Wednesday 18 February 2009

10 songs that make me leave the room

After I mentioned Theory of a Deadman the other day (shudder), I started pondering what songs really offend me. Some songs routinely come out on top (or should that be bottom?) in worst song polls, like We Built This City or My Heart Will Go On. I can get through songs like that. Not comfortably, but I can clench.
I choked down the bile, and compiled 10 songs that I loathe. This isn't a top 10 of horrible-ness, because the amount they make me vomit in my own mouth is equal.

My Humps by the Black Eyed Peas
You know what I'm going to say. It's a juvenile playground chant that reduces women to 'lovely lady lumps'. Just in case you didn't get the hint that sex is a transaction (e.g women give men sex, in turn men give women designer handbags), Fergie reels off luxury brand names ('Dolce & Gabbana, Fendi and then Donna'). In the video, she drapes herself over Louis Vuitton products and big shiny cars.
Buttock-clenching moment...
will.i.am's threat to 'mix my milk with your Coco Puffs'.

Do Ya Think I'm Sexy? by Rod Stewart
I can't bring myself to listen to this one. It's so embarrassing. Also, it keeps getting re-released, remixed and covered. Just go away, please.
Buttock-clenching moment...
The thought of Hot Rod gurning away in skin-tight leopard print trousers.

Come On Eileen by Dexys Midnight Runners
This is a school disco staple. I despise everything about it, from the fiddle intro to 'my thoughts I confess verge on dirty'.
Buttock-clenching moment...
Walking past an Eighties-themed bar and hearing someone belting this out on karaoke.

Ebony and Ivory by Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder
Building racial harmony and integration through song. What a nice idea. But this is saccharine, laboured and hideous. The intentions are so anguished that it falls flat onto its face. I blame Paul. Stevie's just getting through it.
Buttock-clenching moment...
The harmonised 'side by side on my piano keyboard / Oh, Lord, why don’t we?'

The Girl Is Mine by Michael Jackson featuring Paul McCartney
Schmaltzy duet in which Macca and Jacka contest their ownership of a submissive slave-woman. Thriller is supposedly one of the greatest albums of all time, but only if you ignore this track. Apparently, there's a will.i.am remix. I haven't listened to it.
Buttock-clenching moment...
The hideously contrived spoken word ending.
Paul: 'Michael, we're not going to fight about this, ok?'
Michael: (Chortling) 'Paul, I think I told ya. I'm a lover, not a fighter.'
Paul: 'I've heard it all before Michael. She told me that I'm her forever lover, don't you remember?'
Michael: 'Well, after loving me she said she couldn't love another.'

Achy Breaky Heart by Billy Ray Cyrus
The song that spawned a million line-dances. It is tedious, trite country music by numbers.
Buttock-clenching moment...
The thought that we could have left this song in the past, but then Miley Cyrus popped up and reminded us all of its existence.

2 Become 1 by the Spice Girls
This is supposedly a sweet, romantic song that people probably chose as their first dance at weddings. This baffles me as the central image is so starkly sexual that it makes me blush. It's so... penetrative.
Buttock-clenching moment...
The cooing 'wanna make love to ya, baby'. And Geri's clown make-up in the video.

Sledgehammer by Peter Gabriel
Sorry, Peter Gabriel. You really haven't done anything to offend me, but I can't stand Sledgehammer. The stop-motion video is amazing, but the song goes straight through me. Is it the slap bass, the aggressive brass hits or the evangelical 'show for me'? I'm not sure. I just know that if I was trapped in a confined space, this is the song I would start hallucinating. Until I went mad.
Buttock-clenching moment...
The panpipe whirl that punctuates the song.

Rollin' (Air Raid Vehicle) by Limp Bizkit
Embarrassing and meaningless, this was a number one single for three weeks in October 2000. It was also the moment that nu-metal died.
Buttock-clenching moment...
Fred Durst.

Don't Let Me Be The Last To Know by Britney Spears
The fourth and final single from Oops!... I Did It Again, this song didn't make it on to Britney's greatest hits. Because it is truly terrible. Shania Twain is partly responsible for this dreary ballad in which Britney pleads a sexy man chunk to fall in love with her.
Buttock-clenching moment...
The intro sound of an unidentified (synth) instrument. It's presumably meant to sound sexy, but reminds me of a damp sweat patch on a faux leather sofa. The 'shoo-be-doo' backing vocals. The climactic key shift. The video in which Britney - wearing a white bikini - cavorts in the surf with a spunk. Everything, basically.

2 comments:

  1. I would also like to add anything by Dildo- oops, I meant Dido (like we haven't heard that joke 10,000 times before). Everytime I hear her voice it grates on my eardrums and I die a little.

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  2. Oh- and "Heal the World" by Michael Jackson. I can feel the bile rising.

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