The Top 10 Worst Hit Songs of 2014

The Top 10 Worst Hit Songs of 2014

In the following few paragraphs, I take a look at the worst year of the 2010s for the Hot 100 and rip into the songs that truly made that year such a horrible one.

(this list was originally created on July 5, 2021)

Hey guys, welcome back to Fire's Flaming Hot Takes. Today, we have another worst list, the top 10 worst hit songs of 2014!

If there’s anything that has been fully solidified by this relisten, it’s that 2014 is far below the rest of the 2010s in terms of quality, making it the worst year of the 2010s for the Hot 100. For Hot 100 year-end lists, I almost always at least like half the list - likely due to me growing up in the 2010s and my music taste really being built around this decade. 2014 is...uh...well not that. It’s important to note that sometimes the amount I enjoyed a year for my personal life will also end up affecting my opinion on some of the music that year, since that can stem some both good and bad memories - it’s part of the reason why I liked 2016 more than everyone else. 2014 is definitely not that, since I remember that being a fun-filled year for me...but this year sure as hell isn’t showing that.

So why was this year that bad? Well, 2014 is after the Club Boom of the early 2010s died out, but before trap started to rise in full dominance, so what ended up dominating this year instead? Bland pop music. This was a boring year where somehow the most bland pop possible managed to become enormous, annoying, overplayed hits. Alright, so if the pop was bad this year, why not turn to the other genres? Well a decent chunk of the rap this year was not good. They were pretty much all beats produced by DJ Mustard, and while I was able to find a few gems to compete for my best list, a big chunk of them were just the same beat over and over again - as you will see on this list. And country was in its bro-country era. Bro-country is a subgenre of country that I rarely am able to locate any good songs in...they are all painfully generic with the same subject matters and same annoying instrumental choices. Yet somehow, this year was when country had one of its best showings on the Hot 100 this decade. So when you take the generic repetitive hip hop, the annoying and generic country, and the ridiculously bland and annoying pop, we got a year that really was not that good.

Overall, there were 53 songs that fell into my “mediocre tier” or lower...that’s over half the damn list! And given that I’m usually one that is able to like at least half of a year-end list, whether it be a pop-exclusive, country-exclusive, hip hop-exclusive, alternative-exclusive, or just a Hot 100 year-end list in general, that is very telling of the quality of this year. But enough rambling, as a rule the song must have debuted on the 2014 year-end Hot 100 list to qualify - so one certain 2013 repeat is going to get the full thrashing it deserves whenever I get to 2013 - which means now it’s time to tear into the worst of this terrible year for the Hot 100, starting with our dishonorable mentions...

DM #1: Katy Perry - Birthday (YE: #80, PEAK: #17)

I mean, I could just say that this is a rehash of “Last Friday Night” - a far better song - and leave it at that, but that usually isn’t enough for me to dislike it. So it all comes down to Katy’s high notes in the chorus which are super shrill and annoying. Look I’ll stand up for “Dark Horse” and “Roar”...this I cannot stand up for...next!

DM #2: Enrique Iglesias f/Sean Paul, Descemer Bueno, & Gente de Zone - Bailando (YE: #38, PEAK: #12)

It’s very hard for me to pinpoint why exactly I hate this song...but the best I can think of is that it all comes down to it being very boring when it’s trying to be fun. The boring production perfectly describes 2014 in my eyes - boring.

DM #3: YG f/Jeezy & Rich Homie Quan - My Hitta (YE: #58, PEAK: #19)

A slow, boring DJ Mustard produced dirge. It has not aged well in terms of production, and Rich Homie Quan sounds drunk, I don’t have anything else to say about this. This is almost “so bad it’s good”, key word being almost.

DM #4: Jason Derulo - Trumpets (YE: #61, PEAK: #14)

Why did Jason Derulo choose the fakest sounding trumpet? The trumpets don’t go well with this slick, R&B production, they have no momentum to support them. At least in AJR’s “Burn The House Down”, the beat is able to support the horns, even if it is still a terrible song. Again, this is almost “so bad it’s good”, key word being almost. And you’re telling me that Jon Bellion produced this!? Are you kidding me?

DM #5: Rich Gang f/Young Thug & Rich Homie Quan - Lifestyle (YE: #72, PEAK: #16)

Bad autotune, limp and pathetic beat, and neither Young Thug or Rich Homie Quan can rap on this song at all, with Young Thug slurring his words drunkenly and Rich Homie Quan making the most vague rhymes possible...yeah, this is horrible.

DM #6: Chris Brown f/Lil Wayne & Tyga - Loyal (YE: #30, PEAK: #9)

Chris Brown entices women to cheat on their boyfriends, and then once they do so takes the famous Shakespere quote “these hoes ain’t loyal” and uses it to say that the women are disloyal to their boyfriends even though they were dragged into doing so. What’s not to love.

DM #7: Kid Ink f/Chris Brown - Show Me (YE: #43, PEAK: #13)

On the subject of Chris Brown...we got this Mustard production that is so painfully generic it hurts. Also “you remind me of something, I don’t know what it is” - lyric of the century right here people.

Alright, on to the list proper...

10...I said earlier of how the country music this year was horrible...let’s take a look at one of the biggest examples of such...

10. Jason Aldean - Burnin’ It Down (YE: #63, PEAK: #12)

Okay...who the hell thought it was a good idea to add the EDM-oriented production to this? Jason Aldean said that this song was supposed to be a slow-burn R&B-oriented sex song...but I don’t know who the hell would want to listen to this. There’s a fine line between sounding relaxed and sounding lifeless, and Aldean has crossed it. Lifeless vocals in addition to a lifeless production that tries going for R&B-leaning but ends up EDM-oriented...you get a lifeless song. This is painfully generic - which is arguably the story for pretty much all bro-country honestly.

9...Guys...we didn’t need to make one of the whitest songs ever a hit...

9. Ed Sheeran - Sing (YE: #56, PEAK: #13)

Ed Sheeran managed to get two year-end hits this year...and while both are pretty horrible, “Sing” has always been the one I’ve found more atrocious than “Don’t”. Ed Sheeran’s falsetto in this song sounds awful. Add in the ridiculously limp beat...and would you look at that, Ed Sheeran is trying to make a “Blurred Lines” - already one of my least favorite songs of all time - just fucking terrific. This might not have the rapey lyrics to propel it to the same level as that catastrophe of a song...but it sure as hell has the production and vocals to make it nearly as unpleasant to listen to. And I know Ed Sheeran is trying to elevate the song into “good tier” by adding a guitar to the limp beat, but this is all before we get to arguably the most annoying part of the song...the chorus where Ed Sheeran sings his “ooh oh oh oh oooho” in the most irritating and obnoxious way possible...yeah this isn’t fun, it’s just atrocious.

8...Hope you enjoyed that brief break from the country with the bland pop...because now we’re coming in with another atrocious bro-country song...

8. Kenny Chesney - American Kids (YE: #73, PEAK: #23)

Now we get to talk about Kenny Chesney...one of the most generic artists in country today. The lyrics to this song are the obvious critic bait of nostalgia...and I’m not biting it. First of all, why is Kenny Chesney rapping? Somehow it is a trend in some bro-country songs to rap, which is not fun or charming, it’s annoying. Kenny Chesney is trying to give off a laid-back vibe here but his lack of ability to rap just makes the whole thing annoying anyway. And the instrumental is just a guitar loop with a melody that doesn’t wow or impress me in the slightest. The song is utterly soulless, it’s inoffensive but so inoffensive to the point of it hurting. This is trash.

7...And we’re not done with the country just yet!

7. Jake Owen - Beachin’ (YE: #91, PEAK: #26)

One certain critic put this song on their “best of the decade” list...and to this day I remain thoroughly confused, as in my eyes this is the worst country song this year. Again...why is Jake Owen rapping? Somehow he’s failing even harder than Kenny Chesney at getting the laid-back and chill vibe, it comes off as super annoying instead. And what do I even say about the production other than that it’s a generic bro-country production? And the lyrics aren’t anything special either. This song was already pretty terrible from the start, and the rapping completely destroyed this. Jake Owen, go back to making “Barefoot Blue Jean Night”, not...this.

6...The good news is that if you were tired of me talking about country, I’m happy to inform you that there aren’t any more country songs on this list...however really, pretty much all but 1 country song here was mediocre or worse. Now onto a song from one artist that had one big year and then just fell off the face of the Earth right after, but that was after this song, which is probably the worst for both acts, became one of the biggest hits of the decade...

6. Iggy Azalea f/Charli XCX - Fancy (YE: #4, PEAK: #1)

I’ll get Charli out of the way quickly...I’m comfortable calling this her worst performance in a song, trying to sound like she is bragging but instead comes off as annoying. And the fact that this is her biggest hit to date - good lord she has “Boom Clap” and “Forever” in her discography, come on! Now onto Iggy Azalea, an Australian rapper who found major success in 2014. She tries to sound like a thug but instead sounds annoying, from the fake accent to the utterly embarrassing lyrics - “my flow retarded” being just one example. All on top of yet another generic Mustard beat...yeah I hated this song back then and overtime it seems to have only gotten worse.

5...This next song, just like “Trumpets”, was almost “so bad it’s good” for me. Key word being “almost”. And coincidentally, these songs are both by the same artist...

5. Jason Derulo f/Snoop Dogg - Wiggle (YE: #40, PEAK: #5)

This song is an utter trainwreck. It is one of 2014’s many ass anthems, and this is possibly the most annoying one of them all. We got a production that ruins a good crescendo by that god awful chorus. The chorus line was literally delivered on a fucking recorder and that’s really where the conversation should end. It’s clear that this song isn’t taking itself seriously at all, with some lyrics truly as abysmal as “patty cake with no hands” and “go ham sammich”...and usually that would make me more lenient to this song...or at least it would if the rest of the song wasn’t migraine inducing! This is a joke of a song that really fails on multiple levels...Jason Derulo had “Cheyenne”, and 6 years later he would release “Take You Dancing”, yet America made this song a hit!?

4...I know I hold an unpopular opinion of really hating this song, but that said this song disappoints me greatly, on account of it truly squandering its potential right out the gate...

4. Bobby Shmurda - Hot Boy (YE: #54, PEAK: #6)

There aren’t many songs on this year-end I can point to that really wasted their potential as much as this. One that was super close was “Somethin’ Bad” by Miranda Lambert and Carrie Underwood, which only barely missed my dishonorable mentions and would’ve definitely made it in a stronger year. Look, I get the appeal of “Hot Boy”, I actually like Bobby Shmurda’s flow, he actually rides the beat pretty damn well...but that beat is almost certainly one of the worst beats I’ve ever heard. The production has a very unsettling alarm sound throughout, and there is a very annoying sound that sounds like a train’s whistle present throughout the beat that makes this production thoroughly insufferable. And given how Bobby Shmurda was later arrested on murder conspiracies and illegal firearm possession - he was released back in Februrary - it makes the lyrics very unsettling too. This song wasted so much potential it had, it could’ve been great. It lands here almost on disappointment alone to be honest.

3...The fact that “Ride” by Twenty One Pilots - a fantastic song that is among the best of 2016 - got comparisons to this song just offends me on every level

3. MAGIC! - Rude (YE: #7, PEAK: #1)

I can’t believe I actually liked this song at one point, ugh. Let me start off with the line “why you gotta be so rude”. Our vocalist here decided to sing that line in the most whiny fucking way possible. It’s annoying for the listener and it would embarrass your average 6 year old whining for candy at the store. And that’s before I get to the lyrics which are utterly despicable. Usually I would be able to ignore a song that may have bad lyrics if at least I like the production - which is why I like “Dear Future Husband” and “Treat You Better” despite their very blatant lyrical flaws - but “Rude” does not have anything in the production going for it, just a basic ass reggae production that was only done better by Twenty One Pilots when they made “Ride” two years later. So the “despicable” lyrical content? Well it’s all about the frontman asking this girl’s father to marry her and the father says no. So the brilliant frontman is like “fuck you bitch I’m marrying her anyway, we’re running away to another galaxy where you will never stop us bitch”. And this is all while the girl is showing absolutely ZERO signs that she wants to marry this man - and quite frankly given this toxic behavior, I hope she got away as soon as she could, and I hope this man never ends up with a woman with behavior this toxic. You know, I was actually starting to feel sorry for our frontman here until this point, because honestly who wouldn't blame the father for refusing his daughter to marry this horrible man. It’s quite fitting that after this song, MAGIC! never had another hit after. Good riddance.

2...I know a lot of people are going to be very angry by placing this song on a “worst of 2014” list, let alone in the top 2 worst of the year. And on the surface...it’s not the song you’d expect to be this high on this list, especially in a year-end this weak. That said this song still irritates every single part of me and...let’s explain why...

2. Naughty Boy f/Sam Smith - La La La (YE: #82, PEAK: #19)

Okay, despite Sam Smith’s pretty good vocals and nice string production, this song just irritates me so much. Sam Smith’s vocals in the verses are pretty good, but when he goes in his falsetto in the chorus it’s just so cringey and paints him in a bit of a pathetic light. The dark, sour mood of the whole thing kills the whole innocence and immature vibe this song is trying to go for. Additionally, the beat in this is super limp and slow-tempo, it drives me insane. But that’s before I get to the worst part of the song...that kid voice that plays throughout genuinely makes me angry that something so cringey could be so well-liked by the general public, I don’t get it at all. And given that Sam Smith’s other electronic hit this year - “Latch” - is the one that has stood the test of time and the one that is actually good, I’m not missing this song at all in the slightest.

1...At the end of the day, it had to go to this top spot, it had to go to the song that irritated me the most. It had to go to the song that somehow after all these years is still somewhat relevant. It had to go to the song that kickstarted the career of an artist who would only go on to create more controversial tracks and have her career almost entirely fizzle out by the end of the decade. And when you tack on the fact that she actually has made good songs later on, but this is the song that everyone ends up pointing to when you hear the artist’s name, yeah...no way in hell that this top spot was going to anyone besides Meghan Trainor, because this year, she deserved it!

1. Meghan Trainor - All About That Bass (YE: #8, PEAK: #1)

Well, I sorta like the melody in the pre-chorus compared to the rest of this song, but that’s really where my “praise” for this song ends because this song is an insufferable trainwreck musically, vocally, and lyrically that was one of the top 20 biggest songs of the 2010s for reasons that to this day I don’t know. I’ll deal with Meghan’s vocals quickly, there are points in the second verse where she goes into an annoying high note that does not match the production, and she sounds like she is mocking the audience in certain places. And speaking of the production, the bass line is weak as hell - ironic considering the song is called “All About That Bass” - the melody is beyond annoying, and the entire song is so downbeat and sour that it makes you question if this song is truly about body positivity. Except it is not, it thinks it’s about body positivity, but the lyrics in this song prove it otherwise. Instead of promoting body positivity, it’s promoting skinny shaming. You can try claiming otherwise, but when you have lyrics such as “I won’t be no stick-figure, silicone Barbie doll” and “Go ahead and tell them skinny bitches that”, it’s hard to deny that. And this song allowed Meghan Trainor to generate hits for several years, and she simply is not a good songwriter. She would constantly say that these songs are about something positive but in reality they only inflict more cultural damage. She said that she made a song about feminism when in reality it brings up the most stereotypical and toxic behaviors one could think of, and when she said she made a song about feeling confident about oneself it instead was a gigantic ego trip. The damage just keeps on multiplying here. And that’s the real ugliness behind this song, it inflicts a bunch of cultural damage from the start while simultaneously being an atrocious song musically, and it enabled the artist to continue to inflict more cultural damage. And as such, “All About That Bass” by Meghan Trainor is the worst hit song of 2014. And given how Meghan’s career has pretty much flamed out at this point, yeah let’s extinguish this song too. No one’s gonna miss it.

So I’ve dug into the absolute worst of a terrible year for the Hot 100, hopefully you guys see my point as to why this year was that horrible. That said, did this year manage to have anything redeeming about it? We will only find out soon, my best of 2014 list will be up in a bit.