Intended as a corollary to the “bands ruined by one song” thread (), this is for all those unfortunates who had absolutely the wrong song hit it big…or one pretty good song hit it too big, sparking an inevitable backlash.
Starting with the obvious ones:
Barbie Girl, Aqua. I can tell that there’s a lot of resentment surrounding this song just from the parodies of it I’ve seen. It’s really too bad since, as I’ve mentioned before, just about every other song they’ve ever done is better.
Who Let The Dogs Out, Baha Men. What I like to call “Macarena syndrome”, simply an example of a non-American band seeing one of their songs inexplicably develop into a national craze. (Exactly what part of this song is relevant to sports, anyway?)
I’m Walking on Sunshine, Katrina and the Waves. Already well-documented. Just really, really unlucky.
Lady in Red, Chris DeBurgh. Almost his entire discography is acoustic rock, a la Neil Diamond. So how exactly did this syrupy romantic piece…which he only did for his wife, I might add…become the Chris DeBurgh song? It’s like Angel being the big Aerosmith hit…something’s just not right here.
Dang…that’s the last time I try to do that automatic-link thing. Anyway, the thread I mentioned is there…just gotta search.
Oh, and bands that weren’t really affected by much by one huge hit are out of this discussion. I’m talking Celine Dion (hated by many well before My Heart Will Go On), Chumbawamba (never wanted fame in the first place), Eiffel 65 (Blue not that big a hit; none of the Who Let The Dogs Out-esque massive resentment), etc.
I wouldn’t say any of those you mentioned were tarnished by their one big hit. I don’t think any of them had their musical careers ruined by their one hit. If they only managed one hit, which is an acomplishment in and of itself, it is probably because people didn’t like the rest of their music as much.
Well, I saw Foreigner on Behind the Music the other day. Lou Gramm seems to deeply regret recording “I wanna know what love is”. It took off and ruined them, since all of a sudden, this hard rocking band is known for a sappy love song. Apparently, it was all downhill from there.
And I wouldn’t say that Aerosmith was ruined by Angel. It definitely changed their direction, though. They saw that the public eats up sappy rock ballads, so they embraced it and started recording sappy ballads on every album. Now they seem to market themselves to lovesick preteen girls (can you say TRL?), instead of their rock fans… Ugh. Cough(sellout!)Cough I’m of the opinion that Pump was the last passable album they’ve released.
When I saw R.E.M. a few years ago, someone yelled out asking them to play Shiny Happy People. Michael informed the person that they don’t play that song any more.
The worst part about Bobby McFerrin’s situation is that Don’t Worry, Be Happy is actually a good song…it just got played to bloody hell. And anyone who’d like it would like most of his other stuff, too, if they ever took the time to look. But, no, he’s dismissed as a one-hit wonder.
He hasn’t sung that song in at least a decade. anyway.
