Worst Song by Favorite Band

Racking my brains, but I absolutely can't think of a bad Velvets song.

Lee Scratch Perry, one of my favourite artists, has done some unspeakable shite. And the gig I saw recently was pretty poor. He's far too prolific, for anyone's good.

Standard answer for several of my friends might well be: "Beyond the Sunrise" by B&S - known as 'the clunker' in, ahem, 'industry' circles months before the release.

I'll go for Laika's "Badtimes". Reciting an internet chain-letter virus spoof over churning loops and *releasing it as a single* - not cool. For a horrible moment last summer I thought they might get A-list airplay and become famous because of this mis-fire.

Ramones covering R.A.M.O.N.E.S. is fairly low.

Jesse Garon & The Desparados' 'Grand Hotel' is a slightly weak attempt at a protest number from a mostly untouchable band.

Nina Simone must have released a duff song somewhere, but I'm damned if I'm searching through 40 odd records to find it. Although, thinking on it, maybe I will. See ya later....

Other shit nuggets include "Unhappy Birthday" by The Smiths, "See You" by Depeche Mode, "Face Up" by New Order (this song really ruins _Low-Life_ for me), "Serial Thrilla" by The Prodigy, 75% of _Surrender_ by the Chemical Brothers (how can you pick one stinker from that pile?), and any random TKK song recorded after 1992.

You're on your own with this 'Fold Your Hands'-is-best-LP insanity, though.

I find Dan's original answer re: the Cure and all terribly amusing. Though evil, 'cuntastic' is my word du jour.

Ruth

The Beach Boys - Student Demonstration Time. Yes, it's fucking wretched, but NOT worse than the imbecile Al Jardine's "Take A Load Off Your Feet" , also from "Surf's Up" (Gareth - we don't need to have the twittering birds debate again, don't worry! Both of these tracks are worse than "At My Window" - just.)

Anyway here are mine :

Abba - "Thankyou for The Music" - Fuck Off.

The Kinks - It's kind of unfair to pick early album filler that Shel Talmy foisted on them like "Bald Headed Women" , as dire as it is. I'd prefer to look at some of the later albums when Ray had proved his singular genius for lapses in taste. In my book everything is perfect from "Kinks Kontroversy" to "Arthur". Then - "Lola vs Powerman and the Money-go-round". Here Ray falls into the classic trap of starting to write about being in a band. The biggest offence here is " Denmark Street". Look Ray, sorry, but I don't give a shit about the details of your publishing deals and dodgy lawyers. This kind of whinging doesn't make good songs, and actually Ray, it makes you sound like a horse's ass.

Along the same lines - writing songs about writing songs always deserves a good shoeing. The Who "Getting In Tune" is what I have in mind here.

The Jam. All credit to Bruce Foxton for temporarily holding the fort whilst Paul was going through writers' block or whatever after the first album, but "Don't Tell them You're Sane" is a humbling 3 minutes or so. Like watching a three-legged horse trying to run the Grand National.

i'm actually finding it hard to pick the worst sonic youth song -- there is an unfortunate amount of bad stuff. i'll say "i love you mary jane" right now. i remember "bee bee's song" being bad too.

i actually like just about everything by joy division. maybe the "sister ray" cover.

Half of Zoot Allures is must-have Zappa -- "Wind Up Workin' in a Gas Station" is where Ween got "Pumpin' 4 the Man" and as close as FZ came to punk; "Black Napkins," "Friendly Little Finger," and the title-track are classic Zappa-as-guitar-god; and "The Torture Never Stops" has to be heard to be believed. The other half, though, is absolute dreck -- "Ms. Pinky" covers the same thematic ground as "And In Every Home A Heartbreak," but is stupid and a hella lot more tiresome; "Disco Boy" introduces FZ's disco-hate done much better later on in "Dancin' Fool"; and "Find Her Finer" and "Wonderful Wino" are just pointless.

Man from Utopia is total crap (except for the album cover). And if you want to hear anything from Zappa's 1988 tour, stick with The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life and pass on the boots.

Richard: Impossible for me to disassociate 'Hunkpapa' from the time I heard it and all manner of extra-musical shenanigans. Hence the (possibly excessive) fondness. Though it was the first Muses LP I bought, a friend had already taped 'House Tornado' for me, and this, peculiarly, only made sense in the light of 'Hunkpapa', and sent me scurrying back to earlier material.

(There's probably more to be said about this, but not here. Not sure it's worth reviving the Muses thread though...)

(actually, I've always thought that MBV, or any shoegazer outfit, coulda done a killer cover of that Zep song)

Yep, No Quarter is godawful as well.

Fruit Nut: XTC

"The Last Balloon" - XTC.

"Paranoid Acoustic Seduction Machine" - Momus.

"Door To Door" - Delia Derbyshire.

Student Demonstration Time (ruins what could have been their best album)
Cherry Cherry Coupe (are they cheering on a fucking tortoise?)
No Go Show Boat (Shit song about a shit car)
Just Once In My Life (Really really badly sung)

Also - the majority of their car songs.

Stones - if you're only talking pre-total suck, i'd say "Starfucker" is a weak tune on an otherwise underrated album.

Drive By Truckers - "Tornadoes" - God I dislike this one so much. It sounds like he's improvising the melody as he goes.

"Life Is A Carnival" by The Band

"Gary's Got A Boner," obviously

"Scarlet Begonias" by the Dead

I hate all Robyn Hitchcock's Syd covers.

There are no bad songs by Witchcraft, Souled American, Royal Trux, Velvet Underground, Jerry Jeff Walker (pre senior citizenship), The Shadow Ring, or US Maple, and that about covers all my favorite bands.

WHAT

I don't like B&S very much, if at all, but this is by FAR my favourite song of theirs. Carmody's 'The Last Balloon' shout is also WTF when shit like 'That Is The Way' and half of Oranges And Lemons exists.

theres probably about a million more, but this is too depressing.

*listens to erotic city*

i can name a couple replacements albums that don't have a single song as good as that one.

for reasons i can't quite explain, i'm currently listening to a playlist of songs neil young had no business putting on a record, which goes like this:

"let's roll"
"baby what you want me to do"
"mystery train"
"ten men workin'"
"are there any more real cowboys"
"mideast vacation"

right now, "mideast vacation" is in the lead, so to speak.

I agree with all of your picks, but I've said this before and I'll say it again - a bad Neil Young record beats a good record by almost anyone else.

Landing On Water has some really good songs.

And as far as the Mats, I don't count anything past Don't Tell A Soul, but I still like "I'll Be You" better than "Gary's Got A Boner." I think it's the context that bugs me so much.

Ooops I didn't mean this, I was thinking of Life, which also suffers from horrid production, but has some fine songs

and yes, Life has 'When Your Lonely Heart Breaks," "Inca Queen" and "Prisoners of Rock and Roll." Sold. The album itself is a bit on the turgid side, I agree.

YOU ARE FUCKING CRAZY.

But surely we can agree that Tim is their best?

YOU ARE FUCKING CRAZY

And, make no mistake, I LOVE every Mats album up till Don't Tell A Soul, almost equally, but Tim gets the slight edge for me. I can't explain why, it just does. It's ALWAYS perfect, whenever I listen to it. There's never a 'wrong time' for that album - morning, evening, drunk, stoned, funeral...