THE WORST SINGLES OF THE 90s

HAHAHAHA! So many of these songs are grebt. You are all on crack.

But Keith, most of Moby's nineties stuff is fine - the metal stuff I'm not sure about but it is surely to negligable to count.

It's all blandly inoffensive Radio Rock, mostly, but hardly anything I would run from the room to avoid. This is what happens when you get Yanks to tell you what they hate. Where are all those really shit records that came out of Europe and Britain in the 90s, eh... EH?!!

2. red hot chilli peppers “under the bridge”
Really? Number 2? It's not that bad, is it?

3. billy joel “we didn’t start the fire”
Good pick here. This song should be buried somewhere in a Nevada desert.

8. smashing pumpkins “tonight tonight”
? Surely they've put out worse?

11. rem, “radio song”
Yes, you should have put "Everybody Hurts" on there, too. Though this one sucks pretty bad as well...Did they really release it as a single?

14. spin doctors “two princes”
Another good pick. Awful.

15. bryan adams “everything I do (I do it for you)”
However, really EXCELLENT for comic relief, if you start spontaneously singing the chorus if you do someone a favor and they say "Thank you".

16. joan osborne “one of us”
Would almost certainly be in my the Top 5, for me.

17. alanis morrisette “ironic”
Overwrought, but I dislike "One Hand in My Pocket" more.

19. cranberries “zombie”
My father inexplicably LOVES this song. I mean LOVES it. He doesn't like anything else by them, just this song.

42. michael jackson “black or white”
Brings back chilling memories of McKauley Culkin...

46. genesis “I can’t dance”
Should be MUCH higher up on this list. Another Top 5'er.

57. counting crowes “round here”
Mr. Jones

65. toad the wet sprocket “all I want”
Nah. Harmless. I say substitute this with that "dance on the ocean" or "walk on the ocean" (or whatever the hell it was) song.

Good list, Tom and Jess!

Others:

As suggested previously, Dead Eye Dick's "New Age Girl" has GOT to be on this list, and way, way up. Sheryl Crow's "If It Makes You Happy". Bryan Adams' "Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman" might be a strong contender as well.

one that really should be there: "Both Sides Of The Story" by Phil Collins. or was he just not worth hating by that time?

did smashmouth release anything in the 90s? 'walking on the sun' should be included if eligable

and is 'keep em seperated' really worse than 'pretty fly for a white guy'?

This is from a BJ discography: Storm Front and the first single, We Didn't Start The Fire, reached the #1 spots simultaneously on the Billboard album and singles charts on December 16, 1989. My Billboard book says it stayed #1 for a total of two weeks. So while it was still a hit during the first flush weeks of the '90's, it peaked before 1990. Hence, I would say: NOT a '90's record.

Oh god, yes, the Juliana Hatfield one.

"Champagne Supernova" wasn't a single, but I guess it might as well have been. But given my horrid housemates obsession with it I'll let that pass.

Tracks that I'm not sure came out in the 90s:

3. billy joel “we didn’t start the fire”
31. digable planets “rebirth of slick”
39. color me badd “I adore mi amore”
74. vanessa williams “save the best for last”
82. mc hammer “2 legit 2 quit”

3. billy joel “we didn’t start the fire” - 1989
31. digable planets “rebirth of slick” - 1993
39. color me badd “I adore mi amore” - 1991
74. vanessa williams “save the best for last” - 1992
82. mc hammer “2 legit 2 quit” - 1991

Is 14.

Graham - by Dodgy's standards, Staying Out For The Summer isn't that bad...

Under The Bridge, though...

Ned: "Tonight, Tonight" is possibly the most god-awful single of the quarter century -- a shallow ploy to try and replicate the commercial success of "Disarm," except in place of that single's boringly ominous vibe they brought in the flattest, most rudimentary string section possible and everyone just pumped and pumped and strained to find some emotion in a very, very dull song. Corgan's labored bleating over the top does not help -- he sounds like Gilbert Gottfried in labor.

Ones I like / don't mind so much: "Radio Song" (please replace with "Everybody Hurts," which even as an REM-friendly type I cringed at), "Two Princes" (it seems wrong for Spin Doctors to be the whipping-boys of the 90s when they generally just seemed like a casual bar-band that lucked into a chart single: I don't even think they thought they were cool), "Rebirth of Slick," "Djed" (this is a list of pop singles; shoehorning the 20-minute album track "Djed" in there seems like a really lame way to pick on post-rock, plus ruins the logic of the thing, because if album tracks count I guarantee you there are things on let's say Lou Bega's record that are a million times worse than "Mambo #5") ... (replace "Everything About You," which was at least sort of amusing, with UKJ's "Cat's in the Cradle" cover). "More than Words" I absolutely hate but I feel like there's something remarkable about having written the anthem to every American high-school asshole pressuring his girlfriend to put out, and I think I might like to write about that. (Funnily enough I am already writing something for something else about Silk's "Freak Me," the only song in history that makes me physically ill when I hear it.) "Cantaloop" ain't so offensive (though "Mr. Wendel" is, it seems like something Mr. Lif would have written when he was younger and even hokier). "Sex and Candy" I didn't mind, and file with Spin Doctors -- such a brief flash of an inoffensive throwaway single that it seems rude to hate it. Thank you for remembering the shit that was the Toadies; and yeah, I too unsurprisingly like "Buddy Holly."

Things I seem to recall really sucking: that Cake "how do you afford your rock and roll lifestyle" song, the Fleetwood Mac comeback release (if that can count), Sublime's "What I Got" or the even more dire one that came after it, something or other about Superman by some horrible Canadian alt-rock band or other (Our Lady Peace?), John Secada, "These are Days" by 10,000 Maniacs, BLACK CROWES ...

Also please note that maybe contrary to your intentions this looks like a list that was written by people who listen to mostly alt-rock and just don't like the examples of it that chart.

Let's just say I violently disagree and leave it at that. :-)

That said I stand by my choices, which I do think are all very bad records and really got under my skin and annoyed me (in a way that even awful pop usually doesn't - something about the typical forcefulness of the rock delivery maybe?).

"Black Hole Sun" if it's in there because of me is in there because the video is so bad.

ethan got on my dick last night that the list was too obvious and middlebrow, but fuck it, that's what WAS so horrible about the 90s: the creeping evil of banality and all that...(also, ethan has lost any ability at aesthetic reflection in the last 12 months.) part of the point of making lists like this, however, is a. wallowing in yr own "misery" and b. attempting to rile people (as ethan and 50% of the posters to this thread have proved out.) it was also a lot f fun. what's the point of doing anything then, especially posting a reply to a thread about it?

(or, what tom said as i was posting.)

I will not bother listing the indie entries which I consider lacklustre and plodding but not actually BAD because I know nobody involved will ever agree, but I must disagree with the first two lines of Dan's suggestions, too. I wouldn't be that offended if Smart Es got in, but really, is there any complaint that could be levelled at it that wouldn't be much more fairly aimed at, I don't know, Poing?

(I'd even stick up for the original Poing if I had to, but whoever decided it needed a 1999 trancebag makeover needs a slap.)

Certainly "Both Sides of the Story" as well as "Another Day in Paradise" are both vomit-inducing. Was "The Living Years" by Mike and the Mechanics in the 1990s? Something's telling me it was in the 80s, as well as "Wild Wild West" by The Escape Club. If not, they are all viable candidates for inclusion.

How about "Deeper Shade of Soul" by Urban Dance Squad? I have kind of a love/hate thing with that one...or "Life Is a Highway" by Tom Cochrane? Eh, I guess it isn't Top 100 bad.

DB, please tell me you not serious!! The video rules!!!!

What about the Wedding Present as they neared the end of their "hit parade" experiment (and running out of inspiration/money)? They could pretty much release anything at that stage and it would be a Top 40 hit, with something like "Shaft", or the theme from "Twin Peaks" on the B Side.

Wait Dom you don't like the Magnetic Fields? I thought you were all about lame indie shit like that?

Why be guilty of music you used to like?

even if it was Pearl Jam and Stone Temple Pilots?

I'm not embarrassed to have liked Pearl Jam. Infact i still like those records. Always hated Stone Temple Pilots(apart from that 1 song that sounded like Redd Kross). ST always seem more liked on ILM than PJ for some reason.

Or are you admitting you like Pearl Jam and STP and feel guilty?

the latter

i think i just picked completely the wrong year to get into US rock but it coiuldn't really be helped

Wait Dom you don't like the Magnetic Fields? I thought you were all about lame indie shit like that?

-- Matt DC, Sunday, 30 March 2008 12:35 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

I like pussy indie shit, not lame indie shit.

Ahh blueski I think you're a (good?)few years younger than I am so im sure you can be excused for liking that stuff in your early teens. I liked U2 at that age. And i've no guilt, even though I've hated their last few albums with a passion.

Was the sweetest thing a 90s single? if so that's one of the worst(of any decade)

it was an 80s b-side and a 90s a-side. go figure.

unless you're talking about Refugee Camp Allstars 'The Sweetest Thing' which was pretty good (it's OK i know you're not)

Worst use of breathy singing.