Bits in songs that make you cringe

[HolidayAtNight]

Inspired by the thread the other day about "More Than Words" by Extreme. Like many posters, I hadn't heard the song in years, so went to listen to it. It was all going well until the bit when he sings "Hold me close don't EVAH LET ME GO" and I had to turn it off immediately.

What bits of songs do you find jarring and/or embarrassing? I have so many, but will try to choose a few. Lines where they've had to awkwardly shift the words around or use old-fashioned vocab/syntax to make them fit are definitely among the worst offenders.

In "Upside Down" by Diana Ross: "Respectfully I say to thee..." Whyyyy

In "A Spaceman Came Travelling" - the bit where he sings about a baby's cry and then the guitar imitates a newborn crying. This might be the worst one.

In "Come On Eileen" - "You in that dress, my thoughts, I confess, verge on dirty" Just no. The awkward old-fashioned phrasing, and the way his voice goes when he sings "dirty". Unbearable.

Very true - yet if they'd included a realistic number of 'greats', we'd all be criticising them for how much it jars and doesn't scan at all!

The names shaniqua and wot line from ouch by n-dubz

They had some crackers - “I am the biggest female boss that ever lived”

I find so many lyrics so cringe, and kind of picture the writer earnestly chewing his pencil and thinking “face down, booty….hmm high? up?” Or “Im not here for long, catch me or I go….hmmm, I know, Houdini!” like, why?

That is true! I wonder how many greats there would have to be to be accurate?!

Does anyone remember bloodhound gang they made me laugh back in the day let's do it like they do it on animal planet. Or the other song about porn star chasey lane show them tit's lol

Another level - freak me. Don't want the night to grow cold
I wanna lick you up and down
And then I wanna lay you down c'mon sexy
Let me lick you up and down
Til' you say stop (everytime I think about your love I want to lick you down)
Let me play with your body baby.

Pretty much the entire thing

There was that in Hearts song too.....

He is a hitchhiker on a rainy night "no umbrella, no coat" and she shags him because her husband cant get her pg. She takes him to a hotel and says "Its a place I knew well" so she has clearly been driving around picking up homeless or desperate men and in exchange for a bed for the night she shags them for months!

If this was told as if she was a man it would never be played again!

I'm really bad at hearing or remembering lyrics beyond the chorus. Some of these are hilarious.

Only one I disagree with is OutKast's "Shake it like a polaroid picture". That is hilarious in a good way.

Ok, slightly off topic here, but has anyone watched Whigfield's "Saturday Night" video recently? She's getting ready to go out (including the most 90s hairstyle ever), and looks through a sheaf of photos to pick a guy. She rejects most of them, and then chooses what appears to be the actual Satan. You only see the photo for a split second. It's so out of place with the rest of the song/video.

I was reading the YouTube comments that were all the usual stuff about "still listening in 2024" "music nowadays is shit compared to this" "I remember hearing this when..." No mention of SATAN.

Is it?!?

Well, that makes more sense!

Sorry, Jermaine 😂😂😂

Shape of You, they nick food from an all-you-can-eat because they’re “thrifty”, but then they get a cab. Thrifty my arse, the thieving, profligate sods.

‘Abra-abracadbra, I wanna reach out and grab ya.’ Ugh. And even worse ‘black panties with an angel’s face.’ Revolting.

The bit in I’ll Be There For You where the singer goes for a higher note and absolutely biffs it.

I think it’s called You Get What You Give, when the singer rush sings/squawks ‘give it to me now’. No idea what ‘it’ is, but it’s like fingernails down a blackboard.

Forget the number of great great greats...

What about

"I've been to the year 3000. Not much has changed BUT THEY LIVE UNDERWATER" (!)

The worst lyric is "what are you waiting for?" Loads of songs use it and I don't understand why.

Why do the song writers think that the listeners are waiting? I'm not waiting for anything.

And that's after the line saying 'mirrors on the ceiling, pink champagne on ice'
(Which is itself followed by...
'We are all just prisoners here of our own device.' Huh?

cringes song ever for me (apart from one which, were I to post it here would probably see me banned permanently ) is not because of the lyrics. Mamas and Papas-california dreaming. The most out of tune flute solo ever committed to vinyl. They must have been completely out of it to let that go, its fingernails down the blackboard bad.

The james blunt one about the wise men living in a semi what was that all about?

Hahaha to PP who mentioned the ‘let’s do it like they do on discovery channel’ song, when I was younger and those ‘dance mats’ that connected up to PlayStations were popular it was one of the featured songs on the dance games (aimed at young kids 😂) why on earth they chose that I have no idea.

The whole of the Pina Colada song. It’s hard to picky the cringiest lines because the whole thing is excruciating. ‘My lady’ and ‘my lovely lady’ are horrendous.

And:
‘If you have half a brain
If you like makin' love at midnight
In the dunes on the cape’

🤢

Yes! I was just thinking of that one!
You and me, baby, ain't nothing but mammals. So let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel
😂

Not defending her but I did see her quizzed about this once as it annoyed a lot of people and she said it was meant to portray that whoever she was singing to made her feel so young and act even younger

And Picture This.
It sounds like she’s singing “There’s blood on your lips and you peed on your skis”.
The actual lyrics are “There’s clouds on your lips and you’d be on the skids.” but I prefer what I hear……..!

After all these years, I still can’t work out what Blues ‘All rise’ is about. Clearly not a love/heartbreak song going by the lyrics, it seems actual fraud/a crime had taken place?!

I particularly like Simons rap…

“Step in my house, you find that your stuff is gone
But in reality, to whom does the stuff belong?
I bring you into court to preach my order
And you know that you overstepped the border, uh-huh”

I think the songwriter had recently experienced some sort of theft 🤔

it must have been mentioned but the song that goes ‘lalalala lum girl if you cry I’m gonna push it push it some more’ 🤮

Poison by Alice Cooper gives me the creeps

"I got a fetus on a leash," Nick Cave in Jubilee Street makes me wince.

See also, from the same album

She was a catch
We were a match
I was the match
That would fire up her snatch
But there was a catch
I was no match
I was fired from her crotch

• Mermaids

Plus also lots from the 90s

"I'm cold and I am shamed, laying naked on the floor." Natalie Imbruglia Torn.

"How bout them transparent dangling carrots,"
Alanis Morrisette Thank U

"Am I sexual?" Backstreet Boys

Is there a time for first communion
A time for East Seventeen
Is there a time to turn to Mecca
Is there time to be a beauty queen?

U2

I could add to this thread all day too to be honest.

"And these girls know that I'm nasty
I sent her back to her boyfriend
With my handprint on her ass cheek"

Industry Baby by Lil Nas X although these lines are said by Jack Harlow.
This song won all kinds of awards but these lines ruined the song for me.