? It's a song about wanting to know someone's interior self, and how hard that can be because of large breasts and/or insecurity. "I just wanna know what's under/That tender titty meat." Paak is a creative, chance-taking songwriter, and this is what happens when you roll the dice and lose.
Kanye West "Facts"
Album: The Life of Pablo
When the best thing you can say about a song is that the new version is "better," you know you're in trouble. When Kanye first dropped "Facts," his diss track at one of the most recognizable companies in the world, it was brash and petulant (and, it bears mentioning, incorrect), but it wasn't a good song. It got a new beat from Charlie Heat, making it listenable for the first time, but "better" and "listenable" don't warrant any song's inclusion on one of the best albums of the year.
Chance the Rapper "Blessings"
Album: Coloring Book
The critics who find Chance to be saccharine, who find his worldview grating or too sunny to be convincing—this is the best evidence for that argument. It also doesn't help that the reprise of this song is so god-level it makes the first iteration feel even more unnecessary.
Frank Ocean "Futura Free"
Album: Blonde
The lyrics alone makes Blonde one of the best albums of the year. Which makes "Futura Free" all the more frustrating. These words read like an unedited freestyle, relying too heavily on the repetition of some truly clunky lines. Where was his editor?
A Tribe Called Quest "Mobius"
Album: We Got It From Here...Thank Your 4 Your Service
We Got It From Here is a long album. At two discs (although, if we're being real here, who's listening to this on a CD?) stretching over 16 tracks, cuts could have easily been made. And this song is a bump in the road between two really strong songs ("Enough" and "Black Spasmodic").
Schoolboy Q f/ Miguel and Justine Sky "Overtime"
Album: Blank Face LP
Even Q knows this is the one. And it's not even that the album can't accommodate a softer moment—"Whatever U Want" is good. This song just doesn't...work.
Drake "Views"
Album: Views
There was no greater musical crime in 2016 than Drake premiering that fantastic Winans sample before "Summer Sixteen," and then affixing it to the Views title track—the weakest album closer on his weakest album. If you're wondering why everyone is so hard on Drizzy's fourth despite it being, more or less, perfectly fine? "Views" is a perfect microcosm of issues seen elsewhere on the album. A good, but unremarkable beat. The whiplash of flex bars showcasing Aubz' current state of being—"My exes made some of my favorite music/I dated women from my favorite movies/Karma's such a thing of beauty"—next to mind-numbingly sophomoric lines like "My wifey is a spice like David Beckham." Or "It's farfetched like I threw that shit a hundred meters." Or "I'm a staple in the game, all my papers together." And last but not least, the passionless delivery all throughout. Drake might've written this himself, but it sure sounds like he's just reading lines off a piece of paper regardless. "My life is on display like Truman." "Views" and Views are the sound of Drake's boat hitting the wall.
Young Thug f/ Yak Gotti, Duke, and Peewee Roscoe "Slime Shit"
Album: Slime Season 3
Young Thug is a singular talent, the kind of rapper who can, at will, redefine what good rapping sounds like. Basically, there's no one else quite like him. Which makes the prospect of a Thug-led posse cut an exercise in dilution, as this song goes to show.
Mac Miller "Skin"
Album: The Divine Feminine
For Mac Miller, love is sex. Which, cool—physical intimacy as a conduit for emotional intimacy is dope. Sex is fun. But "my dick on business trips"? If there were a competition for Bad Sex in Hip-Hop, this song would win it.
Travis Scott "Wonderful"
Album: Birds in the Trap Sing McKnight
Travis Scott doesn't make bad songs, per se. Instead, he makes forgettable songs. "Wonderful," in spite of a big-name feature from the Weeknd, is one of those songs.
Rihanna "Close to You"
Album: Anti
Though Anti is rightfully hailed as Rihanna's strongest album to date, it doesn't quite stick the landing. Closer "Close to You" is not only the weakest song of the LP, it's also a victim of poor sequencing. Ending an album with three straight ballads is a daring move that Rihanna nearly pulls off—"Love on the Brain" is a cool throwback anthem, and "Higher" is arguably the best song on the entire project. "Close to You," unfortunately, is a clunker, paced too slow, and lacking any of the bold, unapologetic attitude that otherwise defines Anti.