We built this city on detestable lyrics
April 27, 2004
No. 1 is usually a good place to be for a band. Making it to the top spot on music magazine Blender's "50 Worst Songs Ever!" list is a more dubious honour.
The plastic tiara - and we're guessing no one will be especially shocked at the news - goes to Starship's 1985 anthem We Built This City.
In the May issue, Blender describes the song as "the truly horrible sound of a band taking the corporate dollar while sneering at those who take the corporate dollar".
The magazine's editor, Craig Marks, says the song was the choice of virtually every colleague, industry insider, music fan and friend he polled.
"The outpouring of bile against this song was amazing. A few people claimed to be able to scientifically prove that We Built This City is the worst song ever. It really felt like we'd hit a nerve in the collective unconscious."
The news came as a surprise to Starship singer Mickey Thomas, who joined the group in 1979 when it was known as Jefferson Starship, which formed in 1974 from the ashes of Jefferson Airplane.
"It kind of hurts my feelings," Thomas says. "I'm really proud of that song. For me it was a response to lost innocence. It was about rock music growing up and losing its idealism. I wonder if Craig Marks even listened to the lyrics, which are really interpretive."
Marks listened, all right.
"Who is Marconi? And what is the mamba?" asks Marks, referring to the line "Marconi plays the mamba".
"The mamba is the deadliest snake in the world, so he must have meant the mambo, but it sounds so much like 'mamba' that every lyric web site writes it that way. It makes sense neither way."
Blender's list - compiled via an arbitrary and anecdotal data collection process and ranked by Marks - included several whimsical criteria.
One was to go easy on novelty songs.
The 10 worst songs of all time, according to Blender magazine:
1. We Built This City, Starship
2. Achy Breaky Heart, Billy Ray Cyrus
3. Everybody Have Fun Tonight, Wang Chung
4. Rollin', Limp Bizkit
5. Ice Ice Baby, Vanilla Ice
6. The Heart of Rock & Roll, Huey Lewis and the News
7. Don't Worry, Be Happy, Bobby McFerrin
8. Party All the Time, Eddie Murphy
9. American Life, Madonna
10. Ebony and Ivory, Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder
"They set the bar lower almost by definition," Marks says. "And we basically like novelty hits. We would argue that Macarena is better than The Sound of Silence" - which by virtue of "self-important lyrics like 'Hear my words that I might teach you'," landed at No42.
The magazine pledged to pick only once on any band. "One Genesis song would beget another and another. Finally we had to decide whether Genesis's Illegal Alien was worse than Phil Collins's Sussudio. It is."
Additionally, songs needed to be reasonably contemporary and have attained a certain measure of success so readers would be familiar with them. This wasn't an issue with We Built This City, which Starship manager Bill Thompson notes went to No.1 in 23 countries. Thompson also enjoys pointing out that the song's lyrics were written by Elton John's long-time collaborator Bernie Taupin.
"I talked to Bernie and asked him how it felt to have written the worst song of all time and the best-selling song of all time, Candle in the Wind," Thompson says. "He said it's kind of like being Tom Cruise the year he was in Cocktail and Rain Man. Maybe this is good. It's publicity. I'm going to try to talk RCA into rereleasing the song."
Thompson adds, "I still love this song, and I can't imagine how the audience would feel if I didn't play it."
Baffled as he is by the list, he's thrilled to be in the same company as some of the other artists who made it to the top 10. "I wish Blender had called us for a group shot. I'd love to have my picture taken with Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney."
April 27, 2004
No. 1 is usually a good place to be for a band. Making it to the top spot on music magazine Blender's "50 Worst Songs Ever!" list is a more dubious honour.
The plastic tiara - and we're guessing no one will be especially shocked at the news - goes to Starship's 1985 anthem We Built This City.
In the May issue, Blender describes the song as "the truly horrible sound of a band taking the corporate dollar while sneering at those who take the corporate dollar".
The magazine's editor, Craig Marks, says the song was the choice of virtually every colleague, industry insider, music fan and friend he polled.
"The outpouring of bile against this song was amazing. A few people claimed to be able to scientifically prove that We Built This City is the worst song ever. It really felt like we'd hit a nerve in the collective unconscious."
The news came as a surprise to Starship singer Mickey Thomas, who joined the group in 1979 when it was known as Jefferson Starship, which formed in 1974 from the ashes of Jefferson Airplane.
"It kind of hurts my feelings," Thomas says. "I'm really proud of that song. For me it was a response to lost innocence. It was about rock music growing up and losing its idealism. I wonder if Craig Marks even listened to the lyrics, which are really interpretive."
Marks listened, all right.
"Who is Marconi? And what is the mamba?" asks Marks, referring to the line "Marconi plays the mamba".
"The mamba is the deadliest snake in the world, so he must have meant the mambo, but it sounds so much like 'mamba' that every lyric web site writes it that way. It makes sense neither way."
Blender's list - compiled via an arbitrary and anecdotal data collection process and ranked by Marks - included several whimsical criteria.
One was to go easy on novelty songs.
The 10 worst songs of all time, according to Blender magazine:
1. We Built This City, Starship
2. Achy Breaky Heart, Billy Ray Cyrus
3. Everybody Have Fun Tonight, Wang Chung
4. Rollin', Limp Bizkit
5. Ice Ice Baby, Vanilla Ice
6. The Heart of Rock & Roll, Huey Lewis and the News
7. Don't Worry, Be Happy, Bobby McFerrin
8. Party All the Time, Eddie Murphy
9. American Life, Madonna
10. Ebony and Ivory, Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder
"They set the bar lower almost by definition," Marks says. "And we basically like novelty hits. We would argue that Macarena is better than The Sound of Silence" - which by virtue of "self-important lyrics like 'Hear my words that I might teach you'," landed at No42.
The magazine pledged to pick only once on any band. "One Genesis song would beget another and another. Finally we had to decide whether Genesis's Illegal Alien was worse than Phil Collins's Sussudio. It is."
Additionally, songs needed to be reasonably contemporary and have attained a certain measure of success so readers would be familiar with them. This wasn't an issue with We Built This City, which Starship manager Bill Thompson notes went to No.1 in 23 countries. Thompson also enjoys pointing out that the song's lyrics were written by Elton John's long-time collaborator Bernie Taupin.
"I talked to Bernie and asked him how it felt to have written the worst song of all time and the best-selling song of all time, Candle in the Wind," Thompson says. "He said it's kind of like being Tom Cruise the year he was in Cocktail and Rain Man. Maybe this is good. It's publicity. I'm going to try to talk RCA into rereleasing the song."
Thompson adds, "I still love this song, and I can't imagine how the audience would feel if I didn't play it."
Baffled as he is by the list, he's thrilled to be in the same company as some of the other artists who made it to the top 10. "I wish Blender had called us for a group shot. I'd love to have my picture taken with Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney."
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