Top 10 Most Disappointing R&B Albums

R&B albums that may not have been completely terrible but still didn't satisfy and left a lot to be desired.

The Top Ten

  1. Coming Home - Usher

    Better than Hard II Love, but this album felt like it was left over from 10 years ago. While Hard II Love may have been worse, at least that album had "Tell Me" on it, which was actually amazing.

    I couldn't find a "Tell Me" anywhere on this album. Just a bunch of throwaways. He even brought in The-Dream and Rico Love as if it were still 2012!

  2. Glad You Came - Mario

    While not terrible, Mario definitely needed to come harder.

    Most of the songs are so short, and other than Space and two or three others, nothing really stood out.

  3. Victims & Villains - Musiq Soulchild & Hit-Boy

    This was just bad.

    It just wasn't Musiq, at all.

  4. Wildheart - Miguel

    This was the beginning of Miguel's weird phase.

  5. Life on Earth - Musiq Soulchild

    Again, just not up to Musiq standards.

    The production, the vocals, and the writing were all lacking compared to his previous work.

  6. Game Changer 2 - Johnny Gill

    Other than "Bed on Fire" and "Beautiful You," this really didn't feel like a proper follow-up to Game Changer from 2014, which was actually a great R&B album that I still listen to to this day.

    Edit: This album has grown on me a lot, actually. With songs like "Home," "That's My Baby," "Lose a Lover, Keep a Friend," and the previously mentioned "Bed on Fire," as well as "Soul of a Woman" and "Perfect," which were pretty solid too, this definitely isn't a bad album by any means.

    I think the problem here is that two of the best songs don't come until the second half of the album. In contrast, the first Game Changer album had a great run of 6 or 7 high-quality songs right from the start.

    Another thing that confuses me with this album is the song "So Hard." It honestly sounds like a leftover track from the late '90s or early 2000s. (I'm not saying it's bad, it's actually quite good.) But you can tell by Johnny's voice that this wasn't a recent recording. He clearly sounds much younger. Also, what's with the random uncredited female singer? Even the subject matter - like "girl you makin' everything hard" and the mention of phone sex - sounds more like something from the late '90s or early 2000s, similar to "Too Close" by Next, rather than something you'd expect from a guy in his 50s.

    So overall, not a bad album, just incredibly disjointed.

  7. Icarus Falls - Zayn

    Zayn ditched the R&B sound we had come to love him for in favor of a more poppy one.

    "Tonight" was a standout, but the rest, for the most part, was all pretty forgettable.

  8. Cuffing Season - Eric Bellinger

    Up until this point, Eric actually had some halfway decent music.

    This album marked the beginning of the end.

  9. The Buffet - R. Kelly

    While far better than Black Panties, this album was pretty underwhelming and forgettable minus a few great tracks.

  10. Graffiti - Chris Brown

    Like Eric, this album marked the beginning of Chris's downfall.

    11. The Newcomers
  11. ?

    Caos - Miguel

  12. ?

    Make Me Say It Again, Girl - The Isley Brothers

    Rick Ross, 2 Chainz and the Midgos all featured on one album, an Isley album? Yeah... this should've never happened. I knew something was wrong when both Ronald Isley and Uncle Charlie were featured on a Fetty Wap remix SMH. If you're gonna get rap features, at least get somebody who actually complements the song! I definitely wouldn't mind hearing someone like Big K.R.I.T. on an Isley song, I feel like his vibe might actually mix well with their soulful style.

    13. The Contenders

  13. B'Day - Beyonce

  14. Dopamine - Normani

    This honestly would've been disappointing if it had anything to live up to. By the time it came out, people had already moved on.

  15. Raymond v Raymond - Usher

    This definitely wasn't as strong as his previous work, and this is when he started to get lost in trend-chasing, which has only continued throughout his career.

    It felt like Usher was going through a mid-life crisis, especially with songs like "Lil Freak," "OMG," and even "Hey Daddy (Daddy's Home)," which honestly felt like a watered-down version of Mario's "Ooh Baby." That song was also written by Rico Love, yet was far better and actually succeeded in what it was trying to do.

    This album didn't really have any songs that I would consider my favorite or Usher's best work. Some songs were decent to pretty good, but nothing was truly great here.

  16. Good Man - Ne-Yo

    This was hyped as his big R&B comeback, but most of the music just honestly wasn't very good or memorable. The production was underwhelming compared to his best work.

    There was even a song that featured Eric Bellinger on here, which was predictably unappealing and sounded like it could have been on any one of Eric's many albums or mixtapes.

  17. 1123 - BJ the Chicago Kid

    This was very mainstream in terms of production and features, especially compared to "In My Mind." After a three-year wait, that only made it more disappointing.

    Thankfully, BJ has recovered from this in recent years with the much more soulful and sophisticated "Gravy," which reminded us why we liked his music in the first place.

  18. Hard II Love - Usher

    Another album that, other than the masterpiece that was "Tell Me," pretty much lived up to its name. With songs like "No Limit" and "Bump," it was clear that Usher was still "looking for himself" after all these years.

  19. Double Up - R. Kelly

    Probably his second worst album he ever made, the first one of course being the infamously awful "Black Panties." This was stuffed with so many features that it felt more like a compilation of the hottest artists of the moment rather than a proper solo studio album.

    Some people might say "The Buffet" was worse, but I'd personally probably take that album over this. For all its flaws, and there are plenty, at least it had "Wake Up Everybody," "Backyard Party," and "Get Out of Here with Me," which were all amazing and are honestly some of my personal favorites. They reminded us what Robert was truly capable of when he was really locked in and not chasing trends.

  20. To All the Girls - Verse Simmonds

    I actually liked Verse Simmonds before this, but this was a major disappointment after a long wait. What happened to the smooth vibe he had with Boo Thang? This was yet another example of an R&B artist trying to be a mumble trapper.

  21. Sex, Love & Pain II - Tank

    This was the beginning of the end for Tank. The first song, SLP2, tricks you into thinking this could actually be a pretty decent album, but it was pretty much the only one.

    From track 2 onward, Tank falls hard into the trap-n-b lane. After this album, a few similar ones followed, and I think that's probably part of the reason why he's transitioned to podcasting in recent years.

  22. Girls Night Out - Babyface

    This was really just an album to highlight all the female "talent" in modern R&B more than it was ever supposed to be a proper solo album. But still, it was terrible, and the fact that Babyface's name was even attached to this crime against R&B, the same man who had given so much quality music over the years, was truly hard to overlook.

    From the generic modern production, the bad "singing" from most of the features, and the trashy lyrics, I think this is an album that most true R&B heads would all rather forget.

  23. War & Leisure - Miguel

  24. Royalty - Chris Brown

  25. Eazy Call - Eric Bellinger

  26. My Name Is Joe Thomas - Joe

  27. Crash - Kehlani

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