Firehose #156: The Five-Worst-Songs Challenge

Also: Second Sunday penciled in for 3:30 p.m. ET

Since you people apparently can’t get enough of arguing about music, and/or declaring loudly what songs and artists are OBVIOUSLY terrible, I’ve devised a little channel for your (and my!) creative negativity below. But first!

Tomorrow, Aug. 10, is the Second Sunday of the month. You know what that means! Paying subscribers will be invited to a Zoom call, tentatively penciled in for 3:30 p.m. ET, that may or may not be released later, but during which MAYBE we’ll announce a new treat that will soon be offered to some of our paying subscribers….

* Oh hey, speaking of potential announcements, what’s this job advertisement I see in the (for-paying-subscribers-only) Chat? From the inimitable Jason Mojica:

Greetings all. I've moved on from 2WAY (but The Moynihan Report is in good hands, I assure you), and am working on a new Fifth-adjacent project. We're in need of an experienced social media producer / community manager type. If that's you, please send your CV & portfolio to socials@ospreymedia.net

Thanks!

* On several recent episodes, Moynihan has touted the recent Epstein-related work of past guest Michael Tracey. On Thursday, Ol’ Hollywood got the decidedly independent journalist on his Report to talk about it:

Of Tracey’s relevant coverage I’ve consumed, the ones that interested most were “Julie K. Brown: Groundbreaking Epstein journalist, or ridiculous myth-peddler?”; “But wait, there's more: Julie K. Brown's growing credibility problem,” and “The Insane Multitude of Misconceptions About the Epstein Case.” As ever, the value added here does not require one’s agreement about the conclusions derived.

* As also mentioned on Episode #518, I wrote a Reason thumbsucker about the longstanding and lately quite interesting tension between U.S. foreign policy and rhetoric. Mag headline is “Putin and the D-Word: Donald Trump Calls Volodymyr Zelenskyy a ‘Dictator,’ But Not Vladimir Putin.” Twitter mini-thread here; excerpt below:

In January 2017, there was a Republican senator alarmed by the incoming Trump administration's potential softness on Russia. At the confirmation hearings for soon-to-be Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Marco Rubio lit into the former Exxon executive, accusing him of lacking "moral clarity."

"I asked you about whether Vladimir Putin was a war criminal, something that you declined to label him as," the Florida senator said. "I asked about Saudi Arabia being a human rights violator, which you also declined to label them….You said you didn't want to label them because it would somehow hurt our chances to influence them or our relationship with [Putin]. But here's the reality: If confirmed by the Senate and you run the Department of State, you're going to have to label countries and individuals all the time."

Conclusion: "When [those struggling for freedom] see the United States is not prepared to stand up and [say], 'Yes, Vladimir Putin is a war criminal, Saudi Arabia violates human rights,' it demoralizes these people all over the world."

What a difference eight years makes. Or even eight months—as recently as May 2024, the interventionist senator was tweeting that "Tyrant Vladimir Putin, who once again stole an election, uses his 'inauguration ceremony' as propaganda. Another example of an authoritarian dictator masquerading as a democratically elected leader."

And now? When asked on CNN in February how to reconcile his past fire-breathing toward Putin with the Trump administration's reticence to criticize, the secretary of state said, "My job working for the president is to deliver peace, to end this conflict and end this war….How are you going to get Vladimir Putin and the Russian Federation to a table to discuss even the opportunity, whether even to explore whether there's an opportunity for peace? You're not going to do it by calling them names."

Critics were quick to ridicule Little Marco for bending the knee to Trump. While there may be some truth to that dig, it misses what looks like a more momentous shift.

On January 30, 10 days after being sworn in, the secretary of state gave a wide-ranging interview to podcaster Megyn Kelly, in which the 2025 Rubio sketched out a foreign policy vision that would have been unrecognizable to the fresh-faced Cuban-American politician who first entered the Senate 14 years ago….

* This week, Aussie-Aussie oi-oi pal Josh Szeps (#25, #80, #103, #117, #196, #328, #423, #445, Members Only #231) posted his recent Uncomfortable Conversation with our own Kmele about race & spirituality & wokeness, and TBQF, I’m not feeling comfortable with the amount of male thigh on offer.

SZEPS WORLD TOUR - KMELE FOSTER on Race, Spirituality & 'Wokeness'

* Cleansing meteorology break:

Alert listener David Fourman found some video of Emma Parigi’s scientific work, but then cast his vote for competitor Vanessa Minotti:

Nominations for hot weather dudes also gladly accepted….

* We talked in #518 about Donald Trump’s axing of the Bureau of Labor Statistics chief, and recommended for commentary on such things people like Washington Post columnist Megan McArdle. Well, here’s what she said last week:

This move was so boneheaded, William Beach, who served as bureau commissioner during the first Trump administration, called it “totally groundless” and “a dangerous precedent” that “undermines the statistical mission of the Bureau.” […]

Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers matter tremendously in other ways. They feed into a great deal of market activity as well as vital social science, both of which are possible only if the numbers are trustworthy. The statistics are also, of course, one of the president’s essential guides to economic policy.

This guide is now telling the administration that it is moving in the wrong direction….

[E]ven if Trump managed to bully the guides into telling him what he wants to hear, what then? Eventually voters will look around and notice the truth: America is losing its way.

* I do a podcast w/ McMegan’s worser half, on which we also talked this week about the BLS B.S., in addition to other things (including the Billy Joel doc!). Here’s an edited lil’ rant from me:

* Did someone say Billy Joel? Obviously during all the recent excitement I went ahead and compiled a basically chronological playlist of the B.J. songs I like to hear. It’s longer than a Long Island poodle haircut circa 1978! Though it omits certain famous songs that we’ll get to later….

* Moar Moynihan Report: His show this week also interviewed psychedelic researcher Hamilton Morris, because why not:

* Extremely functional adult Bill Schulz (#79) has alerted me that the extended trailer to Ken Burns’s Revolutionary War docuseries is now up, and is encouraging some kind of costume watch party/shenanigans this fall. Which, yes.

* Reminder! American hero Busty Wimsatt has over the years painstakingly posted old episodes of the late, great Fox Business Network program The Independents over on the Paloma Media YouTube page. Here’s one on government secrets and conspiracy theories, featuring some old friends:

* Comment of the Week 1 comes from DawgInExile:

Moynihan you missed out! I saw Bryan Adams in concert when I lived in Istanbul, and it was rocking! He packed Besiktas soccer stadium. One big issue: the pitch was GA, and we were squashed in so tight that the dude standing behind me molested me for half the concert, and besides throwing elbows and crushing his foot with my heel there wasn't much I could do. I couldn't turn around and it was too loud for him to hear me cursing him. I was probably the only natural blonde within a 500 mile radius so I was messed with a fair amount, but that dude came awfully close to having to marry me.

Bryan Adams was in Istanbul to film the video for "Do I have to say the words" (aka Do I have to say a prayer). My first night back in the US, I had a bad case of Mohammed's revenge and some reverse culture shock, and in the middle of the night I was flipping through the channels and came across the Prayer music video and bawled. It still makes me teary, (sentimental fool). AND KMELE anytime you mention VR, I think of Bryan Adams wearing the huge vr contraption in that video. Song: not so great. Video: beautiful!

* Comment of the Week 2 comes from Chris:

Appreciate the Oyster Bay shoutout! Hope you enjoyed your time there Matt. Grew up in the little beach town Bayville on the northern part of the bay and we used to refer to Billy as our town drunk. His notorious drunken car crash (circa 2003) was right into my buddy’s grandmother’s house. She didn’t have a clue who he was.

Man, Oyster Bay got some money ‘round there! Also, one of my fave bits in the recent doc was Joel indignantly crying “fake news!” at reports of him having any D.U.I.s. It’s like, yeah dude, show me ANY cop on Long Island who’s gonna make that arrest; meanwhile, how many one-on-none crashes have you had?

Anyhoo, that’s a good segue to my aforeteased Five Worst Songs contest. While I am decidedly not a nabob of musical (or any other) negativity, and genuinely despise the category of discourse where I’M HERE TO TELL YOU THAT YOU’RE BAD FOR LIKING A THING, I will confess to having some fun thinking the occasional bad thought.

So: Here are the rules: 1) Using Wikipedia’s handy #1 songs of whatever year lists, sketch out an honest bloc of years where you without having to look them up know in your bones at least half the songs. My era on this is basically 1965-1994. This is your time-bracket from which to choose, since that’s when They Hurt You. 2) Either from those lists or ear-singed memory, make a list of THE five worst #1 songs, according to your own heart & earholes. 3) Try to avoid gimmick songs (“Disco Duck,” “Macarena,” etc.), and try to privilege songs from actual artists of note. 4) Put this information in the comments! Where, I am predicting, I will express genuine fondness for at least one of your five, because my heart swelled three times its size that day when they invented popular music. (No lie, I adore “You Light Up My Life.”) As, no doubt, many of you will express fondness for these abominations:

5) “We Built This City.” Basic Bitch answer, yes, but someone’s always playing corporation games!

4) “(I Just) Died in Your Arms Tonight.” Deserving for the parentheses alone. A chorus that makes me want to jump on a bed of razor blades.

3) “We Didn’t Start the Fire.” Even Billy thinks the music’s crap. Rock and roller, cola wars, I can't take it anymore!

2) “I Just Called to Say I Love You.” Possibly the most insincere & unconvincing love song ever written (he means it from the bottom of his heart!), with a truck driver’s gear shift key change to seal the deal. Partners well with the (non-number 1) “Wonderful Christmastime.”

1) “Sussudio.” At least “I Just Called” pretends to be about something.

OK! Let’s cleanse the palate with tastier walkoffia. Today a really good old band I used to play bass in more than two decades ago had a reunion, shockingly enough. Woulda been there to heckle (they, annoyingly, had gotten better *after* I quit), but have some camp-dropoff duties that won out. Anyhoo, this is a successor band’s version of the tune we used to close with, though in fairness my high harmonies were better: