Look, not every song is a winner. In fact, most are losers if you think of the charts as a competition. I don’t, but I do think of my personal tastes as such. And thus, we have a worst list to consider.
I’ve tried to be nice, I’ve tried to be constructive, but I am only human. The bad stuff so far this year has generally been uninspiring and miserable. Dregs of cultural monotony that failed to capture zeitgeist-y musical successes from the past decade. Everybody wants to be a star, and they’ve got the exact one they’re going for in mind.
Or they’re just tacky and bad.
To begin!
10. In Love With Your Girlfriend - Mckayla Twiggs
I feel bad about this one. Mckayla Twiggs is just one of many wannabe pop starlets who have released mediocre music in the wake of TikTok stars breaking out big. But unlike obvious mood board centrepiece Addison Rae, Twiggs is just not a star. I watched her first single become minorly viral online and was happy to forget about it, until I was served it again on Spotify and decided to see how the rest of her music turned out. Unfortunately, only that first single came close to anything listenable. Her EP WHAT A GIRL WANTS (2026) is a short, derivative dive into music built out from a single idea or hook. In Love With Your Girlfriend is the worst song on it.
It is an Ariana Grande song made by someone who only remembers her hits through bad mashups built for edits on social media. It is cheaply produced and poorly designed, with a poor excuse for a hook and vocals that slide up and down her upper register looking for a note to land on. Twiggs is not an untalented girl, but she is a formless pop star who is trying so hard at something she is not ready for.
This was an easy pick, but fairly low on the list because it is nothing to me. Alex Warren is a social experiment in how much Christian-lite music can we get on the charts if it sounds vaguely like Ed Sheeran, and the answer is too goddamn much. His voice is ugly, his song is worse, and nothing about this appeals to me. We all deserve better.
8. She Did It Again - Tyla, Zara Larsson
Tyla’s post-Water career has basically been a continual stream of good music that fails to really grab the public in a meaningful way. I’m not sure if she has real stans out there, which is an unfortunate thing to say about a starlet. Bliss should have been huge, and Chanel ended up whimpering out amongst more memorable music. She Did It Again has been about the same level of success, and it’s so much worse.
A big portion of the blame can be placed on Zara Larsson, who has had a great year thusfar with some very good (and some very bad) music. Larsson is a professional, and I would expect that she could find her way around a Tyla song quite easily. That proves not to be the case, as her try hard ways are on full display with showy stacked vocals and cringe-inducing lyrics. The two do not pair well together. At least, not with this.
7. Trump The Bill (Remix) - Sunshine Benzi, Trim
It has been really hard for pop audiences to let go of Nicki Minaj.
Since 2018, Minaj has seen her fame crystalize and collapse into a mess of pink American flags and nostalgia bait posts that obscure the fact her music has only gotten lazier and less fun. Her presence used to elevate other artists, but now she is just an exhausting relic with too many ties to bigotry and sexual violence. Pop radio’s former favourite rapper has made it impossible for audiences to forgive and forget. So we see a continual search for a replacement.
Rappers Sunshine Benzi and Trim have managed to gain a foothold in the war to replace the TROLLZ rapper with their collaboration on the remix for TRUMP THE BILL - technically released at the tail end of 2025 but having made real impact earlier this year. It was all over TikTok, leading to my choice to delete the app and stay off for a while now. Because it sucks.
A good beat and a clever sounding hook does not make up for the fact that this is all stuff we have heard before. Cliches and referential bars. Audiences ate it up because they’re lazy. More of the same is always better to them. But neither Sunshine Benzi nor Trim are particularly good at this. It isn’t that either are untalented, but by god, they’re just soaked in their singular reference. It’s exhausting and derivative and garbage.
The fact they’re doing so well is a testament to how much Mrs. Petty has screwed up.
6. hate that i made you love me - Ariana Grande
Ariana Grande resents her pop stardom so much it makes me question why she keeps making pop music. That probably isn’t fair, considering how much of her career over the past decade has been defined by tragedy, and her generally terrible fan base. I cannot think of another major pop star who is so consistently dismissed by their fans. The entitlement of those that stream her music is exhausting and has been for a long time. It is sympathetic in the abstract.
But Grande’s increasingly vocal frustration in the music she makes and the fans she sells it to is generally unappealing. I was fairly kind to Eternal Sunshine, to my chagrin, as it is a record I have come to see as representative of the worst instincts in pop music. hate that i made you love me is basically a continuation of the bitterness that permeated that record and was further highlighted by the obnoxious remix of Sympathy is a knife for the brat remix album (2024). There’s nothing introspective or exploratory about her perspective. She just is unhappy.
hate that i made you love me has none of the tricks that make a Grande song shine. It is smooth in the way yogurt is, in that the texture is the only redeeming quality. The song is sour. Grande used to glide across her range with joy and excitement. Now she seems unhappy to be singing at all.
Nobody is making her do this.
I wish there was something interesting to say about the biggest boy band in pop music. A group that has been defiantly successful for years now. But for all my efforts, I have never found a single thing BTS has done to be interesting or memorable. Not even in their solo efforts, which I tried really had to get on board with. These men are making just as much slop as their female counterparts, and I won’t pretend it is passable just because their fans mobilise well.
Hooligan is musical cardboard.
4. KGB - ADÉLA
ADÉLA does not have it. I’m sorry. She’s very pretty and sings well. That doesn’t entitle you to being a pop star. All her music walks the line between Katseye garbage and Ava Max runoffs. This is more Ava Max than is tasteful.
KGB is a song attempting to be funny and failing. It’s self-aware pop music designed to introduce ADÉLA to the general public after some buzzy singles and I cannot imagine a worst introduction. Jokes that don’t work and music that isn’t actually fun. On premise this is a track that assumes that music is a meritocracy and she has earned her spot because she’s studied hard. No. Pop success is about star power, and she does not have it.
I complained about Zara Larsson’s try hard ways earlier, but I want to be clear that she has what ADÉLA lacks. The ability to do something so cool and so effortless that you feel it in your bones. You can see the effort here and that is a problem. This is a student showcase by someone who is desperate for your attention. And in that way, it is very Ava Max.
3. Runway - Lady Gaga, Doechii
Speaking of Ava Max!
That isn’t fair. The only thing Ava Max-esque about this track, other than it not being very good, is Lady Gaga’s general vibe. And Max stole that years ago.
There isn’t much to say here that hasn’t already been said elsehwere. Lady Gaga stopped being interesting when she stopped being transgressive, and everything since 2011 has been either awful or boring. This is boring. It is exactly the song you would expect from the premise of Gaga making a song for The Devil Wears Prada 2 (2026) and I can’t even be that mad at it. She doesn’t embarrass herself because there’s nothing to be embarrassed about anymore. This is not a woman or an artist we’re looking at, it is a corporate product.
The person I am mad at is Doechii. This woman was meant to be the latest in a line of interesting pop artists breaking through and bringing something new to the charts. Her work with SZA earlier this year is reflective of what that was meant to be. But while girl, get up. was interesting and introspective, Runway is proof that she’s quite comfortable selling out from time to time. I kept my mouth shut when Anxiety (2025) became a hit, but this is much worse. Doechii is at her best when her fire and energy is put into the music. She’s funny and weird and genuine in that oddity, and I hate to see it funnelled into garbage. Gaga is a bad influence.
Runway is a theme song to a movie I don’t like, so it is obviously at a disadvantage. But more than that, it is reflective of everything I hate on the radio. It sounds like Kidz Bop dance music. The kids must love it. Right?
2. Obvious - Chris Brown
I won’t be writing a review.
It came on the radio once and was bad.
Moving on.
I thought Internet Girl would be the worst song I heard all year. But PINKY UP by Katseye is just…abysmal. Not because it’s ugly and annoying. But because it’s a pathetic gasp of a song.
Even ignoring the lineup drama and accusations of racism the group and their management has faced…what is the appeal to this? It’s Cocomelon for tweens and those who think like them. Pop music can be brilliant and fun and thought provoking - or at least sonically appealing. This is the music equivalent of throwing an exploding lemon at a baby. Messy and bitter and painful.
Just awful.
And that’s the list. It was actually quite hard to put together. There’s a lot of songs I spiritually dislike but do not think are actually that bad in practice. And a lot I like but know are terrible. Compromise is always key!
Did I get anything on this list wrong?
No. Don’t @ me.
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