There are a few things that get my goat, musically speaking. One is bad lyrics. In particular, lyrics that are there just to make the rhyme work really irritate me. You can see them coming from a mile away. Here is an example from a recent Ricky Martin song:
Looks like a flower but stings like a bee
Like every woman in history
As South Park's version of Johnny Cochran says in his famous Chewbacca Defense, "That does not make sense." Not only is it a bad ripoff of Muhammed Ali, if the song is supposed celebrating this woman's uniqueness, why would it mention that she is the same as all other women? I really hate this lyric. My brothers have taken issue with Huey Lewis' lyrics in the past for similar reasons.
Another little nit I have to pick is words that look like they should rhyme, but don't. No American singer should rhyme "again" with "rain", "gain", or "pain", for instance. Particularly nasty are the words whose pronunciation depends on context, like "read" or "wind". Musicians should just say no to bad rhymes, or give up rhyming entirely.
My last gripe is with artists who try to infuse a standard piece with "meaning" by slowing it down and adding what I call significant pauses. This is a cheap device, and I won't stand for it any more. "Jingle Bells" is not a meaningful song, and Mannheim Steamroller can't make it so by playing it in a minor key and stopping every three notes. Likewise, the Windham Hill recordings of George Winston (or as I like to call him, Patrick Henry Winston Churchill the Second) make me want to use that car-vaporizing laser on the stereo.
Man, I gotta get me one of those. So versatile!
You can respond to my ranting here.
The hills are alive with the sound of ranting.