This was a hard one to do because there have been so many horrific videos made since bands started making videos. Many of the worst ones were made in the eighties, go figure since that has to be one of the worst decades for mainstream music. 1981 was the year MTV launched as well and the very first music video ever played on MTV was The Buggles – Video Killed the Radio Star. The majority of the videos played on that first day were completely awful, they did play 2 Iron Maiden vids the first day, so there were at least 2 good videos, you can see the list of videos on that first day here. Since then there have been a lot of great videos and even more bad ones. A few of these are foreign videos, so they were never on TV but are so bad they have to be on the list. These are the videos that I think are the worst of the worst, #1 being the worst video ever! Let me know what you think.
10 – Journey – Separate Ways
9 – Vanilla Ice – Stop That Train
8 – Gunther – Teeny Weeny String Bikini
7 – Kraftwerk – The Robots
6 – Right Said Fred – I’m Too Sexy
5 – Men Without Hats – Safety Dance
4 – Wham – Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go
3 – David Hasselhoff – Hooked on a Feeling
2 – Leonard Nimoy – The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins
1 – The number one worst music vid ever is a Finnish video and it is extremely bad, I guess the band is called Armi and Danni and the song is “I Wanna Love You Tender”
Bonus – (since I found out this was from a comedy show I removed it from #1 but I am leaving it as a bonus) This is Zlad! and the song is Elektronik, Supersonik, enjoy because words cannot describe this one!
So I lied….it gets even worse in Part 2!
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LOL…Prepare for Countdown! 5….4…3…1!
Uh…number 1 isn’t an actual music video. It’s a comedy sketch from an Australian TV show and features Santo Cilauro (from Working Dog of Late Show/The Castle/The Panel fame) as the singer/character Zladko “Zlad” Vladcik. It’s meant to be hilariously bad.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santo_Cilauro
That’s cool, thanks for the info, i did not know. It is still very funny.
Number one reminds me of those skits Benny Hill used to do where they used to all dress up and do the bad dance routine.
The funniest part is
someone looked as these once and said “This is FANTASTIC!!!”
“This is gonna take me to the next level”
I know, I don’t know what some of them were thinking.
First off, the Right Said Fred video was parody, so it’s “badness” is intentional and funny in a good way. Second, what exactly makes you put Safety Dance on this list? It is odd, but hardly poor quality or stupid – the band was exceedingly odd in everything they did. Otherwise I agree with everything on your list. Third – a suggestion for your list: Red Skies at Night by The Fixx has always been my vote for the worst video ever; oh! and what about the Toni Basil’s Mickey? Cheers!
Thanks for the feedback, I remember when the Right Said Fred video came out and I always thought it was meant to be serious, never knew it was parody. The Men Without Hats Video is just bad, but that is just my opinion. The quality is good and I dont even mind the band or song, I just don’t like the video. I will have to check out that video by The Fixx, I remember them but not the video. Tony Basil’s Mickey is very bad as well, I agree totally and did not even consider that one. So many came to mind while doing this because there have been so many bad videos I was able to think of.
LOL, i totally agree with Journey. Good music actually but what happens to the vids?
hey pls dont forget Boys Town Gang – Can’t Take My Eyes Off You.
It’s worth to nominating in your list.
http://www.80s-music.co.cc/video/Boys-Town-Gang-Cant-Take-My-Eye
I am glad you agree with the Journey vid, I like them musically too but their videos were bad, especially the Separate Ways one. The vid you suggested is a good one as well. I may do a part 2 or something someday because there are so many bad ones out there.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=–Vaz9jW054
end of discussion.
i.G
How the hell did Fish Heads not make this list? Barnes and Barnes were robbed!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTpUVAcvWfU
Fishheads, I remember the song and vid well. There have been so many bad ones though that narrowing down to 10 was REALLY hard.
While a fantastic song, “The tide is high” by Blondie video is retarded. Giant goldfish, spilled water, a Darth Vaderesqe character, chicken fights with empty cardboard cartons.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppYgrdJ0pWk&feature=PlayList&p=8EEEB7B1E1C5D6C8&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=50
Wow, that Blondie vid is really bad. I know the song well but never saw the vid. Thanks!
I disagree. I think the David Hasselhoff one is actually the BEST music video ever.
Are you from Germany?
i remember a vid to a song , something about push the little daisies and make them come up. man that had to be one of the worst. just some goofball dressed like a devil and some kid. anyone remember that one?
I remember that, it was Ween and the song was from the album Pure Guava. They were a weird band for sure.
Two norwegian comedians make hilarious music videos. Here are two of them: [url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRK7Mg09DyY[/URL]
[url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7F_HSlnpho[/URL]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rH6b_lSQst0&fmt=18
Thanks, them Norwegian comedians are very funny, I had never heard of them. The only stuff I know from Norway is metal bands.
WOW! That is really bad, I know Crispin Glover is a weirdo but WOW! Thank you for that, I had never seen it and never knew he did anything musically, well, if you can call that music, lol.
Come on. No love for “In the mood” by Robert Plant? An awful song with the lead singer from Led Zeppelin hamming it up like David Lee Roth post-Van Halen?
There’s also a Pantera video that I saw a week ago late night on one of VH1 Classic’s rock video shows, and it looked like it was put together like a high school sophomore for a graphic arts project, but I can’t remember the name of the song.
I remember “In the Mood” and it is another very bad video for sure. I love Pantera but I do not know if I have seen all their vids. Pre Cowboys from Hell Pantera is awful, just really bad glam metal and I know they did some awful videos.
thanks for including Gunther! His video’s rock, in a totally “wtf” kind of way.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbYtqAWDF2U
Mark Gormely – Without You
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87nkJquHnAU
I have never heard of Mark Gormely, but that was definitely a bad video.
You forgot the most important of all time!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZ7ffmoZCWM
I dare you to watch this untill the end: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFGzGfym-7Y
Video did kill the radio star. What made music so important in many of our lives (mine for sure) was the sincerity of the message from artist to audience. When MTV and Much Music started and the rules of the music game changed, a magic connection and bond was broken between artists and those of us who go back to the FM radio days. Lip syncing singers, guitars that were so obviously not plugged in to anything and irrational fashion sense turned a whole generation of music lovers off the art. How sincere is a lip synced video? If artists weren’t taking their craft seriously, we would just have to treat it as the cheese-ball sell out that it was and we found other ways to entertain ourselves.
Who can’t remember David Lee Roth flying on a wire in pink tights? It’s a pathetic image. There are a handful of beautiful and artistic music videos but it while someone else could make an equally compelling list of bad videos it would be a challenge to come up with 10 great ones without thinning out the gene-pool.
But thanks for the provocativeness.
Yayyyy!!!! Number One! Number One! Number One!
Seriously speaking, boys and girls, as a Finn we know the pain of having produced this…thing. To offer some terrible facts about it: the vid has been made in the 1970′s (I think) and it features Danny, at the time the country’s most popular male singer famous for extravangant stage shows – the man’s over 60 these days and keeps going….uh huh….the lady is a former Miss Finland beauty pageant winner Armi Kuusela with whom the guy had an adulterous love affair that broke up his marriage even after her untimely death. To add to the horror, the woman known to have choreographed this thing is in fact THE MOST FAMOUS AND MOST POPULAR dance teacher and choreographer in Finland alltogether and still keeps doing her stuff even though she has celebrated her 80th birthday recently. (She wasn’t that old in the time this was made, obviously, but apparently she taught an entire generation or two on how to disco dance…)
(As a side note, I would’ve voted Belinda Carlisle’s Heaven is a Place on Earth for the list – weeirdd…)
Thanks for the comment, I grew up in the MTV generation since I was born in the mid seventies and I had to see all this crap growing up. Some songs were so good and the videos just killed them, even a couple on my list. I love music though and without it who knows where I would be today. I am also very diverse when it comes to what I like because I will go from listening to some crazy deathmetal to Jack Johnson then onto something like Robert Cray, I love all of it except most rap, most country and all the garbage you hear on the radio nowadays which just sucks.
Thanks for telling us more about it, sounds very interesting. I assumed it was from the 70′s just by the outfits and dance movies as well as the quality. I listen to many Finnish metal bands and folk metal bands, you guys know good metal over there for sure.
Anything by Rick Astley (sp ?) could also have made the list.
Thanks for the background info Daniels. I’m amazed anyone admits to choreographing that dancing – and I’d be even more amazed if anyone claimed that any of the dancers actually did any rehearsal before filming the clip. Truly and utterly excerable – lol !!
One small correction. The finnish singer is Armi Aavikko, not Kuusela.
Just to let you know, you are being quoted on the second most popular website of Finland. http://www.iltasanomat.fi/viihde/uutinen.asp?id=1667338
It’s a tabloid newspaper… Your post was first made popular in Finland by Voice
http://www.voice.fi/index.php?option=com_sbsarticle&cat=1&tmpl=blog&cid=2983
And also the biggest tv-channel wanted to mention it on their website:
http://www.mtv3.fi/viihde/uutiset/musiikki.shtml/842535?armi_ja_danny
Well I guess everyone can put up a list of their own for sure. In some aspect there really is something that makes all of the listed videos appear funny or down right poorly made at this date! However for the list to serve a purpose it should include your comments and the explanation of the reasons why you have included the the particular in video on this list and what you think is wrong with it. Please also consider that some of the videos are made eons before the others, note also budget, schedule etc. and the purpose / target audience of the video. You have at least a few intentional parody videos here, so to say they are poor in their objective is to say that not funny or they do not serve the purpose of parodify their target.
And if you belive all the Iron Maiden videos are exellent, well please explain me what it is that makes this one a killer:
Wow, that is insane! Thanks for letting me know Jeez, I appreciate it. I cannot read it but i hope I did not piss them off too bad,lol
Yes, Maiden are also guilty of making some bad vids as well, I don’t disagree. I am sure the majority of bands out there from that era have bad vids. I just choes these because IMO they are just bad videos, not bad music in every case but the vids were awful, video quality not counting. it was just the cheesiness that they all share in common.
Billy Squier’s “Rock Me Tonite”. It was so bad it singlehandledly destroyed his career.
That Billy Squier video is very bad and it was one of the many I had to decide between when making the list. There are so many awful vids that I had a really hard time picking them.
just watched that Billy Squier “Rock Me Tonite” that is god awful lol
Thanks. This is grreeeat content.
What about Will To Power’s “Baby I Love Your Way/Freebird” video??? Much worse than half of this list!
Hey Central Scrutinizer, That is one I have not seen, so I will go check it out. Most of the vids in the list I remember growing up, that’s how I remembered how awful they were. There are a couple that I just kind of stumbled on as well though, including the #1 video.
Thanks Josh, subscribe to the feed if you like the site!
I heartily disagree with Journey and Men w/o Hats! Those were cool!! The midget dancer, the way the Journey band made it so clear they weren’t playing their instruments–real band doing air instruments! And then the drummer had those hubcap cymbals! What’s not to love?? Oh, all the close ups, and that poor woman’s hair.
Thanks for the comment ChangoGrande, I knew there were many people that would disagree on some of them. For me the vids were just a little too cheesy, midgets are awesome though, that was the only thing that vid had going for it.
RAP LEGEND – SICK VIDEO TOO!
http://digg.com/music/PRINCE_EA_THE_BEST_RAPPER_TO_EVER_BE
There is more, enjoy the Finnish music from the 90′s:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hu3Pbc2BKt4
Wow, that is pretty bad too! damn,lol.
I don’t think Kraftwerk is that bad!
Every time I see Safety Dance, I want to scream out “Play Stonehenge!”
What exactly makes the Kraftwerk video bad? If you don’t like Kraftwerk, you won’t like it, but considering that they’re one of the most self-aware, self-constructed bands around who have always been ultra-careful about every aspect of their sound and image, not to mention that this video fits in perfectly with their wider imagery and mythology, AND that at least half of what they do is self-conscious, intentional parody of how electronic music is perceived in the wider world of pop , I fail to see how it fits in with emarrassingly naive motherfuckery like the Journey or Wham vids.
It is just cheesy to me, but I am not a fan even though I respect them for their musical innovations.
I just heard about this one the other day. It’s a GO TEAM AMERICA type song but it is f*cking horrible.
http://mumbletomyneighbor.blogspot.com/2009/09/worlds-douchiest-douche-sings-douchiest.html
This list is incomplete without Men at Works “Down Under”. Come on, the video is terrible.
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You’re nuts for including “Safety Dance” in this list. One of the most buoyant and original videos of its time. Truly unique.
I am a little nuts.
Where is Dio- Holy Diver?
Kraftwerk!? Love that song and the video. Yea, it is cheesy, but there are millions of other worse videos out there. Like anything by Iron Maiden for instance.
Definitely some real winners, er losers, here. You should make a top 10 list for the 80s, 90s, and 00s since there are so many other horrible videos out that deserve consideration. A recent Family Guy episode featured almost the entire video of Dancing in the Street with David Bowie and Mick Jagger. I suggest you check it out if you haven’t seen it.
To me, the difference between and “bad” video and a top 10 worst video is in how painful or bizarre it is. Sure Vanilla Ice’s video is bad, but it’s at least somewhat stylish for early 90s. I wasn’t that put off by it, whereas Hasselhoff’s video was freakin’ weird and not in a haha way. The robots song creeped me out. I had to turn it off because my brain felt like it was going into a hypnotic trance. But hopefully that’s just me
Zlad on the other hand is hilariously horrible. I actually enjoy it. Still, I’m not debating that it deserves to be at #1, whether the artists intended it to be a parody or not.
Now how can you include Safety Dance
Video number 1,, Why they’re smiling ?
Wow, superb blog layout! How long have you been blogging for? you made blogging look easy. The overall look of your site is fantastic, let alone the content!
Look up Whip it by Devo… God awful!
For shame…. Kraftwerk is beyond criticism.
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