WORST Best Single Of The Year According To Robert Christgau

The only one that made me go wtf was "We're Still 1."

speakin truth to power OTT

I don't know these off hand:

(1993) Jaydee, "Plastic Dreams"
(2005) Eminem, "We're Still 1"
(2006) Todd Snider, "You Got Away With It"

Of the ones I know, I'd vote BDP, I guess, over Puffy. It's not a bad list!

i don't get this list. these are his best singles of the year? why is the clash 2001?

9-11.

Of the ones I know, Puffy. I've heard most of what Em has ever done and I really don't remember that single.

did they really re-release rock the casbah as a single after 9-11? that's weird. or creepy or something. i do love that song.

To clarify, I like most of these songs, but I think the evolution is kind of fascinating with some WEEEEIRD hiccups

loser was so cool. i remember where i was when i first heard loser.

did they really re-release rock the casbah as a single after 9-11? that's weird. or creepy or something. i do love that song.

― scott seward, Saturday, October 24, 2009 11:28 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I'm pretty sure it wasn't re-released. And there's really no justification I can think of for Christgau putting it there that isn't ridiculous.

Not to defend him, but I think his logic was just that it was the song that he was most obsessed with that year, and people should list singles the year they have the most impact. (I agree with the latter point, btw, though not to that extreme extent. He also listed AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" in his top 10 sometime in the mid/late '80s, I think, and Lee Dorsey's "Yes We Can Can" was his #2 single last year, when Obama got elected.)

I liked "Loser" when I first heard it on the radio, but I thought it was just a goofy novelty song, and Beck would be a one-hit-wonder. (Thought the same thing when I first heard "My Name Is" by Eminem.)

i know, it's kinda sad to think of loser now. it was so much fun. and then it turned out that i had to read and hear about this guy for decades afterward. and it would turn out that he was actually a pretty humorless and driven scientologist.

same with eminem kinda except for the space alien religion thing.

late 90s nostagia: "remember when beck was a towering figure in popular culture"

Most of those deserve to win. Christgau is probably the most clueless critic in the entire world.

Also Sasha Frere Jones >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> XGau

never change

this todd snider song is so bad

also gogol bordello sounds exactly like how i imagined they would

puffy ugh

That's the weirdest list I ever saw - pretty much an even split between great choices, obvious choices, terrible choices and wtf choices. I wouldn't normally vote because it's obviously just one guy's ego raging out of control, but seeing as I can't imagine anything worse than 'I'll Be Missing You' I will make an exception.

an even split between great choices, obvious choices, terrible choices and wtf choices

In other words, pretty much like any other sane person's list of favorite singles over the course of three decades.

+ "I'll be missing you"

i know, it's kinda sad to think of loser now. it was so much fun. and then it turned out that i had to read and hear about this guy for decades afterward. and it would turn out that he was actually a pretty humorless and driven scientologist.

― scott seward, Saturday, October 24, 2009 10:42 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

haha

i voted 'gangstas paradise' fuck that song

plus, weird al's version is so much better.

Easily "Rock the Casbah" for the conceptual reasons discussed above.

"i'll be missing you" because it's horrible is my answer fwiw

"Loser"/"Rock the Casbah"/"I'll be missing you"/"Ultimate" one of these four, can't choose right now.

No real reason for any of those 4 except "they all suck" - most of the other stuff I've heard off that list is ok-good-great.

"kim", jeezus, another song i haven't thought about in years. she was a real person! she still is! that is so fucked up.

ha, i heard 'i'll be missing you' the other day and thought it wasn't that bad tbh

Todd Snider? that seems pretty random

The Snider song seems like an anti-Bush choice to me.

G
O
G
O
L

B
O
R
D
E
L
L
O

song is almost as obnoxious as my post

fuck you deej, you ain't my friend

voted "Loser" btw

I bet the eminem's worse tho

I don't know a lotta those, but I know the worst ain't "I Want It That Way"

(or "Loser")

is the eminem thing just this?

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

because that's not bad, but there's sure not much to it.

"i'll be missing you" because it's horrible is my answer fwiw

Really, any of the choices from this span:

(1996) Pulp, "Common People"
(1997) Puff Daddy & The Family, "I'll Be Missing You"
(1998) Backstreet Boys, "Backstreet's Back (Alright)"
(1999) Backstreet Boys, "I Want It That Way"

(1996) Pulp, "Common People"

― cough syrup in coke cans (Eric H.),

o_0

"i'll be missing you" will walk this

the Panjabi MC & Jigga seems like a really weird choice as I've never heard it since the Saturday night it debuted in the UK on the Tim Westwood show and he replayed a verse because it has anti-Iraq war sentiment (on the eve of the war iirc?). Does anyone care about it? Was it particularly good? I don't seem to remember thinking so.

it was a pretty solid hit here & got played in clubs for awhile

basically, prefer the non-jigga version tho

OG version is a classic tbrr

Also Sasha Frere Jones >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> XGau

― Tied Up In Geir (Geir Hongro), Saturday, October 24, 2009 7:39 PM (Yesterday)

lmao i never could have predicted this tbh

I never understood his choice of "Kim" as single of the year. I guess I'm corny in that for me singles have always been songs I want to play over and over again -- songs I primarily tend to derive pleasure from -- and I can't imagine enjoying "Kim" in that way, but obviously to each his own.

So I guess Geir hasn't read the SFJ column about how today's bands need more black music influence yet.

funny thing is Xgau loves SFJ's writing.

I Want It That Way. One of the many chart hits by teen groups that was surely the result of a dare between writers to see who could allude to anal sex. I have no evidence for this song being about anal sex at all, other than the title. But still. Props to the video for perfecting the boyband "reach out, grab and pull back" move though.

"I'll Be Missing You" is, was and e'er shall be: dire.

There are very very few songs that I hate more than "I'll Be Missing You." "I Want It That Way" is one of them.

(2004) Andre Tanker, "Food Fight"
(2005) Eminem, "We're Still 1"
(2006) Todd Snider, "You Got Away With It"
(2007) Gogol Bordello, "Ultimate"

WTF r these?

I Want It That Way. One of the many chart hits by teen groups that was surely the result of a dare between writers to see who could allude to anal sex. I have no evidence for this song being about anal sex at all, other than the title. But still. Props to the video for perfecting the boyband "reach out, grab and pull back" move though.

so this is a general endorsement then.

i want it that way is still an amazing song. i kinda agree that is prob about anal sex but it could also be about john leguizamo's character in "summer of sam"

seriously tho. it is a great song.

Picking "Plastic Dreams" as the best single of the year will make me love Christgau forever and ever, wow.

btw the correct answer to this question is always and will always be Puffy

I Want It That Way. One of the many chart hits by teen groups that was surely the result of a dare between writers to see who could allude to anal sex. I have no evidence for this song being about anal sex at all, other than the title. But still. Props to the video for perfecting the boyband "reach out, grab and pull back" move though.

Wonder if these guys read Christgau before making this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwykvrwvWW4&feature=related

Tough choice between both Eminem's, Puff or BDP. Gonna vote for Puff, though.

some of these songs really aren't bad ("common people" "looking for the perfect beat" "rock the casbah") but the eminem and diddy songs suck

"Rock the Casbah" might be the only thing I unequivocally dislike, but there are so many things there that go right past me (plus a few songs I don't know), I won't cast a vote. Probably "Jump" and "Loser" are the only two songs I love. My album tastes are usually in the general vicinity of Christgau's--especially through the '70s and '80s--but his singles lists have never overlapped much with mine.

ive noticed that christgau does put a lot of mainstream hits, for better or worse

Well, singles are made to be heard by lots of people.

true that

Starting with 2000, most of the songs up above really don't feel as much like "singles" to me. I'd almost call it a decline into solipsism -- like, he stopped caring about aligning with any consensus among fans or critics, which for Xgau had been a bigger deal than for lots of voters -- except that the switch pretty much coincides with everybody else's shift toward digital "tracks" -- a switch that affected overall Pazz & Jop results as well. Also, you can't call it solopsism when so many of his '00s choices are clearly supposed to align with front-page headlines instead. Still feels like it to me, though. (And I say that as somebody who often votes for way weirder things than he does.)

"Food Fight" by Andre Tanker btw is a great soca track about food, off an Honest Jon's compilation called Lif Up Yuh Leg An Trample.

Pretty sure "Kim" is also the first track above that was not actually released as a single (which means it once would have defied the literal-singles-only rule that Xgau himself had created for the poll.)

I dunno if it says more about me or the list that the 80s stretch looked pretty awesome, the 90s was pleasant nostalgia up until Puff Daddy, and then I was just scratching my head.

Haven't heard (at least, can't remember) the Todd Snider or the Andre Tanker, but they'd have to work to be worse than "I'll Be Missing You"

a decline into solipsism -- like, he stopped caring about aligning with any consensus among fans or critics

the 80s stretch looked pretty awesome, the 90s was pleasant nostalgia up until Puff Daddy, and then I was just scratching my head.

this is how i feel about xgau's writing in general.

i think his writing actually improved mid-decade (good job, Chuck); the low point was '92 - '96 for me. his top choices have gotten somewhat odder over the years tho, true.

Haven't heard (at least, can't remember) the Todd Snider

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5t04YUt8Z8

i think that song is pretty funny as far as anti-bush jokey folkies go. but picking it as single of the year was so drably "political" of him.

the '02 and '03 picks are pretty "IT'S ABOUT IRAQ DO YOU SEE" too but they're at least decent songs that were hits on rap radio -- the Mystikal is awesome, but the Jay verse on the Panjabi MC song isn't really anything special, thought it was lame that it was one of his highest ranking songs on the p*tchf*rk tracks list too.

I can't find a link to the 12" version of "Plastic Dreams" which is essentially a 10-minute organ solo and fucking incredible, but here is the 7" single edit which is still pretty tasty:

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

This was probably my favorite track of 1993.

Is that Mike D on drums?

Takes a while to build even for a 7-inch (and i can't say it blasts past everything else i've heard from the year) but that is pretty tight for an organ showcase

In fairness, I encountered it on the "Welcome To The Future" compilation that used a bunch of goofy pitch phasing tricks to create a surround-sound effect out of regular stereo speakers; IIRC the high-hat and drums always sounded like they were coming from the far corner of the room while the organ was right in front of you and the snares and drums were somewhere off to your left. I used to blast this on my dad's stereo nonstop.

in the context of his later dj shadow and latin playboys love, i can see why xgau would flip for it

wtb more jazzy house music

Why should "consensus among fans or critics" necessarily come into play when choosing your #1 song of the year? Esp. if you think (as Xgau seems to) that this consensus has grown apolitical?

xuxhk didn't say it should, just that for Christgau in the past it seemed to.

picked the clash. i remember thinking that was extraordinarily precious and lame in 2001. i'm not a new yorker tho.

xp I'm just saying the trend away from consensus-type choices struck me as disconcerting. I actually like lots of the '00s songs he picked; they just don't all strike me as "singles", per se'. (Well, maybe half of them do. Where, pre-'00s, pretty much all of them do.) Also, really, I don't see what's so horrible with picking a top song of the year based on the "This Song Is The One That Will Always Remind Me What Living In Such-And-Such Year Felt Like" criterion, to be honest. Who cares whether I'd pick the same song as him?

Also, fwiw, it's possible to like that Panjabi MC single a lot (I do) without thinking Jay-Z's rap on it is monumental in any way (or even while thinking his reference to current events is fairly gratutious, which it is.)

yeah i feel the same way xhuxk does about it basically

but i tend to be a sucker for fairly one-note exoticism in music

I wasn't singling xuxhk out specifically, just using his words -- seems like there's an undercurrent here that's suspicious of Xgau verging from the consensus, especially when he weights political content more highly than that consensus.

i don't think it's so much that he needs to be listening to the radio and aligning his tastes with everyone else's, just that there's a strong sense that he was doing that for 20-30 years and at some point decided he'd rather pick an album track or make a 'statement' w/ his #1 instead of championing his favorite charting single. some people are 'suspicious' of that, some people lament it, some people just wonder why.

yeah, it's not that his choices are political or unpopular, but the curiosity that he suddenly stopped following anyone's definition of a single outside of Greil Marcus', when he used to be a stickler for that shit.

See, I think to assume he's "making a statement" when he picks Todd Snider implies a kind of bad faith, like secretly he enjoyed "Sexyback" more but felt obligated to go with the anti-Bush song.

I think also the fact that we're only looking at #1s kind of skews this too. Lots of obscure stuff in his earlier top tens, lots of hits in his later ones.

you seem focused on defending his fondness for the political or obscure, which no one's really attacking

i think that song is pretty funny as far as anti-bush jokey folkies go. but picking it as single of the year was so drably "political" of him.

― STRATE IN2 DAKRNESS (tipsy mothra), Monday, October 26, 2009 2:50 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

the '02 and '03 picks are pretty "IT'S ABOUT IRAQ DO YOU SEE" too ...

― President Deez (some dude), Monday, October 26, 2009 3:44 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

The Snider song seems like an anti-Bush choice to me.

― President Keyes, Saturday, October 24, 2009 11:18 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark

here's a strong sense that he was doing that for 20-30 years and at some point decided he'd rather pick an album track or make a 'statement' w/ his #1 instead of championing his favorite charting single

― President Deez (some dude), Monday, October 26, 2009 5:08 PM (13 minutes ago) Bookmark

sorry, I should have said you seem to be ignoring the fact that this shift towards political anthems came along with a serious loosening of the definition of what qualifies as a single, which is part of why people assume his choices that genuinely are singles in that period are also "statements." It's not that he just started praising against me! 7-inches.

I don't see what's so horrible with picking a top song of the year based on the "This Song Is The One That Will Always Remind Me What Living In Such-And-Such Year Felt Like" criterion, to be honest.

But could anyone vote for such a song in Pazz, xhuxk? I don't recall the rules exactly. If that's always been the case, then my best single of 2006 would've been Middle of the Road: "Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep."

I haven't listened to the Todd Snider song so I can't speak to that, but the Clash pick in particular is something you can't help but read as anything but "making a statement," whether it's a political one or one about a song from 1982 being better than anything actually released in 2001.

Well, sure, but every list is "making a statement."

Also, I think the statement that choice makes is "Everybody said dumb shit at the end of 2001."

xgau's been a todd snider fan from the start, and i don't at all doubt that he greatly enjoyed snider's bush song -- that it may well have been the song he played most that year, or played for other people most that year, etc. (and fwiw i like todd snider too, probably more than anyone else posting in this thread.) but his list is for public consumption, it's intended to say something, and by "drably 'political'" i mean that that song's placement at #1 just feels very ho-hum to me -- from both a political and musical standpoint. and maybe he's just fine with being ho-hum, who knows?

what especially bugged me at the time was that he justified calling RtC a 'single' because he'd played it on his own radio show a couple times.

could anyone vote for such a song in Pazz, xhuxk?

Yep. Every poll letter that went out when I was there (and going back to 1980 or so, I think) stipulates that "literal release dates are not binding."

And part of my point above, btw, was that, if Xgau's singles lists seemed less fun come the '00s, so did everybody else's. At least in my mind -- loosening of definitions being a big part of the reason.

you guys called out that one stinkypants for filling his album list with old stuff, though.

Hoot if you think the "Casbah" pick was meta and sarcastic why didn't you say so 20 posts ago

Has he written about his decision to start choosing album tracks? How much of it is a "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" response to the 00s?

Sorry, I was the one being meta and sarcastic there with the "dumb shit" statement.

How much of it is a "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" response

I suspect that had a lot to do with it -- "If everybody else is gonna do it, I might as well, too." Probably said something along those lines in a Pazz & Jop essay once, but I can't cite specifics right now.

i thought that there was a loosening of the "strict" has-to-be-a-single policy round about that time (2000/2001). didn't he mention that any song/track/single performance was then eligible for the singles poll?

Yeah, I'm not sure what year exactly, though. It was an inevitable change, given what people were already voting for, but I still wasn't crazy about it.

you guys called out that one stinkypants for filling his album list with old stuff

Yeah, that was the unwritten "Stinkypants Clause," invented by me, namely: "You can vote for whatever you want, jerk, but fuck if I'm going to waste 20 minutes of my life data-entrying your stupid ballot."

Maybe I'm denses, but what is the Todd Snider song saying Bush got away with?

life.

So what was the "Rock the Casbah" pick all about? Is it generally understood that people played the hell out of that after 9/11? Feel like I"m missing something there.

It was played by the US Army as it marched triumphantly into Baghdad, spreading freedom.

that explains why xgau put lee greenwood at #2

it's a good thing he didn't pick "Bomber."

Now I totally want to hear Lee Greenwood cover "Ante Up."

ANTE UP, OSAMA! ANTE UP!

Ghost Dance

"Just when we needed a jolt of moral certitude, the glad-handing frat boy grayed out like the policy wonk we wish he was."

I forgot how much he loves Bette Midler's "From a Distance."

Actually, I'd say a dumber statement came from P&J voters for:

10. Ryan Adams: "New York, New York" (Lost Highway)

someone should do a shop of this as Xgau's In a Metal Mood: No More Mr. Nice Dean:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9c/In_a_Metal_Mood_No_More_Mr._Nice_Guy.jpg

oops...this:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9c/In_a_Metal_Mood_No_More_Mr._Nice_Guy.jpg

(2000) Eminem, "Kim"

Easy vote.

oh my god we're back again

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

What kind of monster hates Kris Kross?

The "I'll Be Missing You" hate is rote. But I'm kind of surprised by second place. What's the beef against "Ultimate?" Not that I'm in love with it. Just curious.

Or were people voting against it for not being a single?

Anti-Gypsy racism

"Rote" is a good way to put it. I've always liked that single -- certainly better than the boring song it cribs from. Anyway.

lol @ consensus

wait wait waiiiiiiiiit why is motherfuckers voting for cameo

Some kind of advanced challop testing I'm guessing.

wtf 3 votes for "Around The Way Girl" .. I usually don't complain about stuff like this, but WTF??!?!?

genuinely surprised by the number of songs voted for

(1996) Pulp, "Common People" 2

who is frontin

fight the real enemy: people who hate "Pump Up the Jam"