Does anyone here have one or more songs that are really critically and / or commercially successful but which you personally just can't understand what all the fuss is about?
For me, by far and away the best example is Wonderwall by Oasis. I just don't get it. It's musically and melodically dull. The lyrics are terrible ('Maybe... you're gonna be the one that saves me'. Sheesh, primary school level bad). And the vocal itself... 'And after awwhhll... you're my wonder wahhll'... it actually grates on me.
And what the fuck is a 'Wonderwall', anyway?
This song often appears high on best of the 90's lists... indeed, even on best of all time lists. I can't fathom why. You don't even need to go through the rest of the best of the 90's to find vastly superior songs... you just need to go to the very album this song appears on. Don't Look Back In Anger and Champagne Supernova aren't particularly great in the whole scheme of things, but for mine they are both superior to Wonderwall on any criteria I care to apply.
So could someone tell me what I'm missing with this song? And what other similarly 'big' songs are there that people just can't understand the popularity of?
For me maybe some Disco stuff .... I was firmly in the "Disco Sucks" camp at the time .... Now some of it does indeed give that rush of Nostalgia lol...This one is a fine example .....I used to want to shoot the radio a la Elvis back in the day .... Now i'm dancing a little and thinking ...wow ...thats kind of a fun groove
There are plenty of songs I don't personally like that are popular with many others where I can at least understand why others like them. Take Bohemian Rhapsody for example (or, indeed, any of the really popular Queen songs). It leaves me cold... I just find an artifice to some of Queen's biggest songs that leads to no emotional connection for me. But I can absolutely see the appeal in those songs that others may enjoy.
But Wonderwall... nothing. No great melody, no soaring chorus, no interesting lyrical bent... just a monotone nothingness. Please, someone, help me understand.
Björk. There is something about her that is an absolute turn-off. Her voice, the way she sings, has the same effect as scratching a chalkboard. Can't stand it.
Never liked her image, the way she behaved, talked. Not my thing, although she was very successful in the early 90s.
I'll be honest, I love "Don't look back in anger", think it is by some distance Oasis's best song.
I have to say, I've never "got" "After the Gold Rush" though I like some of Shakey's other works.
I can't disagree with anything you say about "Wonderwall," but I love it anyway. But, despite Dylan and Neil and Bruce and Jackson (and others) being amongst my very favorite artists ever, I'm not necessarily much of a lyrics guy. I'm mainly about the melody and that below that the rest of the music. If, on top of that, the lyrics are brilliant, that's fantastic. If they're merely serviceable, that's fine. I just need them not to be actively terrible...and if the music's good enough, I can even look past terrible lyrics.
As for what a wonderwall is?
What else could it be? :)
When it comes to other popular songs I hate, I'm sure some will occur to me. But it's funny, the first few that leap to mind illustrate a strange experience; both the good lady wife and I have noticed that songs we absolutely abhorred when we were younger now have a nostalgic appeal, even if we don't want them to. Whether we want it or not, it seems as though our minds react to how young and energetic and hopeful we were back in the days of yore. And that song we despised at age 18 or whatever now brings a certain endorphin rush with it, no matter how much we might wish otherwise.