Saxon fans thought their heroes had reached rock bottom with 1986's Rock the Nations, but the group's next studio album, Destiny, sadly proved them frighteningly wrong.

Having bored everyone to tears with the former LP's well-intentioned but uninspired back-to-basics approach, Saxon decided to go for broke in their quest to make it in America by delivering a shamefully sleek, shallow, and formulaic late-'80s pop-metal album.

The choice to kick off proceedings with a surprisingly sedate cover of Christopher Cross' "Ride Like the Wind" was surprising at best, and then following it with the album's best number, "Where the Lightning Strikes," was tantamount to torture, given the largely unsalvageable dross that followed.

Indeed, brave were the souls (utterly doomed, but brave) who navigated the murky waters of the atrocious, Titanic-inspired "S.O.S." -- only to endure desperate ballads ("I Can't Wait Anymore," "Song for Emma") and sugar-coated headbangers (think post-1987 Whitesnake ripoffs) like "Jericho Siren" and "Calm Before the Storm." The latter wastes a touching dedication from singer Biff Byford to his recently deceased father, and even he seemed to realize it later, since the same lyrics were used again for a much better song called "Iron Wheels" in 1992.

Any such chance at career redemption was entirely out of the question upon Destiny's release, however, and Saxon and their fans were arguably never more at odds.