It makes much more sense when you know it's Trojans not jojos.

[mrissa]

So here is my silly question for the day:

What is the worst song you are prepared to admit to liking here, on my lj?

I was going to default to Salt N Pepa's "Shoop," but the more I talk about "Shoop" the more I end up defending it as doing a very good job indeed at what it's doing, even though it's way outside my usual tastes. So I'm now thinking that it has to be something from Billy Joel's Innocent Man album, which my cousins and I wore through in cassette form when I was 6 and which I will always love for that reason.

This came up because we encountered references to the band America recently, at which timprov and I feel the urge to exhort them to name the damn horse. Sometimes we suggest names for the horse. Spot. Sparky. Frank. Lefty. Esteban. Rita. On the Way To Mississippi By Way of Kalamazoo, because it's a horse, so the name doesn't even have to look like a name. We don't care. Just name the horse. You're in the desert. You've got time. (This does not qualify, as I don't actually like the song.)

No mocking the other people who answer! Although defending their choices as actually good is just fine.

Comments

[reveritas.livejournal.com]

Well, the obvious answer is that I'm in love with "We Built This City." But I don't think that's a bad song!

Even though everyone disagrees with me on that.

I don't like Shoop, but I do like a bunch of their other ones, namely Let's Talk about Sex and (especially) Push it!

Master and Servant. Informer, by Snow. Green Grass and High Tides Forever!

[timprov.livejournal.com]

I still get the chorus to "Informer" in my head at the slightest provocation.

[apis-mellifera.livejournal.com]

I will defend the honor of "The Final Countdown" to the death.

[marydell.livejournal.com]

We got a toy piano thingy that plays The Final Countdown to my toddler! And you can switch it from regular notes to playing the tune in dog barks. Which we, of course, do. We made up our own words to sing it to him because we couldn't remember the real ones...until I went and bought the MP3 because I HAD TO HAVE IT.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

"She Bop" by Cyndi Lauper.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

THAT IS NOT A BAD SONG!

It is a revolutionary, healthy, sex-positive, AWESOME song!

My bad song I love is ABC's "Poison Arrow." Or maybe Matthew Wilder's "Break My Stride."

Yes, I was born in 1971. Call a hotline.

[buttonlass.livejournal.com]

Something by Bon Jovi from a couple decades ago. I don't know if I can pick just one sadly.:)

[alecaustin.livejournal.com]

Just as long as it's not "Backdoor Santa".

I'm ashamed I even know that song exists.

[zwol.livejournal.com]

Are we going for objective bad or bad relative to one's usual taste? I don't even think I know how to assess songs for objective goodness, but there is a bunch of stuff that I like only because I heard it a lot at a formative age, not because it fits the music I currently like. Everything off Elton John's 1974 greatest hits compilation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elton_John%27s_Greatest_Hits), for instance.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The maraca man song!

The Peloponessian War is like that, yes.

[timprov.livejournal.com]

As I said before, the worst song on my current playlist is probably the Eagles' "Learn to Be Still," which I keep around for one line that I really like. (We are like sheep without a shepherd/Don't know how to be alone/So we wander round this desert/Wind up following the wrong gods home) I may have to think more to come up with the worst song I like overall.

[juliansinger.livejournal.com]

Honestly, "Do You Believe In Life After Love," otherwise known as "Cher Now Faintly Audible Everywhere In America," which suuucks but wanders into my head and then I enjoy it for awhile, mildly.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

It's great for washing dishes to. Plus cyber-hologram-Cher with plastic straws on her head! I will forgive much for a splendidly cheesy video. (Yes, I *was* in high school when MTV was invented....)

[rosefox]

I listen to bad music as a hobby--brooksmoses and I once spent an afternoon driving around with the windows down and the speakers cranked to blast Portsmouth Sinfonia Plays the Popular Classics at top volume--so I'm hard-pressed to pick the worst bad music I love, even discarding obvious contenders like Richard Cheese or Me First & the Gimme Gimmes.

The Sinfonia's "Classical Muddly" is probably up there, though. Or, uh, down there.

[zelda888.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes. This is that lovely time of year when I drive around the suburbs of Chicago with the windows down, rudely blasting banjo music at unsuspecting motorists.

That's not bad, though, just... underappreciated. On the cheesy pop front, I seem to recall several tracks on Madonna's True Blue, although I haven't dusted that one off for years. And dear Toni Basil was key in my formative years.

[athenais.livejournal.com]

"Not Gonna Get Us," t.A.T.u.

[caoilfhionn.livejournal.com]

"Butterfly" by Smile.dk. The song would have been completely invisible in the U.S., but then it was included in Dance Dance Revolution. It only seems vapid until you hear the other songs on their eponymous album. And yet...so inescapably boppy...

[mycroftw.livejournal.com]

Okay, I'm a metalhead from back in the '80s, because I listened to CBC stereo at home, and couldn't take the no-energy, no-imagination crap they were playing on the radio.

And I have 5 edits of "Butterfly". I don't know what it says about me...

On an '80s note, when I went back to university, and was older than all of my friends, I used to go down to '80s night at the local goth club. At one point, someone said to me, clearly enjoying it, "you know the only reason we're here is making fun of the cheesiness". "Yeah, I do. What you have to realize, is that Sturgeon's law has already applied, and this is the 10% *good stuff*." Cue expression of horror as she tried to imagine what the other 90% sounded like...

[pnkrokhockeymom.livejournal.com]

Well, *I* don't think this is bad, but I had "No Scrubs" by TLC stuck in my head for literally six months, and ended up getting it stuck in everyone else's heads too. But I *love* TLC, and had just downloaded it all from eMusic. There the TLC collection sits, in the very same playlists as all of my indier-than-thou favorites, without shame.

As for things I actually think might be sort of bad? There are the three Carrie Underwood songs, along with a whole host of Glee soundtrack downloads. The three I have and shameless sing out loud are "Last Name," for its love of tequila and car-theft, "Cowboy Casanova" because it makes me laugh, and "Before He Cheats" because I just roll like that.

I totally stand by the Lady Gaga, however.

(Just in case you're all thinking of disowning me, don't forget, I have all of the music! More than enough to support my IMS, indie and gothic cred. Don't Judge Me!)

[reveritas.livejournal.com]

I love "No Scrubs," and its response by someone I forget, "No Pigeons."

No Scrubs reminds me of my ex. :D

[txanne.livejournal.com]

A bad, bad song that I've hated all my life: The Pina Colada Song. Also Magnet and Steel.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Cheater.

[madmanatw.livejournal.com]

You can dance if you want to, you can leave your friends behind...

(Ok, I'm sure that's not the worst, but I'm not thinking of any good examples offhand.)

[txanne.livejournal.com]

In a similar vein, "Come On Eileen."

[marydell.livejournal.com]

Styx, Come Sail Away

In my defense, it's rare that a pop song falls exactly into my vocal range for singalong purposes, and this one does. But also YEAH STYX WOO!

here's a bunch of school kids singing it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3sJfpriulk

[txanne.livejournal.com]

I have everything except Mr. Roboto. PIECES OF EEEEEEEEEEEEIGHT, THE SEARCH FOR THE MOOOOOOOONEY TREE!

[daharyn.livejournal.com]

TLC, "Waterfalls". *blush* Now, I WAS thirteen when it came out...

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

I couldn't possibly narrow it down to one song. I'm a child of the 80s, and my love for the length and breadth of 80s music is unshakable. And really, much of that music was bad. At this moment it would be a tie between Journey's "Separate Ways" and Quiet Riot's (a cover, Cod help us) "Cum On Feel The Noize." Both of these songs, along with many of their equally bad friends, were on a mix tape my favorite aunt made me when I was 8. In her defense, she also gave me tapes of REM, Fugazi, and the Cure.

[todfox.livejournal.com]

Guilty pleasure's include Lady Gaga and Ke$ha or however you spell her name. I am not ashamed... much.

[todfox.livejournal.com]

Various Blue Oyster Cult...

[papersky.livejournal.com]

Fernando.

No, I've thought of a worse one. MacArthur Park!

[kchew.livejournal.com]

Ooo! Abba! I have fond memories of Muppet birds bouncing on wires, singing "Take a Chance on Me".

[kchew.livejournal.com]

Kellis, "The Milkshake Song". And "Larger than Life" by the Backstreet Boys. And many, many cheesy 70s songs, because the childhood glow just makes them better.

[joeboo-k.livejournal.com]

I'm with you on "Milkshake"

[brooksmoses]

Somewhere between the various conversations about earworms over the past many months, and you asking the question, I've discovered that I seem to have developed a fondness for "It's a Small World (After All)". I am not entirely sure that this fondness will outlive the next time I actually hear the song, but there it is.

[barondave.livejournal.com]

"It's A Small World" is one of my favorite songs. I have several versions. Annoyingly, the version I can't find (even at Disneyland) is the 45 (or digital recreation of the 45) I originally got at the New York World's Fair in 1964. Near the beginning of side 2: Yodeling. I love yodeling. When done well. Or by dolls.

[barondave.livejournal.com]

Little Willie (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3XGjnQgsJA). Yeah, it's dumb bubblegum pop, but catchy. I like a lot of that sort of stuff.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

At least it's not as problematic as Wig Wam Bam (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rF9cUmT_IGs).

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

I am deeply and unironically fond of ABBA and always have been. I will however concertedly defend them as not, much of the time, actually bad, and most of the stuff of theirs that is bad I don't like; but 'The Piper' is just awful and I love it.

I still like the first Ace of Base album and I refuse to apologize. (Also, the Mountain Goats cover of 'The Sign' may be the greatest cover ever made.)

But, in terms of racist, sexist, stupid, ashamed-of-myself, honest-to-God what-is-this-doing-in-my-iTunes, well, there is this copy of Kid Rock's 'Cowboy' that I don't play when anyone else is around-- but I do play it, and I really don't have any excuses.

[timprov.livejournal.com]

Also, the Mountain Goats cover of 'The Sign' may be the greatest cover ever made.

This entire thread was worthwhile just for making me find several versions of this on Youtube.

[alecaustin.livejournal.com]

Um. Lots of competition here, sadly.

"Complicated" by Avril Lavigne. I know. You don't have to tell me.

"Valley of the Damned (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUWCrCXiVpA)", by Dragonforce.

(Plus pretty much any song off of Stabbing Westward's Darkest Days. Because they're all the same, and yet I like them anyway.)

[joeboo-k.livejournal.com]

I can't hate on you for Avril. It's a fun, catchy, poppy song. And, because I lost my soul somewhere a few years back, I am listening to it right now.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

There are just so many 50s/60s popular songs that are lovely of their kind (three minutes of simple joy) unless you listen closely to the words embodying the underlying dreadful gender assumptions. As with the Temptations, 'Ain't Too Proud to be a creeepy stalker sleeping on your doorstep all night and day Beg'.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I just love how his friends laughing is the worst thing he can imagine. "Ohh, I could be functionally homeless. Or mocked! Even mocked by casual chums! That is how much I love you, baby: enough to stand idle scorn!"

Yes, knowing all the lyrics to a lot of that stuff is not always an asset. A superpower. But not always an asset.

On the other hand, there is nothing in the world like my memory of my dad Pip-dancing (as in Gladys Knight And The) around the living room Christmas morning in his pajamas, and it is well worth any times Ms. Gladys made me go, "Wait--what? Lady, what?"

[shark-hat.livejournal.com]

Deeply Dippy by Right Said Fred. ("Deeply dippy 'bout the way you walk/Contact sport, let the neighbours talk") On Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9u7-lWE54M). I dunno, I like the singer's voice and it's all happy and bouncy. (Also wins some sort of award for Least Convincingly Heterosexual Video Ever.)