Really Bad Pop Songs

[dr_mabeuse]

We're trying to find the worst pop single of the last 40 years or so.

To qualify, it has to be have been released as a single, not as a part of an album, and should be familiar to most people. Preferably it would have made the Top Ten, and believe me, there are a lot of real stinkers that made the Top Ten

Nominees so far are:

"In The Year 2525" by Zager & Evans (Overblown juvenile pseudo-futurist claptrap apparently sung by a weasel and a beaver)

"MacArthur Park" by Richard Harris (Harris was drunk during the session. Had to be to record this overproduced gobbler)

"Eve of Destruction" by Barry McGuire (A has-been white-guy-come-lately sounds the alarm too late)

"Seasons In The Sun" by Terry Jacks(?) (a song specifically designed to be sung on the bus by middle-aged bingo junkies)

"Honey" by Bobby Goldsboro (In fact, anything by Bobby "The King Of Smarm" Goldsboro, later arrested for pedophiia)

"In A Gadda Da Vida" by Iron Butterfly (classic lobotomy music!)

The floor is now open for further nominations.

 

[English Lady]

Hi Dr M!


I dunno howwell it did in america but i nominate


Wannabe by the Spice girls....*shudder*

 

[waverlysgirl]

THAT'S EASY

Billy, Don't be a Hero

Run, Joey, Run!

Don't recall the fine musicians who put these out. Absolutely dreadful, as Simon Cowell would say.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Billy, don't be a hero,
Don't be a fool with your li-i-ife

Yes!
Excellent choice! A truly terrible song about a teen age girl's pleas to her Viet Nam bound boyfriend.
What happens? He dies, doesn't he? I forget. Got, what a stinker!

"Run, Joey, Run" I don't remember, but could it have been as bad as "Indiana Wants Me"?

And speaking of Billy gioing to Viet Nam, what about Sgt. Barry Satler's "Ballad of the Green Berets"? This guy went in and recorded this goofy chest-thumper wearing his full dress uniform and jump boots!

More, more!
---dr.M.

 

[waverlysgirl]

RE: RUN, JOEY, RUN!

"Daddy, please don't! It wasn't his fault.
He means so much to me.

Daddy, please don't we're going to get married...."

The stinker was about two teens in love and the girl gets pregnant. Hotheaded dad grabs his shotgun and aims for Joey as his daughter jumps in front of the gun and buys the farm. What a hoot!

Any song from the disco era would automatically qualify so you might want to discount them as they are too numerous to mention. The Bee Gees, KC and the Sunshine Band, Andrea True Connection, Donna Summer; The Hustle, Funky Town, Rock the Boat, etc. Shannon, almost as bad as Seasons in the Sun.

 

[waverlysgirl]

BLACK BETTY

"Whoa, Black Betty. Blam-de-lam.
Whoa, Black Betty. Blam-de-lam.
Black Betty had a child (blam-de-lam)
The damn thing gone wild (blam-de-lam)..."

What a can of worms you opened up!

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Whoa, Waverly's got the fever!

Well, originally I was going to set the upper cut off at the beginning of the disco era, because as far as I'm concerned, with a few exceptions, pretty much everything post-disco bites more or less. I would like to keep the disco portal open long enough to see KC and the entire Sunshine Band roasted over a fire fed by Barry White's fat, but I think we must draw the line somewhere, or else we'll have to include all of Rap & Hip Hop which will unloose the hordes of hell.

So: our era is from 1960 to the begiunning of disco.

Who made that horrible "Black Betty"? The 'song' was originally a very legitimate and authentic slave 'field holler' from the south from the 20's before some white boys decided they could improve upon it.

What about "Good Vibrations" by the Beach Boys? Doesn't anyone else find that to be an over-arranged piece of pseudo-psychedelic booshwah pushed over the edge into the land of pukesville by that embarrassingly corny theremin (that 'outer space' sound). I know: Brian Wilson was certifiably insane, but even so...

---dr.M.

 

[dr.bong]

i like a few of the first ones mentioned

worst song

Born in the USA


no question about it

 

[Artina Heartflash]

"afternoon delight"
Maybe because I'm sexually lacking and frustrated, but I HATE THAT HICK SONG!!!

 

[dr.bong]

you are right afternoon delight does really suck

when a friend of mine sings it doing karaoke, i refer to it as the beginning of his crap-a-thon

 

[Tchalla]

Some friends of mine had this conversation not too long ago and we agreed that Afternoon Delight was truly one of the most dreadful songs ever.

 

[carrie-on]

How about that irritating...aggravating...nauseating Macarena?

 

[carrie-on]

BUMP

 

[Artina Heartflash]

Hey, Doc, you said that the song could not be on an album. so that means we have to exclude your choice of Inna Goda Da Vida. That's a whole side of an album!
"Born in the USA" is on an album.
Even that blasted "Afternoon Delight" is part of Starland Vocal Band's first album. (Never should have happened.)

 

[Master1stgirl]

song

The one that I just despise

Green Alligators and long neckies.. humpty back camels and some chimpanzees,
some rats, some cats, and elephants
as sure as you're born
but you'll never see... no Unicorn

Who did it and what is the real name? No body seems to know.

the second one: Last Game of the Season.

thirdly Letter to My Ex-Wife
however the back side is a peach. It is called.... I Used to Work in Chicago.


UGH!!! and JUJU playing Muskrat Love by Capt. & Tennelle over and over again.

 

[Artina Heartflash]

Re: song

The one that I just despise

Green Alligators and long neckies.. humpty back camels and some chimpanzees,
some rats, some cats, and elephants
as sure as you're born
but you'll never see... no Unicorn

Who did it and what is the real name? No body seems to know.

the second one: Last Game of the Season.

thirdly Letter to My Ex-Wife
however the back side is a peach. It is called.... I Used to Work in Chicago.


UGH!!! and JUJU playing Muskrat Love by Capt. & Tennelle over and over again.

'Twas "The Unicorn", by The Irish Rovers. =wuf.=

BTW, it's "longneck geese", not long neckies. (Oh, long neckies are as rare as unicorns in my state. LOL!!)

What about "The Night Chicago Died"?

 

[Master1stgirl]

I thought that meant the Giraffes lol
hard to tell... the record skips on that line

and I am ready to scream over Juju playing: Bring It On by Herman Mermits

 

[waverlysgirl]

BLACK BETTY

Whoa, Waverly's got the fever!

Who made that horrible "Black Betty"? The 'song' was originally a very legitimate and authentic slave 'field holler' from the south from the 20's before some white boys decided they could improve upon it.

What about "Good Vibrations" by the Beach Boys? Doesn't anyone else find that to be an over-arranged piece of pseudo-psychedelic booshwah pushed over the edge into the land of pukesville by that embarrassingly corny theremin (that 'outer space' sound). I know: Brian Wilson was certifiably insane, but even so...

---dr.M.

A group called Ram Jam made Black Betty. I liked Good Vibrations. I guess it is overproduced and over done but the song just says "summer" to me and I could listen to it all day.

 

[waverlysgirl]

LOL!

"afternoon delight"
Maybe because I'm sexually lacking and frustrated, but I HATE THAT HICK SONG!!!

That's funny because the Starland Vocal Band was made up of a bunch of liberal hippie snobs from tony Old Town Alexandria, VA. I hate that song, too. Especially that stupid airplane sound effect.

 

[waverlysgirl]

Re: Re: song

'Twas "The Unicorn", by The Irish Rovers. =wuf.=

BTW, it's "longneck geese", not long neckies. (Oh, long neckies are as rare as unicorns in my state. LOL!!)

What about "The Night Chicago Died"?

I loved the Unicorn song when I was a child. My parents had the album and we played it over and over growing up. "Oh this is the biggest mixup that you have ever seen. My father he was orangeman my mother she was green." And I love Waltzing Matilda so please, don't anyone nominate that.

One really awful, morbid song that my brother and I loved as kids was by a group called Bloodrock. They had one song about an airplane crash and the guy is recounting what happened during the accident and how everybody died. I guess that could be nominated because it was so gross.
"I remember, we were flying along and hit something in the air..." Really stupid but creepy to any eight-year-old.

Regards,

WG

 

[Master1stgirl]

I have it

They Are Coming To Take Me Away... ha ha hee hee......

( really going to kill Juju if she doesn't turn off the record player)

 

[alwaysawake]

How about Sugar; Sugar by The Archies...that song would gag a maggot!

 

[redelicious]

Patches by Clarence Carter. Truly, truly awful.

http://www.lyricsxp.com/lyrics/p/patches_clarence_carter.html

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Hey, Doc, you said that the song could not be on an album. so that means we have to exclude your choice of Inna Goda Da Vida. That's a whole side of an album!
"Born in the USA" is on an album.
Even that blasted "Afternoon Delight" is part of Starland Vocal Band's first album. (Never should have happened.)

No, no! If that's what I said then I misspoke. What I meant was that the song had to be have been released as a single. Just about all singles that were hits were on albums.

But you might be right about "In A Gadda Da Vida" I think the song was like 47 minuites long or something.

There have been some atrocious things stuck into alburms by way of filler. (Even the Beatles recorded "Mr. Moonlight")

By the way, Artina. I want to marry your Av.

---dr.M.

 

[jubileeslave]

RESENT

Hey just cause I like indifferent music doesn't mean much TOYA

better then your ALVIN N THE CHIPMUNKS doing WOOLY BULLY