Welcome ladies and gentlemen to the eighth wonder of the world
The flow o' the century...oh it's timeless...HOVE!
Thanks for comin' out tonight
You coulda been anywhere in the world, but you're here with me
I appreciate that…

Back when bell bottoms became popular, again, back when Pluto was still a planet (My Very Excellent Mother Just Served Me Nine Pizzas), around the time I decided Ozzfest-worthy music exploding from the Speakers of my Sony 1 disc CD player (as a big fuck you to dad) was the coolest shit ever; there was my childhood self, complete with bangs and a farmers tan. This was a time when I woke up early to hear Casey Kasem’s top 40 on the radio; a time when I prepared mix tapes of radio edited rap music to play while my neighbors and I acted like hooligans on the school playground—damn, it felt good to be a gangster. There was once a time when Brandon Boyd was my secret crush, when I listened to Lifehouse’s “No Name Face” during the saddest of times, most notably when my goldfish died, and I was too tearful to handle the emotion eloquently. My father would play me Pink Floyd, The Stones, Iggy Pop, and goddamn if I didn’t think my shit beat his tenfold.

These are the songs I consider to be the ten worst in my iTunes. Call me a music snob all you wish, but I can no longer force myself through Hanson or N’ Sync. I can’t remember the last time Drive Thru Records sent me an update (Yes, I once was a fan of Something Corporate). There’s something about the nineties into the early 2000s that keeps these songs alive for me, at least alive enough to keep me from hitting the delete button. It must be because VH1 still had Pop Up Video and Carson Daly still made TRL the place to be at 3. Or maybe there was something in the water. Either way, these songs are a distinct little concoction, part nostalgia, part pure fun. I may be able to succinctly proclaim their shittiness; but I’ll be damned if they don’t make for a great mixtape, perhaps proving nostalgia ain’t so bad after all. So, without further ado…

1) Inside Out by Eve 6 Oh Max Collins, didn’t your mother ever tell you that creative wordplay doesn’t always get you anywhere musically? No wonder RCA dropped you. I’m ten and my eight-year old cousin is brainwashed into belting the lyrics every time the damn song plays on the radio. I’m twenty; I play the song once and it’s all in my head. But the sun is shinin’ and I’m remembering the time with my cousin when I’m interrupted. What? You don’t really dig on this shit? Yeah, well. I’m not as ugly/sad as you.

2) Air Force Ones by Nelly Yeah, it’s a song about shoes. An homage to shoes, really. What? Of course, I remember all of the words. It’s my freshman year of high school and my clean-collared Catholic schoolboy boyfriend is more down with this music than his white hombre’s adventure with “Purple Pills.” What an oaf. Oh, and so you know—ten is my sizein dem. No point in tiein dem. Glad we’ve gotten that cleared up.

3) Wherever You Will Go by The Calling Corny lyrics? Check. Uplifting musical experience? Check. Anguished love song? Check. Bad vocals? Double check. It’s my first dance and I’m badly attempting to grind alongside the much more experienced public school girls. I’m dreading the slow song. Worry not, young Jessica. Wherever you will go, your best friend will be stalked by a 12-year old version of your lesbian/feminist English teacher. No thank you, neither of you would like to tango. They pop up everywhere, those fiendish feminists.

4) Flood by Jars of Clay Is it raining? Even on my face? It hasn’t stopped raining for days? Can’t you see, Jars of Clay? God is punishing you for your vengeful rock music! Just like Elvis and his pelvic shenanigans, God is displeased with your use of violin and soft vocals halfway through your most famous song. Like you really thought you could be The Verve. Repent! Cast down all the waves of sin! That’s much better…

5) You Can Do It by Ice Cube The first movie I saw packed to capacity in the theatre was Save the Last Dance, a film that would not be complete without Ice Cube’s rendition of “You Can Do It.” My seventh grade self and several hundred other unintelligent people actually clapped at the end of the film. Stay classy, southern Indiana. But hey, I guess I’m still down to get my ass and hurra on the drunken occasion. Don’t judge me; there are incriminating drunken photos of you somewhere, too.

6) Good Riddance by Green Day Fuck you Green Day for ruining punk, for instigating emo, and for ruining my senior prom, while I’m at it. That’s right, we all stood in a circle at the end of my senior prom and held hands, pretending as if we were true friends all along and weren’t actually ecstatic to get the hell out of there. People cried and pretended it wasn’t phony bullshit; which, by the way, it was. Since no one even realized the song is actually called “Good Riddance,” I doubt they caught the irony. However, I’ll be damned if those guitar rifts aren’t the catchiest thing since the salmon runs of pioneer times.

7) To the Moon and Back by Savage Garden I’m taking my time, making up the reasons why this song is actually worse than “Truly, Madly, Deeply” or “I Want You (a song I like to call the chica cherry cola song, now you remember?).” I stole this Cd from my sister so many times it eventually became mine. All because of this song. Maybe I have a thing for Daniel Bedingfield or maybe I really want someone to fly to the moon and back so I’ll be his or her baby. I do know this song is in my top 25 most played…

8) Peaches and Cream by 112 It’s the B-E-A-T, you know what I mean? It’s so sweet, I can’t forget. That’s right. That beat, it’s even better when it’s with icecream. Until 112 rocked my world, I never realized there were so many ways to describe the feminine form as a dessert. Just you wait, one day 112 will grace the charts again, this time with an ode to females using various wines as a comparison. Your buttery finish is just like Chardonnay, eh, eh?

9) She Hates Me by Puddle of Mudd What I hate most about this song is that it attempts to be clever and rhyme meaningfully, but fails dismally. Like how I did that? Seriously, “In a trap trip I can't grip/never thought I'd be the one who'd slip.” My eighth grade chat speak is screaming, “WTF!?!” If ever there was a generic, post-grunge rock band that could be declared the worst, Puddle of Mudd would take the cake. Yet, somehow this song cheers me up during the worst of breakups.

10) Bubble Pop Electric by Gwen Stefani Gwen Stefani is like the less in vogue, less obscure version of Madonna, catering to girls who wish they were boys rather than girls who wish they were sexpots. Yet, I could tolerate her, even disregard her insouciant attitude had she never gone solo. Chalk up No Doubt to being young but chalk up Gwen Stefani to…what? Visiting Japan, perhaps? Stealing lyrics from the seemingly longest musical of all time, Fiddler on the Roof? This aside, for one summer “Bubble Pop Electric” became my excuse for slutting it up in the backseat. You never know when tonight is thheeeee night.