An oral history of "We Built This City," the worst song of all time (2016)

I agree that a "worst song of all time" is a bit silly, but if someone was trying to make the worst song of all time that would still get regular radio play and you asked me for ideas, "put a traffic report in the middle of the song" would be pretty high on my ideas list.

I say that with love as I absolutely love the We Built This City (and Starship for that matter)

I mean...c'mon..they could have at least picked a "worst song of all time" that wasn't a Billboard Top 100 #1 hit. Ditto for "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now"...

I remember having my own rabbit hole with the Residents band.

In junior high I used to stay up late and watch Letterman. He used to have Chris Elliot the comedian on doing various bits. He had one that imitated the Residents where Chris and several other people dressed up in weird outfits called something like "Maumoshcantz" or something French sounding. Chris' costume had a big black box with three toilet rolls for the face on it and played bizarre, "avant-garde" music. When they finished, Chris came over to sit with Dave. Dave tried to announce the name of the band and Chris scolded him by over pronouncing the name. Then Dave asked what part Chris played and he exclaimed, "I played the guy with toilet rolls on his head Dave! Shesssh!"

I recounted the bit to a friend and he instantly said the whole bit was a tilt of the cap to the band The Residents and it poked fun at their outfits and members on purpose.

This lead me, pre-internet to start digging around to find out what I could about the band. A few weeks later there was some MTV News story about a musician who died that apparently was one of the members. They made light of the fact nobody knew this since the band had purposefully concealed their identities so they could rotate out people as necessary and then say they just wanted people to focus on the music instead. Strangely enough, there was a similar story making the rounds on the internet about something similar that Slipknot was doing and Corey Taylor even used the same reason they wear masks - so fans can focus more in the music! This of course, brought back memories in my own research that eventually concluded with an older brother of a friend who was into really weird stuff and gave me a somewhat sordid history of the The Residents, and some the eerie connections to their management team Cryptic Corporation. He even pulled out several albums saying there's a possibility The Beatles WERE the Residents and showed me the two albums "Meet the Residents" and "Meet the Beatles" album as proof. Keep in mind, I was like 10, my buddies brother was like 16; so imagine how that conversation went down.

Anyways, thanks for bringing this up, it was really fun remembering my own rabbit hole with that band. Which interestingly enough, started with a David Letterman bit and ended with similar rumors swirling around Slipknot.

With a promotion like "terrible, terrible Jefferson Starship video," I needed to go watch it.

That really was just a completely incoherent mess. But the guys with eyeballs on their heads were there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqLnVgR7fLw

You mean Mandela effect, don't you? If not, the name Mandala is yet another Mandela effect. :D

Sign of our times -- starship more popular than airplane

Mandala effect a typo?

It should be Mandela effect, but this is the 2nd time I've seen Mandala in its place.

>"Layin' it on the Line"

Damn that song is great! Seems to have an anti-war message too.

You can't tell the story and then not link the video!

The same one that hates Nickelback (they're not great, but terrible?, nah), clowns ("eek, let's collectively decide to feign fear at the humorously funny looking people with big shoes at the circus, even without having read "It"!"), and "moist" (who wants an arid cupcake?).

There are anti-fads, too.

I had forgotten just how much I hated that inescapable song in the 80s. Definitely close to my worst song ever. There's plenty of 80s pop that I've softened my views on as I got older and even started to grudgingly appreciate, but not "we built this city".

I don't think I'd even recognize a single Taylor Swift song. I plan to keep it that way, currently she's just a name and a face to me, knowing her music would probably only cause me to dislike her unfairly.

I remember REM self-nominating 'Shiny Happy People ' as the worst song. And even though it was one of their most successful songs in the charts they refused to play it live.

In what universe is "We built this City" the worst song ever?

In this universe where 90% of music-related journalism boils down to competitive hipster snark.

I love the song, but I was ten when it came out, so of course I do.

I think you're missing the point. WBtC is a "bad" song in exactly the same way that Swift's songs are "bad". It's unashamedly pop, aimed at tastes that sophisticated listeners try to escape, and critically: is so good that those sophisticated listeners find themselves listening to it anyway.

It's basically a bouncing, bopping reminder that we aren't as smart as we think we are.

This song brings back good memories for me. Other songs from that era I remember are "Life in a Northern Town", "Walk Like an Egyptian", some Corey Hart songs.

> But if I was making a list of Awful, Terrible Songs, I'm not sure I would have even included this one

I wouldn't. It's not a great song or anything, but I can easily come up with a lengthy list of songs that are far, far worse.

It's a consequentialist sort of "worst": (lack of) artistic quality multiplied by exposure and impact. Couple that with how hard aesthetic quality is to assess and you get some odd lists.

> I didn't know Bernie Taupin wrote the lyrics to this song. Man, that's gotta sting.

It would Sting more if we were talking about a song like "Fields of Gold."

I think there are songs that wear listeners out from being overplayed, some that require repeated listens to appreciate, but there are ones that start out bad and do not get redeemed either by repeated listens or context. Lift Yourself (https://youtu.be/8fbyfDbi-MI?t=117), Gucci Gang (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LfJnj66HVQ), and Beautiful Things (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oa_RSwwpPaA&pp=ygUQQmVhdXRpZ...) all exist as examples of this, I think. All fairly recent, I'll confess.

Let’s all take a moment to recognize that, really, this discussion is about good bad songs.

Bob Dylan made three records of Christian music and 80% of the tracks from those are definitely worse than anything anyone’s discussing here.

There’s bad, and then there’s bad. The bad stuff is so bad it doesn’t even come up in worst-song conversations. Nor in so-bad-it’s-good conversations.

Tiny Tim's "Tiptoe through the tulips" beats that by a country mile. Watch it on youtube and be horrified.

Looking Glass: "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)" occupies that space in my brain.

Not "Total Eclipse of the Heart"?

Or "Ghostbusters" (sorry, Ray, loved your earlier stuff)?

Or Huey Lewis and the News entire catalog?

How about some Big Head Todd, with this riveting chorus:

It's bittersweet

More sweet than bitter

Bitter than sweet

It's a bittersweet surrender

It's bittersweet

More sweet than bitter

Bitter than sweet

It's a bittersweet surrender

(these 8 lines are repeated 4 times through the song)

Neil Sedaka's Bad Blood is pretty awful in my book

A lot of the leaders of the hippies were actually older than that generation, despite the classic "don't trust anyone over 30" and "hope I die before I get old" sentiments of the movement. For example, both Abby Hoffman and Jerry Rubin (who founded the "Youth International Party" or yippies, which mutated into hippies) were born in the 1930s, a decade or more older than most hippies.

Well then, the mystery surrounding how old Ric Ocasek of The Cars will make you even more baffled:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/17/reader-center/ric-ocasek-...

Aerosmith was about to call it quits, they did that duet with Run DMC and had another handful of platinum records afterward. Tyler was ~38 when Walk This Way charted the second time. Many of their greatest hits are from after they were old.

And then there was Tom Petty, who had hits in three decades. Practically David Bowie levels of staying power.

Stephin Merritt was 34 when 69 Love Songs came out.

Dick Taylor was an early member of the Rolling Stones and then in his 40s joined the Mekons and played guitar on some of their best records.

I'm sure there are more fun examples.

Perhaps the exceptions that prove the rule then.

Write it!

I mean... objectively "10 Coolest Things about New Jersey" is a worse song, but let's not pretend Bloodhound Gang's music is meant to be taken seriously.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mk8hFuDoYq8

How did I never know about this?!?!

I made it as far as "your toilet parts".

Still not as vapid as Rebecca Black, though https://youtu.be/kfVsfOSbJY0?si=ruKslHtaZuKrBMP-

"Do They Know It's Christmas" usually makes the lists of terrible Christmas music as well.

So much Christmas music is repetitive, but coloring outside the lines is a tough thing to do with Christmas music. The Pogues nailed it with "Fairytale of New York", but it largely appeals only to GenX and younger.

I will literally leave a store if this is playing.

But also, the fact that you are damn near guaranteed to run into this song _yearly_ qualifies it to be way higher up than any other song on a "worst song" list (even if it weren't already at #1).

Aaagh you monster it's only November and now that horrible aimless effected wobbly chord fever dream is stuck in my head again. I had at least another couple weeks before hearing it for the first time this year.

I never understood how something could be so bland and yet so revolting at the same time, like a smoothie made of wallpaper paste and dog shit.

How does he sing out of tune on his own darn song? If he's not out of tune, those awfully strained high notes shouldn't have been written in whatever weird key they're in.

Wow, the rare double penalty. Loss of 5 yards for stooping to a Christmas song for worst song of all time debate, loss of an additional 20 yards for going with a post-Beatles McCartney track. This may be internet bullshit, but by god we have rules.

> (Don't believe me? Listen for yourself: https://youtu.be/94Ye-3C1FC8)

This may not be a felony, but it should be. Have you no shame, sir? A child could accidentally click on that link.

Also, ebony and ivory. Absolutely terrible.

The Mannheim Steamroller version of "Deck the Halls" Is bloody awful.

For me, "I want a hippopotamus for christmas" is even worse.

Yeah, I mean it's pretty silly to declare something "the worst song of all time" - everyone has their personal taste and their own personal songs they love to hate. For me, it's (of course) Wham's Last Christmas and I Will Always Love You (sorry Whitney, but back in the 90s when I was watching a lot of MTV, listening to a lot of radio, and ads for Bodyguard were all over the place, I seem to have developed an allergy to this song).

And BTW, I wouldn't even call this the quintessential 80s song, for me that's Stevie Wonder's I Just Called to Say I Love You, with that cheapo synthesizer bleeping along in the background. Oh well, to quote Calvin Harris, it was "acceptable in the 80s"...

That's actually tied with Lennon's "Happy Xmas (War is Over)". Listen carefully and you can hear Yoko Ono screeching incredibly far out of tune as the piece climaxes. It's not in the forefront of the song, but it's there, and it's stuck out so much to me ever since I first noticed it.

If this song isn't proof that Paul McCartney is a psychopath, I don't know what is. It is absolutely the most insipid, uninspired piece of garbage ever to be recorded.

It was a favorite of mine as a kid. I can still sing the whole thing, including the radio DJ part.

But I also liked Styx. So.

I probably would have liked Rush then too, but wasn’t really exposed to them until later, so they remain in the pile of culture-things I’ll simply never understand.

People bond over mutual hatred even if they didn't come to that hatred on their own. Seems like for this song, it was during slow news period when a list of worst songs came out, and it went viral. Soon it became one of those things that everyone just repeated uncritically, like your mattress doubling in weight due to dead mites. There have been many lists of worst songs before that list and many since, but once "We Built This City" took hold in the collective cultural consciousness as being the worst, there was little that could be done to change the dominate opinion.

Boardgame filk versions might make it worse.

Modern music isn't as recognizable because there's way more of it, it's more varied, and doesn't get played a billion times over radio and MTV to a huge audience. The record industry isn't what it was at all, as detailed in your link. Jukeboxes with a selection of hits used to exist, now they're like spotify clients instead. I don't agree with you saying it's less enduring, though. That's a different thing. You shouldn't confuse popularity and number of plays for quality. For me there are some songs I'll hold on to a long time that I first heard in the last 10 years. There's still great music being made, IMO, but then pop from any era rarely was what I'd call good.

I like 80s music a lot, i was 14 in 89, so that computes. But what i find weird (and not at the same time) is that a lot of <20yo like the 80s-90s!

> Anyway, it seems silly to call this the "worst song of all time".

There may be other contenders, but if this song doesn't make the short list for you, I can't explain it. I doubt I could pay anyone to make such an outrageous claim.

On this side-topic, Wikipedia has trouble writing e.g. "worst X of all time", because that can't ever be an objective fact... so instead it has articles named "List of X considered the worst" and "List of X notable for negative reception", to which things like "Worst X of all time" redirect:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_automobiles_known_for_...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_considered_the_w...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_music_considered_the_w...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_television_shows_notab...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sitcoms_known_for_nega...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_games_notable_fo...

In each category, it picks criteria like press reviews or user ratings that mark a work for being considered "worst"

The Shags rule. You just don't get them.

Everyone already knows there is no objectively worse song, and the writer knows everyone knows. It's hyperbole to emphasize the writer's opinion that it's a really bad song, an inconsequential rhetorical flourish no reasonable person takes seriously.

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