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My band opened for trapt in Taunton Massachusetts, my little original band of all dads got a better response. They were all dicks and didn’t give the few fans they had any time after the show. Small cool venue, held abt 200 people and place was sold out for the night. Guys were even to cool to talk to any of the opening bands, and legit just stayed in their tour bus that looked like they bought it secondhand from the movie almost famous. Wish I had a better interaction with them, but just feel when your trying to rebuild your career you’d put some effort into the people that show up. We are a decent band but by no means am I trying to brag. But I’ve had better interactions with more famous musicians then them.
I definitely don't always agree with everything you say, but I really like your content. It's easy to chew. Like, your videos are short enough that they hold my attention, but long enough that I feel like I'm getting enough information.
@@madamkirk yeah it’s like the stigma of getting a silver medal, it should be celebrated for being such an accomplishment but it feels like a shame since people wanted the gold
I commented* this on another page talking about one hit wonders absolutely true, not only that “Jimmy Eat World“ had several hits from the first album they might be one album wonders but that first album had like three big hits on it
Calling Jimmy Eat World a one hit wonder is very close to fighting words. Their discography is incredible. I would venture to say that The Middle is overshadowed by other songs of theirs.
@ghost mall So Jimmy had three songs on a national list of 100 songs and can still be called one hit wonders? I guess the problem is with the definition
I didn't know James Blunt was considered a one hit wonder. Here in Brazil a number of his songs made it big on the radio: You're Beatiful, Carry You Home, Wisemen, Same Mistake and a few others. Wisemen is an amazing song, by the way. I love the acoustic guitar solo, the overall melody and the lyrics.
What you're describing is what's known in the industry as "big in Japan" where an artist will have only one or two or even no hits in the US top 40 and has slowly became relatively obscure in their native country but somehow becomes huge in another country. A good example is David Hasselhoff of Baywatch TV fame, his music has always been considered a novelty in America and the majority of Europe but in Germany the man is a frickin GOD and he owns their music charts when he drops a single. There's also Cheap Trick who struggled to get noticed in America and Europe in their early years but Japan ate their music up and it was actually their live album from their Japan tour that gave them international fame, to us they were an unknown band that came out of nowhere but to the Japanese it was just business as usual (if you wonder why its so dependent on the US charts its because the US is the largest market so if you have a hit here you're most likely charting EVERYWHERE)
@@emanuelmartinez7267 Your describing a US mindset, not music industry. The US is a consumer market, not a music market so coming from the UK, when growing up in the 80s and 90s, we couldn't care less about what charted in the US, the UK was it. For americans the US top 40 is the centre of the world but outside of the US that's not the case.
@@wordsbymaribeja1470 ....... the music industry is literally all about consumerism just like all industries. No matter how YOU define a hit, you cannot have a hit song if no one is willing to buy or download the single thats legit just a fact. You can reach the top of the Russian charts but be a nobody in the rest of the world, if you have a single just in the US top 40 you're intentional. This is an undisputed fact, that is how success is measured in the industry otherwise every local band who had their song played on a college station can claim they have a hit song completely diluting the original meaning. Idk why you tried to make it about me being an American lol like ok I get it we're supposed to be self centered and the world revolves around us and blah blah blah 🙄 if you had actually looked up the definition instead of saying how you personally feel you'd have known nationality did not play a role in my comment
@@wordsbymaribeja1470 british tops were very influential throughout all europe. Being portuguese in my teens we didn't had that much of a music scene and the portuguese top was really bad. British music docs, Top of the Tops, fanzines and magazines from the UK were very influential. German Nuclearblast also had a catalog that opened the doors to a lot of metal in Portugal. American music scene became more influential in the mid 90's because of his hop and MTV which was then widespread for the first time in cable.
In the UK, James Blunt has had a few hits - noteably Beautiful and the recent(ish) Monsters. He is a bit like Coldplay - many love to hate him but he is actually popular. Unlike Coldplay, he really rolls with the love to be hated vibe
The tragedy of Milli-Vanilli is hard to get through. It was an abhorrent case of the industry taking full advantage of two people who genuinely wanted to earn their way.
They were ok singers...in German. People were suspicious when they did interviews, because their English was pretty rough in the early 90's. Then the infamous CD skip happened and they got Ashlee Simpsoned.
Milli Vanilli technically can’t qualify as one hit wonders because they also have Blame It On The Rain and Don’t Forget My Number. Unless they’re a case of a one hit wonder where one song overshadows their other songs
@andrewmaximo4485 the German one was an ok singer but the French one who is still alive can really sing and does the song live with his own vocals now
It depends on how you define a one hit wonder. Bowling For Soup and Jimmy Eat World are if you consider it in terms of massively popular mainstream singles but they were both stalwarts of the mainstream rock scene and had lots of popular singles between them. Either band could go on a tour of mid-size venues in a number of places around the world and still do.
That's right, I saw Jimmy Eat World at one of the last Soundwave festivals in Sydney and they were pretty good, I was surprised by how many songs I knew and liked from my younger years. They put on a really good performance too. And they're supporting MCR in March I'm pretty sure. (Edit - spelling errors)
Bowling for Soup is a great band to see, so much respect and joking between the band and the fans, it’s like a big room of friends hanging out enjoying some music. They joke about 1985 too.
Outside of the US James Blunt is not only NOT a one-hit wonder, but has a solid five top ten hits (not that this video went in depth, but the imagery suggests as much). 'Goodbye My Lover', '1973', 'Stay The Night', and 'Bonfire Heart' are right up there with 'You're Beautiful' internationally.
Also 1973, Tears anf rain, Wisemen, Same mistake, Carry you home and many others are all well known songs by him with all over many many millions of views on youtube and streams on Spotify. James Blunt is not even close to being described as a one hit wonder artist, i don't understand why would anyone think that.
A guy I knew from school had blunt as a captain (or maybe a commander, I'm not a military man so I'm not sure) of their tank regiment and apparently he was just the best guy, always had a guitar on the back of their tank and tried to make the best of every situation. I also met him once before he realised any music and I can honestly say he was lovely to talk to
This is so much better than a generic low effort Vh1 style “one hit wonder top 10 list” With random comedians chiming in for no reason. Your commentary is actually thoughtful.
The Ataris are one of the most underrated pop-punk artists of all time. The music is solid and the message hits so hard to someone who grew up in the late 80's, early 90's.
I still consider End is Forever as one of my favorite albums of all time. So long Astoria was an OK album and Boys was a good cover, but, In this Diary was a way better single that just never caught on.
I was a fan of theirs since i heard the album Blue Skies, Broken Hearts...Next 12 Exits. Fuck i still have them in my playlist and its not boys of summer. wasnt a fan of that one. So Long, Astoria had so many good songs.
I don’t think Ataris hold up. The lyrics are pretty cringe for me now. But in highschool and into college, they were great pop punk for that young heartache without being totally emo. Their first three albums are solid and should at least be respected for what they were.
Based on Todd in the Shadows' videos, one hit wonders tend to fall into one of a few major buckets: the sheer flukes who aren't particularly great but manage to get lucky once before returning to their expected level of popularity (e.g. Trapt), niche artists who never really expected to find mainstream popularity but somehow wind up with a crossover hit before going back to their steady career within their niche (e.g. Bobby McFerrin or Loreena McKennit), and talented musicians who ultimately found that other areas of the music industry were better suited to their talents than touring and performing (e.g. New Radicals).
I think its validating for people to watch musicians fail because it validates why they personally didn't choose to "go for it" and stuck to the "easy path". As vicious as it is, insecurity gets people messed up like that sometimes.
i think that's too complicated. most people who hate on musicians never wanted to be one. most people who hate on actors never wanted to be one. these negative emotions aren't generated by the failure of the person doing the hating. they often have happy lives full of other things. they are doing the hating because some person is taking their attention from all of those things they like and saying "hey look at me! i'm more important than what you were doing. is there a war somewhere? who cares, check out this supermodel." the negativity is the result of being exposed to a product you don't enjoy by the media, with the more frequent the exposure the greater the hate. when the exposure goes away, so does the hate. pet rocks are a forgotten thing now, but when they were popular, there was also a bunch of hate for them because they were being shoved in your face by the news and your neighbors whether you liked it or not.
@perfectally cromulent Disagree. Hating is always based in insecurity. The people who hate on Billie Eilish might not have wanted to be musicians but I know plenty of people who would just scroll past and go on to what they actually want to pay attention to. I also know people who would take time to hate, and without exception, those people are insecure. Anecdotal but I doubt it's limited to my experience. If someone with a full and happy life is taking time to hate on things, they're not feeling full and happy. Which can be called insecure because somewhere in them, they're feeling less than safe and secure and so they're lashing out. Security doesn't mean mindlessly praising success and never having negative opinions, but if someone can't not hate on an artist, or has a sense of happiness about someone else's failure, they're probably insecure. They have a personal investment in that situation for some reason and most times, secure people just know how to not pay attention to needless BS. I personally think insecurity is the norm and most people pretend to be secure for online defense, but truly secure people really don't feel a need to bring negativity to something unless there's a true moral outrage.
@@godwarrior3403 i'm pretty sure we are talking about different emotional states using the same word. i am a very secure person, and i will disparage every kardashian whose name i have been forced to know, not out of insecurity but because there are thousands of other things i would rather have society tell me about than them.
@perfectally cromulent Then you're not secure. I think they're pointless to know, but I don't feel a personal attachment when Kardashians come up. The sentence you used suggests a personal attachment to the issue, as does going out of your way to "disparage" them. There's a reason you get personally upset about that rather than just scrolling. You know how many ads you see on a daily basis? How many videos get suggested you don't care about? How many fb articles? How many people on tik tok and IG you'll see that will annoy you if you spend time on it? There's no one forcing you to stick around on any topic on the internet. Or on TV. You have full control. There's definitely a deeper reason you take time to hate. I'm guessing it's insecurity in something. Maybe anger coming from self consciousness about something completely unrelated that gets unleashed on the Kardashians. Or maybe you don't sleep well and are stressed. Whatever the case, that action cannot be said to be taken in security. I can 100% say I've never taken the time to say something like "Who cares" about a celebrity I didn't care to know about. And the things I have taken time to be negative about, while I may give justifications, it always comes down to not feeling good in myself. Maybe you haven't realized it yet. It isn't the case that you're feeling secure when you're doing that though. You're feeling some kind of reason you need to shut them down.
@@godwarrior3403 i have an ad blocker, don't see tv commercials, don't use facebook etc. but certain celebrities appear in the news itself, and that annoys me as much as a news article puffing up coca-cola would. i have said absolutely nothing about going out of my way to disparage someone. i do the disparaging when those people force their way into my attention. i think you are underestimating how annoying this is to other people even if you personally don't find it annoying.
Being a "one hit wonder" is actually not that bad to be honest. You make one kick ass song. Decades later people are listening to it. You're getting paid the whole time and you dont have to deal with all the fame and paparatzi. Millions of bands come and go and are never discovered. Your song will live forever in the "remember that one song?"
It'd be one thing if the band had one hit, then said screw it. Let's give up music and try macrame instead. But then they would just be the good band that gave it all up.
There are a lot of factors that create a One Hit Wonder. Dust For Life is a great example. They had a big hit with "Step Into The Light" in the early 2000's. I have known several of the guys that were in the band at different times over the years. Their situation was completely out of their control. They had someone stealing money from them and lost a band member as a result of that situation, and had a resulting lack of support from the record company. Despite their debut album going gold and reaching as high as #28 on the charts, they never released a second album. It had nothing to do with them or the quality of their music. It was completely out of their control. There have been a ton of bands put in similar situations over the years.
Jimmy Eat World actually had a handful of hits on their first album to be fair they’re more like one album wonders…. I’m pretty sure that “the middle” and ” the sweetness” both went to number one…. Plus one or two more hits that didn’t quite hit as high as those two but I remember there being like four singles….
@@jonathanfilson5509 They were one of my favourite bands when I was 17 but ask anyone around you in the world today if they can name a single one of those that isn't the Middle. The scope of the "hits" is not remotely comparable.
I agree. Rick Astley stumbled into one hell of a one-hit-wonder wonderland with a hit song becoming a super popular meme; the dude must be rolling in royalties.
I don't care what anyone says, Steal my sunshine by Len is still a BOP! I still bust it out almost every summer. I looked up the brother-sister duo and they kinda live normal lives now. Marc owns a music publishing company and Sharon works in IT. In the music video, there's a pregnant woman exposing her almost due date belly, and I sometimes wonder how she and her adult child are now. I love 90s nostalgia.
Should listen to the album the song is from if you havent. the whole thing is really good. Also, took me forever to realize Steal My Sunshine is about a bag of weed haha
Afromans new song "Will You Help Me Repair My Door", complete with the film clip showing the security footage of the police raid on his house for "kidnapping", is absolute gold
When Crazy Town’s Butterfly hit the shores of Malaysia (where I’m from), I was so excited to see and hear more of them. They came out at the height of the nu metal takeover. We had bands like Linkin Park, Korn, Incubus, Limp Bizkit, POD, Static X and more so when Crazy Town came out with Butterfly I was so rooting for them…On,y to never hear of them ever again. Hope the frontman will be okay from now on. Really admire those who struggle with drug addiction or any kind of addiction. Lost 2 uncles who did drugs…
You "admire" people who struggle from drug addiction? Even if they never make any effort to overcome it? I certainly have empathy for people who are addicted. But Jesus, try "admiring" firefighters or something.
I love one hit wonders. Oftentimes I find myself thinking "hey remember that one band that wrote that one song?? I wonder if their other stuff was any good..." And sometimes you find a hidden trove of awesome music
Thats because to have a hit, luck Is a big factor. How many times the Singles are not the Best songs from an álbum?? More often than not, as hits tend to be límited to simple Easy yo digest songs. Anyone who Is a real music fan and not just a normie who only hears mainstream music and the Singles knows this.
Remember "popular" by Nada Surf? A friend of mine played their album Let Go back in college and I could not believe how amazing it was. If you want to check out an awesome album by a band you'd probably never think of, check it out.
My favourite example is Q Lazarus, who gave us the beautiful Goodbye Horses, but it’s literally the only song she released. She’s an insanely talented singer so it’s sad but ultimately she got a taste of fame & decided it wasn’t for her. She just wanted the quieter life and I respect that
I wish we got more hits from Blind Melon and other bands like that. Where we lost an artist or they broke up before they could do another. I appreciated your take on this subject.
Blind Melon's self titled album was actually pretty decent, but I haven't heard another song by them with the same hit power as No Rain. Their other songs just felt different to me, like it was a totally different band playing those songs. Jet's Get Born was an incredible album that had the same kind of feel as Blind Melon's other stuff, but it was way better and had a lot more songs on it that could have been hits. It's hard to believe Jet didn't blow up more and were basically also a one hit wonder.
Depending on how you count it, Quiet Riot could be considered a one hit wonder that got famous (like, REALLY famous) off of a cover song of another one hit wonder. Their big hit 'Mama weer all crazee now' (they had another minor hit with 'Metal Health' but that only reached 37 in the US so you may or may not count it) was a cover of a Slade song. Slade, depsite being quite succesful in the UK could never find the same success accross the pond. Their only hit in the US was 'Run Runaway', which made it to no.20 on the hot 100. Also, Todd in the Shadows has a great series called One Hit Wonderland where he breaks down various one hit wonders and goes over their hit, why it got big and what they did after said hit. It's pretty good. Would recommend.
I think The New Radicals would make a great addition to this list. Because eventho they had just 1 hit (and the fame caused mental health problems for the singer), he wrote a lot of songs/hits for other artists.
Yeah but I think they shouldn't be on the list since they genuinely weren't trying to be a hit band and they probably could have made more hits if they chose to go that route
@@anushkasharma664 they’re still marked as one because it’s their biggest hit and many 90’s one hit wonder lists still qualify it as part of the late 90’s selections
Jimmy eat world isn’t a 1 hit wonder. They do several headlining tours and even still do well. They’ve had several hits! Sure The Middle is their biggest, but they have several other big singles.
@Raymond Fagan absolutely legendary take! That's the track that's helped me discover how good they are besides the mediocre middle, thank god for random Spotify recommends
The funniest thing about the Milli Vanilli case is that after the whole scandal broke, the actual band with the real singer(s) tried to pursue a career and released music under the name "The Real Milli Vanilli".
@lincolnhirschi5969 LOL. Yeah, and people shitting on Lip Syncing. It's like, dude. Michael Jackson's Billy Jean performance when he did the moonwalk for the first time was entirely lip synced.
I was 11-12 yrs old when Mili Vanilli came out. Now here me out. I wasn’t into rock yet. I grew up with a mom who loved Pop with a big stereo in the house. I did like MV. Especially with a big system. Every dam one of the studios uses that beat in EVERYTHING afterwards. All it showed me in the end was, the industry will chew you up and spit you out.
there were multiple hits from the 'girl you know it's true' album that were dominant on radio and black radio didn't abandon their music when the scandal hit. everyone loved milli vanilli and i don't remember anyone not saying they didn't really care, they loved the album.
So with Wheatus and Trapt, I think they did the exact "punk rock" thing. They became the big band at the local venue. And those are the best shows to see always. There's less and less bands that operate organically like that but refusing the label, doing your own thing, and putting on killer shows at the local pub. That's punk.
Chumbawumba was politically an important band before (and even after) their hit single. But it’s hard to overcome that massive a hit and talk about anarchy.
afroman sayed it best in a documentory: "they call me one hit wonder... how many hits do you need?" i also think "because i got high" is a pretty genius song and his new release "would you help me repair my door" is a great example on how art can criticize authority and society. in general its great to had real success on one point to have the resources to continue making music.
I saw Trapt and Alien Ant Farm in SoCal a few years ago and there was like 30 people there 😂 as a former musician though I am glad to see them still performing, hats off to them and there 1 hit wonders! Also great video as always! 🙌
I saw them tour for the first album, which I really liked and still do to this day. The hall had around 1500 people, and I thought the building was going to collapse when they played Headstrong. The place went nuts.
I'm surprised Bowling for Soup is technically a "one hit wonder". They're one of the funnest bands I've seen live. Although fans like me enjoy multiple songs of theirs, I think a lot of song listeners would enjoy seeing them perform. They should definitely be held to a higher tier of "one hit wonder"
Something I find interesting is that Sugar Ray stated that it was their intention to become a One-Hit-Wonder... only to end up having actual lasting pop success. Which is why some of their later songs get kinda weird. They were more or less thinking "Well, now that we've done it, who cares what happens?"
Sugar Ray started out as a much heavier band than they morphed into. They were kind of a heavy rock/punk band and then morphed into this beach rock/ballad thing. Goo Goo Dolls kinda did too. They were heavier at the start then had a hit with a ballad and the whole sound changed. Incubus also.
Afroman’s debut record is actually really cool. If you like stoner culture music, and stuff like Sublime, Everlast, and G Love is your bag, it’s worth a listen. It’s a really short home grown (har har) record that he mostly made in his bedroom- and it’s laugh out loud funny in places. The guy can really rap and he’s a good guitarist, too. The only problem is it’s one of those “Oh, shit, guys, you gotta hear this!” records that you play for all your friends to laugh with…and then get so sick of the jokes, that you put it away forever. Think those “Jerky Boys” crank call albums from the 90’s, or “Tenacious D”, stuff like that. The drummer from my old reggae-punk band saw a free Afroman show back in like 2002, and came to practice completely impressed…he said the guy played a few instruments, and laid down his own beats and some turntables here and there. On top of that, he was one of those guys that hangs out at the bar and drinks with his fans after the show, just a cool cat to hang with. On a side note, Bunjie Jambo, a completely epic punk rock with a horn player from here in Pittsburgh -as opposed to a ska band- inexplicably opened for Kid Rock in early 1999 on the very small club tour he did for “Devil Without a Cause” waaay before it went platinum. At the time, that “Bull God” thing was the only thing getting modest air play- and Nooobody could foresee the coming rise of ock rock-nu metal, and Kid Rock’s ridiculously huge career jump. Anyway, I guess Uncle Scarfo, the drummer for Bunjie Jambo, had listened to all the old indie Kid Rock records for years and was a fan, and so he somehow got his band an opening spot when Kid Rock played Grafitti (RIP) here in Pittsburgh, PA. My friends and I were all great friends of Bunjie, so we went to the show. I hate to admit it now, but Kid Rock out on a really good show then. I think there were maybe 200 people there. Club Grafitti was the second largest “small club” here- like, Pennywise and NOFX would play there and sell it out, but Wesley Willis couldn’t sell enough tickets to play there, so he got stuck in Laga, the small small punk club (Again, RIP Laga). Kid Rock went straight to the bar, promptly ordered a whole bottle of Jim Beam, and sat there chain smoking and doing shots. If you approached him, he would invite you to pull up a chair and have a few shots with him- or alternately tell the bar tender to give you whatever you were drinking on him. He had absolutely no security of any type- he did have the full sized major label tour bus clogging up Bigelow Blvd., which was bizarre and funny. Anyway, yeah, just like Afroman, he was a good showman, played every instrument at least once, and then just hung out with the crowd as another drinker. It worked…I was a musically confused 19 year old, a little sick of punk rock for a moment, but having a hard time expanding my catalogue- so I bought Kid Rock’s cd right from him there at the bar…he had a little stack of them. $8…$7 I’d you couldn’t afford $8, $5 if you didn’t have that…free if you were broke, actually. He didn’t give a shit. I didn’t like that record for very long- it soon grew into an embarrassing reminder of a time where angry beard guys rapped, and everyone played metal cds through their subwoofered up cars, producing huge sonic farts heard for miles. But even in his later mookdom, I always remembered the cool, tired, and slightly sad drunk guy from Detroit at the bar. There are people behind all these bands- most have charisma, some have talent, most have neither. It’s kind of a shame that someone’s sacrifice, hopes, and dreams can rise and fall so fast, their story lost, their glimpse at hope labeled a “one hit wonder”, and thrown away. Check out an Afroman show, if you ever see he’s playing your local community day, but I doubt you’ll get anywhere near Kid Rock after his set at the State Fair is over. By the way, the fact that Bunjie Jambo didn’t break big is not only depressing, it’s mind boggling. They were every bit as good as Antiflag, Pittsburgh’s only band to get signed to Fat, Epitaph, and I think maybe Epic. They opened for NOFX, the Pilfers, and probably Reel Big Fish, and Kid Rock, like I said. I think they didn’t make it because they didn’t send their damn record out for anybody to hear. They were also a high humor band, almost like dead milkmen level…and they had a lot of local jokes in there, that might’ve stifled them. They have been gone for decades, but search Bunjie Jambo on RUclips and see for yourself. Slainte!
Thanks for mentioning SR-71. I absolutely loved them and obviously Mitch went on to a successful songwriting and producing career. the funny story is he got into that career by accident and it all started with 1985 Shawn Mullins "Lullaby" is a one hit wonder. I met him. He told me I wouldn't know about him without that hit. So he would agree with you it was a nice boost. and now he carries on as an independent artist with a big audience.
@10:21 INTERESTING TO NOTE, THE BEAUTIFUL PIXIE HAIRED BRUNETTE IN THE VIDEO WENT ON TO BECOME A MODEL AND FASHION DESIGNER, AND HAS A GOOD FOLLOWING ON INSTAGRAM.. SHE TURNED OUT TO BE SMARTER AND MORE SUCCESSFUL THAN PPL WOULD HAVE THOUGHT HER TO TURN OUT.. THE LEADER OF THE BAND, HOWEVER, HAD A FUCKED UP LIFE..
Milli Vanilli were far from the only band doing lipsyncing. The famous German disco band Boney M did exactly the same thing, there also was the French punkpop song "ça plane pour moi" of which it came out years later that the singer of the song wasn't Plastic Bertrand but the Belgian writer of the song Lou Deprijck who sang the vocals. Plastic Bertrand just looked the part. In the end music is just a business and you can go in different ways about it. You have tons of talent and become one the next memorable bands with a long career in the spotlight or you create what they call a one hit wonder and have a quick celebrity moment while cashing in as much as possible before you dissapear. There is nothing wrong with it.
The Baha Men are a great example -- they formed in 1977 and had been touring for 23 years before their big hit. That just made it easier to tour, I'd suspect. I bought their early cds because I was really into world music back then, and their early stuff was much more rooted in traditional Bahaman dance music called Junkanoo. Then they did a KC cover "That's the Way I Get Down" that I absolutely love to this day. Apparently their fourth cd only sold 700 copies in the US -- and I guess I was one of them -- but they might have faded into obscurity after that. Instead, boom! Relevant forever, even if it's for a song that a lot of people hate or make fun of. I doubt they regret it.
Baha Men were and still are big stars in their home country, so they can probably live with having only one hit abroad. Same with Psy, who is only known for Gangnam Style in the rest of the world but is still very successful in his home country and has been so even way before Gangnam Style.
Crazy Town had some cool songs on that record but butterfly just swung the band in a very different direction so that's what everyone suddenly expected.
The Gift of Game was a great album, but sadly, they pretty much painted themselves into one hit wonder corner with their next album with which they lost all charisma and turned into a mediocre Linkin Park clone.
My beef with Crazy Town's Butterfly is that the WHOLE song sounds veeeeeeeeery veeeeeeeeeery close to ONE section of Red Hot Chili Pepers' Pretty Little Ditty. Like they ripped it off, just that one bit, and didn't add anything else to it except vocals
@@perrodetokio Holy hell, i just looked that song up and after a minute or so still couldn't hear what you were referring to and them BAM, there it was. How did they not get sued????
I think Jimmy Eat World is a really interesting case. When you look at their peers from when they were starting out like The Get Up Kids, or the Promise RIng, that one hit really set them up for what seems to have been a long sustainable career, allowed them to afford to build their own studio, and put some money in the bank for leaner years
Definitely can relate to the artists who'd prefer to just have a sustainable career with a small but very loyal base of fans without being a huge, massive star. The idea of having millions of people constantly talking about you, scrutinizing every little thing you're doing and trying to be all up in your business the way a lot of people seem to be with the biggest stars in the industry does not sound appealing.
He's not correct in this case, as many people who aren't JEW fans can remember more than one of their songs. When has anyone else referred to them as such?
I also never saw them as a one hit wonder. Just because The Middle was their biggest hit it doesn't mean they didn't have a successful career afterwards. Some of their other songs like Sweetness, Pain, Always Be, etc. still received a lot of airplay and their following albums also still sold well and they still have a huge fan base worldwide.
The usual standard used is Top 40 hits. Technically, The Grateful Dead is a OHW by the same standard, despite having one of the most loyal fan bases of all time.
Len's "You Can't Stop The Bum Rush" is indeed a FANTASTIC album. When I picked it up, several of my friends made fun of me. Then when I played it for them, almost all of them decided it wasn't bad at all!
1985 by Bowling For Soup was written by Mitch from SR-71, and SR-71’s biggest hit, Right Now, was written by Butch Walker, who also wrote Girl All The Bad Guys Want by Bowling for Soup. Weird circle of songwriting Butch’s old band Marvelous 3 is a one hit wonder too (Freak of the Week) Pop punk songwriters are fascinating
Milli Vanilli weren't a one hit wonder. Hey had several hits. "Blame it on the rain", "Girl I'm gonna miss you", "Baby, don't forget my number", "Keep on running"...
Notice how lots of One Hit Wonders come from the late 90s-early 2000s. That's a time where if you wanted to be mainstream, you had to play at Mtv's rules because there was no youtube, fast internet was rare, etc. So this forced lots of people to sell out in a way that didn't work, or made some bands just refusing to sell out after a hit. And the sad thing is that sometimes the bands were treated like disposable stuff, or epigones of somebody else more successful.
There were one hit wonders back til the beginning of music. See: The Wonders in the movie That Thing You Do. But your sentiment is correct. It’s a holdover from consolidated media. And no band of today will ever get that big again. Those who currently are Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, Imagine Dragons, all got big in the tail end of traditional media while also benefiting from the digital boom.
@@ligairi No-one ever gets famous out of sales only. Apparently, Imagine Dragons get money not from sales, but from promo commercials. Which means that in the mainstream, the classic formula doesn't work anymore.
I've always kinda viewed one hit wonders as an incredible success because we all remember them. Like, they become legend. And if you're trying to leave your mark with art, I think that's pretty damn cool.
Milli Vanilli were actual performers, but were basically hired for their marketability. They did originally sing on a few recordings, but their producer decided it wasn't good enough and hired some singers to come in and record the album instead. By that point, they had already signed on the dotted line and didn't have much choice but to go along with it. Then, when the secret came out, they took the brunt of the backlash, rather than the label or the producers. They really got a raw deal on that one.
Yeah they were pretty much forced into it, as the producer threatened to make them pay back the advance if they didn’t lip sync, along with constant empty promises he’d let them sing on future songs that never happened
@@StefanMedici I had heard of that. He actually performed the male vocals on Boney M’s recordings then had another vocalist perform them live (thought not lip syncing)
@@ghost_mall exactly, they didn’t read the contract and spent the advance money, which is why they couldn’t back out when Farian threatened to make them pay it back if they didn’t go with his plan. And then they became the scapegoats when it went south
little remark: James Blunt has multiple no.1 albums and singles, a 20 year career, 188x platinum certifications and is popular all over the world. I would not call him a one hit wonder
Great topic, I've often thought about this. As an amateur musician (with a separate career unrelated to music as my main focus) I am very happy to play covers and add bits of musical improvisation. Songwriting is a completely different skill that has little bearing on how well you play your instrument. There are great instrumentalists who are mediocre songwriters and mediocre instrumentalists who are great songwriters. With that in mind, I agree with you that one hit wonders are far more of a success than any kind of failure. To write a song that connects with a large amount of people at a particular moment in time is impressive; it does take talent (and a bit of luck) that rises above the countless other bands out there. Essentially, I apply these rules: If you write one song that connects with people, you are a success If you write an album that connects with people, you are truly great, a respectable artist If you write multiple albums that connect, you are a legend
Saw a great documentary on Afroman, such a nice dude. When asked about the "one hit wonder" thing, his reply was "Well how many hits do you need?" and then laughed and drank out of his custom chalice.
I agree and would say the same about the Deep Blue Something album, “Home.” “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” isn’t even one of the best five songs on it, imo.
Thank you for not mentioning Faith No More. One of the most brilliant discography of all times and still most people call them OHW because of "Epic" success.
Chumbawumba are my favorite band! So many great albums. And frankly, using your fame and fortune to help others is pretty much what everyone SHOULD be doing!
@@fromthethicket4370 They're my second favourite British post-punk anarchist collective band with a decades long career from West Yorkshire. (The first is The Mekons)
Fun fact about 1985: When the video would play on MTV, the closed captions would read "there was U2 and Blondie, HER music's still on MTV" instead of "and music still on MTV."
Agreed. Absurd comment, but I guess it's his opinion. Ironically enough I hated the cover and I don't really care for the original. Every song on "Anywhere but Here" and "Blue Skies" is better if you ask me.
There are 3 kinds of one hit wonders: the ones whose only hit was so good and iconic they were never able to top it, the ones whose only hit was so bad or mediocre that no one cared to hear what else they had to say, and the ones whose first hit was a cover
I have a Blind Melon tattoo. Shannon's writing really spoke to me as a teenager and into my 20's. Out of all of my music tattoos, people are always most confused on that one lol. No Rain is a great song, but it doesn't come close to being their best.
The unfortunate problem with Blind Melon is that they wouldn’t have been had Shannon not overdosed. That album’s songwriting is a strong indicator of how much more they had in the tank, then heroin happened
Jimmy Eat world had 3 songs from their debut album on radio and followed it with Pain. They even covered Last Christmas which is played at every mall every year. 7 million monthly Spotify listeners.
Afroman has a song called One Hit Wonder that basically outlines the thesis of what you said here. Sure, he only had one "hit" but now he regularly sells out small venues, performing the music he loves to make.
it was strange to see Tatu in tis video. Because in Russia where they are from, they are not one hit wonder at all. They had a huge impact on Russian music and half of the songs from their album became hits.
Fountains of Wayne are a one hit wonder based on chart success, but in quality of all their albums and songs, they were a killer band and it's everyone else's loss in not digging further than their "one hit".
I remember "Sweetness" by Jimmy Eat World feeling just as big as "The Middle" although I don't know the numbers on either. They also had a few songs featured in various TV shows - I think The OC was one of them with "Hear You Me". I especially have a soft spot for "Bleed American". There was a show in the early-mid 2000s on Much Music in Canada called "One Hit Wonders" which was excellent. It felt like the message of the show was "Remember this great song? Wouldn't it be cool if this band was popular again?"
80's is my decade for 1-hit wonders. So many bands were 1-hit wonders in America but were huge in Europe and other areas. Bands like Kajagoogoo (Too Shy), Dexy's Midnight Runners (Come on Eileen), Madness (Our House), Tommy Tutone (867-5309), A Flock of Seagulls (I Ran), A-Ha (Take On Me), Baltimora (Tarzan Boy), Soft Cell (Tainted Love), Lipps Inc. (Funkytown), Timbuk 3 (Future So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades), After The Fire (Der Kommisar), Murry Head (One Night In Bangkok), T'Pau (Heart and Soul), Mightnight Oil (Beds Are Burning), Modern English (I Melt With You), Animotion (Obsession), Bow Wow Wow (I Want Candy), Men Without Hats (Safety Dance), The Weather Girls (It's Raining Men), Talk Talk (It's My Life), etc. It's pretty insane how many 1-hit wonders in the 80s there were. Again, many of them like Madness, Dexy's Midnight Runners, Midnight Oil, Flock of Seagulls, and others were HUGE in England and Australia and other countries. However, in America we got the 1 hit and that was it.
Surprised you didn't mention Natalie Imbruglia and "Torn" as a one-hit wonder with a cover. Especially how shocked people are to learn that song is a cover.
I think this will surprise you, but “Torn,” peaked just outside the Top 40. Despite everyone remembers the song and you’ll still hear it sometimes, Natalie Imbruglia technically has zero hits. We probably thought it was even bigger than it was thanks to TRL.
From what I understand, if you have a song that plays on terrestrial radio, if you signed the right deal and aren’t a dumb ass with your money, you never have to work again for the rest of your life if you don’t want to. Good on them. ❤
Favorite example of a One-Hit-wonder: Smile Empty Soul. 'Bottom Of A Bottle' goes up to #7 on the US Rock Charts in 2003. You never hear anything else from them played again... Aside from the fact they continue to tour for the last 20 years and put out 7 albums since. Not counting Sean Danielson's solo work. They put on a great live show in clubs and have some other good songs that never got radio airplay that you stumble upon on Spotify
Patrick Hernandez 70's disco one and only hit "Born To Be Alive" plays every day on the radio. The guy gets a 10000 check every week to this day. He never had to work again.
1. "Butterfly" stole a RHCP lick, but the album was actually pretty cool. I listened a lot to it as a teenager. 2. Waiting for Alien Ant Farm... Also super cool debut album.
The Gift of Game was a great album with many great tracks. Sadly the follow-up album was pretty lame as they lost all originality and became a dull Linkin Park clone.
Just wanted to third that the album kicked ass. Do you guys prefer the album version of “Dear Kate,” or the first version, which I think shared the album’s title? Also, “Blue Sky,” remains one of my favorite songs ever.
For some one hit wonders, the song that everybody knows is actually inferior to the rest of their catalog. A perfect example of this (shown @ 0:36) is Gotye Sure, Somebody I Used to Know is a good song.. and definitely weird (memorable!) But he has *numerous* songs that are even better. Dude also makes great music videos, an under-appreciated talent these days
My favorite band of all time is a one-hit wonder. Blind Melon doesn't get near enough love. Their album that was released after the death of Shannon Hoon titled Nico is hauntingly perfect and includes a somber version of their one-hit "No Rain". And Soup is experimental and is the kind of album that takes two listens to really appreciate how creative and quality it truly is. Love that band.
Thank you for what you said about “Failure Porn.” I’ve seen so many of those videos and yes, they are engrossing, but you just leave them feeling icky. I can only imagine what those folks must think if they come across those videos. All because they attempted to make art of some kind and weren’t successful long term. Glad you took a moment to focus on this.
I remember a few years back looking up tATu, because I remembered All The Things She Said, to hear what their other songs are like. And most of tATu’s stuff is really good and underrated. I don’t see being a One Hit Wonder as being a failure, just something that ended up happening.
For being an essentially manufactured act, tATu actually had some talent and put some work into their music. I'd say that most of their stuff is pretty enjoyable, personally I like their pretty much unknown Waste Management album more than the one with their biggest hit.
@@ROMANTIKILLER2 Well PoP acts back then were very manufactured, the Spice Girls was 100% manufactured with hundreds of girls auditioning. Same with tATu, lots of girls auditioned. But yeah for being a manufactured act tATu were great.
Len kinda spawned a legendary Canadian band, Broken Social Scene. Their bassist Brendan Canning has stated that he used all his Len money to fund the first BSS album. So, that's your neat Canadian factoid of the day!
I found you when I was trying to get into morerock music. I pride myself in liking many songs from many genres of music, and I realized on day that rock music was a genre that is really broad in scope, and I didn't know where to start. I found you and didn't think you'd have anything good to say about anything outside of like one genre, but I love how diverse your tastes are. I like many different music genres including pop in all of it's forms, classical and childrens' music, so hearing someone that isn't just one of those rock fans who just listen to like one artist is refreshing.
Great video Finn, always love your content. One nitpick. Milli Vanilli had three #1 songs on Billboard. Not just hits, but #1s. Girl You Know It's True actually only went #2, though probably their biggest song. So calling Milli Vanilli a one hit wonder is a huge stretch. Flash in the pan maybe, but not a one hit wonder. Keep it up though! Look forward to the next video.
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My band opened for trapt in Taunton Massachusetts, my little original band of all dads got a better response. They were all dicks and didn’t give the few fans they had any time after the show. Small cool venue, held abt 200 people and place was sold out for the night. Guys were even to cool to talk to any of the opening bands, and legit just stayed in their tour bus that looked like they bought it secondhand from the movie almost famous. Wish I had a better interaction with them, but just feel when your trying to rebuild your career you’d put some effort into the people that show up. We are a decent band but by no means am I trying to brag. But I’ve had better interactions with more famous musicians then them.
Finn 'Butt First Rock' McKenty
aka Butt Thirst Rock
jimmy eat world isn't a one hit wonder...
Hendrix is technically a one hit wonder.
I definitely don't always agree with everything you say, but I really like your content. It's easy to chew. Like, your videos are short enough that they hold my attention, but long enough that I feel like I'm getting enough information.
I never thought of One Hit Wonders as failures. If you’re an artist that produced one hit, that’s one more than 99 percent of musicians will ever get.
So true.
It's a matter of personal and social expectations of the artist.
I'd much rather be a one-hit wonder than a no-hit wonder.
@@madamkirk yeah it’s like the stigma of getting a silver medal, it should be celebrated for being such an accomplishment but it feels like a shame since people wanted the gold
I commented* this on another page talking about one hit wonders absolutely true, not only that “Jimmy Eat World“ had several hits from the first album they might be one album wonders but that first album had like three big hits on it
@@martyshwaartz971 Fr if you have a song that people still want to hear to this day that’s a W
Calling Jimmy Eat World a one hit wonder is very close to fighting words. Their discography is incredible. I would venture to say that The Middle is overshadowed by other songs of theirs.
i mainly know of jimmy eat world because of their song “pain.” it wasn’t til later that i found out they were also the band that made “the middle.”
Oh absolutely. I don't even think of the middle when I think jimmy
@ghost mall So Jimmy had three songs on a national list of 100 songs and can still be called one hit wonders? I guess the problem is with the definition
@@ghost_mall you'll be shocked to know that the world is bigger than the US. Sweetness hit #2 in the UK.
@@OneCentWonder Ah, Pain. Great song that I forgot about. Time for a revisit
I never thought of Jimmy Eat World as a one hit wonder. I think they've got a great discography and plenty of hits.
They definitely aren't
Pain and sweetness got lots of radio play here
Exactly. I'm not even 1 minute into this video and I went straight to the comments. Dude obviously doesn't have a clue what he's talking about
I've heard several of JEW's songs on the radio, and I don't even listen to the radio much. That's not a sign of a one hit wonder for me.
It’s just laughable, like someone saying modest mouse is a one hit wonder. 😂
I didn't know James Blunt was considered a one hit wonder. Here in Brazil a number of his songs made it big on the radio: You're Beatiful, Carry You Home, Wisemen, Same Mistake and a few others. Wisemen is an amazing song, by the way. I love the acoustic guitar solo, the overall melody and the lyrics.
What you're describing is what's known in the industry as "big in Japan" where an artist will have only one or two or even no hits in the US top 40 and has slowly became relatively obscure in their native country but somehow becomes huge in another country. A good example is David Hasselhoff of Baywatch TV fame, his music has always been considered a novelty in America and the majority of Europe but in Germany the man is a frickin GOD and he owns their music charts when he drops a single. There's also Cheap Trick who struggled to get noticed in America and Europe in their early years but Japan ate their music up and it was actually their live album from their Japan tour that gave them international fame, to us they were an unknown band that came out of nowhere but to the Japanese it was just business as usual (if you wonder why its so dependent on the US charts its because the US is the largest market so if you have a hit here you're most likely charting EVERYWHERE)
@@emanuelmartinez7267 Your describing a US mindset, not music industry. The US is a consumer market, not a music market so coming from the UK, when growing up in the 80s and 90s, we couldn't care less about what charted in the US, the UK was it. For americans the US top 40 is the centre of the world but outside of the US that's not the case.
@@wordsbymaribeja1470 ....... the music industry is literally all about consumerism just like all industries. No matter how YOU define a hit, you cannot have a hit song if no one is willing to buy or download the single thats legit just a fact. You can reach the top of the Russian charts but be a nobody in the rest of the world, if you have a single just in the US top 40 you're intentional. This is an undisputed fact, that is how success is measured in the industry otherwise every local band who had their song played on a college station can claim they have a hit song completely diluting the original meaning. Idk why you tried to make it about me being an American lol like ok I get it we're supposed to be self centered and the world revolves around us and blah blah blah 🙄 if you had actually looked up the definition instead of saying how you personally feel you'd have known nationality did not play a role in my comment
@@wordsbymaribeja1470 british tops were very influential throughout all europe. Being portuguese in my teens we didn't had that much of a music scene and the portuguese top was really bad. British music docs, Top of the Tops, fanzines and magazines from the UK were very influential. German Nuclearblast also had a catalog that opened the doors to a lot of metal in Portugal. American music scene became more influential in the mid 90's because of his hop and MTV which was then widespread for the first time in cable.
In the UK, James Blunt has had a few hits - noteably Beautiful and the recent(ish) Monsters. He is a bit like Coldplay - many love to hate him but he is actually popular. Unlike Coldplay, he really rolls with the love to be hated vibe
The tragedy of Milli-Vanilli is hard to get through. It was an abhorrent case of the industry taking full advantage of two people who genuinely wanted to earn their way.
Yes. I'm a teen of the 90s and loved so many of these poor ppl that died. It happens in acting too. Johnathan Brandis. He didn't deserve all of that
And to think now there are televised professional competitions for lip syncing. Our culture is beyond pathetic
They were ok singers...in German. People were suspicious when they did interviews, because their English was pretty rough in the early 90's. Then the infamous CD skip happened and they got Ashlee Simpsoned.
Milli Vanilli technically can’t qualify as one hit wonders because they also have Blame It On The Rain and Don’t Forget My Number. Unless they’re a case of a one hit wonder where one song overshadows their other songs
@andrewmaximo4485 the German one was an ok singer but the French one who is still alive can really sing and does the song live with his own vocals now
It depends on how you define a one hit wonder. Bowling For Soup and Jimmy Eat World are if you consider it in terms of massively popular mainstream singles but they were both stalwarts of the mainstream rock scene and had lots of popular singles between them. Either band could go on a tour of mid-size venues in a number of places around the world and still do.
That's right, I saw Jimmy Eat World at one of the last Soundwave festivals in Sydney and they were pretty good, I was surprised by how many songs I knew and liked from my younger years. They put on a really good performance too. And they're supporting MCR in March I'm pretty sure.
(Edit - spelling errors)
One Hundred Percent correct as both bands are far from a One Hit Wonder.
Bowling for Soup is a great band to see, so much respect and joking between the band and the fans, it’s like a big room of friends hanging out enjoying some music. They joke about 1985 too.
@@Litpu Yes I've seen them before, loved the banter between the band. Reminds me of how Blink used to be.
@@Exalted_in_Venus re: the edit. 👈-------🤨 Just so long as ya didn't change your original message none! Ya hear..?! Dat's ILLOOOOOGAL!
Outside of the US James Blunt is not only NOT a one-hit wonder, but has a solid five top ten hits (not that this video went in depth, but the imagery suggests as much). 'Goodbye My Lover', '1973', 'Stay The Night', and 'Bonfire Heart' are right up there with 'You're Beautiful' internationally.
And that 3 wise men song
Also 1973, Tears anf rain, Wisemen, Same mistake, Carry you home and many others are all well known songs by him with all over many many millions of views on youtube and streams on Spotify. James Blunt is not even close to being described as a one hit wonder artist, i don't understand why would anyone think that.
A-Ha was much bigger outside the US as well.
I don't think any of the bands he actually mentioned were one hit wonders lol. In most cases their big hit spawned a couple of minor hits
A guy I knew from school had blunt as a captain (or maybe a commander, I'm not a military man so I'm not sure) of their tank regiment and apparently he was just the best guy, always had a guitar on the back of their tank and tried to make the best of every situation. I also met him once before he realised any music and I can honestly say he was lovely to talk to
This is so much better than a generic low effort Vh1 style “one hit wonder top 10 list”
With random comedians chiming in for no reason. Your commentary is actually thoughtful.
Thank you!
Yes I agree. Much love to all of us who are opening ours eyes to this kind of mistreatment. Someone in power needs to do something. These poor ppl
The Ataris are one of the most underrated pop-punk artists of all time. The music is solid and the message hits so hard to someone who grew up in the late 80's, early 90's.
I still consider End is Forever as one of my favorite albums of all time. So long Astoria was an OK album and Boys was a good cover, but, In this Diary was a way better single that just never caught on.
Could not agree more.
I was a fan of theirs since i heard the album Blue Skies, Broken Hearts...Next 12 Exits. Fuck i still have them in my playlist and its not boys of summer. wasnt a fan of that one. So Long, Astoria had so many good songs.
I don’t think Ataris hold up. The lyrics are pretty cringe for me now. But in highschool and into college, they were great pop punk for that young heartache without being totally emo. Their first three albums are solid and should at least be respected for what they were.
Based on Todd in the Shadows' videos, one hit wonders tend to fall into one of a few major buckets: the sheer flukes who aren't particularly great but manage to get lucky once before returning to their expected level of popularity (e.g. Trapt), niche artists who never really expected to find mainstream popularity but somehow wind up with a crossover hit before going back to their steady career within their niche (e.g. Bobby McFerrin or Loreena McKennit), and talented musicians who ultimately found that other areas of the music industry were better suited to their talents than touring and performing (e.g. New Radicals).
Love me some Todd in the Shadows. One Hit Wonderland is one of the best shows on RUclips.
Todd is awesome.
Loreena Mckennitt, was such a jump off point for me when it comes to neo pagan, folksy magick music. She has some really enchanting songs.
Fountains of wayne falls into the latter
YES (and of course the 'International/Foreign' flukes' who have 1 or 2 American hits then continue to be a success in their home country.
getting millions of people to love and care about even one of your songs, as an artist, is a huge accomplishment
I think its validating for people to watch musicians fail because it validates why they personally didn't choose to "go for it" and stuck to the "easy path". As vicious as it is, insecurity gets people messed up like that sometimes.
i think that's too complicated. most people who hate on musicians never wanted to be one. most people who hate on actors never wanted to be one. these negative emotions aren't generated by the failure of the person doing the hating. they often have happy lives full of other things. they are doing the hating because some person is taking their attention from all of those things they like and saying "hey look at me! i'm more important than what you were doing. is there a war somewhere? who cares, check out this supermodel."
the negativity is the result of being exposed to a product you don't enjoy by the media, with the more frequent the exposure the greater the hate. when the exposure goes away, so does the hate. pet rocks are a forgotten thing now, but when they were popular, there was also a bunch of hate for them because they were being shoved in your face by the news and your neighbors whether you liked it or not.
@perfectally cromulent Disagree. Hating is always based in insecurity. The people who hate on Billie Eilish might not have wanted to be musicians but I know plenty of people who would just scroll past and go on to what they actually want to pay attention to. I also know people who would take time to hate, and without exception, those people are insecure. Anecdotal but I doubt it's limited to my experience. If someone with a full and happy life is taking time to hate on things, they're not feeling full and happy. Which can be called insecure because somewhere in them, they're feeling less than safe and secure and so they're lashing out. Security doesn't mean mindlessly praising success and never having negative opinions, but if someone can't not hate on an artist, or has a sense of happiness about someone else's failure, they're probably insecure. They have a personal investment in that situation for some reason and most times, secure people just know how to not pay attention to needless BS. I personally think insecurity is the norm and most people pretend to be secure for online defense, but truly secure people really don't feel a need to bring negativity to something unless there's a true moral outrage.
@@godwarrior3403 i'm pretty sure we are talking about different emotional states using the same word. i am a very secure person, and i will disparage every kardashian whose name i have been forced to know, not out of insecurity but because there are thousands of other things i would rather have society tell me about than them.
@perfectally cromulent Then you're not secure. I think they're pointless to know, but I don't feel a personal attachment when Kardashians come up. The sentence you used suggests a personal attachment to the issue, as does going out of your way to "disparage" them. There's a reason you get personally upset about that rather than just scrolling. You know how many ads you see on a daily basis? How many videos get suggested you don't care about? How many fb articles? How many people on tik tok and IG you'll see that will annoy you if you spend time on it? There's no one forcing you to stick around on any topic on the internet. Or on TV. You have full control. There's definitely a deeper reason you take time to hate. I'm guessing it's insecurity in something. Maybe anger coming from self consciousness about something completely unrelated that gets unleashed on the Kardashians. Or maybe you don't sleep well and are stressed. Whatever the case, that action cannot be said to be taken in security.
I can 100% say I've never taken the time to say something like "Who cares" about a celebrity I didn't care to know about. And the things I have taken time to be negative about, while I may give justifications, it always comes down to not feeling good in myself. Maybe you haven't realized it yet. It isn't the case that you're feeling secure when you're doing that though. You're feeling some kind of reason you need to shut them down.
@@godwarrior3403 i have an ad blocker, don't see tv commercials, don't use facebook etc. but certain celebrities appear in the news itself, and that annoys me as much as a news article puffing up coca-cola would.
i have said absolutely nothing about going out of my way to disparage someone. i do the disparaging when those people force their way into my attention. i think you are underestimating how annoying this is to other people even if you personally don't find it annoying.
Why does Afroman only have one hit? Because he got high.
Being a "one hit wonder" is actually not that bad to be honest. You make one kick ass song. Decades later people are listening to it. You're getting paid the whole time and you dont have to deal with all the fame and paparatzi. Millions of bands come and go and are never discovered. Your song will live forever in the "remember that one song?"
This
"Gimme the fortune and fame, then forget about me" is a great way to look at it.
It'd be one thing if the band had one hit, then said screw it. Let's give up music and try macrame instead. But then they would just be the good band that gave it all up.
@@davidvaughn7778 better to have loved and lost then to have never loved at all.
@@LibertarianUSA1982 but macrame?
There are a lot of factors that create a One Hit Wonder. Dust For Life is a great example. They had a big hit with "Step Into The Light" in the early 2000's. I have known several of the guys that were in the band at different times over the years. Their situation was completely out of their control. They had someone stealing money from them and lost a band member as a result of that situation, and had a resulting lack of support from the record company. Despite their debut album going gold and reaching as high as #28 on the charts, they never released a second album. It had nothing to do with them or the quality of their music. It was completely out of their control. There have been a ton of bands put in similar situations over the years.
Jimmy Eat World actually had a handful of hits on their first album to be fair they’re more like one album wonders…. I’m pretty sure that “the middle” and ” the sweetness” both went to number one…. Plus one or two more hits that didn’t quite hit as high as those two but I remember there being like four singles….
Yea, can’t agree with the inclusion of Jimmy Eat World
Pain was also a #1 hit. Work was pretty popular too.
@@oops6876 Pain, Bleed American, A Praise Chorus, The Middle, Sweetness. They were not a one hit wonder. Sorry Finn, you're wrong about this band.
@@jonathanfilson5509 They were one of my favourite bands when I was 17 but ask anyone around you in the world today if they can name a single one of those that isn't the Middle. The scope of the "hits" is not remotely comparable.
Bleed American was actually their worst performing album that broke the Top 50. They have 5 others that placed considerably higher (inc a 5 and a 6)
Dude, if I just had one hit song that was played and listened to repeatedly for decades, I'd die happy. Respect to all these artists.
I agree. Rick Astley stumbled into one hell of a one-hit-wonder wonderland with a hit song becoming a super popular meme; the dude must be rolling in royalties.
I don't care what anyone says, Steal my sunshine by Len is still a BOP! I still bust it out almost every summer. I looked up the brother-sister duo and they kinda live normal lives now. Marc owns a music publishing company and Sharon works in IT. In the music video, there's a pregnant woman exposing her almost due date belly, and I sometimes wonder how she and her adult child are now. I love 90s nostalgia.
Should listen to the album the song is from if you havent. the whole thing is really good. Also, took me forever to realize Steal My Sunshine is about a bag of weed haha
Completely agree, still gets lots of rotation in my house. It was the first single I ever purchased 😍
Hell yeah the sister was s ok hot eating that lollipop with two piggy tails
It’s totally my “guilty pleasure” song for sure. I’ll ALWAYS stop on that song if I’m flipping stations. Every single time.
Nobody dislikes that song. It's too damn cheery in the best way for anyone to truly dislike.
Afromans new song "Will You Help Me Repair My Door", complete with the film clip showing the security footage of the police raid on his house for "kidnapping", is absolute gold
When Crazy Town’s Butterfly hit the shores of Malaysia (where I’m from), I was so excited to see and hear more of them. They came out at the height of the nu metal takeover. We had bands like Linkin Park, Korn, Incubus, Limp Bizkit, POD, Static X and more so when Crazy Town came out with Butterfly I was so rooting for them…On,y to never hear of them ever again. Hope the frontman will be okay from now on. Really admire those who struggle with drug addiction or any kind of addiction. Lost 2 uncles who did drugs…
CT always reminded me of a poor man's Linkin Park. They had the same setup but the songs weren't as good.
You "admire" people who struggle from drug addiction? Even if they never make any effort to overcome it?
I certainly have empathy for people who are addicted. But Jesus, try "admiring" firefighters or something.
They owe entire career to John Frusciante of RHCP..bc Butterfly is taken from John's "Pretty little Dity" song, which he wrote at 18 yrs old
Shifty, one of the rappers from Crazy Town, died from an overdose a couple weeks ago.
I love one hit wonders. Oftentimes I find myself thinking "hey remember that one band that wrote that one song?? I wonder if their other stuff was any good..." And sometimes you find a hidden trove of awesome music
Preach! I think I can count on one hand the number of times I have looked into a 1-hit wonder and not found even more music I liked from the group.
Thats because to have a hit, luck Is a big factor. How many times the Singles are not the Best songs from an álbum?? More often than not, as hits tend to be límited to simple Easy yo digest songs. Anyone who Is a real music fan and not just a normie who only hears mainstream music and the Singles knows this.
Remember "popular" by Nada Surf? A friend of mine played their album Let Go back in college and I could not believe how amazing it was. If you want to check out an awesome album by a band you'd probably never think of, check it out.
My favourite example is Q Lazarus, who gave us the beautiful Goodbye Horses, but it’s literally the only song she released. She’s an insanely talented singer so it’s sad but ultimately she got a taste of fame & decided it wasn’t for her. She just wanted the quieter life and I respect that
I’ve heard that song from skate 3!
RIP
Damn...I always thought that song was sung by a dude...
I read somewhere that she's a city bus driver now in Baltimore
@@nicolasbaker9601 yeah I heard that too, someone claimed she was a taxi driver too, maybe she has done both?
I wish we got more hits from Blind Melon and other bands like that. Where we lost an artist or they broke up before they could do another. I appreciated your take on this subject.
Blind Melon's self titled album was actually pretty decent, but I haven't heard another song by them with the same hit power as No Rain. Their other songs just felt different to me, like it was a totally different band playing those songs.
Jet's Get Born was an incredible album that had the same kind of feel as Blind Melon's other stuff, but it was way better and had a lot more songs on it that could have been hits. It's hard to believe Jet didn't blow up more and were basically also a one hit wonder.
Depending on how you count it, Quiet Riot could be considered a one hit wonder that got famous (like, REALLY famous) off of a cover song of another one hit wonder. Their big hit 'Mama weer all crazee now' (they had another minor hit with 'Metal Health' but that only reached 37 in the US so you may or may not count it) was a cover of a Slade song. Slade, depsite being quite succesful in the UK could never find the same success accross the pond. Their only hit in the US was 'Run Runaway', which made it to no.20 on the hot 100.
Also, Todd in the Shadows has a great series called One Hit Wonderland where he breaks down various one hit wonders and goes over their hit, why it got big and what they did after said hit. It's pretty good. Would recommend.
I think The New Radicals would make a great addition to this list. Because eventho they had just 1 hit (and the fame caused mental health problems for the singer), he wrote a lot of songs/hits for other artists.
Yeah but I think they shouldn't be on the list since they genuinely weren't trying to be a hit band and they probably could have made more hits if they chose to go that route
@@anushkasharma664 they’re still marked as one because it’s their biggest hit and many 90’s one hit wonder lists still qualify it as part of the late 90’s selections
Jimmy eat world isn’t a 1 hit wonder. They do several headlining tours and even still do well. They’ve had several hits! Sure The Middle is their biggest, but they have several other big singles.
I definitely still jam Jimmy Eat Worlds new stuff. Night Drive is a solid
Pain was a banger
Considering they have been announced as one of the second slot bands for download this week... yeah, they aren't "one hit wonders"
Bleed American > The Middle, imho.
@Raymond Fagan absolutely legendary take! That's the track that's helped me discover how good they are besides the mediocre middle, thank god for random Spotify recommends
The funniest thing about the Milli Vanilli case is that after the whole scandal broke, the actual band with the real singer(s) tried to pursue a career and released music under the name "The Real Milli Vanilli".
So both the singers and Milli Vanilli themselves were one hit wonders? That’s like 2 one hit wonders in one song.
@lincolnhirschi5969 Oh dear, if you think that that was something that is new, I've got some news. lol.
@lincolnhirschi5969 LOL. Yeah, and people shitting on Lip Syncing. It's like, dude. Michael Jackson's Billy Jean performance when he did the moonwalk for the first time was entirely lip synced.
I was 11-12 yrs old when Mili Vanilli came out. Now here me out. I wasn’t into rock yet. I grew up with a mom who loved Pop with a big stereo in the house. I did like MV. Especially with a big system. Every dam one of the studios uses that beat in EVERYTHING afterwards. All it showed me in the end was, the industry will chew you up and spit you out.
there were multiple hits from the 'girl you know it's true' album that were dominant on radio and black radio didn't abandon their music when the scandal hit. everyone loved milli vanilli and i don't remember anyone not saying they didn't really care, they loved the album.
@@zubileegluckgluck You are correct.
So with Wheatus and Trapt, I think they did the exact "punk rock" thing. They became the big band at the local venue. And those are the best shows to see always. There's less and less bands that operate organically like that but refusing the label, doing your own thing, and putting on killer shows at the local pub. That's punk.
Chumbawumba will forever be a favorite for how they did everything. And Afroman is definitely far from a failure.
I dont consider Afroman a one hit wonder. He has quit a few classic tunes, they just can't be aired due to content.
Colt 45. Lemon pound cake is amazing.
yeah because I got high isn't even his biggest song
Chumbawumba was politically an important band before (and even after) their hit single. But it’s hard to overcome that massive a hit and talk about anarchy.
Having ONE hit means you are lucky. Most musicians don't ever have one hit.
exactly. if that one hit pays me a house and complete independence for my kids. I´d take it.
afroman sayed it best in a documentory: "they call me one hit wonder... how many hits do you need?" i also think "because i got high" is a pretty genius song and his new release "would you help me repair my door" is a great example on how art can criticize authority and society. in general its great to had real success on one point to have the resources to continue making music.
I saw Trapt and Alien Ant Farm in SoCal a few years ago and there was like 30 people there 😂 as a former musician though I am glad to see them still performing, hats off to them and there 1 hit wonders! Also great video as always! 🙌
Thats so sad
Alien Ant Farm is surprisingly underrated. No joke they are really talented. They have a really solid catalogue also
@@AxiomApefully agree, muuuuch better than trapt ever was or could be, imo
I saw them tour for the first album, which I really liked and still do to this day. The hall had around 1500 people, and I thought the building was going to collapse when they played Headstrong. The place went nuts.
I'm dumb, where is Socal?
I'm surprised Bowling for Soup is technically a "one hit wonder". They're one of the funnest bands I've seen live. Although fans like me enjoy multiple songs of theirs, I think a lot of song listeners would enjoy seeing them perform. They should definitely be held to a higher tier of "one hit wonder"
Something I find interesting is that Sugar Ray stated that it was their intention to become a One-Hit-Wonder... only to end up having actual lasting pop success. Which is why some of their later songs get kinda weird. They were more or less thinking "Well, now that we've done it, who cares what happens?"
Sugar Ray started out as a much heavier band than they morphed into. They were kind of a heavy rock/punk band and then morphed into this beach rock/ballad thing. Goo Goo Dolls kinda did too. They were heavier at the start then had a hit with a ballad and the whole sound changed. Incubus also.
Afroman’s debut record is actually really cool. If you like stoner culture music, and stuff like Sublime, Everlast, and G Love is your bag, it’s worth a listen. It’s a really short home grown (har har) record that he mostly made in his bedroom- and it’s laugh out loud funny in places. The guy can really rap and he’s a good guitarist, too. The only problem is it’s one of those “Oh, shit, guys, you gotta hear this!” records that you play for all your friends to laugh with…and then get so sick of the jokes, that you put it away forever. Think those “Jerky Boys” crank call albums from the 90’s, or “Tenacious D”, stuff like that. The drummer from my old reggae-punk band saw a free Afroman show back in like 2002, and came to practice completely impressed…he said the guy played a few instruments, and laid down his own beats and some turntables here and there. On top of that, he was one of those guys that hangs out at the bar and drinks with his fans after the show, just a cool cat to hang with. On a side note, Bunjie Jambo, a completely epic punk rock with a horn player from here in Pittsburgh -as opposed to a ska band- inexplicably opened for Kid Rock in early 1999 on the very small club tour he did for “Devil Without a Cause” waaay before it went platinum. At the time, that “Bull God” thing was the only thing getting modest air play- and Nooobody could foresee the coming rise of ock rock-nu metal, and Kid Rock’s ridiculously huge career jump. Anyway, I guess Uncle Scarfo, the drummer for Bunjie Jambo, had listened to all the old indie Kid Rock records for years and was a fan, and so he somehow got his band an opening spot when Kid Rock played Grafitti (RIP) here in Pittsburgh, PA. My friends and I were all great friends of Bunjie, so we went to the show. I hate to admit it now, but Kid Rock out on a really good show then. I think there were maybe 200 people there. Club Grafitti was the second largest “small club” here- like, Pennywise and NOFX would play there and sell it out, but Wesley Willis couldn’t sell enough tickets to play there, so he got stuck in Laga, the small small punk club (Again, RIP Laga). Kid Rock went straight to the bar, promptly ordered a whole bottle of Jim Beam, and sat there chain smoking and doing shots. If you approached him, he would invite you to pull up a chair and have a few shots with him- or alternately tell the bar tender to give you whatever you were drinking on him. He had absolutely no security of any type- he did have the full sized major label tour bus clogging up Bigelow Blvd., which was bizarre and funny. Anyway, yeah, just like Afroman, he was a good showman, played every instrument at least once, and then just hung out with the crowd as another drinker. It worked…I was a musically confused 19 year old, a little sick of punk rock for a moment, but having a hard time expanding my catalogue- so I bought Kid Rock’s cd right from him there at the bar…he had a little stack of them. $8…$7 I’d you couldn’t afford $8, $5 if you didn’t have that…free if you were broke, actually. He didn’t give a shit.
I didn’t like that record for very long- it soon grew into an embarrassing reminder of a time where angry beard guys rapped, and everyone played metal cds through their subwoofered up cars, producing huge sonic farts heard for miles. But even in his later mookdom, I always remembered the cool, tired, and slightly sad drunk guy from Detroit at the bar. There are people behind all these bands- most have charisma, some have talent, most have neither. It’s kind of a shame that someone’s sacrifice, hopes, and dreams can rise and fall so fast, their story lost, their glimpse at hope labeled a “one hit wonder”, and thrown away.
Check out an Afroman show, if you ever see he’s playing your local community day, but I doubt you’ll get anywhere near Kid Rock after his set at the State Fair is over.
By the way, the fact that Bunjie Jambo didn’t break big is not only depressing, it’s mind boggling. They were every bit as good as Antiflag, Pittsburgh’s only band to get signed to Fat, Epitaph, and I think maybe Epic. They opened for NOFX, the Pilfers, and probably Reel Big Fish, and Kid Rock, like I said. I think they didn’t make it because they didn’t send their damn record out for anybody to hear. They were also a high humor band, almost like dead milkmen level…and they had a lot of local jokes in there, that might’ve stifled them. They have been gone for decades, but search Bunjie Jambo on RUclips and see for yourself. Slainte!
Thanks for mentioning SR-71. I absolutely loved them and obviously Mitch went on to a successful songwriting and producing career. the funny story is he got into that career by accident and it all started with 1985
Shawn Mullins "Lullaby" is a one hit wonder. I met him. He told me I wouldn't know about him without that hit. So he would agree with you it was a nice boost. and now he carries on as an independent artist with a big audience.
@10:21 INTERESTING TO NOTE, THE BEAUTIFUL PIXIE HAIRED BRUNETTE IN THE VIDEO WENT ON TO BECOME A MODEL AND FASHION DESIGNER, AND HAS A GOOD FOLLOWING ON INSTAGRAM.. SHE TURNED OUT TO BE SMARTER AND MORE SUCCESSFUL THAN PPL WOULD HAVE THOUGHT HER TO TURN OUT.. THE LEADER OF THE BAND, HOWEVER, HAD A FUCKED UP LIFE..
Milli Vanilli were far from the only band doing lipsyncing. The famous German disco band Boney M did exactly the same thing, there also was the French punkpop song "ça plane pour moi" of which it came out years later that the singer of the song wasn't Plastic Bertrand but the Belgian writer of the song Lou Deprijck who sang the vocals. Plastic Bertrand just looked the part. In the end music is just a business and you can go in different ways about it. You have tons of talent and become one the next memorable bands with a long career in the spotlight or you create what they call a one hit wonder and have a quick celebrity moment while cashing in as much as possible before you dissapear. There is nothing wrong with it.
Don't forget C+C Music Factory. They did the same thing MV did. Had people record the album and then had "pretty" people in the videos and pictures.
Sonic Youth did a really good cover of ca plane pour moi that never got the credit it deserved
Ça plane pour moi is one of my childhood favourites.
The Baha Men are a great example -- they formed in 1977 and had been touring for 23 years before their big hit. That just made it easier to tour, I'd suspect.
I bought their early cds because I was really into world music back then, and their early stuff was much more rooted in traditional Bahaman dance music called Junkanoo. Then they did a KC cover "That's the Way I Get Down" that I absolutely love to this day. Apparently their fourth cd only sold 700 copies in the US -- and I guess I was one of them -- but they might have faded into obscurity after that. Instead, boom! Relevant forever, even if it's for a song that a lot of people hate or make fun of. I doubt they regret it.
Baha Men were and still are big stars in their home country, so they can probably live with having only one hit abroad. Same with Psy, who is only known for Gangnam Style in the rest of the world but is still very successful in his home country and has been so even way before Gangnam Style.
Crazy Town had some cool songs on that record but butterfly just swung the band in a very different direction so that's what everyone suddenly expected.
The first album was great, I loved it as a teen. It just was totally not butterfly, as you said.
Toxic and revolving Door are fun records
The Gift of Game was a great album, but sadly, they pretty much painted themselves into one hit wonder corner with their next album with which they lost all charisma and turned into a mediocre Linkin Park clone.
My beef with Crazy Town's Butterfly is that the WHOLE song sounds veeeeeeeeery veeeeeeeeeery close to ONE section of Red Hot Chili Pepers' Pretty Little Ditty. Like they ripped it off, just that one bit, and didn't add anything else to it except vocals
@@perrodetokio Holy hell, i just looked that song up and after a minute or so still couldn't hear what you were referring to and them BAM, there it was. How did they not get sued????
I think Jimmy Eat World is a really interesting case. When you look at their peers from when they were starting out like The Get Up Kids, or the Promise RIng, that one hit really set them up for what seems to have been a long sustainable career, allowed them to afford to build their own studio, and put some money in the bank for leaner years
Regarding Crazy Town, let's not forget the track it's a Pretty little ditty... by RHCP ! Check the original couse it rocks!
Definitely can relate to the artists who'd prefer to just have a sustainable career with a small but very loyal base of fans without being a huge, massive star.
The idea of having millions of people constantly talking about you, scrutinizing every little thing you're doing and trying to be all up in your business the way a lot of people seem to be with the biggest stars in the industry does not sound appealing.
Chumbawumba have spent their careers fucking over the music industry and I fucking love it
Jimmy Eat World has had an entirely different career trajectory than the others you listed. Not sure they quite deserve that title.
He's not correct in this case, as many people who aren't JEW fans can remember more than one of their songs. When has anyone else referred to them as such?
I also never saw them as a one hit wonder. Just because The Middle was their biggest hit it doesn't mean they didn't have a successful career afterwards. Some of their other songs like Sweetness, Pain, Always Be, etc. still received a lot of airplay and their following albums also still sold well and they still have a huge fan base worldwide.
@@torstenscholz6243 Perfectly said
💯💯💯
The usual standard used is Top 40 hits. Technically, The Grateful Dead is a OHW by the same standard, despite having one of the most loyal fan bases of all time.
Len's "You Can't Stop The Bum Rush" is indeed a FANTASTIC album. When I picked it up, several of my friends made fun of me. Then when I played it for them, almost all of them decided it wasn't bad at all!
The second half on that record is insane
I still listen to that album one of my favorite
1985 by Bowling For Soup was written by Mitch from SR-71, and SR-71’s biggest hit, Right Now, was written by Butch Walker, who also wrote Girl All The Bad Guys Want by Bowling for Soup. Weird circle of songwriting
Butch’s old band Marvelous 3 is a one hit wonder too (Freak of the Week)
Pop punk songwriters are fascinating
Milli Vanilli weren't a one hit wonder.
Hey had several hits.
"Blame it on the rain", "Girl I'm gonna miss you", "Baby, don't forget my number", "Keep on running"...
Notice how lots of One Hit Wonders come from the late 90s-early 2000s. That's a time where if you wanted to be mainstream, you had to play at Mtv's rules because there was no youtube, fast internet was rare, etc. So this forced lots of people to sell out in a way that didn't work, or made some bands just refusing to sell out after a hit.
And the sad thing is that sometimes the bands were treated like disposable stuff, or epigones of somebody else more successful.
There were one hit wonders back til the beginning of music. See: The Wonders in the movie That Thing You Do. But your sentiment is correct. It’s a holdover from consolidated media. And no band of today will ever get that big again. Those who currently are Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, Imagine Dragons, all got big in the tail end of traditional media while also benefiting from the digital boom.
@@ligairi No-one ever gets famous out of sales only. Apparently, Imagine Dragons get money not from sales, but from promo commercials.
Which means that in the mainstream, the classic formula doesn't work anymore.
Milli Vanilli actually had quite a few big hits in their day. Blame it on the Rain, Girl You Know it’s True, Baby Don’t Forget My Number, and so on
Concur, they are not a one hit wonder, they probably would have many successful albums if it wasn't for that damn skipping incident
Fountains of Wayne’s discography is phenomenal. Wheatus has some great songs as well!
Yea, wasn't Radiation Vibe a hit? I saw it on 120 minutes
Halley's Waitress is on frequent rotation.
I've always kinda viewed one hit wonders as an incredible success because we all remember them. Like, they become legend. And if you're trying to leave your mark with art, I think that's pretty damn cool.
Just for the hell of it, Alien Ant Farm’s cover of Smooth Criminal.
Afroman got a couple hits from that first album.
Milli Vanilli were actual performers, but were basically hired for their marketability. They did originally sing on a few recordings, but their producer decided it wasn't good enough and hired some singers to come in and record the album instead. By that point, they had already signed on the dotted line and didn't have much choice but to go along with it. Then, when the secret came out, they took the brunt of the backlash, rather than the label or the producers. They really got a raw deal on that one.
Yeah they were pretty much forced into it, as the producer threatened to make them pay back the advance if they didn’t lip sync, along with constant empty promises he’d let them sing on future songs that never happened
What a lot of people don't know is the producer behind them was the same guy who created Boney M, and they were exactly the same.
@@StefanMedici I had heard of that. He actually performed the male vocals on Boney M’s recordings then had another vocalist perform them live (thought not lip syncing)
@@ghost_mall exactly, they didn’t read the contract and spent the advance money, which is why they couldn’t back out when Farian threatened to make them pay it back if they didn’t go with his plan. And then they became the scapegoats when it went south
They really got done dirty by Farian and the music industry. RIP Rob
How can Afroman be just a One-Hit-Wonder? He's got 83 albums, hittin' like thunder!
Lemon Pound Cake is a banger!
Colt 45 &2 zigzags, bb that's all u need
Palmdale, I need you and i love you baby
@@thecomanchekid classic
@@thecomanchekid Yo, let me get a "Palm"...
little remark: James Blunt has multiple no.1 albums and singles, a 20 year career, 188x platinum certifications and is popular all over the world. I would not call him a one hit wonder
True that! I wondered about naming him as a one hit wonder 🤔
Great topic, I've often thought about this. As an amateur musician (with a separate career unrelated to music as my main focus) I am very happy to play covers and add bits of musical improvisation. Songwriting is a completely different skill that has little bearing on how well you play your instrument. There are great instrumentalists who are mediocre songwriters and mediocre instrumentalists who are great songwriters.
With that in mind, I agree with you that one hit wonders are far more of a success than any kind of failure. To write a song that connects with a large amount of people at a particular moment in time is impressive; it does take talent (and a bit of luck) that rises above the countless other bands out there.
Essentially, I apply these rules:
If you write one song that connects with people, you are a success
If you write an album that connects with people, you are truly great, a respectable artist
If you write multiple albums that connect, you are a legend
Saw a great documentary on Afroman, such a nice dude. When asked about the "one hit wonder" thing, his reply was "Well how many hits do you need?" and then laughed and drank out of his custom chalice.
Dude, great call out to Len's first album. It's highly underrated.
I agree and would say the same about the Deep Blue Something album, “Home.” “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” isn’t even one of the best five songs on it, imo.
Thank you for not mentioning Faith No More. One of the most brilliant discography of all times and still most people call them OHW because of "Epic" success.
Here in Australia they had multiple hits
Oh man. That would be serious fighting words.
For fucking real.
Who would consider Faith No more a one hit wonder? Didn't Angel Dust outsell The Real Thing?
@@deathmetal11111 One-Hit Wonder applies strictly to singles. FNM definitely counts, because they only had one Top 40 hit
Chumbawumba are my favorite band! So many great albums. And frankly, using your fame and fortune to help others is pretty much what everyone SHOULD be doing!
This comment knocked me down but i got up again. Never expected chumbawumba to be someone's fav band.
@@fromthethicket4370 True Dat
@@fromthethicket4370 They're my second favourite British post-punk anarchist collective band with a decades long career from West Yorkshire. (The first is The Mekons)
I had an ex who only knew Chumbawamba from their collections of Anglican folk songs and had never realized they were the same band as Tubthumping
It’s actually spelled “Chumbawamba”, FYI. Since they’re your favorite and all
Milli Vanilli being criticized for lip syncing and not singing their songs... now that's all modern music is.
Fun fact about 1985: When the video would play on MTV, the closed captions would read "there was U2 and Blondie, HER music's still on MTV" instead of "and music still on MTV."
The Ataris originals couldn't live up to "boys of summer"? Never disagreed with anything more in my life. One of the best bands in the genre!
Amazing lyrics in so many songs.
Fast Times At Drop Out High and 1*15*96 are two of the greatest story telling songs.
Agreed. Absurd comment, but I guess it's his opinion. Ironically enough I hated the cover and I don't really care for the original. Every song on "Anywhere but Here" and "Blue Skies" is better if you ask me.
Unfortunately, the world in general disagrees strongly with you. And again, unfortunately, you can't make a "hit" by liking it yourself.
@@davecarsley8773 I don't think 'The World' has a objective collective opinion on The Ataris mate 🤣
There are 3 kinds of one hit wonders: the ones whose only hit was so good and iconic they were never able to top it, the ones whose only hit was so bad or mediocre that no one cared to hear what else they had to say, and the ones whose first hit was a cover
Or good acts that simply find they don't enjoy the fame..
I hear Blind Melon being referred to as a one hit wonder, and it's crazy. They were so great. So many incredible songs.
They did have the one big hit but the two albums (and the rarities compilation) are truly amazing.
I have a Blind Melon tattoo. Shannon's writing really spoke to me as a teenager and into my 20's. Out of all of my music tattoos, people are always most confused on that one lol. No Rain is a great song, but it doesn't come close to being their best.
Every song on soup could be a hit man blind melon is so good
@@jazzturkey2108 No Rain has really stood the test of time. I agree. I could never pick a favorite.
The unfortunate problem with Blind Melon is that they wouldn’t have been had Shannon not overdosed. That album’s songwriting is a strong indicator of how much more they had in the tank, then heroin happened
Jimmy Eat world had 3 songs from their debut album on radio and followed it with Pain. They even covered Last Christmas which is played at every mall every year. 7 million monthly Spotify listeners.
10:31 don’t forget their amazing collabo with Oakenfold “Starry-Eyed Surprise” track was lit af
How the hell is Jimmy Eat World a one hit wonder?????
I know right there totally a two hit wonder lol
Name another song besides the middle
For the reason he gave dude
@@Justabigbeaver sweetness
@@Justabigbeaver also bleed american is a huge hit
Anytime someone wants to bring up "You Can't Stop The Bum Rush" by Len, I'm all in. It's seriously an amazing album front to back.
Afroman has a song called One Hit Wonder that basically outlines the thesis of what you said here. Sure, he only had one "hit" but now he regularly sells out small venues, performing the music he loves to make.
Bro he came not to far from me. In Knoxville, TN. Alot of people showed up. He's still very popular here.
it was strange to see Tatu in tis video. Because in Russia where they are from, they are not one hit wonder at all. They had a huge impact on Russian music and half of the songs from their album became hits.
Some years ago, Vanilla Ice said he made $16M off of Ice Ice Baby. Yeah, it stinks to have a hit, hope it never happens to me.
Fountains of Wayne are a one hit wonder based on chart success, but in quality of all their albums and songs, they were a killer band and it's everyone else's loss in not digging further than their "one hit".
My band just opened for Wheatus! There still killin' it!
I remember "Sweetness" by Jimmy Eat World feeling just as big as "The Middle" although I don't know the numbers on either. They also had a few songs featured in various TV shows - I think The OC was one of them with "Hear You Me". I especially have a soft spot for "Bleed American".
There was a show in the early-mid 2000s on Much Music in Canada called "One Hit Wonders" which was excellent. It felt like the message of the show was "Remember this great song? Wouldn't it be cool if this band was popular again?"
Agreed, a few of these bands, but especially Jimmy Eat World, had more than one very popular song with heavy radio airplay.
Bruce Greene from inside gaming told me most of this info years ago 😂😂 Great video btw 🙌
80's is my decade for 1-hit wonders. So many bands were 1-hit wonders in America but were huge in Europe and other areas. Bands like Kajagoogoo (Too Shy), Dexy's Midnight Runners (Come on Eileen), Madness (Our House), Tommy Tutone (867-5309), A Flock of Seagulls (I Ran), A-Ha (Take On Me), Baltimora (Tarzan Boy), Soft Cell (Tainted Love), Lipps Inc. (Funkytown), Timbuk 3 (Future So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades), After The Fire (Der Kommisar), Murry Head (One Night In Bangkok), T'Pau (Heart and Soul), Mightnight Oil (Beds Are Burning), Modern English (I Melt With You), Animotion (Obsession), Bow Wow Wow (I Want Candy), Men Without Hats (Safety Dance), The Weather Girls (It's Raining Men), Talk Talk (It's My Life), etc. It's pretty insane how many 1-hit wonders in the 80s there were.
Again, many of them like Madness, Dexy's Midnight Runners, Midnight Oil, Flock of Seagulls, and others were HUGE in England and Australia and other countries. However, in America we got the 1 hit and that was it.
Surprised you didn't mention Natalie Imbruglia and "Torn" as a one-hit wonder with a cover. Especially how shocked people are to learn that song is a cover.
I didnt know that was a cover... What a great song thou
I think this will surprise you, but “Torn,” peaked just outside the Top 40. Despite everyone remembers the song and you’ll still hear it sometimes, Natalie Imbruglia technically has zero hits.
We probably thought it was even bigger than it was thanks to TRL.
@@brandonjames412 What? It hit #1: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torn_(Ednaswap_song)#Weekly_charts
From what I understand, if you have a song that plays on terrestrial radio, if you signed the right deal and aren’t a dumb ass with your money, you never have to work again for the rest of your life if you don’t want to. Good on them. ❤
Funny that bowling for soup did the song for Phineas and Ferb because he looks like Doofenshmirtz.
Favorite example of a One-Hit-wonder: Smile Empty Soul. 'Bottom Of A Bottle' goes up to #7 on the US Rock Charts in 2003. You never hear anything else from them played again... Aside from the fact they continue to tour for the last 20 years and put out 7 albums since. Not counting Sean Danielson's solo work. They put on a great live show in clubs and have some other good songs that never got radio airplay that you stumble upon on Spotify
That one hit can generate money in perpetuity for the songwriter. May not always be millions, but it can be some nice mailbox money
I'd freakin' love that. Write a massive hit, have relatively steady income for the rest of your life. License it and make even more money.
Patrick Hernandez 70's disco one and only hit "Born To Be Alive" plays every day on the radio. The guy gets a 10000 check every week to this day. He never had to work again.
Bowling for Soup, great band. Very underrated, Love Punk Rock 101.
I remember that one from the NHL 2004 soundtrack. Great times.
1. "Butterfly" stole a RHCP lick, but the album was actually pretty cool. I listened a lot to it as a teenager.
2. Waiting for Alien Ant Farm... Also super cool debut album.
Hell yeah, AAF deserves much more love than they get
The Gift of Game was a great album with many great tracks. Sadly the follow-up album was pretty lame as they lost all originality and became a dull Linkin Park clone.
Dynamite Hack is a case study for not using a cover as your lead single. That debut record was solid and was completely missed by most.
Love the Superfast album front to back
Just wanted to third that the album kicked ass. Do you guys prefer the album version of “Dear Kate,” or the first version, which I think shared the album’s title?
Also, “Blue Sky,” remains one of my favorite songs ever.
For some one hit wonders, the song that everybody knows is actually inferior to the rest of their catalog. A perfect example of this (shown @ 0:36) is Gotye
Sure, Somebody I Used to Know is a good song.. and definitely weird (memorable!)
But he has *numerous* songs that are even better. Dude also makes great music videos, an under-appreciated talent these days
Been rocking that Len album since it dropped. Its a masterpiece.
I heard that LEM track on the "GO" soundtrack, which is amazing, BTW, but I'll have to buy their album now.
My favorite band of all time is a one-hit wonder. Blind Melon doesn't get near enough love. Their album that was released after the death of Shannon Hoon titled Nico is hauntingly perfect and includes a somber version of their one-hit "No Rain". And Soup is experimental and is the kind of album that takes two listens to really appreciate how creative and quality it truly is. Love that band.
Blind Melon is far from a one hit wonder.😅
They get too much love.
@@CMill78 I can't think of another song by them
Galaxie was a hit.
@@j_murdoch 🤷🏽♂️
I saw crazytown live a couple years ago and it was epic. They played a lot off of brimstone sluggers which was so good! What an amazing album
Bowling for Soup is more of a cult. They also were featured in the movies "Cursed" and "Sky High"
Thank you for what you said about “Failure Porn.” I’ve seen so many of those videos and yes, they are engrossing, but you just leave them feeling icky. I can only imagine what those folks must think if they come across those videos. All because they attempted to make art of some kind and weren’t successful long term. Glad you took a moment to focus on this.
I remember a few years back looking up tATu, because I remembered All The Things She Said, to hear what their other songs are like. And most of tATu’s stuff is really good and underrated.
I don’t see being a One Hit Wonder as being a failure, just something that ended up happening.
For being an essentially manufactured act, tATu actually had some talent and put some work into their music. I'd say that most of their stuff is pretty enjoyable, personally I like their pretty much unknown Waste Management album more than the one with their biggest hit.
@@ROMANTIKILLER2 Well PoP acts back then were very manufactured, the Spice Girls was 100% manufactured with hundreds of girls auditioning. Same with tATu, lots of girls auditioned. But yeah for being a manufactured act tATu were great.
Len kinda spawned a legendary Canadian band, Broken Social Scene. Their bassist Brendan Canning has stated that he used all his Len money to fund the first BSS album. So, that's your neat Canadian factoid of the day!
11:58 Love you, man. But no, Jimmy Eat World is NOT in the same category as Len or Crazy Town.
I found you when I was trying to get into morerock music. I pride myself in liking many songs from many genres of music, and I realized on day that rock music was a genre that is really broad in scope, and I didn't know where to start. I found you and didn't think you'd have anything good to say about anything outside of like one genre, but I love how diverse your tastes are. I like many different music genres including pop in all of it's forms, classical and childrens' music, so hearing someone that isn't just one of those rock fans who just listen to like one artist is refreshing.
Great video Finn, always love your content.
One nitpick. Milli Vanilli had three #1 songs on Billboard. Not just hits, but #1s. Girl You Know It's True actually only went #2, though probably their biggest song. So calling Milli Vanilli a one hit wonder is a huge stretch. Flash in the pan maybe, but not a one hit wonder.
Keep it up though! Look forward to the next video.