# Popular Songs You've Never Heard Of **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 17, 2009, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239 "2009-02-17T05:32:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![SharkB8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/977dab/32.png) [@SharkB8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SharkB8)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/21 "2009-02-17T18:43:47Z")
> [@Art\_Rock](#): > > This will be difficult to imagine for Americans, but.. > > Freebird - Lynyrd Skynyrd > > It did not get any significant radio play in Holland in the seventies, and even now it rarely features on classic rock stations. This was my high school graduation song in 2000, and I hadn’t heard of it before then. ---
**Author:** ![Dread\_Pirate\_Jimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dread_pirate_jimbo/32/3897_2.png) [@Dread\_Pirate\_Jimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dread_Pirate_Jimbo)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/22 "2009-02-17T18:47:22Z")
> [@Baal\_Houtham](#): > > The thread title is nice. _Popular Songs You’ve Never Heard Of_. That’s kind of like asking for Things You Don’t Know You Didn’t Know. > > Anyway. Mariah Carey is (I think) the most successful female singer of all time. The only thing by her I know is “Vision of Love.” My sister put it on a cassette for me 14 years ago and I finally listened to it earlier this year. It’s not bad. > > I must have heard Celine Dion’s “Our Love Will Go On” but I couldn’t tell you a thing about it other than the title. I couldn’t tell you anything at all about Ms. Dion’s other songs. I believe you mean “My Heart Will Go On” from the Titanic soundtrack by Celine Dion. 🙂 If you’ve not had to suffer through hearing that song relentlessly being force-fed to you by radio in the last decade consider yourself lucky. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/23 "2009-02-17T19:27:26Z")
[quote=“1920s Style “Death Ray”, post:9, topic:486239”] I first heard Freebird while watching The Texas Chainsaw Massacre in a hotel room a couple of years ago. I had also never seen any version of TTCM and didn’t realise that’s what I was watching until the end credits. [/QUOTE] Are you sure you weren’t watching THE DEVIL’S REJECTS? I do think the first remake TCM movie did have “Sweet Home Alabama”. ---
**Author:** ![corkboard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e9bcb4/32.png) [@corkboard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/corkboard)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/24 "2009-02-17T21:41:16Z")
> [@Lungfish](#): > > The one song I didn’t know existed until a few years ago is Baker Street by Gerry Rafferty. What? By who? ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/25 "2009-02-17T21:43:26Z")
> [@Baal\_Houtham](#): > > I must have heard Celine Dion’s “Our Love Will Go On” but I couldn’t tell you a thing about it other than the title. I couldn’t tell you anything at all about Ms. Dion’s other songs. **Baal Houtham** , I love you and I want to have your babies. Now, if possible! ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/26 "2009-02-17T22:34:47Z")
> [@FriarTed](#): > > Are you sure you weren’t watching THE DEVIL’S REJECTS? Yes you’re right! I’m conflating to hotel incidents. ---
**Author:** ![Ice\_Machine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Ice\_Machine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ice_Machine)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/27 "2009-02-17T22:38:34Z")
75-80% of the songs post 1990 I still wouldn’t know. Half of those listed in this thread I don’t recognize. However, Pop Muzik by M is one I have on several different compilations. I am perpetually stuck in the '80s. ---
**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/28 "2009-02-17T23:03:42Z")
> [@Dread\_Pirate\_Jimbo](#): > > I believe you mean “My Heart Will Go On” from the Titanic soundtrack by Celine Dion. 🙂 If you’ve not had to suffer through hearing that song relentlessly being force-fed to you by radio in the last decade consider yourself lucky. 🙂 Apparently then, I don’t even know the title. Now, I’m trying to think how I’ve missed the song. I only watched about 40 minutes of the movie at a friend’s house, and skipped the Oscar show the year Titanic came out. There’s no MOR music at work, there’s no MOR music on my radio buttons, my supermarket usually features up tempo catchy rock. Presumably I’ve heard the song in restaurants or offices, but it never registered. ---
**Author:** ![Yorikke](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yorikke/32/4335_2.png) [@Yorikke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yorikke)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/29 "2009-02-17T23:15:42Z")
Don’t know how big it was (#1? I guess?), but I never heard “My Humps” until very recently. I also, like the poster upthread, never heard “Hey Ya” until my wife made me sit down and listen to it. Boy, that song fuckin’ SUCKS, and it was #1? Joe ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/30 "2009-02-18T00:11:11Z")
> [@wheresgeorge04](#): > > Don’t know how big it was (#1? I guess?), but I never heard “My Humps” until very recently. I also, like the poster upthread, never heard “Hey Ya” until my wife made me sit down and listen to it. Boy, that song fuckin’ SUCKS, and it was #1? > > Joe Who has the heart to tell Joe that it won a Grammy, too? ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_Prize](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d2c977/32.png) [@Sir\_Prize](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_Prize)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/31 "2009-02-18T02:03:11Z")
> [@Diz](#): > > Well, I’d never heard of _Bad Day_ or Daniel Powter until now 🙂 Me neither. ---
**Author:** ![Stephe96](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Stephe96](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stephe96)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/32 "2009-02-18T02:08:20Z")
What’s this National Anthem thing everyone keeps talking about? ---
**Author:** ![Quercus\_alba](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quercus_alba/32/4061_2.png) [@Quercus\_alba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus_alba)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/33 "2009-02-18T02:10:47Z")
> [@Rachael\_Rage](#): > > Yeah, honestly, I don’t know what I was doing, but apparently I wasn’t anywhere that anyone was playing music. Or perhaps I went temporarily deaf. > > Similarly, I heard Rhianna’s “Umbrella” for the first time around last summer. I thought I was getting better, but apparently it came out about a year before that. > > In my defense, I have both heard and seen the video for “Single Ladies,” but only after Beyonce was on SNL a few weeks ago. I’d never heard of Chris Brown or Rhianna until last week…:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Jurph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/50afbb/32.png) [@Jurph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jurph)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/34 "2009-02-18T02:19:22Z")
I had managed to hear _Bad Day_ but did not know (nor care to find out) the artist’s name. Ditto _Single Ladies_, although I really only know the first three seconds - I hear that clicking and the girl starts saying the words “ALL THE SINGLE LADIES” over and over and I change the station. How many more minutes does the song last before she sings something different? I have heard of _My Humps_ but would be unlikely to identify it until the word “humps” shows up in the lyrics. I suspect this is another one that I aggressively interdict using my lightning-fast channel-switching finger. Having never watched a single contiguous minute of _American Idol_ I am fairly confident that I could be stuck in an elevator with each of the winners from the last eight seasons, while the elevator played songs that they made famous, and I would neither recognize them nor realize that the songs I was hearing had been forcefully placed in the “Play This CD Six Times An Hour” bin by record execs hungry for marketing tie-ins. Actually, I might recognize Clay Aiken, because I know his name and I’ve heard he’s handsome-but-goofy-looking, and I know he’s got red hair… but I wouldn’t catch on that the music was his song. Oh, and I know that Simon and Paula are judges. Isn’t there a third one, though? ETA: **Quercus alba** , I don’t know who either of those people is, but I know Rhianna sings a song about an Umbrella. ---
**Author:** ![Rucksinator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/898d66/32.png) [@Rucksinator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rucksinator)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/35 "2009-02-18T02:24:08Z")
> [@corkboard](#): > > What? By who? I heard that that song held the record for most consecutive weeks at #2 (maybe it was also "… without ever making it to #1). Don’t know if that’s true or not. I was in highschool in the early 90’s when I got a hold of a Led Zeppelin tape to check out this “Stairway to Heaven” song that I kept hearing about. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/36 "2009-02-18T02:36:16Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > I have been pretty much out of touch with popular music for at least ten years. Sometimes I know the song. Sometimes I’ve heard of the artist. Rarely can I match up the two. For instance the domestic violence incident with Rhianna and Chris Brown has been in the news. No idea what either of them have done. That’s why I can’t enjoy any of Weird Al Yankovic’s recent albums. I’ve never heard most of the songs he does parodies of any more. And I’ve been a fan of his since the 80’s. > [@Lungfish](#): > > The one song I didn’t know existed until a few years ago is Baker Street by Gerry Rafferty. I think I’ve heard that song, but it seems to have gone missing from my memory. ---
**Author:** ![It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/it_s_not_rocket_surgery/32/312_2.png) [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/It_s_Not_Rocket_Surgery)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/37 "2009-02-18T02:39:36Z")
> [@Cyberhwk](#): > > **Queensryche**. I’m FROM Washington and I couldn’t pick out any of their songs if you played them for me. In your defense, they are a metal band, and only had one pop song that ever got played anywhere outside hard rock stations. The song that I quite literally never heard, despite having read about it at least 100 times, is “Suzanne” by Leonard Cohen. Boy, does this song get mentioned a LOT in music literature and magazines! Yet, I never heard it even once until a satellite radio station played it about 3 years ago. It’s not quite the same as a “hit”, but the gap between reference and airplay is huge. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/38 "2009-02-18T03:08:08Z")
> [@](#): > > Similarly, I heard Rhianna’s “Umbrella” for the first time around last summer. I thought I was getting better, but apparently it came out about a year before that. I have no idea at all what this song is. ---
**Author:** ![K364](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k364/32/5_2.png) [@K364](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K364)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/39 "2009-02-18T03:44:42Z")
I tuned out of pop music many years ago, but still listen to non-pop, non-country, non-rap radio. I heard this crazy, over the top vocal singing a roller coaster melody… fortunately they mentioned the band and here it is: [4 Non Blondes - What’s Up](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXcQGsoDkDk) Not a huge hit in North America, but big success elsewhere. Oddly enough, often mentioned in the the “Worst of” lists. Oh well, I liked it. It’s nice to hear something different. ---
**Author:** ![Lucky\_13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucky_13/32/13209_2.png) [@Lucky\_13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucky_13)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239/40 "2009-02-18T03:53:21Z")
> [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](#): > > In your defense, they are a metal band, and only had one pop song that ever got played anywhere outside hard rock stations. > > The song that I quite literally never heard, despite having read about it at least 100 times, is “Suzanne” by Leonard Cohen. Boy, does this song get mentioned a LOT in music literature and magazines! Yet, I never heard it even once until a satellite radio station played it about 3 years ago. It’s not quite the same as a “hit”, but the gap between reference and airplay is huge. There are a lot of songs that music critics seem to adore, but which most people who are not music critics haven’t even heard of, 'cause they don’t get played on the radio, or at clothing stores, or in elevators. Hell, I bet most Americans never even heard Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” till John Cale’s version was played on the “Shrek” soundtrack, or when it was played on that episode of “The OC” when some girl died. On the other hand, there are a lot of songs that people over a certain age don’t hear much, or at all, mostly 'cause they tend to get played mainly on people’s MySpace pages or at places where young people gather. I hadn’t heard “That’s Not My Name” by the Ting Tings till they played it at the gym where I exercise, for example. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popular-songs-youve-never-heard-of/486239.md?page=3)