Honey - Mariah Carey,
I can only liaten to pre-Honey, anything after is Crap.
I now she’s not a band, there may be one living in her head now, since she’s so screwed up in the head.
RE: Bobby McFerrin
I feel that for the guy, but it seems to me he bares responsibility for the song’s sappy perception. IIRC, the video was him merrily hopping about with Robin Williams. Changes to the scenery/imagery could have easily gotten across any intended irony.
RE: The Dead
When Jerry came back from his coma in the late 80’s, Touch of Gray opened the first show. You should hear the crowd explode at the chorus, it will totally change your perception of the song. As for it being the beginning of the end – all I have to say to that is ‘So Many Roads’. But my vote? Donna songs.
RE: My submission
I think I’ll get an anti-drug message across to my kids pretty effectively by turning them on to Jefferson Airplane. White Rabbit, Lather, Volunteers… But at the first hint of drug-curiosity, I’ll lock them in a room and make them listen to We Built This City. Tough love.
quote:
Originally posted by Stoid
“Sugar, Sugar”.
The Archies’ music cred was completely shot after that.
The Archies were a cartoon band produced for *The Archie show. *Although the musicans were talented and went on to successful careers, The Archies never performed live or toured and IIRC were never promoted as “real” people. Probably that’s what’s meant by saying they were not a “real band”.
Sorry that it took 9 months to give you an answer. I’ve been busy. 
good one, stoid!
Never one to settle for a mere song when a whole album could do, Lou Reed put out Metal Machine Music. It was hyped by people like Lester Bangs as being the future of rock’n’roll, and the few people that bought it were absolutely appalled. Of course, I, personally, think it’s brilliant, and that Reed’s previous album, Sally Can’t Dance, was much more insipid, but, well, we’re going with the moments that forever alienated the artist from the mainstream audience, right? People wanted another “Walk on the Wild Side.” What they got was white noise and screeching, distorted guitars. You gotta love the chutzpah.
I’d say a good example of this phenomenon is Sugar Ray, with that I Just Wanna Fly song. Up until they released that song, they were a shitty metal band (I’m fairly sure that every other song on that album was also shitty metal, too). With the huge success of that song, however, they were forced to make a decision: cut off their balls and become this laid-back money-sucking lite-music romanticy band, or go back to metal and surely become a one-hit wonder? We know which choice they made, and it makes me wonder if they don’t feel less fulfilled as a consequence. Doesn’t really matter to me; they’re bad one way or the other, as far as I’m concerned.
If I’m not mistaken, the Archies were a conglomerate of session musicians that basically played those songs in a few minutes (notwithstanding time between last penstroke and count-in at the studio) after they were written, in the company of other groups such as the 1910 Fruitgum Company, possibly the Association, etc. While it could be argued that they are a band during the session (about three hours at a time usually) they just went in, read the chart (if there was one), and got paid, and went off on their separate ways, usually. The producers are the “band”. Very complex and interesting stuff here, regarding the use of session musicians in popular music acts.
I saw Avril Lavinge doing a concert on Empty-Vee the other day, and couldn’t help but wonder if this hit of hers is going to put her in the scope of this thread, seeing as the rest of her material seemed markedly more grim.
What? Nobody has mentioned YES? I vote for Owner Of A Lonely Heart. Pretty much all of their prior music was fantastic and very melodic to a musician. Then that crappy song came out…
It’s the ONLY song by them that I EVER here on the radio any more.
I’m not sure if that really counts. After Tales from Topographic Oceans, the band began to disintegrate. Rick Wakeman left, unsure about the direction the band was taking and by the time 90125 came out, for my money they were “Yes” in name only.
Mine is Jethro Tull. I can’t point to any one song, but by the time Too Old to Rock and Roll, Too Young to Die came out I’d completely lost interest in whatever it was they were trying to do.
I second “Losing My Religion.” My band just started working on “Don’t Go Back to Rockville”, and we were all reminded of how amazing REM were back in the day. “Religion” is a pretty song, but nothing like what the band was capable of.
As a female singer in a largely Dead cover band, I should defend the Donna songs, but. I. Just. Can’t.
I ABSOLUTELY HATE that song. They did so much better stuff than that! I heard “The Sun Always Shines On TV” the other day… the melodies in that song always make me feel like I am flying…
S’ok… I didn’t mean to say that Donna was completely bad – just pure Donna songs. Her backup really hit it on songs like Playin’, etc.
I gotta disagree. The OP is looking for a song that’s unrepresentative of the artist, and there are plenty of Enya songs that are sickeningly sappy (“Anywhere Is,” “Only If,” or shudder “How Can I Keep From Singing?” come to mind). They’ve been getting sappier since the relatively sap-free first album, so “Only Time” isn’t any kind of spike… it’s the crest of a giant wave. Still, Roma Ryan’s lyrics have always been the sappiest sap that ever sapped, to quote Homer J. They just seem to be making them much more audible these days, and not so much in other languages.
She’s more of a pop singer than she is New Age.
-fh
They Might Be Giants - Particle Man (or Istanbul)
Everyone knows them from Tiny Toon Adventures, but I’d say Flood is their least representative album, and those songs are least representative of the album.
Also, I’ll agree with betenoir and say Simple Minds’ “Don’t You Forget About Me.” They didn’t write it, they initially didn’t want to record it, and it became their biggest hit. It wasn’t representative of their sound, lyrically it sticks out like a sore thumb, but it became a sort of turning point… too bad everything following it went rapidly downhill. Although I have a soft spot for “Once Upon a Time.”
I’ll also second Weezer. Having your video included on a Windows 95 install is only slightly less pathetic than spamming Hotmail and AOL trying to sell penis enhancers, and earns you a lifetime ban from my stereo.
-fh
When I found out that Rickie Lee Jones recorded “Chuck.E’s In Love” from a friend who was trying to turn me on to her music (she mentioned the song in with a list of other songs by Jones that I might have heard before, she was not recommending it), I was floored. For some reason, I never heard who sang it when it was popular(it didn’t get played much where I live) and figured it was some flash-in-the-pan 80s one-hit-wonder.
Whenever I hear “Sweetness” by Jimmy Eat World, I think that it could be the song that does them in. Were they trying to sound like corporate rock - e.g. Starship and 80s & 90s-era Bad Company? Or is this what the rest of the album sounds like? I thought “The Middle” was goofy and fun, but “Sweetness” is painful. What are they going to do next, a cover of “Feel It Again” by Honeymoon Suite?
Indeed. He’s an extremely talented artist with a huge vocal range who’s done excellent work in the pop, jazz and classical genres. He’s collaborated with such musicians as Chick Corea and Yo Yo Ma, and has been a regular guest conductor for numerous symphony orchestras. I doubt he’s really lamenting his 15 minutes of mainstream fame.
Thirded. As a teen I was a big fan of New Gold Dream and Sparkle In The Rain but really disliked the quasi-anthemic, U2-wannabe direction they started taking after Don’t You Forget About Me. You should check out their execrable album of covers released last year to see how far they have truly fallen.
Well, if the OP is looking for bands that will always be remembered for songs that were FAR from typical of their work, the one that comes to my mind is…
Focus. They considered themselves serious artists, and regarded “Hocus Pocus” as a jokey novelty. But today, the only Focus song anyone remembers is “Hocus Pocus.”
You know what collection you guys need to pick up?
I nominate “Should I Stay or Should I Go” by the Clash. Definitely not representative of their music up to that point, but sadly was one of their most heard songs, at least here in the States. It was pretty much all downhill after that, although I am not seriously suggesting this song was the cause.
I understand that to their credit they usually did the song live at twice the speed of the album version, in order to get through it quicker.