Ice Ice Baby – Vanilla Ice (1990)

Named by a Houston Press critic as the worst song ever to emanate from the state of Texas, in 1990 Vanilla Ice stole the bassline from Queen and David Bowie’s Under Pressure and recorded Ice Ice Baby, a white rapper monstrosity of a song. A lawsuit saw the correct crediting take place in an out of court settlement.

Thong Song – Sisqó (2000)

A repetitive chorus, overly sexualised lyrics and an obsession with ladies’ underwear ranks Sisqó’s 2000 effort Thong Song amongst the worst of all time. By dedicating a whole song to the thong in this overtly sexist tune, Sisqó landed himself the top spot in a St. Paul Pioneer Press reader poll as the worst song in history.

Sussudio – Phil Collins (1985)

Heavily synthesized and with an overbearing use of a horn section, Phil Collins’ 1985 track Sussudio was described by critic Michael Saunders in the Sun-Sentinel as the worst song of the rock era. Collins has even said himself he simply used the word Sussudio as a placeholder for a better title, but just gave up on finding one.

Don’t Worry, Be Happy – Bobby McFerrin (1988)

This song was named by Village Voice critic Michael Musto as the worst of all time after its 1988 release. It was in the year 2000 however that Don’t Worry, Be Happy would combine with arguably the worst novelty item of all time, Big Mouth Billy Bass. An animatronic fish glued to a board became the living manifestation of hell on earth every time it opened its mouth to sing this song.

Baby – Justin Bieber (2010)

When a fresh faced sixteen year old started singing about falling for his baby, the cringe level only got worse by the introduction of a soft rap cameo from Ludacris. This song did launch the successful career of Bieber but that didn’t stop its official video from being the most disliked on YouTube until 2018.

Friday – Rebecca Black (2011)

A perfect example of the power of social media, Friday by Rebecca Black became an overnight sensation in 2011 for all the wrong reasons. The online hype prompted Lyndsey Parker of Yahoo! Music to ask if it could be the worst song ever. The song uses voice altering software Auto-Tune throughout, resulting in pitchy, awkward vocals.

Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da – The Beatles (1968)

This 1968 song is so out of The Beatles’ usual wheelhouse it sounds like they accidentally pressed record when messing about in the studio – which is sort of how the song actually ended up existing. The song was voted the worst track ever recorded in a listener poll organized by Mars, and it was hated by John Lennon so much that he purposely messed up the song’s piano intro which was left in the final edit.

Who Let the Dogs Out? – Baha Men (2000)

Who exactly did let the dogs out? After suffering through every radio station overplaying this annoying track in the year 2000, we never even found out – but it did hit top spot in Spinner’s Top 20 Worst Songs Ever poll. The Baha Men tried their best to bring their Bahamian Junkanoo sound to the masses but at the end of it all we were just left scratching our heads at how this became a hit.

It’s Everyday Bro – Jake Paul (2017)

Not content with annoying the world on YouTube, Jake Paul thought it would be a good idea to record this diss track in his hip-hop debut in 2017. With weird lyrics like ”England is my city”, Paul at least kept his YouTube notoriety up with the video for this song being the second most downvoted video of 2017 after Justin Bieber’s Baby.

Life – Des’ree (1998)

Des’ree’s 1998 track Life was actually a huge hit, especially in Europe, but it’s the lyrics that make this song stand out, having been voted as having the worst lyrics ever in a poll conducted by the BBC. The song just doesn’t make sense, with one notable line of “I don’t want to see a ghost, it’s the sight that I fear most, I’d rather have a piece of toast, watch the evening news” leaving listeners simply baffled.