Sunday, December 11, 2016

Top 10 Worst Hit Songs of 2016

Well, here's the worst of the worst. The top 10 worst hit songs of 2016, plus the dishonorable mentions, will be the subject of this list. I decided to cover the worst songs first so I could end the year on a high note with the best list, and also because most other people also do the worst list first.

Now, there weren't a lot of awful songs this year, mostly just average. That may not sound terrible, but remember that 2015 was one of the best years for pop music in quite a while, with some of the best of 2014 bleeding in and the worst being left behind. I didn't even mind all of the stupid Vine fads making it to the charts, because we've had memes on the charts since Crank That (Soulja Boy) back in 2007. I would have had a lot of trouble coming up with a list of bad songs that year. This year, not so much. I actually had to cut a few songs from the dishonorable mentions so the list wouldn't drag on for too long. So, why don't we take some time to go over these songs. These are the songs I would love to leave in the past. Let's do this.

Dishonorable Mentions

7 Years by Lukas Graham

I don't hate this song as much as a lot of people do. I mean, I don't like it, I find it annoyingly smug and unbearable. Still, I can tell the writers weren't trying to be smug, they were just trying to sound grateful for their opportunities. Would I recommend this band? No. It's still annoyingly smug and unbearable, as are a lot of their songs.

Treat You Better by Shawn Mendes

Here's another guy who can't tell when he's being annoying or not. Shawn Mendes, a well-meaning teen from Toronto, is unable to write to save his life. He gets assistance from former teen pop singer Teddy Geiger to write this track, and it really shows. "I'm just gonna assume you're not happy with this guy and tell you this straight to your face without asking first so I can hopefully make you sleep with me instead of that guy." That's basically it.

The Hills by The Weeknd

This song is basically everything wrong with The Weeknd rolled up into one package. It's got a whiny attitude. It has gratuitous amounts of sex. There's an individual woman who's always doing things she shouldn't be doing. The production is dark and unpleasant. Every bad The Weeknd song has one or more of those elements, and this song is a good example to show people who ask why I used to hate this guy.

Hide Away by Daya

I had to get the obligatory teen pop out of the way some time, so here's this year's breakout teen pop star Daya with her first real success, Hide Away. It's about as banal and lame as it gets. My personal favorite lyric is right in the bridge, where she quite literally says "to be fly as a mother," basically trying to be hip while sounding quite the obvious. At least her follow-up Sit Still, Look Pretty had a good enough message; this is just her whining about how "good boys" go after vapid women and never notice her. 

Wicked by Future

This song never made the top 40 of the weekly Hot 100 this year, and was one of three songs on the Year-End list to do so (the others being Really Really by Kevin Gates and See You Again by Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth, though the latter was a carry-over from 2015 where it topped the chart). This is an entirely pointless song with very few redeeming qualities and very little effort put into it. The one saving grace is the production, which fits perfectly fine, and the fact that I can't get mad at this like I can the stuff on the top 10. Speaking of that top 10, let's get straight to them.

The List Proper

Number 10: Starving by Hailee Steinfeld and Grey ft. Zedd

This song just narrowly made the list, beating out 7 Years to take the number 10 spot. Unlike 7 Years, which was annoying in its egotism, this one is just plain stupid. The verses are played on acoustic guitar for the most part (at least the first ones), so at first it sounds fine. Then Haille Steinfeld opens her mouth. Look, I like Hailee Steinfeld as an actress, but she really should stick to acting. Her breakout success was called Love Myself, and was quite literally about "loving" yourself. This time around, one isn't enough, and she's in love. The lyrics are really awful here, like, a special kind of bad. "Don't need no butterflies when you give me the whole damn zoo." Sure. Not even the production can save it; it's all very generic-sounding and very stupid, much like the rest of this song.

Number 9: Work by Rihanna ft. Drake

2016 could possibly be described as the year that tropical music returned to the mainstream. So much tropical, dancehall, and reggae-inspired music made it on the charts that it started to get rather annoying when the new big single was yet another tropical song. Work came out before that sentiment started to show, but that doesn't make the song any less bad. Despite feeling at least partially authentic (heck, some of the writers are from Jamaica and Rihanna sings part of the song in Jamaican Patois), it all feels very drab. Nothing about this song is fun at all. The production is especially depressing, with no life whatsoever. Both vocalists sound incredibly bored, too, and Drake once again gives a disappointing delivery for a disappointing year. Come on, you two can do better than this.

Number 8: Heathens by Twenty One Pilots

Alright, Suicide Squad comes out and everyone is excited. When you actually go to see it, you realize it's pretty terrible. One thing that's really not good about the movie is the soundtrack. There was no original song on that album that I would consider good; this song isn't even the worst thing on that soundtrack. Once again, this is a production issue. Not only is it drab and depressing, but it isn't even well-made. Every point I made in my review I did from way before the movie even came out stands, so I'm gonna keep this brief. Simply, every conceivable thing about this song sounds wrong, and that's all there is to it. It's not terrible, it's just wrong.

Number 7: One Dance by Drake ft. Wizkid and Kyla

This song here was the biggest success off of Drake's 2016 album Views, and probably the worst of those to make this list. He's going for this dancehall-afrobeat fusion (the album had a lot of dancehall, let's admit that), but it really doesn't work. Kyla's lyrics are actually a sample of her collaboration with the Crazy Cousinz titled Do You Mind, and the sample doesn't work. Wizkid's lyrics sound phoned in and don't work. The writing feels lazy. The production is boring. Drake's performance is as dry as the Serengeti. Nothing here works. It's all a mess, and it was overplayed to hell and back. Just listen to the three singers' other material, don't bother with this.

Number 6: Work From Home by Fifth Harmony ft. Ty Dolla Sign

Ah, yes, Fifth Harmony, the girl group that only wishes they were as good as the Spice Girls. They're here with their second hit, and easily their most successful single to date. Not only does this song say the word "work" far more than the song that's just called Work, but it's also far more annoying. Not one performer on this song gives it their all. The beat is fairly minimalist, at least Starving from earlier on this list had an interesting beat, but much like Starving, the lyrics are purely stupid. Various labor-based metaphors and less-than-clever innuendo. Hey, I like a good doin' it song once in a while, Marvin Gaye was great at that, but at least be clever or, dare I say it, sexy. Ty Dolla Sign doesn't help either, he just falls into the same pitfalls as Fifth Harmony's members do.

Number 5: Sucker for Pain by Lil Wayne, Wiz Khalifa and Imagine Dragons with Ty Dolla Sign and Logic ft. X Ambassadors

Here's the other Suicide Squad soundtrack cut that made the list, and it's definitely the worst of them. It's sort of hip-hop, but they have rock bands perform the chorus, only it's just the one rock band (Imagine Dragons) and the other (X Ambassadors) is only there for a single repeated line on the outro. You could take them out and nothing would be changed, just have the singer of Imagine Dragons perform that part. The rappers are no better. Look, it's Ty Dolla Sign's second appearance on this list. It's not that he's bad, he probably has the best verse here, but he's so forgettable. The first time I listened to this, I couldn't figure out which one Ty Dolla Sign was (he's the first rap verse, by the way). If he's the best verse, then how are the others? Logic tries hard but fails, and the other two rappers don't even try whatsoever. The beat isn't even catchy, this thing doesn't even have memorability going for it. The only thing I can remember are the chorus, the outro and Lil Wayne's "peanut butter and jellyfishes" line. There is almost nothing worthwhile about this.

Number 4: Same Old Love by Selena Gomez

I hate this. I hate this a lot. It isn't even that horrible on a technical level, I just really, really hate it. The same few notes are played over and over and over and over again throughout the song and it's already annoying by the first verse. There's this shrill synth note, maybe a light tap, and those three things are pretty much the only instrumentation you'll hear for most of this. It's some of the worst production I've heard all year. Let's not forget about Selena Gomez herself. No one can quite understand why she's big, they just kind of accept it. I mean, I thought she was alright when she had the Scene backing her, but her solo career has not been noteworthy whatsoever, even producing some songs I actively disliked, this one included. I can appreciate that she's not going for her usual bored monotone, but that's about all I can appreciate here. Just pass.

Number 3: Gold by Kiiara

Call me old-fashioned, but I like my pop music to have a little bit of rhythm to them, a bit of substance. Here, we have by far the most minimalist song on the year-end list, and it isn't even good at that. I've heard a lot of people compare this song to Lorde's output, and yeah, I guess I can kind of see that, but at least with Lorde there was something there. This is worthless, meaningless cardboard. Okay, meaningless is not necessarily true, there's some meaning to this song. There is sort of this combination of hip-hop bragging with being mad at her (former) partner. She's confident. She's so over this guy. She's so over it, she cared enough to make a song about how much she didn't care! Yeah, that's a cliché I'm tired of, claiming you don't care but acting in a way that suggests you do without any hint of irony whatsoever. Yeah, I don't know if the rest of the album this comes from (Low Kii Savage; yes, she really wants to be hip) is any better, but I sincerely hope it is.

Number 2: Pillowtalk by Zayn

Okay, Zayn Malik leaves One Direction and starts a solo career, records an album, and puts this out as the first single. What kind of first impression does that leave? Well, besides the fact that Zayn can't stand on his own as a performer at all and really needed One Direction to help him stand out at all. This song just plain sucks. This is a sex song, plain and simple. Like I said, I like a good sex song. This, however, is not a good sex song. I'd argue this song is even less sexy than Charlie Puth and Meghan Trainor's ironically-named collaboration titled Marvin Gaye, one of the absolute worst songs to come out in 2015. This is barely even musical. It's probably the least memorable song to come out this year, other than that I remember it for being terrible. If this wasn't a former One Direction member, I don't think anyone would have bought this. It's pure star appeal. Let's just get to number 1 and finish this up.

Number 1: Me Too by Meghan Trainor

Behold, complete trash. This is the worst hit song- no, the worst song period, of 2016. There is nothing good about this song whatsoever, goddamn it. Every second, ever minute, is total garbage. The production is all over the place. The singing is lousy. The lyrics are obnoxious. Actually, I don't even want to talk about this song anymore. Just listen to the song. It'll tell you everything you need to know.

Well, that was my list. Overall, quite a long list of crap. The dishonorable mentions list would have been longer, but I had very little to say about many of them. The honorable mentions list could possibly be longer, but it will likely take me quite some time to get to the best list. There just wasn't a lot of great songs this year. Still, I will make the list, and I hope you return to read it. Until next time.

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