Artists whose biggest hit is their worst

[Groovy]

Fun., We Are Young is decent but Some Nights and Carry On were far better songs than it.

[thelegends]

Mariah Carey (We Belong Together). Can’t wait for the carnage.

[Groovy]

Gwen Stefani, even though I think Wind It Up is worse, Hollaback Girl is still pretty bad compared to her other hits like Sweet Escape and Cool.

[Groovy]

Harry Styles, Watermelon Sugar is a fine song but Adore You and Sign of the Times are far better than WS.

[salt]

2 kinda similar hits here: Weezer's "Beverly Hills" and Panic At The Disco's "High Hopes." Both bands had been pretty much irrelevant on the Hot 100 for over a decade after some decent-sized hits from their debut albums, but then pulled their biggest (and worst) singles right out of nowhere. As a kid I just found Beverly Hills super annoying and didn't bother to check out the rest of Weezer's discography until around 2012. As for Panic At The Disco, I liked most of their stuff leading up to 2018, but then they release their weakest album by far with a single that I just couldn't stand. And it became their biggest hit yet.

[Deleted]

"Can't Feel My Face" (although slightly annoying), "The Hills", "Starboy"  (both great songs), "I Feel It Coming", "Heartless", "Earned It", "Love Me Harder", and "Call Out My Name"  are all better than the unnecessarily overplayed "Blinding Lights". 

[Groovy]

According to Billboard, Taylor Swift's biggest song is Shake It Off, while I think LWYMMD is far worse, Shake It Off is bad in itself and she has so many better songs like Blank Space, Wildest Dreams, Style, Mean, Love Story, You Belong with Me, Teardrops on My Guitar, cardigan, Delicate, the 1, Mine, Out of the Woods, etc.

[Groovy]

Throw in Billie Eilish, bad guy is a good song but bury a friend, when the party's over and everything i wanted are better.

[Choco]

But how can you say with a straight face that "bad guy" is Billie's worst song? "my future" alone is way worse in every single way.

[After Minutes]

Nov 3, 2020 7:51:31 GMT -5 Choco said:

But how can you say with a straight face that "bad guy" is Billie's worst song? "my future" alone is way worse in every single way.

Yeah but we're talking about hits

[Private Dancer]

Let's see Havama by Camilla Cabello...well any song by her is horrible...

Anyways, someone said "We Belong Together" by Mariah Carey...chile the delusion is real

[SabrinaFan]

Most of Shawn Mendes songs that have become popular are crappy IMO, while many of his good songs iMO ("Something Big" and "Lost in Japan {Zedd Remix}") didn't chart very high. I'm mixed on "Wonder" though.

[SabrinaFan]

Nov 3, 2020 19:05:03 GMT -5 Private Dancer said:

Let's see Havana by Camilla Cabello...

Yes. "Liar" deserved so much better!

[Groovy]

One Direction, you can just replace any hit they had with What Makes You Beautiful specifically with Story of My Life or Drag Me Down.

[back2blk]

I'm not sure if I'm playing this right, but it never sat right with me that Blurred Lines was Robin Thicke's seemingly biggest mainstream hit, when I spent years melting to his crooning.

[Deleted]

It's not her worst song at all and she doesn't have that many hits lol but Demi's Sorry Not Sorry

[Lost In Musical Reverie]

back2blk Oh, absolutely! Even if I haven't listened to much of his material, "Blurred Lines" seems like an anomaly in his catalogue. Even songs in his disastrous "Paula" have more interesting production and much less questionable lyrics.

@mirza "Cool For The Summer", "Skyscraper", and "Confident" really deserved the honour of being Demi's most successful song instead.

[dremolus - solarpunk]

Imagine Dragons. Thunder, Believer, heck even Radioactive isn't good.

I'd also put Beck in this category. Even as someone who's not a massive fan, I know Beck can do a whole lot better than 'Loser'

[leonagwen]

Oct 12, 2020 20:20:08 GMT -5 Luckie Starchild said:

Bobby McFerrin - "Don't Worry Be Happy"
Chicago - "Look Away"
Billy Joel - "We Didn't Start The Fire"
Air Supply - "The One That You Love"
John Denver - "Sunshine on My Shoulders"
Anne Murray - "You Needed Me"
Al Jarreau - "We're in This Love Together"
Liz Phair - "Why Can't I?"

Billy Joel's biggest hit is It's Still Rock and Roll To Me, which topped the Hot 100 for 2 weeks and is a great song.

[Luckie Starchild]

Nov 27, 2020 5:07:34 GMT -5 leonagwen said:

Oct 12, 2020 20:20:08 GMT -5 Luckie Starchild said:

Bobby McFerrin - "Don't Worry Be Happy"
Chicago - "Look Away"
Billy Joel - "We Didn't Start The Fire"
Air Supply - "The One That You Love"
John Denver - "Sunshine on My Shoulders"
Anne Murray - "You Needed Me"
Al Jarreau - "We're in This Love Together"
Liz Phair - "Why Can't I?"

Billy Joel's biggest hit is It's Still Rock and Roll To Me, which topped the Hot 100 for 2 weeks and is a great song.

Okay, but "We Didn't Start The Fire" also topped the Hot 100 for 2 weeks and I think it's pretty annoying.

[Private Dancer]

Despite having a #1, Taylor Dayne's biggest hit is Tell It To My Heart and I personally am not crazy for that. Taylor Dayne's other top ten hits easily outmatch TITMH

[AmazDrag]

Ariana Grande - 7 Rings

[mkarns]

Nov 26, 2020 8:14:41 GMT -5 dremolus - solarpunk said:

Imagine Dragons. Thunder, Believer, heck even Radioactive isn't good.

I'd also put Beck in this category. Even as someone who's not a massive fan, I know Beck can do a whole lot better than 'Loser'

Right about Beck, though to be fair the pop charts have never done him justice, and he's never really made them a priority. Alt and to some degree rock, triple-A, etc. are his core formats (when he tries for radio at all). "Loser" seemed to many like something of a novelty hit and its pop success now looks like an anomaly.

[Groovy]

Surprised nobody said Rihanna yet, Work is terrible, I can find about 5 songs of Anti alone that are better than it.

[Groovy]

Blackpink, Ice Cream is trash and they have better songs as well as The Chainsmokers, they aren't the best artists and they have better songs than Closer such as Something Just Like This and Don't Let Me Down.

[Ｓｏｕｎｄｃｌ🕤ｃｋ]

Dec 1, 2020 14:46:12 GMT -5 Groovy said:

Surprised nobody said Rihanna yet, Work is terrible, I can find about 5 songs of Anti alone that are better than it.

(I'm late with the reply) because it's not her biggest song. We Found Love, Umbrella and maybe even Diamonds are bigger.

[musicfan134]

Try and take away my stan card, I dare you, but Kelly Clarkson. (See what I did there?) Stronger is by far the weakest single she's ever released, although it doesn't help that I don't like the cliche. I do appreciate what it did for her career though. I think an argument could be made that SUBG is her biggest hit, but Stronger was her longest running No. 1 on the Hot 100, so I don't think it's out of the question for that to count as her biggest hit.

[M1tchD]

Jesse McCartney - Leavin’
Nicki Minaj - Super Bass

[Groovy]

^Super Bass is truly not Nicki's worst hit, Starships, Beauty and a Beat, Anaconda, Fefe, Trollz and Move Ya Hips are all worst in comparison.

[Lost In Musical Reverie]

Jun 8, 2021 21:19:32 GMT -5 musicfan134 said:

Try and take away my stan card, I dare you, but Kelly Clarkson. (See what I did there?) Stronger is by far the weakest single she's ever released, although it doesn't help that I don't like the cliche. I do appreciate what it did for her career though. I think an argument could be made that SUBG is her biggest hit, but Stronger was her longest running No. 1 on the Hot 100, so I don't think it's out of the question for that to count as her biggest hit.

Fortunately, according to the GOAT list from Talk Of The Charts, "Since U Been Gone" is considered Kelly's biggest chart hit, with "Stronger" as second.

But yes, in terms of weeks at #1, I see where you're coming from, and I couldn't agree more. Never got the appeal of the song, and its generic composition and overcrowded loud production made it age very poorly.