A Tournament of the Worst Songs of All Time | March Badness 2022, Round 2: Sweet Sixteen

[@Vanessa.P]

As someone who hates Train with every fiber of my being, it was so satisfying seeing "Hey Soul Sister" get the disrespect it deserves.

[@VoiceofHarold1]

You should check out Pat Finnerty. He did a huge takedown of that song on his show, What Makes this Song Stink. He has also gone after Kid Rock and Three Doors Down to name a couple. in general, I recommend his channel as he is both hilarious and entertaining!

[@Vanessa.P]

@@VoiceofHarold1 I saw that, it was great! I would have absolutely attended the Stop the Train rally if I lived in his area lol.

[@adamp2029]

Pat’s videos are fantastic! The Train one was like a mini-movie.

[@janpoelkamp4229]

What are you guys talking about? Hey Soul Sister RULES, man!!!! Okay, that was a blatant lie…

[@Caveduck0137]

Completely agree

[@adamp2029]

The Mendoza line 😂. It’s that time of year! Go Phils 😁

[@jppagetoo]

I pretty much enjoy all your content. But this is the best of your ideas. Great job on this!

[@oppothumbs1]

Ahab the Arab may come off insensitive but it was not intended to be racist. It's based on an Arab story and was meant to be humorous.

[@davidellis5141]

Boston Vs Train will be an epic battle. Tom Scholtz was known as such a perfectionist in the day & spent millions on his albums. Ironically , The debut Boston album was the Demo submitted with only a bit of mixing & it worked out fine. That was a long time ago. Good Luck Coach K !

[@chrisdelisle3954]

There's so much joy in your distaste of these songs.

[@Leo-qe3gl]

This!😂

[@exitthelemming145]

The only appropriate response to such waste of misguided negativity is for the rest of us to create our own tournament for the Worst Podcast of All Time. Tune in next week for 'Its Only a Bit of Fun: Choose Your Favourite Global Plague. Sudden Death Round'

[@Leo-qe3gl]

15:06 Jason is so funny sometimes 😂 "..heeeyy....heyyyy."

[@theydontmakeemliketheyused9995]

Completely agree with Joe about Red Dress. It sounds almost like it could have been a one hit wonder if you just tweaked a few elements.

[@janpoelkamp4229]

Red Dress is in it’s own universe and it sticks in your brain the way a rusty 4” nail can stick in your brain. And that universe still needs to be decoded. Red Dress Universe?

[@179rich]

Believe it or not, Bon Jovi back in the day remarked in an interview years ago that Bruce Springsteen's The Rising didn't get a lot of repeat listens from him. How ironic that his own stab at Rising-like social consciousness was such a resounding blunder.

[@TastesLikeMusic]

Oh how delicious! - Joe

[@janpoelkamp4229]

Pot calling the kettle.

[@nightowl1851]

"Turning on women south of the Mendoza line." So like Buddy Biancalana? The Pat Finnerty video on "Hey Soul Sister" is tremendous. If you even have a trace of like for this song, you won't after watching that video.

[@lubilou64]

I’ve literally had to play Rock Paper Scissors to figure out whether to vote for the racist Arab song or pervy little girls song. Both equally shocking.

[@jkf9167]

I feel like Ahab the Arab is bad in same way all the way through while the 7 Little Girls keeps discovering new ways to be bad. There's something about how 7 Little Girls circles around to various different kinds of unpleasantness. First there's the pervy premise, then there's the annoying chant that the 7 girls do, and then there's the fact that the the singer is supposed to be describing a frustrating situation, but he can't connect emotionally to the lyrics at all, which makes it even creepier, especially when he starts talking about his carburetor. Plus Ray Stevens is a decent singer and makes funny noises, but Paul Evans is hopeless.

[@ashrobinson4604]

This is a fun concept. What is left for next year? These songs are the worst of the worst. Perhaps next year could be March Radness, a contest of the best songs of 2022? The three of you listen to many more albums than many of your reviewers, so it would be a great way for us to discover new music. Just throwing it out there. Now back to enjoying this year’s March Badness!

[@TastesLikeMusic]

Could always go worst artists of all-time. - Joe

[@ashrobinson4604]

@@TastesLikeMusic Sounds like a sure-fire way to grow the channel 😜. Seriously though, keep up the great content. You guys deserve to be a top, top music channel on KZbin. 👏

[@roxannewalsh]

@@TastesLikeMusic Please NO, there is already so much McCartney on the channel!

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

@@roxannewalsh Honestly Roxanne . . You realy think Paul is the worst of all time? He's not even the 'worst solo Beatle".

[@roxannewalsh]

@@NaughtyVampireGod When you look for such candidates then it makes little sense to search 5th tier artists that are of no consequence (who cares to distinguish Corey Feltman from the Shaggs?). You go for targets that caused large scale havoc and irredeemable crimes against music - Joe would probably nominate Bob Dylan. People who ruined hours of your childhood with their tralala, the Perry Comos and Cliff Richards, the Ed Sheerans and Justin Biebers or whoever it was in your generation...The stuff that today you avoid like a vampire avoids daylight.

[@LarsPop-Tartus]

Great show round excellent. A suggestion: consider putting the audience vote last

[@ryankramzer1256]

Well, you can see those results online so it's not much of a surprise factor

[@LarsPop-Tartus]

Another thought is giving the audience 2 votes so 5 votes then majority wins moves on. Thanks for the hard (and hysterical) work!

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

@@LarsPop-Tartus that's what they do already . .(confused)

[@rockjagg1]

Didn't realize until now that Jewel had joined Boston and taken over the songwriting duties as well.

[@shane.b.]

if 4 Bid in Attraction by Corey Feldman was in the running it would probably win for the worst song, solely for him saying “THEN I LOOK AT YOUR HIPS” in that horrible Tom Waits / Michael Jackson crossover imitation voice

[@clydevanzant]

I was hoping for an appearance by Cherry Pie in this tournament.

[@SomeSong2]

That Paul Evans track feels like incriminating evidence against anyone who listens to it and makes it through the whole thing. Like, my god.

[@cameronhayes1017]

The “Ew” and “Telephone man” matchup was easily the hardest one to decide. Both of the songs were so terrible, it was hard to choose

[@peterblack8173]

Surprised illegal alien by Genesis didn’t make the list. Both bad and racist at the same time.

[@wietzedejong9732]

Absolutely right! throw Train under the train 😂

[@LarsPop-Tartus]

Thanks again for the great shows. My former worst song of all time was “I’ve been to paradise (but I’ve never been to me)… you know “ I’ve slept with kings and I’ve seen some things”. Ewww has to be the worst song of all time.

[@neesi1570]

1) I'll have to ponder a bit before voting. How I am supposed to pick between "Seven Little Girls" and "Ahab the Arab"? 2) Both of these tournaments have been a fun reminder of how atrocious Life, Love & Hope is. Feel how you like about Boston (you don't need bother with anything after Third Stage, IMHO), but at least you can hear the care and perfectionism that went into the other albums. LL&H, on the other hand, feels like Scholtz slapped it together in a month.

[@179rich]

It's true that if you had saved the audience opinion for last it could potentially prolong the suspense. When Kramzer voted for Toby Keith, the suspense was over. However, I'm not convinced that's the best way to do it. But it was an interesting suggestion (Can't remember who mentioned it on Discord).

[@179rich]

On second thought, it has to be revealed first.

[@jackde1965]

It's going to be a real battle. The last 8 are really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really bad. Fun videos.

[@seanmoloney7797]

Hey Soul Sister almost diminishes my love of Mr. Mister just for that horrendous lyric.

[@davidpalmer9014]

I like how Kram slipped into a Jar Jar Binks voice during Hey Soul Sister

[@Chadner]

What is the next big theme you guys are going with? You did albums, then songs, how about artists? Like best artist of the year, overall - including big shows, output, cultural impact, it might make for interesting takes.

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

Hi there . . Just my take but when you discuss artists I think it is better to address them a decade at a time . . "artist of the year" would just be a reflection of your favorite albums/songs of that particular year . . It's an interesting idea, tho . . of course we still have over 20 "years" to go for SOTY , , almost six months in "real time" . . . Honestly I always found "cultural impact" to be a squishy area . .

[@TimeToGetAlone]

I'd be down for that.

[@Chadner]

Right, I guess after 2005ish I kind of lose interest anyway, I am already in the mindset of this is so cool what can be the next chapter. But the whole point of the 'artist of the year' is to try to get these subjective notions like cultural impact or best shows paralel with best song/album and try to make it a top 5. And it's going to be personal anyway, that's what makes it interesting to watch. And this is just what I thought of in a flash while thinking of someone else's comment, I'm sure that if the boys put their heads together they can come up with an awesome way to rank the artists and make it engaging.

[@Chadner]

And we can't do the decade thing because then it'll all he over too quickly. We need to milk this thing ;)

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

@@Chadner i see what you mean - over too quickly

[@johnw706]

As was articulated in Apocalypse Now : The horror..........

[@WowThereBuddy1]

I try not to take into consideration the actual content of the song when saying something is worse but for the most part the morally questionable songs tended to be worse anyway.

[@179rich]

I agreed with the voters every time except the first one - had to go with Seven Little Girls.

[@EmoBearRights]

Photograph is Castle On The Hill done badly.

[@jasonrobert4384]

I thought for sure that Hasselhoff's CurrentOfLove would be the stand out awful from BayWatch. kzbin.info/www/bejne/aZu7aZeHpcqahNU

[@niveketihw1897]

I'm someone who thinks there could exist a way to talk / sing about a group of people that could be respectful and insightful. I'm not someone who thinks the mere act of recognizing / collectivizing a nationality / ethnicity or any other grouping, even if the person doing so is not part of said grouping, is always 100% inherently bigoted. However, I also think that Ahab song is trash not only because it sucks but because it makes no attempt to be respectful at all and is instead an exercise in xenophobic othering. On another note, Red Dress is an experiment. It's extremely interesting how it was done.

[@179rich]

Seven Little Girls just irritates me way more as a song than Ahab the Arab.

[@janpoelkamp4229]

Kramz… you sure you don’t like Hey Soul Sister? 😀

[@ryankramzer1256]

The only thing I'm more passionate about is my LOVE FOR DEEP FRIED CHICKEN

[@fidoz2370]

I'm here for the Fallon hate.

[@jkf9167]

First of all, I had no idea that Liz Phair had ever done anything as bad as Bollywood. Second, some more people have got to come out and vote for 7 Little Girls, because that song is downright disturbing, and not only because it's pervy. Ahab the Arab is racist, but the performance is nothing like the awfulness of 7 Little Girls.

[@CrunchyFrog47]

I will say one thing about the term "Little Girls". Considering this was released in 1959 it was common to juvenize women in song. The term girl, little girl, and even little child was very common with out really meaning they were under age you can throw out a good amount of early Beatles tunes for using any of those terms. It is sexist as hell, but more than likely not directly meaning under aged women. My beef mainly with "Seven Little Girls" is that it's desperate, pervy, and displays male entitlement to female affection. Throw in the sexist term "Little Girl" and it's a socially tone deaf song now in all manners under today's standards. In other words, typical 50s and 60s social mentality.

[@janpoelkamp4229]

Heh, I call my wife ‘my girl’, but in an affectionate way.

[@jkf9167]

The problem of 7 Little Girls, as compared to all kinds of other old songs that would fall afoul of today's mores, is that it sounds like it's emotionally dead inside, which makes it sound a million times more pervy and creepy. AND WHO THE HELL IS FRED!!??? I could write a dissertation on that dumb song, but then I couldn't use all-caps.

[@matthewstreet1961]

Just a funny thought...if we are going to consider a novelty song from well over 50 years ago be considered in this badness because it's 'racist'...then as a 1/2 Italian American, on my mother's side...I insist that "Dominick The Donkey", you know the Italian Christmas Donkey be added to this contest! Dammit I'm offended! As a half Italian, half of me wants to beat someone up, the other half forgot who. Tee hee...wink wink. Cheers Matt Street "Jing A Dee Jing, hee haw hee haw"

[@herrdwabash]

I want Toby Keith and Bon Jovi to go up against each other.

[@barryosullivan1486]

I listened to that Jimmy Fallon song. It's beyond embarrassing. It's one of the worst piles of trash I've ever heard in my life.

[@179rich]

The melody in Dr. Bombay's verses are freakin kindergarten level. Even without the racism, just insultingly bad.

[@edgustafson]

Yeah. I think that Dr. Bombay song is the worst thing left.

[@curly_wyn]

Some real trash heaps here! But also, about Kram and Paul McCartney: Why would he never want to hear about him if he didn’t hate him? That makes no sense. You do hate him, Kram, just admit it! Lol 😂

[@tillwesenberg1178]

You think these songs are terrible, but they're not. At least not compared to the most terrible song of all time, which is Lemon Tree by the German band Fool's Garden. Don't tell me you don't know that song? You lucky bastards.

[@janpoelkamp4229]

Hehe, it was kinda fun back in the day, especially when I was clubbing with my buddies. Bartenders would often smash a glass to it. Corny as heck, but a funny memory. I remember people comparing it to Fischer Z back then because of the vocals. It’s not a favourite by any stretch, but I can deal with it.

[@viscountpalmerston]

I think Kram and Jimmy Fallon have a lot in common...

[@ryankramzer1256]

Successful and hated

[@claytonkelley4921]

Nick Kroll is so funny! One of my favorite comedians. Ew for EW

[@ryankramzer1256]

Yeah, I love big mouth to death

[@claytonkelley4921]

@@ryankramzer1256 such a clever show! Still gotta catch up on new season

[@viscountpalmerston]

Racism will always win (in musical badness terms)

[@179rich]

re: Rice and Curry and Ew! How to decide?? Both are infinitely bad. There's no way to see that far down.

[@jkf9167]

EW! Has such bad lyrics from people who should know better, but Rice and Curry is just a singsong, migraine-inducing mess. I gotta go with Rice and Curry.

[@pauldaniels2019]

not only did kid rock steal from 2 songs. . .he ripped off the title from a great Beach Boys song and album.

[@ChrisNorwood3]

I'm fairly certain Train is worse than Nickelback across the board, song for song. And random taste question - are there any Green Day fans among you?

[@TastesLikeMusic]

Green Day is good. - Joe

[@BazStrickland]

Boooyyyzzz…..

[@herrdwabash]

'Bollywood' is worse than 'If You Were In Love'

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

Respectfully disagree - - Bollywood & Liz Phair do not belong in any "badness" discussion - Pitchfork's "zero stars" - c'mon man . . what is it about her?

[@TastesLikeMusic]

I agree with OP comment. Bollywood is worse. - Joe

[@TimeToGetAlone]

Yeah I think this tournament makes me realize that while the execution matters a ton for my top songs, when we're talking worst of the worst amateur performance is the lesser of my concerns. Horrible songs done professionally don't help at all

[@gamingninja6357]

13th

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

never gets old

[@gamingninja6357]

Yeah bro

[@dannyjohnson3569]

Re: the Sarah Brand song "Red Dress": She obviously sang the song in the proper key with proper backing tracks, then overdubbed all of the melodic instruments in a completely different key and then muted the original backing tracks when doing the final mix. It doesn't take any special skill to sing the song in an entirely different key - just transposing/overdubbing the key of the backing tracks to a non-related key.

[@179rich]

Mister Mister was already a lame band name, but its appearance in that Train song has made it even lamer.

[@scottstephenson2112]

I’ve never heard some of these songs before, and holy crap they’re bad! Bollywood is much worse than the Boston song, which is bad. If you listen close you can hear What’s Your Name and More Than A Feeling being “reworked” behind god awful singing and lyrics. The Bon Jovi song is terrible and I couldn’t get through all of Ew! and Red Dress. Well done tournament so far!

[@anthonysablan8650]

March Badness 2023: worst artists of all time 🤞😣🤞

[@dtchinacat3973]

what you "Young Guys" got to understand is: what is now recognized as "Racism" was once considered "Humor" not saying it was right, but it was the mainstream!

[@GeneBolmarcichEsq]

I have no problem with the condemnation of racism and pervism but why even bring attention to those songs? This should have been about song quality and not a vehicle to teach us about how to be nice to everyone and not commit crimes. We come here to escape the world in a sense and not to be preached to. That horrible Ahab song was OK in its time and that may be the way to judge it, not under today's more enlightened standards. Hell, I remember Don Rickles saying worse things about various groups of people and being considered hilarious. Also, I'm sure that pedophilia was not on the minds of anyone connected with those songs that, again, were acceptable back in their time. Pedophilia (child trafficking) is much more of a real thing today than it ever was when those "innocent" songs were written.

[@TastesLikeMusic]

The songs themselves suck. Lyrics are part of songs. You can’t ignore the full badness of all of these songs. We’re not going to analyze chord changes. - Joe

[@GeneBolmarcichEsq]

@@TastesLikeMusic No argument there. Badness comes in many different forms when it comes to music. Let's move on. This is not a place to get political. Looking forward to 1997 and a special surprise especially for you, Joe!

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

Hey Gene - yeah. Basically I am in agreement w you here. Honestly you could fill an entire bracket with misogynist rap lyrics; however, they get a hall pass for whatever reason. I support this channel but I will be glad to see the focus being shifted to what's good instead of what's bad.

[@MrUnclesean]

no ones preaching... get over yer bad self

[@GeneBolmarcichEsq]

@@MrUnclesean If not preaching then certainly sounding SO OFFENDED by nothing and going on and on a bit too much about it (that to me, is preaching). Who would dare say that AHAB the ARAB was a harmless joke of a song that was just fine IN IT'S TIME. Sorry but I'm over all this PC nonsense forced on me every day now.

[@johnr8095]

I actually like hey Soul sister. It’s a very catchy song. Yes, some of the lyrics in hey soul sister are bad, but I think the point is to make so stupid they’re clever lyrics. The first verse is a perfect example. ‘Your lipstick stains On the front lobe of my left-side brains I knew I wouldn't forget you And so I went and let you Blow my mind” He’s actually making an oral sex joke tying blowing your mind to getting blown. His girlfriend is blowing his left brain lobe. To the point where she leaves lipstick stains on his brain. The Who idea of it is just so stupid it’s actually funny that he would think to make such a comparison. Also, the song “ain’t that Mr.Mister” on the radio is talking about the band Mr. Mister. So, it’s not quite as vomit inducing as we think. It’s just a pop cultural reference. Train seems to do that in a few of their songs, often to clunky effect. Same with “Like a virgin, you’re Madonna” the writer has to know the lyrics are silly and not to be taken seriously.

[@scottstephenson2112]

I thought they missed the Mr. Mister and Love Connection pop culture references as well. Before their time.

[@TastesLikeMusic]

Your analysis makes me hate the song more. But yes we get the mister mister reference. That doesn’t make it better. - Joe

[@johnr8095]

@@TastesLikeMusic the song is actually very catchy melodically. But the lyrics are groan inducing. However, he had to know they are groan inducing and used those lyrics intentionally. I’d put the lyrics in the “so bad they’re good” category. Compare that to Jon Bon Jovi making these earnest lyrics and you can tell he really means it despite them being treacle. With Train they make these ridiculous lyrics but they aren’t being serious with them. And I really think they are there to make people laugh at how silly they are. I take that back. In the songs where they do this they are intentionally trying to be silly. But they have their own serious songs too. And those are the songs of train I usually hate the most.

[@viscountpalmerston]

You make a compelling case, but I don't buy it! :-)

[@janpoelkamp4229]

The oral sex lyric could be written by Nickelback.

[@themusiccritic3196]

I didn't even listen to half of these songs.

[@TastesLikeMusic]

There’s no reason to. They’re terrible. - Joe

[@themusiccritic3196]

@@TastesLikeMusic One more thing - Joe, you are the most, how do you say it… you can pronounce every single word in this video correctly. Jason can’t pronounce “tournament” and Kram can’t pronounce a word but I can’t remember what it is. (I’m Ohioan, and we do not understand any other kind of language).

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

@@TastesLikeMusic The Boys listen so we don't have to . .

[@179rich]

If You Were In Love repulses me musically and makes me wonder if Tom Scholz was hit in the head or something. But the Bon Jovi is so cringe, so uncomfortably cringe, I think I gotta go with Jon.

[@themusiccritic3196]

Can we switch to best albums next year? Please?

[@edgustafson]

March Radness?

[@NaughtyVampireGod]

I think the channel was basically founded on this concept and has done this series for every year starting sometime in the early 1960s . . Honestly I wouldn't mind doing a "album of the year" reboot . . . Why? Because the channel has grown a lot since then (sometimes people don't wanna comment on "old" videos), plus your personal tastes change . . What Saith Ye Creators? 😀

[@ryankramzer1256]

Tournament won't happen. Ya just got to wait for top 200 albums

[@themusiccritic3196]

@@ryankramzer1256 You know what you could do? Do a tournament for best albums but only the people’s votes count.

[@themusiccritic3196]

@@ryankramzer1256 Kram, the polls are acting up on your site. I couldn’t even vote on them.

[@matthewstreet1961]

Guys I'm enjoying this. But gee whizz, don't make this the "woke" March Badness. Ahab the Arab was just a product of its time. It's a dumb, novelty song. Judging it by 2022 standards is silly. Is it a bad song, sure...is it racist in 2022, sure. But the worst song of all time? No way. Cheers Matt

[@ryankramzer1256]

C'mon, if this was all about being woke, the bon jovi song wouldn't be anyway near here

[@matthewstreet1961]

@@ryankramzer1256 I'm not saying you're all woke at all. And I'm not even commenting on the Rice/Curry or Bon Jovi songs. I just thought your comments on Ahab were a tad woke. C'mon the song ain't that bad. In later years he sang about streaking for goodness sake. He's basically a novelty song guy. Although he did sing Everything is Beautiful...shit that's worse than Ahab the Arab! Ha! Just having fun with it guys...dont take me too serious. Cheers Matt Street

[@ryankramzer1256]

@@matthewstreet1961 agreed. I would not have nominated it. This is Jason's baby

[@matthewstreet1961]

@@ryankramzer1256 thanks for the replies Ryan...love the channel.

[@jamgrieve]

I wanted to see Photograph move on. It's easily one of the worst produced Nickelback tracks. Believe me, I know. I've listened to every damn Nickelback album. Not much else in their discography sounds as bad as Photograph.

[@jameshunter7303]

The Arab song is not for the snowflake generation that’s for sure. I’m not a big fan but it’s just of a time when people were not so uptight about everything. It’s mildly amusing and funnily enough does not make me think any less of Arabs after listening to it. So you condemn that song as “racist” and the very next song you barrack a pro-racial harmony song Ebony & Ivory, which okay may be slightly nauseous to some, but the intentions were on point.

[@GeneBolmarcichEsq]

I agree

[@TastesLikeMusic]

That’s the whole point. You can be racist or anti-racist and still make a horrible song. - Joe

[@TastesLikeMusic]

Substitute any culture for Ahab the Arab and it still sucks. It’s not funny or clever. It’s like EW! Level laziness. - Joe

[@janpoelkamp4229]

It’s terrible no matter what. No rectification on earth can save it.

[@mainzergirl9610]

Wow, Kram throws in some geographical bigotry (mason dixon line) worthy of a standard issue arrogant New Yorker.