Made to Be Broken
second full-length album from Soul Asylum
Made to Be Broken is the second full-length album by Soul Asylum. It was released on January 18, 1986. It was the first of the three albums released by Soul Asylum in 1986.
The song "Never Really Been" contains the line "And where will you be in 1993." The band performed the song on their 1993 appearance on MTV Unplugged, by which time they'd seen their first platinum-selling album and number one single.
Critical reception
Trouser Press called the album "an essential Soul Asylum LP," writing that "raging dual vocals and interwoven guitar work by Pirner and Dan Murphy, supported by new arrival Grant Young’s precise, varied drumming, make the tuneful power of 'Tied to the Tracks,' 'Ship of Fools,' 'New Feelings' and the countryish title track shatteringly original." The Spin Alternative Record Guide wrote that "[Dave] Pirner's punch-drunk, night-stand poetry took on real power when framed by new drummer Grant Young's off-kilter, rhythmic swerve and guitarist Dan Murphy's dual vocals."
In a retrospective review, Stylus Magazine wrote that Made to Be Broken "taps into a potent spirit of underdog defeatism; it’s the sound of watching the tour bus through the window of the cramped van, gazing at the hotel en route to the fan’s couch or floor, and imagining a bath while showering in a sink."
Track listing
All songs written by David Pirner, unless otherwise noted.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Made to Be Broken” as second full-length album from Soul Asylum. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as second full-length album from Soul Asylum. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 3, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2314567. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1986 and 1993.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Made to Be Broken” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.