"We Built This City" voted as the worst single ever

News.Com.AU | April 21, 2004 | Patrick O'Neil

[yankeedame]

Dotty ditties with cringe factor

By Patrick O'Neil
April 21, 2004

LOVE or hate them you can't get these stinkers out of your head.

Blender magazine Blender Magazine has rated We Built This City as the worst single ever constructed in its list "The 50 Worst Songs Ever".

The magazine said the Starship song earned the accolade because it inspired "the most virulent feelings of outrage".

To make the list, each pungent ditty had to be a hit.

Entry was based on unintentionally poor songwriting.

Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder's maudlin duet Ebony and Ivory also featured, as did R.E.M's Shiny, Happy People and John Mayer's Your Body is a Wonderland.

But the inclusion most likely to spark calls of blasphemy is the listing of the Simon and Garfunkel ballad The Sounds of Silence.

"It's the poetry meaningfulness that got our goat," said Blender editor Craig Marks. "With self-important lyrics like, 'Hear my words that I might teach you', it's almost a parody of pretentious '60s folk rock."

Few outside the boot-scooting fraternity would contest the listing of the Billy Ray Cyrus atrocity Achy Breaky Heart at No. 2.

Fallen star Vanilla Ice made it in with perennial dance-floor filler Ice Ice Baby, as did good-times theme song Don't Worry, Be Happy by Bobby McFerrin.

Eddie Murphy's ill-advised foray into music, with the 1985 tragedy Party All the Time, was evidence actors other than J-Lo should not sing. It ranked No. 8.

Herald Sun

[glock rocks]

I watched a History Channel documentary on the sinking.

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

Has anyone mentioned Morris Albert "Feelings" ?

Ohmigawd. I can't believe we got to 400+ posts before that was mentioned!!!

Where is Chuck Barris when we need him?

[Skooz]

Bump for later when my stomach can handle it.

BTW, I haven't read this thread, but "Long Haired Lover From Liverpool" by Jimmy Osmond is about as bad as "We Built This City." Both are atrocities.

[Salamander]

"Right on!"...LOL!

I remember getting a portable 8-track player when I was 14.
The sound from the single front-mounted speaker was *awful* but I was the hit of the school bus....until the driver totally blew her cool and outlawed it.
[too many endless loops of "Baby, Baby Don't Get Hooked On Me", maybe?....:))

[beelzepug]

"...atrocities..."

I cast one vote for "Patches" (I'm dependin' on you son) by somebody or other, and one for Elvis's "Caught In A Trap", the most monotonous song ever.

[Houmatt]

Have a look at my own thoughts on the subject.

[Khurkris]

ITCHYCOO PARK by The Small Faces...which included...STEVE MARRIOTT . RONNIE LANE . KENNY JONES . IAN MCLAGAN. Some very hot names in music later on.

[Khurkris]

The Small Faces - made up of: Steve Marriot, Ronnie Lane, Kenny Jones, Ian McLagan and Jimmy Winston. Peter Frampton and others joined but I don't know their names!

They started off in 1967 with 'Here come the Nice', a song I think is about a 'the pleasent onsets of intoxicants'. They went on doing major hit singles like Itchycoo Park (which was later covered by the M People), another song about drugs.

One of my favourite songs 'Lazy Sunday' was released in April 1968 went straight into No.2 in the UK chart. Loads more songs did really well but, as most bands do, they broke up in 1969 when Marriot and Frampton formed the band 'Humble Pie' and Lane, Jones and McLagan joined with Rod Stewart and Ron Wood to form 'The Faces'.

They're called 'The Small Faces' because, stupidly, they were all short in build (small) and they all had good looking faces!(or so they thought).

Almost all of the songs they sang were written be Steve Marriot and Ronnie Lane.

From the web site...The Small Faces Page

I know...more than you wanted...I am an old fan of the group.

[fortunecookie]

Oh, no, Debbie Gibson! Yikes.

Mine was something from 'The Wiz', what was that big 'hit'? It was fairly lame.

[Darnright]

"Actually, I think Doug and Geoffrey Fieger are brothers. Could you imagine trying to raise those two in the same household? "

Whoa, you are right. I remember seeing a VH1 show that talked about The Knack. I could have sworn they said Doug and Geoffrey were cousins. I did some surfing and found Doug's web page, where he admits (poor thing) having the above mentioned famous brother.

They sure look alike.

[MoralSense]

DOFP is drippy, sentimental pap. The portentous spoken word portions are total barf. And no, I'm not a garage band wannabe. I played for a living for years, play several instruments, and play jazz nowadays. I don't object to orchestration as such -- loved Laura Nyro, as did most of the musicians I knew and worked with in the 60s and 70s.

[TheBigB]

Elvis's "Caught In A Trap"

That would be "Suspicious Minds" His last #1 single.

[Liberatio]

LOL

[oyez]

I'm hip now. I never could remember who did "Itchycoo Park", but somehow Lane and Heart or a name involving to proper names comes to mind.

What I was really doing was attempting a smart #ssed remark using Sacco and Vanzetti.

[oyez]

How about "God didn't make little green apples and it don't rain in Minneapolis in the summer time." Yech!

[Colonel_Flagg]

Well, now it's your turn to reach. That wasn't a bad tune, IMO. But I must admit, such concentration on ineptitude makes my brain hurt.

Which leads me to Springsteen, in my opinion the most overrated musician of the 20th Century. Ugh. :)

[Colonel_Flagg]

In a manner of speaking. :)

[Colonel_Flagg]

Oh, yikes. Nice catch! Or something ... ;)

[TheBigB]

Okay, pulling one of the air...

"Your Auntie Grizelda" by the Monkees. :^) One of the token attempts to let Peter sing lead. The resulting musical train wreck was responsible for the Watts riots and Watergate. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

[Colonel_Flagg]

I stand in awe of your powers of recollection. That one is straight out of left field. Watts, huh? :)

Unfortunately, I think the all-time champion has already been mentioned on this thread - "Mr. Tamborine Man" by William Shatner. So bad it hurts.