Songs that Normies Love that Real Music Fans HATE! 

Came here for the AVGN critiques, stayed for the music talk. Love these vids man!

I wore a Skinny Puppy "Dig It" shirt in highschool that caught some people's attention. They'd ask me about the band and what genre it was and I'd tell them "They make industrial music" and one of the responses was "Oh like Ramstein?" Lol

Never going to get over the fact that someone made a spider punk playlist and added enter sandman

I would add: Yes - Owner of a lonely heart.

Normies also don't take the time to go back and explore a band's past before that band became popular. They think that band just existed the day they discovered them!

When you said you took a thin "white" duke this morning I shouted "YOU'RE NOT A BIRD" at my computer screen.

When it comes to “normie” songs, one that stands out to me is Another Brick in the Wall Part 2 by Pink Floyd. Everybody loves the “we don’t need no education” song, but they don’t care about much of anything else the band ever put out, which is a huge shame because the rest of their catalogue is far more interesting. The same thing could honestly be said about Money as well. Both are great songs, but are FAR from the Floyd’s most captivating songs.

Not directly connected to this topic but it always drove me crazy when music casuals would claim to like bands and refer to their first top 40 hit as “when they came out” which often was after several releases and even in some cases ones on major labels. 🤬

I think I've heard bohemian rhapsody and Enter Sandman enough in my life time lol

Your discussion on Queen is exactly how I feel. I had two phases with them and in fact, the hits for me have now become as fresh as stale bread and the only Queen songs I have on now are the deep cuts which have aged better.

Great video, Josh! Agree with the takes on a lot of these bands. Sweet “OK computer” reference. As a R.E.M. stan, (bought the 25th anniversary vinyl re-release of “Up” last year- and I’ll do the same if they release “Around The Sun” in 2029) better for the unwashed masses to remember for “LMR” then “shiny happy people”. Was actually listening to a bootleg of a show I was at in ‘03- which I pulled from Napster back in the day.

Dabbling in metal, underground rap/hiphop, punk, EDM, folk and psychedelic rock scenes, mainstream pop fans are the *worst* with gatekeeping. It’s like the “trve kvlt” black metal fandom on PCP. Death threats, delusional fangirling and an unabashed following of awful humans are the norm for mainstream pop

I'm a huge DM fan.. own their entire discography, and seen them in concert numerous times 😄 but Enjoy the Silence is my favorite song!

As a Radiohead fan I'm gonna have to say it as it is. Creep is an amazing song and the only reason you hate it is because it's popular and the band doesn't like it and the whole thing about the lyrics not being as good as later Radiohead lyrics is just setting a stupid high standard to a teenagers writing skills

I love this! As someone who ran karaoke for 3 years in Northern Kentucky I can relate. It may be different by location but it seems as though people get stuck on a few songs from their generation or what they know & will not stray from that. It makes hosting karaoke very tedious & boring over time in my opinion. It's not always an easy job either dealing with drunken fools & knowing the exact songs certain people will add as soon as they walk in the door. I need variety. In the 3 years I ran karaoke I must've sang every random or obscure song available. Even many of them as jokes or if I lost bets (including a couple female vocal songs). The room goes dead when they don't know something. I equate it to being like a band who wants to play a song live off of their brand new album. The audience is waiting for that encore song moment. I absolutely agree with you that if I like a band I'm going to listen to more than just their hits. On the flip side to that though not every song is released on karaoke unfortunately. I have been lucky enough to find some rare songs I never thought would be karaoke songs along the way but then wondered why other songs were never available. You tend to hear a lot of older 1980s & one hit wonder 1990s songs in karaoke here. It's usually mixed in with a lot of country which I'm not the biggest fan of. I love rock & metal music & some of the deeper cuts from bands are greater than a lot of the same old hits that get crammed down our throats.

The thing is, we're ALL normies. The divide comes from each individual's sense of discovery. So, out of 100 people, I would say maybe 53 hold on to just those initial songs. It doesn't matter if they go further or not. They ARE more aware of their lack of wonder than you might think. They're walking through a party snacking off of a tray while the rest of us are holding out for the entrée. Their loss, our gain... but we're also more pissy about diminishing returns. "That steak is waaay overpriced and why is it cold? I liked it better when this place was a simple burger joint."

There are clearly some VERY big differences this side of The Pond. We get to hear loads of different tracks by Bowie, Radiohead, Queen, Depeche More (although here in the 80s they were written off as pretty boy pop stars until Enjoy The Silence when they finally started getting taken seriously) REM. I do love pretty much every track you mentioned though.

this is an amazing topic! also the gigchad thumbnail!!!! hahahaha

Song 2 by Blur definitely qualifies here.

I remember as a kid hearing Metallica's song One over and over and over again, to the point that I had to go out and buy the ...And Justice For All album. Once I heard Dyer's Eve it became my favorite Metallica song, and it even got me to go through more of their older albums. These days I can't even listen to the Black Album at all

Man I love R.E.M, especially Man On The Moon from a musical perspective that chorus hits every time.

Yeah these are the same songs you would here on the radio 24/7, and ive had the displeasure of having to listen to the radio. Thats why i hate them.

Was waiting for Thin Lizzy, the penultimate band for this.

Awesome Vid! Thank You very much for Your Work! Greetings from Germany

When I read the title of this video it makes me think of a question ive been asking for many years now, and that is, how come whenever I hear someone driving around with an amazing sound system in their car, they are always blasting the shittiest music that appeals only to the lowest common denominator of "music fans". Just once I would like to hear someone other than me driving around and blasting some pop/punk. It's just too bad that I don't have an awesome sound system of my own. Edit: I'm only a few minutes into the video but I suspect Radiohead's "Creep" will be on here. Edit 2: 9:51 called it, though it was rather predictable that this song would be on a list like this.

I grew up in the 80’s & 90’s. Back in those days, we would pop in a cassette or cd and listen to the whole album. I miss physical media. It’s sad that kids today are missing out on the experience of hanging out in music stores like Coconuts.

Normies often get hung up on dismissing a band as a "one hit wonder", without actually taking the time (as I do) to investigate the rest of the band's material to see if it is as good (if not better) than their one hit. And you know what? I have an entire album collection of these "so called" one hit wonders, and with only a few exceptions--it was money well spent. I found the rest of the bands material to be better than the one hit. Normies only buy what the AR guy at the label tells them is a hit, and judge bands only by that criteria without thinking more deeply for themselves what songs by a band are actually good

A song that DEFINITELY comes to mind in my eyes is Closing Time by Semisonic. Now, don't get it twisted, the song's not all that bad. The only problem I have with it is that it's essentially the first song people think of when I mention the band at all and I only have this complaint because that ain't how I got into that band in the first place. First Semisonic song I ever heard was Delicious and I found out about it from an episode of Friends that I saw a couple of years ago. Granted, discovering the band THAT way probably ain't any better than what I was just whining about in the first paragraph, but I love that song and definitely think more people should listen to it.

As a big Black Sabbath fan, I would add the Paranoid/Iron Man/War Pigs triumvirate. All stone cold classics, but Sabbath had so much more good music than just 3/4 of side A of one album.

No oasis wonder wall?

That's why I don't listen to the radio 😅

Recently saw that a lot of ppl know ministry only from revenge or work for love when literally their whole discography is amazing

zz top: la grange/legs pantera: walk megadeth: symphony of destruction van halen: jump

Cool video, but as a normie, I would have appreciated some suggestions for every artists of what I should listen instead to better understand theses bands !

As someone who grew up in the era of album oriented radio, I get where you are coming from as rock stations back then, played more than just the singles as a feature and in rotation. In Toronto Ontario Canada, we have CFNY which has a program for over 30 years, which brings into context, alternative music and other cool facts about more mainstream and underground bands alike. There are a couple of bands you had missed which I think needed to be mentioned. Korn with two songs: Got The Life and Freak On a Leash, which are both rock radio hits and the latter, I actually think is better than the other one. Tool with Sober and well, what else can you say about Tool? I like everything they have put out including all the weird sound collages, which should've been played on the radio in regular rotation, just to annoy people. Another band is Slipknot, with Wait and Bleed being the only song I hear on rock radio, when I listen to stations outside of Canada. Maybe Psychosocial and The Devil In I are also played in rotation, but Shit and Bleed is the champion and on top of that, I hate that fucking song and Slipknot are one of my 5 favourite bands besides: Tool, Metallica, Pantera and Queen. Oh yeah, good call on both Metallica and Queen as I also have no problem with playing deep cuts from both bands and talking about them with fans. So, I am in the middle of both sides and content to let the great unwashed and real fans argue.

Normies be like i love 80s music and only play Never Gonna Give You Up, Take On Me and Billie Jean on loop, and nothing else.

Back then, I was trying to find the other songs on albums that I think were more listenable than the so-called "hits." So we'll take the Awake album by Godsmack for example-- obviously Awake and Greed were the "hits," but I think Mistakes was the heavier song on there. It just had that sick doom/sludgy sound to it. 🤘

1:09 hahahah that's one of my late night thoughts.

I feel like (given your general dislike of the whole emo/pop punk/post hardcore genre?) the only other MCR song you MIGHT like would be The Foundations Of Decay. Because I hate it lmao. Gerard and the boys basically went "lets make a prog rock song" after10 years of hiatus and meh. I'll stick to Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge.

Let me assure you that you're wrong about the Punk Rock MBA - the dude absolutely loathes The Offspring. On a completely unrelated note, can we have an Offspring appreciation video? As that chick from Guano Apes once said, kuma yo, m'lord. Love your channel, dude.

Dancing with Ghosts new song "The Filthy Masses" has become a hit with normies.

The people who say "They LOVE Prince!" but only know the 3 songs that have been played to Death on the Radio...

Rammstein - Amerika listen to that.

I am honestly really surprised Smells Like Teen Spirit isn’t in here. So many normies love that song but don’t even know the true intoxicating world of Kurt Cobain. Smells Like Teen Spirit always sounds like the coolest song in the world when you haven’t heard any other Nirvana songs. Once you dive into their other songs, it’s a whole other world.

I would add "Smells like teen Spirit" to this list. I had moved to Seattle a few years ago and have encountered many Nirvana T-shirts worn by young girls who jusdgin by their appearance like k+pop. I am a huge Nirvana fan and unfortunately i pretty much confirmed that the person wearing the shirt couldn't name any song...

Normies: "Ah yeah, Genesis made all those fun 80s and 90s pop songs" Meanwhile me: listening to Supper's Ready for 23 minutes

I’m a diehard Nirvana fan, I’ve heard almost every single song they’ve made, I own every mainline Nirvana cd and more. Almost everyone loves smells like teen spirit, besides actual Nirvana fans. Kurt and the band hated the song and the fans hate people only knowing Nirvana for one song- but it’s genuinely a good song. Nirvana has one of the most shitty fanbases I’ve ever been part of, 90% of them hate smells like teen spirit yet it was the very song that introduced them to the band and led them to liking the band. It’s a masterpiece song, most people who hate the bands most popular song are cringe incels who are just trying to be different. (Which is sadly half of nirvanas fanbase 💀) also- Losing my Religion is an amazing song idc what anyone says, bohemian Rhapsody is a bit annoying tho

This is why it's so important to never judge an artist by their radio hits. Commercial success =/= artistic vision. Anyways, my ultimate choice for a great artist's obnoxious pop hit is NIN's Closer. I don't think Closer even remotely taps into NIN's full potential.

Can’t really disagree with your selections. Kudos for mentioning queens innuendo as well - the title track is their heaviest craziest offering, 7 mins of progressive metal, flamenco strumming and mental time signature changes, and a near death Freddie giving a vocal performance that defies belief. Bohemian rhapsody, it’s time to pass some sort of law to ban it from public forums. Maybe losing my religion is one of the few overplayed that never gets old, it’s folky charm and sheer sincerity of stipes vocal always get me, though you’re right of course, REM have so many great tunes, and invariably the best are not the singles - I’d humbly put my hand in the air for driver 8, finest worksong and world leader pretend. Depeche mode the same, whilst enjoy the silence retains is anthemic potency, you’ve got amazing album tracks like rush or clean. Btw, The b side to Tom Sawyer was witch hunt? Ah man, now that is a great song, spooky and ethereal prog rock with lyrics that a scarily prescient. Enjoyed this video, thank you for making it. Nice to see a vinyl copy of the queen is dead in back ground - they be another band where you get casuals saying, oh yeah, heaven knows I’m miserable now! Er dude, the track of the queen is dead, or the headmaster ritual, or the hand that rocks the cradle? So many great songs in such a short career span time wise.

My pick for normie Queen is "Under Pressure". Not the finest moment for either artist. "High and Dry" closely follows "Creep" for me when it comes to accessibility and radioplay.

Are these the Radio Friendly Unit Shifters Kurt was talking about?

Bowie's Let's Dance was his last record with a label that was trying to make him more commercial. Listen to Scary Monsters.

I would've thought "The Black Parade" was MCR's normie song

Change the title of this to Music Elitist Yells at Clouds

Was hoping for a topic like this for a while now. For a split second I thought you might forget about Tom Sawyer, although I'd say the normies have spread to Limelight almost just as much 😅😅

2 normie songs I absolutely hate are Welcome To The Jungle and Sweet Child Of Mine

Whenever I hear Rammstein played in clubs locally, it's always Mein Teil.

Hi Josh ❤

Run DMC's version of Walk this way feat Aerosmith was played on rock radio. For Queen should have been Killer Queen, or Your My Best Friend or We Will Rock You. Bohemian rhapsody is and always will be a classic that holds you slaps you and gently lays you down at the end. I get what your video is about though and your right there's so many other great songs by artists people only love one song from. Their loss is our gain.

Honestly Queen doesn't fit here. We Will Rock You, We are the Champions, and Another One Bites the Dust all remain quite mainstream to this day

Friday I'm In Love by The Cure, I love The Cure but I'd be happy if I never heard this song again.

I think these songs are the ones that get your foot in the door. They're overplayed because like three companies own almost every radio station in America and purposely just play the most popular songs over and over. Invisible Touch was the first Genesis song I ever heard when I was eight years old and I became a huge fan after that. Enjoy The Silence is still my favorite Depeche Mode song. I even love the Lacuna Coil version. Ooh, you know what Genesis song I really truly despise? Hold On My Heart. I hate it so much. I get annoyed every time they release another greatest hits album and they include that piece of treacly drivel.

Maybe it's because I'm not a MCR fan, but I'm surprised you chose "Helena" over "Welcome to the Black Parade." I figured the latter would be the more normie song because I hear way more people singing that for karaoke, but what do I know as someone who doesn't really listen to MCR? I'm mostly listening to indie rap nowadays, so I probably wouldn't know enough about MCR to pick out the most normie song, lol. I guess if I wanted to throw a personal pick out there for an artist of my choice, I'd say "lalala," by bbno$ would be the normie song that, while I still definitely enjoy, is not the best song that Alex has produced. I'd probably choose just about any song from bb steps or recess over that single which mostly got popular due to TikTok.

Some of these singles were my gateways into the bands because in my early teenager years I couldn’t buy albums whenever I felt like it. So I watched a lot of MTV. When they still played music videos. Enjoy The Silence was one of those. I fell in love with the video and song, then the album. But yeah DM has such a wide library and range of styles it’s madness to only listen to Violator. I loved Creep because I saw the video premiere and it was the first time I’d ever heard of Radiohead. It was also on the SFW soundtrack. I was a weirdo so it spoke to me. But then I heard/watched Fake Plastic Trees and realized that Creep was not representative of their sound. These days Creep is just a nostalgia hit. I still like the end of the song when he screams run. I don’t care to justify my opinion but I cannot stand Bohemian Rhapsody. I’m not big on Queen anyway. Under Pressure and We Are The Champions are good. I truly hate Rhapsody though. I can recognize it in .5-2 seconds and I have a visceral reaction to it. I enjoy Let’s Dance. Modern Love is fantastic, China Girl is too. Bowie actually covered that song to help out Iggy Pop and gave him some of the money he made from that album I think.

Funnily, Bohemian Rhapsody wasn’t always the big Queen song. It’s had a resurgence in the 1990s because of Wayne's World, but you were more likely to hear stadium anthem songs like We Will Rock You, We Are the Champions, and Another One Bites the Dust. Is Losing My Religion the only REM song getting radio play now? I’d think It’s the End of the World as We Know It (and I Feel Fine) would be their big karaoke song; (it’s more fun) and Everyone Hurts, The One I Love, Shiny Happy People, Orange Crush, and Man on the Moon used to get tons of radio play. Even in the 2000s they were still getting lots of radio play, especially on college radio stations. Maybe it’s just my radio station, but I feel like I hear Sabotage, Intergalactic, Paul Revere, No Sleep Till Brooklyn, and Brass Monkey way more than Fight for your Right. Not that they don’t play Fight for your Right, they just don’t play it as much as the other stuff. Was even listening to Intergalactic on the radio just a few hours ago. Enjoy the Silence I’m surprised to see, because Personal Jesus is the Depeche Mode song I always heard way more. Although looking at their RU-vid channel the official video for Silence has like twice the amount of views as the two Personal Jesus ones. They’re also still around, I remember hearing Wrong on the radio a lot in the late 2000s and early 2010s. It would be funny to hear someone doing Wrong at karaoke. I probably hear Paranoid Android on the radio more than Creep. I’m sure Creep is the bigger song, but it feels like Paranoid Android is the one I actual hear way more. Creep seems like a weird karaoke song too, Paranoid Android is the more fun of the two songs; Paranoid Android also got tons of radio play, and the music video was on MTV a bunch back in the ‘90s, so if you know Creep from the ‘90s you should also know Paranoid Android.

i hate to say it but Pink Floyd's "money" gets done to death on the radio

Not a karaoke song but Schism by Tool. Holy fuck I'm so tired of that song. I've seen Tool live like seven times and when Schism comes on, I go get a beer. Same for Rush and Tom Sawyer. Over it. Subdivisions is fucking killer. And for good measure, Run to the Hills and The Trooper. I have Eddie tattooed on my body and I will die on this hill. Never wanna hear those tracks again.

I thought david bowies most played song was changes

Bohemian Rhapsody is a great song. It's been working long enough and deserves a break imo. Don't replace it with we are the champions.

The blame needs to be placed right on the heads of RADIO CONSULTANTS, which injected the strict playlists as far back as the late 70’s. They and they alone are responsible for these songs and lists. It definitely has been affecting all the previous decades. Chuck Berry is now a one hit wonder who only did “Johnny B Goode”.

I'm a Losing My Religion guy with REM, I can't help it, it's their only good song I've heard. Don't worry, I felt your pain when you said Helena was the only MCR song you liked.

I would add A-ha "Take on me"

I wonder if bands actually hate their hits. Aside from Metallica - they're billionaires and Enter Sandman is basically a half of it. But I can see Rammstein being sick of Du Hast, but I might be projecting since I'm sick of it since 1999 as a die hard fan from back then. I also remember reading that Nirvana despised Teen Spirit, that's their Sandman I guess.

I'm a big fan of Seal, and there's that one song... the one from Batman? Yeah. Like, sure it's a good song, but isn't anyone tired of hearing it yet?

I thought that Welcome to the Black Parade was My Chemical Romance normie song?

Im surprised i cant dance by genesis and the black parade by mcr were not the normie picks .

Stacey's mom should be on a list like this

I love Tori Amos but Cornflake Girl is the only song I ever hear. Also Gorillas Dare, that was so overplayed on my local radio i started to hate it.

I have most of those songs.

I'd argue "I Wanna Be Sedated" is the Ramones song that is most overplayed and the only song most "normies" know by the band. It certainly the only Ramones song I've ever heard on regular rock radio.

I’ve seen Depeche Mode live 106 times. You are correct. I can do without ETS and PJ and JCGE….

I was expecting Sledgehammer to be on your list. Hope you gain more female subscribers Josh. 😀

Losing My Religion and Enjoy The Silence are dope. Blitzkrieg bop is boring as hell though. Edit: wtf Let’s Dance is great too and I love most Bowie albums. Cat People is a better track off that album though

Damn Josh your head looks bigger for some reason

I like what I like. The music taste of others doesn't effect mine. Calling people normies is cringy mr hairdye.

"Real music fans"

There are far too many normie-bait REM songs for my liking. Orange Crush, End of the World, that stupid tear jerker I forget the name of, fucking Stand...endless radio fodder...If I didn't like Stipe's voice and snark to begin with, the constant air play really made me hate them. They just came across to me as big time sell-outs, and I never looked further into their music because I couldn't get away from it to begin with!...This is not a personal attack - I totally agree with your entire list! I've been on the normie side of some of them, but a lot of times the side that wishes people had given some bands' other music a chance! For me, I would've added the Cure. Disintegration is the only album the vast majority of people who consider themselves "hardcore fans" even know, and that's a shame. Most of their early catalog right up to that album is a fantastic listen!...Yes, I was a goth chick in my youth, so I probably out-cringe you and anyone else here. ;)

My favourite band for 20 years has been CKY, and I cringe when people tell me about the song 96 Quite Bitter Beings. Just like Hammer Smashed Face by Cannibal Corpse since it was in Ace Ventura. Go away.

Miss Murder by AFI. Easily one of the 2 worst songs off December Underground played into oblivion by everyone. People act like it's their only song i swear.

Nirvana

Walk by Pantera. Not counting their pre cowboys stuff, walk is a bottom 5 Pantera song

You're hitting on every damn song that youtube reactor's listen to and get all excited about because they *NEVER* heard it before. Unless you are a mormon who just left that underwear cult I'm gonna have trouble believing you never heard Bohemian Rhapsody before.

Thanks Josh! Dig your videos!

Hot topic butt good video😃

This is a topic that really makes die hard music fans blood boil. While many of these songs continue being awesome… it’s still sickening. Example by my favorite band Type O Negative would be ’Black No. 1 (Little Miss Scare-All)’ or maybe ’I Don’t Wanna Be Me’. I think the latter became more popular thanks to spotify or maybe some zoomer tiktok thing, who the fuck knows. I feel similar thing happened to The Killers’ ’Mr, Brightside’.

Definitely Psychosocial

As far as i'm concerned, 98% of musicians and bands are either zero or one hit wonders. I'm not a normie or whatever that even supposed to mean, i just have the bar a little high i guess.

Everybody knows that the only good Genesis song is "I Can't Dance."

I mean Metallica is so basic, unlike Megadeth which had better solos, the rivalry won't die

nah man I still like chop suey