The worst Aussie No. 1 hits ever
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Blast from the past … Anyone remember Scandal’us? Nope.
Source: News Limited
IT’s your fault Australia.
This our pick of the crap crop — the most annoying hits you sent to No. 1.
All your fault … These are the shocking songs we bought by the droves.
Source: News Corp Australia
BLACK EYED PEAS: THE TIME (DIRTY BIT)
No. 1 for two weeks in 2010
IT is difficult to pinpoint the most atrocious part of this truly lousy dirge. It was released in 2010 when the `Peas were on such a roll they could get away with anything. Including this ingenious concept of musically mating the love song from Dirty Dancing with what sounds like a car alarm on the blink. Autotune addict will.i.am duets with Fergie on the only moment resembling a tune here, which is of course lifted from I’ve Had the Time of My Life, but it sounds like she’s singing a love song to a Dalek. If pop music dies in the next few decades, will.i.am will have blood on his $ 20,000 designer gloves and this abomination will be seen as the start of the death throes.
DJ OTZI: HEY BABY (UHH, AHH)
No. 1 for four weeks in 2002
TUBBY German DJ Otzi has never menaced the chart since this global No.1. But what a pest. He hijacked Bruce Channel’s 1961 hit for its own nefarious purposes. Otzi didn’t let the fact he sings like he diets bother him. He has the kind of voice autotune was made for. And his ‘dance’ remake is what you’d imagine is playing in the disco inferno way down below.
AFROMAN: BECAUSE I GOT HIGH
No. 1 for three weeks in 2001
MIRACULOUSLY the stoners of Australia got out of the house in droves to buy copies of this herbal novelty hit. Imagine if he’d released it in the iTunes generation, where impaired purchasing is just a greasy fingerclick away.
THE BLACK EYED PEAS: MY HUMPS
No. 1 for two weeks in 2005
WILL.i.am made more money than 98-per-cent of the population ever will by writing these lyrics “My hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my lovely lady lumps”. Not to mention prose like “I met a girl down at the disco. She said hey, hey, hey yeah let’s go.” It’s like jibberish nonsense from a first draft that nobody bothered to put any effort into. Musically My Humps sounds like a puppy walking over a keyboard. Even he must sit down at times and marvel at what he’s gotten away with. When people complain about the quality of modern music compared to the Beatles, etc, this is all the ammunition they need.
CRAZY FROG — AXEL F
No. 1 for three weeks in 2005
THERE was once a band called Pop Will Eat Itself. Well here pop gorged on itself and violently regurgitated this ghastly mess up. It serves as a signpost of the moment the music industry realised it needed to find new ways to make money, as someone (no doubt sunning themselves on a yacht somewhere) turned a ringtone where a digital frog ribbibed the Beverly Hills Cop theme into a global hit single. Funny for five seconds. annoying for infinity.
BORIS GARDINER — I WANNA WAKE UP TO YOU
No. 1 for one week in 1987
SCARY thought — there are 27-year-olds out there who were conceived to this song. Hopefully their parents tell them it was to Sade or something actually sexy instead. Boris — and what pop star is called Boris — tries to turn this into a babymaking jam, but it’s so cliched and clunky it’s about as sexy as watching Kyle Sandilands inhaling a KFC burger.
ASERJE — THE KETCHUP SONG
No. 1 for three weeks in 2002
FOR a while there with Ricky Martin, Enrique Iglesias, Shakira and Jennifer Lopez there was a Latin explosion on the charts. This grating hit was more of the kind of explosion you’d get after eating week old Spanish paella.
HOCUS POCUS — HERE’S JOHNNY
No. 1 for five weeks in 1995
FIRSTLY the positive — back in 1995 for a relatively underground dance track to top the charts on an independent label was a big deal. The happy hardcore trend of the time would also throw up the No. 1 from Scooter, a rave cover of Supertramp’s The Logical Song, but at least that had a second-hand tune. Hocus Pocus were also responsible for the woeful ragtime update Doop, a UK No. 1 but only No. 5 here. Here’s Johnny may be the closest anyone has come to capturing a migraine on record.
LOS DEL RIO — MACARENA
No. 1 for nine weeks in 1996
THINK of all those classic songs that had dances attached — Nutbush City Limits, Bus Stop, The Twist, Vogue, Thriller, U Can’t Touch This — and then there’s this. Maybe people were so busy learning the hand-over-head moves they didn’t realise this was actually an irritating drone with Valley Girl vocals and two old dudes repeating the chorus over and over. Even fellow novelty-dance-soundtracks Gangnam Style and Harlem Shuffle were better. Slightly. And there was even duelling versions of Macarena hogging the chart back then. Them were some dark days.
EIFFEL 65: BLUE (DA BA DEE)
No. 1 for 10 (!) weeks in 1999/2000
WITH the benefit of hindsight, this is a pretty ordinary song. And someone set the autotune control to ‘nasal’.
BAHA MEN: WHO LET THE DOGS OUT?
No. 1 for four weeks in 2000
THERE is actually an entire song beyond the brain-invading chorus. It’s just not much chop. They probably should have just looped the chorus over and over for four minutes. They didn’t even write this song, so not sure how much cashola they made from this, but we’re still waiting for their next big hit. No rush.
BOB HUDSON: THE NEWCASTLE SONG
No. 1 for four weeks in 1975
AUSTRALIANS love comedy song about Australia. Austen Tayshus’ Australiana and The 12th Man’s cricket parodies were both major No. 1 fixtures. This one’s a little stranger. Hudson was a `70s comedian who released a live album containing The Newcastle Song, which is a social observation of what would later be called bogans. There’s lots of grunting and references to “doing it” and FJ Holdens. It does at least contain a bouncy chorus in-between the stand-up routine. As a time capsule of suburban mating rituals in 1975 Australia it’s interesting to listen to now, but it’s remarkable this not only spent a month at No. 1 but bumped off Skyhooks’ Horror Movie to do so. It would be dethroned by Sherbet’s Summer Love as control of the pop charts once again went to its rightful owners — teenage girls with pocket money to burn.
CHARLIE DRAKE: MY BOOMERANG WON’T COME BACK
No. 1 for 12 weeks in 1961/1962
TAKE away the lyrics about being “black in the face” or the Aboriginal boy in the song having a Cockney accent, and claiming that indigenous Australians have pow-wows and this is a comedy song that just isn’t that funny. Or maybe it just hasn’t aged very well. It was produced by George Martin, who’d go on to work with the Beatles, and who was behind getting the didgeridoo sounds in the track. Offensive even then, some versions of the song had the lyric changed to “blue in the face” in an early example of political correctness gone right.
SCANDAL’US: ME, MYSELF & I
No. 1 for 3 weeks in 2001
IS this the worst No. 1 from any reality TV show winners in our history? Quite possibly. Even Scott Cain got a half decent song. Remember him? Anyone? This sounds exactly like someone sat down with all the Pink and Christina Aguilera songs that had been hits and tried to make their own version. Fail.
LEE HARDING — WASABI
No. 1 for five weeks in 2005/2006
HE was the ‘rock’ guy from the 2005 series of Australian Idol. This rhymes ‘wasabi’ with ‘barbie’ and ‘tsunami’ and really wants to be Blink 182 but wound up being about 10 years too soon for 5 Seconds of Summer. Harding joins Altiyan Childs as the ‘where are they now?’ casualties of trying to do cred rock on reality TV. Dean Ray, please take note.
JIVE BUNNY: SWING THE MOOD
No. 1 for three weeks in 1989
CHEAP and nasty vintage hit megamixamatosis. And like rabbits, it kept breeding spin-off singles until someone finally put us out of their misery. Google Stars on 45 for how to do a party mix of someone else’s creativity well.
LET’S GET RIDICULOUS
No. 1 for one week 2013
Too soon? Nah, baby …
