Top 10 Worst Hit Songs of 2010 (5-1)

Posted on December 14, 2010 by bgibs122

…sigh. Alright, bring’em on.

5. The Black Eyed Peas – Imma Be

The Peas have always been several things: braggarts, uncreative, weak producers, and repetitive as fuck. And if “I Gotta Feeling” was able to make a case for these traits as not being terrible, “Imma Be” manages to put them together in a combination so bad, the last time it happened was “My Humps”. This song is so tuneless that it’s not so much a song as much as sound  coming out of the speakers. The beat is minimal almost to the point of not existing. And that blast of trumpets…did the group mix those in at the right time? Because they literally seem to come at random during the verses. Are they just there to remind us that we’re supposed to be listening? “Hey, we know it sucks, but listen, dammit!”

“Imma Be” also features the audio equivalent of Chinese Water Torture with how many times “Imma Be” or the shorter “Imma” comes up. It’s gotta be in the triple digits. And if you love stupidity in your lyrics, the Peas got you covered. Fergie reveals her need for Hooked on Phonics, and will.I.am makes the worst analogy ever by implying he pays men to deposit body fluids into him. There might be dumber songs out there, but none of them deduct IQ points as quickly as “Imma Be”.

4. Justin Bieber feat. Ludacris – Baby

Back when I first started this site, I wrote a blog about things I hoped would go away in the coming year. One of those things was the collective public cancer that called itself The Jonas Brothers and Miley Cyrus. The JoBros spent a year getting married (no, not to each other) and putting out some piece of crap no one paid attention to, and Miley decided to commit commercial suicide, leaving her free time open to other activities. So I kinda got my wish.

But the phrase “be careful of what you wish for” exists for a reason, and in their place stood this kid.

“Baby”. True ubiquitous uninspired pop. The music for this song is so bland I’m surprised it plays when you hit the red button on a Fischer Price My First Pro Tools Set. Unlike “Imma Be”, “Baby” at least tries to have a melody buried in there somewhere, but it falls flat on what might be the least creative chorus of all time. Ludacris’ “I’m here for the money” guest verse is kinda laughable because, you know, this guy, but this song is just terrible. And to add insult to injury, this is Bieber’s biggest hit. At least he’s not being a total twat to the girl…

3. Chris Brown feat Tyga and Kevin McCall – Deuces

…because that would be this guy‘s job. “Deuces” is without a doubt, the most misogynistic song I’ve heard in a long time. And it’s set to this half-assed, no tempo beat that’s somehow the total opposite of catchy. The song is basically “I’m gonna get a better girl and leave you in the dirt”. Alright, there have been songs about that before, but nothing this belligerent. Chris Brown spends his verse singing about how this girl is always expecting the worst and how she’s a vulture, but I have a question for Chris Brown: Why are you with her in the first place?

And then Tyga comes in with a verse that, taken out of context, could very easily pass as lyrics from any emo band of the last seven years. “Trying to see eye to eye but we’re both blind”, “Fuck love, I’m tired of trying”, and my favorite, “My heart’s big but it beats quiet”. Man up, cub.

But I was actually going to leave this song off the list, until I got to 3:02 in the song, and Kevin “I’m a Fucking Asshole” McCall started. His verse reveals that he’s been two timing this girl, flips her off, and then tells her, “I’m a dick, so it shouldn’t be that hard to swallow”. And proving that he can Cross The Line Twice, he follows up a few lines later with, “I finally noticed it, it finally hit me/Like Tina did Ike in the limo, it finally hit me.”

2. Far East Movement – Like a G6

Yep. It’s really that bad. As stupid as “Deuces” was hateful, “Like a G6” has earned the spot of the worst song for which I’ve ever done a Radio Rant. There’s no way to dance to this beat, there’s no such thing as a G6 so the comparison is totally moot (unless you feel as fly as a guitar chord/chess square/Battleship piece), the verses feature the most broken English I’ve ever had to deal with, and there are no redeeming qualities to this song. Forgive me if I’m being brief here, but I already dealt with this waste of time before, and I know you’re all dying to hear…

1. Ke$ha – Blah Blah Blah

Here it is everybody. Ground zero. The seventh circle of pop hell. Literally one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard. So why “Blahx3” and not any of KeAmericanCurrencyHa’s other failures? “Tik Tok” gets a pass on being stupidly catchy. “Your Love Is My Drug”, which bad, pales against the terribleness of “Take It Off”, which was only spared because “Blah Blah Blah” is truly this horrific.

This song is a clusterfuck of bad ideas. The bleepy-bloopy production sounds like it was made by an eight year old playing with SNES sound effects; there’s no consistency or rhythm to it, sounds are tossed in at random and sutured together by a gimpy, ugly beat. Ke$ha’s Auto-Tuning, which I’ve mentioned in plenty of places before, is so bad on teh pre-chorus that it is literally indecipherable without a lyrics sheet. I have had alarm clocks more pleasant to listen to than this song.

And then Ke$ha. I’ve listened to all of her singles. I’ve listened to Cannibal. I’ve even previewed Animal some, and this is her worst performance. Her nasally Valley Girl affected voice, the bitchy attitude, and her not-singing-not-rapping vocals make me weep for humanity. And these lyrics…“Just turn around boy, lemmie hit that” …excuse me, what? “Come put a little love in my glove box/Wanna dance with no pants on” No, I think I might catch something. This song is horrible. The only reason why I can even think that this was released as a single was as punishment for letting “Tik Tok” become a #1. And fuck all, I can’t imagine why it was one of the one hundred biggest hits of the year. May God have mercy on us.

But it’s not over yet. Tomorrow, I continue my look at the hits of 2010 with a look at the Top 10 Best Hits of the year.

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Top 10 Worst Hit Songs of 2010 (10-6)

Posted on December 13, 2010 by bgibs122

Earlier this week, Billboard put out their year-end Hot 100 biggest songs of the year. And, like all “best-of” or “year end” lists, it has the famous high points, “blink and you’ll miss it” hits, and terrible choices. And what better way to wrap up the year than to look at these these abominations? These aren’t just bad songs, these are bad songs that were everywhere. So let’s say hello to the worst of the best of 2010.

10. Glee’s Body of Work

Alright, technically none of Glee‘s songs made the year end list, but earlier this year, the show set a record for having the most appearances on the Hot 100 ever by one group (the previous holder of said record was The Beatles), so they “earned” this spot.

My main problem with Glee isn’t that they lack talent. Actually, most all of them can sing really well (something I can’t say about the majority of this list), and you can tell no expense has been spared on the production. The thing is, these songs are stripped of meaning, and because of how homogenized everything is, they don’t really have a reason to exist. Why listen to what’s basically a karaoke version of “Billionaire” when the real one works fine? There’s no substance behind any of these, but the music of the series is still puzzlingly a cash cow.

9. Enrique Iglesias feat. Pitbull – I Like It

Some songs are instantly forgettable, and some are timeless. “I Like It” manages to achieve both of those goals at the same time because of how boringly generic it is. I don’t know who this Enrique Iglesias bozo is, but he’s ten shades of lame. He comes from the school of “If I sound like a simpering bitch, girls like it, right?” vocal stylings. His lyrics (yes, he’s the top writing credit here) hit the worst part of bad imaginable: boring. There’s not a single good line in the whole song, but none of them approach the level of bad that makes them memorable.

Then there’s Pitbull, who is so forgettable that for this song he might as well have been called “[rapper]”, making the full title of the song “[boring sloppy club jam] by [effeminate whiny male singer] feat. [rapper that isn’t Lil Wayne/Ludacris/Nicki Minaj]”. At least it’s a more honest title than “I Like It”.

8. Mike Posner – Cooler Than Me

I actually reviewed this song earlier in the year, and looked at it as being kind of a non-entity of a hit. But coming back to it, there’s just no real redeeming qualities here. The production’s kinda messy and doesn’t really pull in one direction or another, nor is anything particularly catchy. Yet it was still the 19th biggest song of the year.

This song might as well be a 3 and a half minute manifesto called “Why I Shouldn’t Be Famous” by Mike Posner. He doesn’t even know how to act the part, look at him stumble around in the video. The way the song is organized, he’s already struck out with whoever he’s supposed to be lashing out at here. And I use “lashing out” very loosely; the only burns Posner throws at her are that she wears designer sunglasses, forgets his name (shit, I wish I could), and wears noisy shoes. Oh, and Posner’s vocals are total trash, check out how many times he has to take a breath during the song. “[breath] You got designer shades just [breath] to hide your face [breath] and you wear them around like [breath] you’re cooler than me. [breath] and [breath] you never say hey, or [breath] remember my name, and bits probably cuz, [breath] you think you’re cooler than me.” He’s the biggest vocal hack since Jason Derulo.

7. Jason Derulo – Whatcha Say?

Speaking of which, here’s Jason Derivative himself. I honestly love the first 12 or so seconds of this song, because it means I don’t have to deal with this jackass. Instead, I get to listen to Imogen Heap on the “So sampled I’m surprised no one got sued” chorus taken right out of “Hide and Seek”. “Whatcha Say” is a perfect example of how to not use Auto-Tune; Desucko is trying to make it sound like a subtle stylistic choice, but it’s laid on too thick for that to be the chance.

“Whatcha Say” also has the honor of being the first song on the list where the artist is truly an asshole. The message of the song is, “Hey, I cheated, but I’ll be making lots of money and dammit, I will buy your love back“. And that’s not even a subtle message in the song, look at the bridge. “I don’t want you to leave me/Even though you caught me cheating…but when I become a star/We’ll be living so large I’ll do anything for you”.

6. Train – Hey, Soul Sister

From the same breed that brought you such “I’m a douche” hits like “Hey There, Delilah”, “I’m Yours”, and “Your Body Is a Wonderland”, it’s “Hey, Soul Sister” (now with 90% more ukulele)! I’m usually ok with “feel good” songs, but this is literally a song about nothing. Seriously, these are lyrics in this song

“I’m so obsessed/My heart is bound to beat/Right out my untrimmed chest”–THANKS for that image.

“Your sweet moonbeam/The smell of you in/Every single dream I dream”–Words used: 13. Sense made: None.

“The way you can cut a rug/Watching you’s the only drug I need/So gangster, I’m so thug/You’re the only one I’m dreaming of”–Three, count’em, three cliches in four lines. And you do not get to use “So gangster, I’m so thug” in the whitest song in years! None of this is helped by Pat Monahan’s yelping falsetto vocals.

Ugh, this is what I had to deal with for the first half? It can only get worse, right? Check back in tomorrow to find out!

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Mini Mixtape #10

Posted on December 10, 2010 by bgibs122

And welcome to your Friday Mini Mixtape: This week’s theme is “What the hell was that?“; songs that are weird, loud, or outright noisy. But still count as being crazy awesome. Click the song title and crank the volume.

Sonic Youth – Silver Rocket
A perfectly normal rocker (well, as normal as 80s SY would get) until the 1:30 when the band decides “Fuck all” and launches into one of their trademark noisefests. Steve Shelly’s manic drumming brings it all back together.

The Pixies – River Euphrates
The Pixies made a career out of bent pop, and the chant vs vocal on the chorus is one of the most delightfully weird moments on their debut album.

Dirty Projectors – Useful Chamber
Friend of mine once described this song as “it makes the colors bleed together”. Check the beautiful harmonies at 3:10-3:38. And the rest of the song is euphoric on its own.

My Bloody Valentine – Only Shallow
Yes. That is all guitar. “Only Shallow” makes a compelling case for the best shoegaze song ever; two seconds in, it takes you somewhere else entirely: it’s chaotic, noisy, confusing, and beautiful.

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Lennon Legend: My Top 10 John Lennon Songs

Posted on December 8, 2010 by bgibs122

In twenty years, John Lennon managed to be one of the leading forces in a group that changed how we do music, pushed boundaries that people didn’t even know existed, and etch out a great solo carrier that was cut tragically short. I can’t think of any modern day music luminaries that would even try to do that. Today marks the 30th anniversary of his death, and I thought I’d go through some of my favorites Beatles tunes of his. As usual, click the song title to take a listen.

10. Across the Universe: “Across the Universe” encapsulates almost perfectly who Lennon was in The Beatles’ last days. Mystic, melodic, and not quite making sense, but damn if it ain’t pretty.

9. A Hard Day’s Night (1964): And on the flipside, here’s Lennon towards the beginning of The Beatles. Pop perfection with that first chord (you know the one) and a great fade out.

8. Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds (1967): Who cares what it’s about, this song is still fantastic. The keyboards, the melody, and just hints of a flanged guitar…total psychedelia.

7. Nowhere Man (1965): Would you believe this is one The Beatles’ first songs not about romance? Instead, we see that even for all his success, Lennon was still adrift, just like you and me.

6. Revolution (1968): Later day John Lennon is always seen as this groovy “It’s all love” hippie. Between the scathing lyrics, the scream, and distorted guitars, Lennon kicks the idea in the face and then says “No thank you.”

5. Tomorrow Never Knows (1966): With all the heat that “Lucy…” takes for being LSD friendly, I’m surprised that “Tomorrow Never Knows” never comes up. The result of an acid trip gone right, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and studio experimentation all going perfectly together.

4. I’m Only Sleeping (1966): Lennon’s best pop song, without a doubt. Lennon was notoriously lazy (well, when he could be), and he ended up writing the perfect soundtrack for laying around asleep or reading.

3. Dear Prudence (1968): The second song on the expansive White Album, and some of Lennon’s best guitar playing, period. The song builds from the “basic” acoustic picking (Lennon was a renowned Travis picker) to an exuberant finish.

2. Come Together (1968): The song that opened what is commonly referred to as the great album of all time. It grooves like no other, and Lennon’s delivery is cool and confident to a tee. While not making a lick of sense. “He got hair down to his knee”, indeed.

1. A Day in the Life (1967): One of the gamechangers. A culmination of in-studio experiments, playing with song structure, and unchained ambition, “A Day in the Life” stands as perhaps Lennon’s greatest statement in the Beatles, if not in popular music. If we’d had thirty more years, I can only imagine what we would have seen.

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