one shit wonder - amazing acts that somehow created one of the biggest duds in history

across the universe is so teen poetry it makes me cringe it feels like the kind of song I would have written at 15 if I had talent

I don't understand why the bowie version is so hated doesn't he always sound like that?

Sheila Chandra did the raga pop thing way better than George Harrison or any other 60s rockers

Generally I dislike Bowie's covers, not because they're bad necessarily, but because they're consistently the weakest track on any given 70s album. That said, I like "Pin Ups" a lot haha

I don't think John really wrote any bad songs for The Beatles (except "Across The Universe" imo) but Paul's got about ten pieces of shit in there ("Honey Pie" being the worst)

the granny music bashing is way out of control at this point and lennon wrote bad songs at every stage of his career and almost exclusively after 1968

I'm the only person who loves Bowie's "Across the Universe".

Not the only one.

I always assumed that "Honey Pie" was British slang for shit

Not the only one.

OK, we're an exclusive club!

brb gotta take a wicked honey pie

One of Macca's attempts to capture the cornball essence of Tin Pan Alley.

i.e. "Oh no, I just stepped in a honey pie."

Guess I was mixing up honey pots and cow pies.

Pretty sure I would accept a career that includes a dozen or so pieces of corny shit in exchange for a half-dozen indelible, immortal classics, but whatevs

Obvs

I do love that when everyone in the rock world was putting on their serious blues rock faces McCartney was like, "You know what's really cool..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KX4u4J6m5Pg

HP isn't great but it gets way too much stick coming from an album that contains piggies and people sometimes act like mccartney is the old corny beatle which is ridiculous

the granny music stuff will surely be reevaluated after his death, it's very much what the kids call "a choice" and even if it doesn't always work for me I appreciate big swings that are so studiedly uncool, then or now

it's interesting to me that he started fucking around with this stuff in earnest when his reputation for countercultural coolness was at its height as part of the psychedelic everythingness vibe of the time and how it retroactively became a mark against him when reputations flipped and there is a def an element of misogyny to the reactions these songs provoke among serious beatle nerds

"only corny" I meant but he is the old corny beatle now too xp

When I'm Sixty-Four is the big offender for me there. I kinda like his other cornball stuff but this is just like every reason to dislike the Beatles rolled into one

I know there’s some interesting shit going on in the vocals but I really really do not like “good day sunshine”

GOOD DAY

SUNSHINE

HULK EAT BREAKFAST

I don’t see Paul’s “granny” music (ugh that term) thing as being that far from the general whimsical children’s book vibe that was a big part of uk psych

I am going to be super basic and assert that the best "Across the Universe" cover is by Rufus Wainwright.

Come on. Laibach take this in a walk.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTQcJx7xqAc

i spent several years on a project to find a cover i liked of every beatles original released under the "beatles" name between 1962 and 1970

"what goes on" was the last one i found a cover for (sufjan stevens' cover is good imo, but i don't like it)

for "across the universe" i have clammbon. worst across the universe cover is probably roger waters'. "honey pie" is of course a trifle but i like Göran Söllscher's version.

I don’t see Paul’s “granny” music (ugh that term) thing as being that far from the general whimsical children’s book vibe that was a big part of uk psych

― brimstead

so like toytown?

yeah I think there are definitely parallels in how psych referenced Lewis Carroll stuff and rave referenced tv cartoons, but now I want to walk back what I said because Paul’s top hat and cane stuff is for sure a different impulse

The Boo Radleys - Free Huey and It's Lulu

yeah I think there are definitely parallels in how psych referenced Lewis Carroll stuff and rave referenced tv cartoons

I love making this comparison to people - more-so that end of rave connecting to the more overt whimsy of the Bonzos etc. I'm assuming Kate meant toytown as in 60s toytown pop though - to the UK what sunshine pop is to US where retrospective record collector type genres with rather rigidly defined if still ultimately quite ineffable parameters are concerned.

I am going to be super basic and assert that the best "Across the Universe" cover is by Rufus Wainwright.

Come on. Laibach take this in a walk.

Fiona Apple to thread. One of few covers I'll take over the original

Let's all hug it out and agree that there are some absolutely stellar covers of this song which is not even in the top five Beatles songs.

That could be a topic in itself - songs that are not the original artists' best songs, but that lend themselves to good covers.

*cough* paging Leonard Cohen *cough*

I don't know if there's really a bad Beatles song

Wow. Hard disagreement re "Party." It took Rosanne Cash for me to hearthe sadness.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fjsQPS5l-w

list of mostly great songs there

If it’s good enough for Bowie and Fiona Apple it’s good enough for me.

my least favourite Beatles song is Do You Want To Know A Secret, ever since I heard the V/VM version I've found it almost unlistenable.

I’m Happy Just To Dance With You
If I Fell

whaaaaaaaaaat

Not even a big Beatles fan, but those songs are gorgeous and objectively great

I knew I was opening up a can of worms (probably worthy of its own thread tbh) but I must disagree — despite promising hooks, they’re fundamentally trash.

Anyone mention “Batdance”?

That something so fundamentally weird as Batdance became a hit is entirely a good thing, whatever the track’s merits.

"Batdance" rules and I will hear nothing to the contrary

Vicki Vale
Vick
Vicki Vale

OOOOH YEAH

A few years ago we did a thread about universally held opinions and I think we found that there were none.

There is no song so bad that it doesn't have any defenders. And no song so good that it doesn't have any detractors.

hey Duckie
why don't we put the seven inch in the computer

Batdance camouflaged quite well in the UK charts where collage-type things like that were not uncommon so its extra neat it was huge in the US. Also it sort of reminds me of Meat Beat Manifesto's Cutman.

Hey! I like it as well. But after the magnificence of "Lovesexy" it was...um...a surprise at the time.

You Know My Name is one of the best Beatles songs fwiw

Companion thread

POX: Worst Songs by artists you normally enjoy

I was trying to think of a comparison for how a Bobby McFerrin fan might feel about "Don't Worry Be Happy" & I think it might be something like a Yello fan would feel about "Oh Yeah".

I’m a Todd Rundgren fan and I kinda feel that way about “Bang On the Drum All Day.”

Yeah! Like, they aren't totally out of line with the rest of the artists' work, it's just that these songs became society's singular focus on an almost tossed off aspect of one of many things that the artist does.

I cannot believe Bang on the Drum All Day isn't a Bad Manners original.