Speaking of VH1, which I was yesterday, they have a program called “50 Most Awesomely Bad Songs...Ever”. I’ve seen it thrice now. I can’t argue with most of the songs on their list, but I take issue with their choice of winner, which was (Jefferson) Airplane/Starship’s “We Built this City”. VH1's reasoning seemed to be that what made it so bad was that it was done by the legendary band who’d given us "White Rabbit", "Go Ask Alice", "Jane", "Miracles", etc. I have a problem with that logic because it wasn’t a show called “When Good Bands Go Bad” or “What the Hell Were They Thinking?” it was a show about awesomely bad songs. While I don’t disagree that “We Built This City” is a tune of extreme suckage, I find it hard to believe that anyone could look someone else in the eye and say with a straight face that it’s empirically worse than Gerardo’s “Rico Suave” or “I’m Too Sexy” by Right Said Fred. The winner ought to have been the song most atrociously bad in and of itself, regardless of its performer.
I didn’t understand why some songs were on the list, such as Spin Doctor’s “Two Princes”, Chicago’s “You’re The Inspiration” and Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up”. I’m not saying they’re my favorites, I’m not saying they represent ground-breaking musical or artistic achievement, but I wouldn’t say they’re all that bad. I quite liked “Two Princes” before 99X played it 4,957 times a day for twenty-six days straight. And anything by Dan Fogelberg automatically has to be worse than anything by Chicago.
They also listed the Huey Lewis & The News song “Heart of Rock and Roll”. I don’t deny it’s a bad song, but for my money it’s not Huey’s worst. That would be the phenomenally gay “Hip To Be Square”. “Take it from me, it’s hip to be a square!” No, Huey. It’s NOT. And what the hell is any list of awesomely bad songs doing without Bread on there? Remember “Baby I’m-A Want You”? How about “Make It With You”? I do, despite being occupied with the important business of being potty-trained at about the same time those songs were hits. I seem to recall some local station, probably 94-Q back when it WAS 94-Q, playing a lot of Bread in my middle-school years. Perhaps there was a Bread revival. Now there’s a scary thought. And another thing...how in the name of gods can VH1 justify any list of horrible songs that doesn’t include America’s soporific, horrid piece of pop-crud “Horse With No Name”? What always bothered me about that song was the lyric “in the desert, you can remember your name” - as opposed to what, forgetting it when you go to the beach?
“Welcome to the Ritz-Carlton, sir, will you be staying with us?”
“Yes, I have a reservation.”
“Name, sir?”
“Uh...uh...umm...it’s right on the tip of my tongue...uh...hold on...don’t tell me...”
It gets difficult, though, because artistic intent and personal taste figure into it, as does your definition of “music”, as Bo and I discussed when we were in Indianapolis. If what you intended to do was have an instantly forgettable, bubblegum hit and you succeeded in doing that, selling a lot of CDs and making a lot of money in the process, is your song “worse” because you don’t produce music on the level of King Crimson? (Well, yeah, if you ask me. And that would be level five, by the way. Ooh, esoteric Crim humour!) The point is no matter what rock atrocity I named, Bo could counter with some urban dance-track monstrosity o'foulness, which because of our tastes we’d agree was worse. I’d up the ante with Britney and he’d trump me with Manilow or Pat Boone. And is the pigswill manufactured by Britney, boy bands and J-Ho really “music”? My answer is an emphatic “NO”, but that's just me. Eventually we agreed upon the loosely understood criteria that our personal “worst songs” would be limited to songs that could actually be aired on a station to which we might listen, thus eliminating Britney, Pristina Gaguilera (I love that - I stole it from Eminem), Celine Dion, et al ad nauseam.
I got it down to three (in no particular order): “Alive” by Pearl Jam, “Lightning Crashes” by Live (that appalling line about placentas falling on the floor profoundly disturbs me) and the aforementioned “Hip To Be Square”. Bo argued that “Hungry” is worse than all three of mine (except you have to pronounce it “howngry” like in the song). Bo kept referring to “Howngry” as a Stone Temple Pilots song. I hate to disagree with someone working on a PhD in music, but then I love being right, so here we go. Guess what? “Howngry” isn’t a Stone Temple Pilots song. No, this piece of ordure is courtesy of my least favorite band evah, the incomparably vile, pretentious and trite Pearl Jam! See? It isn’t easy being right all the time, but it’s fun.
MONTOYA DELENDA EST!
I didn’t understand why some songs were on the list, such as Spin Doctor’s “Two Princes”, Chicago’s “You’re The Inspiration” and Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up”. I’m not saying they’re my favorites, I’m not saying they represent ground-breaking musical or artistic achievement, but I wouldn’t say they’re all that bad. I quite liked “Two Princes” before 99X played it 4,957 times a day for twenty-six days straight. And anything by Dan Fogelberg automatically has to be worse than anything by Chicago.
They also listed the Huey Lewis & The News song “Heart of Rock and Roll”. I don’t deny it’s a bad song, but for my money it’s not Huey’s worst. That would be the phenomenally gay “Hip To Be Square”. “Take it from me, it’s hip to be a square!” No, Huey. It’s NOT. And what the hell is any list of awesomely bad songs doing without Bread on there? Remember “Baby I’m-A Want You”? How about “Make It With You”? I do, despite being occupied with the important business of being potty-trained at about the same time those songs were hits. I seem to recall some local station, probably 94-Q back when it WAS 94-Q, playing a lot of Bread in my middle-school years. Perhaps there was a Bread revival. Now there’s a scary thought. And another thing...how in the name of gods can VH1 justify any list of horrible songs that doesn’t include America’s soporific, horrid piece of pop-crud “Horse With No Name”? What always bothered me about that song was the lyric “in the desert, you can remember your name” - as opposed to what, forgetting it when you go to the beach?
“Welcome to the Ritz-Carlton, sir, will you be staying with us?”
“Yes, I have a reservation.”
“Name, sir?”
“Uh...uh...umm...it’s right on the tip of my tongue...uh...hold on...don’t tell me...”
It gets difficult, though, because artistic intent and personal taste figure into it, as does your definition of “music”, as Bo and I discussed when we were in Indianapolis. If what you intended to do was have an instantly forgettable, bubblegum hit and you succeeded in doing that, selling a lot of CDs and making a lot of money in the process, is your song “worse” because you don’t produce music on the level of King Crimson? (Well, yeah, if you ask me. And that would be level five, by the way. Ooh, esoteric Crim humour!) The point is no matter what rock atrocity I named, Bo could counter with some urban dance-track monstrosity o'foulness, which because of our tastes we’d agree was worse. I’d up the ante with Britney and he’d trump me with Manilow or Pat Boone. And is the pigswill manufactured by Britney, boy bands and J-Ho really “music”? My answer is an emphatic “NO”, but that's just me. Eventually we agreed upon the loosely understood criteria that our personal “worst songs” would be limited to songs that could actually be aired on a station to which we might listen, thus eliminating Britney, Pristina Gaguilera (I love that - I stole it from Eminem), Celine Dion, et al ad nauseam.
I got it down to three (in no particular order): “Alive” by Pearl Jam, “Lightning Crashes” by Live (that appalling line about placentas falling on the floor profoundly disturbs me) and the aforementioned “Hip To Be Square”. Bo argued that “Hungry” is worse than all three of mine (except you have to pronounce it “howngry” like in the song). Bo kept referring to “Howngry” as a Stone Temple Pilots song. I hate to disagree with someone working on a PhD in music, but then I love being right, so here we go. Guess what? “Howngry” isn’t a Stone Temple Pilots song. No, this piece of ordure is courtesy of my least favorite band evah, the incomparably vile, pretentious and trite Pearl Jam! See? It isn’t easy being right all the time, but it’s fun.
MONTOYA DELENDA EST!
2 Comments:
I guess the list didn't go back far enought to include 'the Umbrella' song..I HATE that song and when we had 'golden oldies' station(s) in Atlanta, every last one of 'em played that one umptyleven times a day, eight days a week. Speaking of which, even though it's a Beatles song, 'Eight Days a Week' should probably get at least a mention.
By
Anonymous, at 3:41 PM
1) This goes back a bit, but I still get irritated when I even *think* of "M-m-m-my Sharona." I remember hearing it called Beatlesque, or something like that, and thinking. . . what???
2) If we're not limiting the genre to mainstream pop, let me mention how much I hated that obnoxious and ubiquitous "Achy Breaky Heart." I even hated it in Spanish.
3) Can I just say Anything By Journey?
By
Anonymous Me, at 10:34 AM
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