Funny / Todd In The Shadows One Hit Wonderland 2019

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Specials

Harvey Danger - "Flagpole Sitta" (1997)

• Todd's usual intro:
  Todd: Welcome back to One Hit Wonderland where we [air drums to the opening break]
• Describing the fad of flagpole sitting as "the Tide Pod Challenge of 100 years ago"
• He notes how the music video for "Flagpole Sitta" is the band dragging their equipment through various music scenes that completely ignore them, then they actually perform—in front of a single monkey.
• Todd compares the band's last gasp, King James Version, (unfavorably) to Radiohead's OK Computer. Todd noted that that band was definitely a one-hit wonder (with "Creep") before that release.
  Todd: One Hit Wonder-dom is escapable. If the "Creep" guys could do it, so could Harvey Danger. All they needed to do was record an era-defining masterpiece. [Beat] The flaws in this plan became obvious pretty quickly.
• Todd brings up a YouTube video of a 2001 mockumentary a high school kid made of Harvey Danger, and notes their star had fallen so much that they could readily be interviewed by a high school kid. He also notes the project supposedly got a D-.
  • He also notes that their reunion album from 2005 was pretty much a self-commentary on their career. Its last track: "Diminishing Returns".
• Todd describes the lead singer's career as a music critic and admits he's waiting to be contacted and told exactly why his review sucks by someone who's a much better writer, critic, ''and'' musician than him.
• "Did they deserve better?"
  Todd: Maybe a little.

OK Go - "Here It Goes Again" (2005)

• Todd credits the existence of YouTube—and his livelihood—on the song.
  Todd: Just think: Without OK Go, perhaps YouTube does not become the monopolistic overlord of video content, and I could be plying a more respectable trade like panhandling or insurance fraud.
• Hearing the opening to their first single, "Get Over It," and going
  ♪ Love stinks! Yeah yeah! ♪ ^note "Love Stinks" by the J. Geils Band
  • Somewhat justified by an anecdote involving his then-girlfriend's love for the band. When they broke up, Todd states that he quoted this song at her.
• Todd builds up OK Go's second album's second single, hyping up the low-budget, highly choreographed, single-take video that went viral… which is "A Million Ways."
  Todd: This one-take shot was a humongous viral smash on the Internet video platform we know and love — iFilm. And it racked up an amazing 300,000 views. … That's right, a whopping 1/18th of the views the Hydraulic press guy gets for crushing bowling pins.
• Todd claims everyone has tried the memetic treadmill dance at some point. To prove it, he shows footage from his POV on a treadmill — it shows his feet, a pan up to the staff desk at his gym, and then pans back to his feet walking slowly on the treadmill while "Here It Goes Again" blares in the background.
  Todd: Yeah, no, I'm not doing that, they're watching me. But I could if I wanted to!
• When trying to remember how the "This Too Shall Pass" song goes (the one with the Rube Goldberg Device video), all he can do it recite the Mouse Trap board-game jingle:
  "You turn the crank and snap the plank and knock the ball in the rubba-dub tub..."
• As Todd is describing the band's "decade-long transformation... from talented amateurs to money-grubbing burnt-out content machines," the images consist of footage from one of his early videos and his current Patreon page.

House of Pain - "Jump Around" (1992)

• Todd saved this song for last out of the many requests he had sold, for a very specific reason... The person who requested it had been a Patron for the shortest amount of time.
• Todd rapid fire rapping the entire first verse of the song.
• Todd theorizes that "Jump Around" just might be "The Song of The '90s". He assesses the competition:
  Todd: "Smells Like Teen Spirit"? It's fine. "California Love"? I mean it's good. "Stand Out" from A Goofy Movie? Look, they're all classic songs, they just weren't "Jump Around."
• Todd also highlights the shout-out to Joe Nicolo, a record executive who considered taking "Jump Around", but declined, only to turn around and pick up Kris Kross. He suggested that Nicolo may have stolen the song concept, but fortunately both songs got big.
  • Todd notes that, between House of Pain and Kris Kross, 1992 was a great year for "Jump"-themed songs, with enough room for success for both songs, as was 1984 (Van Halen's and the Pointer Sisters' "Jump") and a brief period in 2000 when Destiny's Child's "Jumpin Jumpin" shared the charts with Third Eye Blind's "Jumper". Cut to:
    Third Eye Blind:^note Well, actually Stephan Jenkins, the lead singer, but since the song is attributed to the whole band, and the joke is easier to explain this way... (Slow acoustic riff not designed at all for dancing plays) I wish you would step back from that ledge, my friend
    Todd: That song's not as great for jumping, though.
• Todd asserts that "Jump Around" can only be listened to with a beer, backed up by the fact that one just appeared in his hand. Unremarked on is the second beer on his music stand.
• Todd claims House of Pain's single topic - "I am Irish and badass" - reminded him of Gerardo (of the song "Rico Suave"), who also only had a single topic ("I am Latino and I sex good.")
• Todd takes a moment to discuss the fact that Everlast went on to have a hit song on his own with "What It's Like", making him a double one hit wonder. Todd's take on the solo hit?
  Todd: I have heard this song some 5 billion times over the course of my life, and I have yet to form an opinion on it. A true 5 out of 10.
  • Then again, DJ Lethal ended up joining Limp Bizkit. Them always singing "Jump Around" reminds Todd how much he hates that band.
• In regards to how influential House of Pain wound up being on Nu Metal:
  Todd: Jump Around was in Mrs. Doubtfire of all things, and they say that right after that movie, a bunch of really young people started showing up at their concerts. Did every single one of those kids start Nu Metal bands? I wouldn't discount it.
• The Stinger where Todd is still rapping the third verse and jumping around at his keyboard.

Paper Lace - "The Night Chicago Died" (1974)

• Todd closing the introduction by stating this is "the episode none of you were clamoring for" (referring to both the stated awfulness of the song and this being the first non-Patron-requested episode in awhile).
• Todd initially pretending that the song is about Al Capone killing the band Chicago (who Todd has previously expressed pretty pure loathing of in other videos), and admitting it might be for the best, since he feels '74 was their last good year.
• The Reveal that Todd conceived of and started researching the episode thinking Paper Lace's one hit was "Billy, Don't Be a Hero".^note Which was technically only a hit in their native Britain; in America they were beaten to the punch by another band covering it and taking it to #1 themselves. It's a song he actually enjoys as a guilty pleasure and because of the interesting subtext (a song about a young man going to war, made during the The Vietnam War). Instead he has to cover "a real blast of '70s lameness sure to make you irritated for the rest of the day!"
  Todd: I can't really tell you why this one is so much worse to me, because it's pretty similar to "Billy, Don't Be a Hero," same chords and everything. All I know is, few songs irritate me like this one.
  • At one point, Todd mentions that "The Night Chicago Died" was included on the album '70s Party Killers, a genre-spanning novelty compilation of some of the decade's most notoriously schmaltzy, overplayed hits... which also features Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods' cover of "Billy", as well as two other hits of '74 — Tony Orlando & Dawn's "Tie a Yellow Ribbon 'Round the Old Oak Tree" and Paul Anka's "Having My Baby" — both of which get mentioned later in the video. It all adds credence to the theory that 1974 really might be the worst year in music.
• When Todd realizes that, while having a real-life background (Al Capone's reign as crime boss), the incident the song talks about is entirely fictional, Todd mentions there's lots of other real-life Chicago disasters Paper Lace could've talked about, citing Great Chicago Fire (1871), SS Eastland Diasaster (1915) and Steve Bartman (2003).
  • The song's English writers playing fast and loose with history and geography, including starting off with the narrator's father being a cop on the "East Side" of Chicago, which would put his beat at the bottom of Lake Michigan (Callender and Miller later admitted they confused it with New York). Or Al Capone — a gladhanding, publicity-conscious guy in real life who always resorted to a bribe rather than killing a police officer and risking the law coming after him in revenge — ordering his gang into an all-out war with the CPD that leaves 100 cops dead. By the sheer scale of the carnage, Todd assumes "Generalissimo Capone" is trying to instigate a coup and have himself declared dictator-for-life.
• Todd flatly and awkwardly noting the song ends with kazoos and mimics them.^note Although as one comment note, there aren't actually in the song, instead being saxophones played at the same time the band sings.
• Todd showing an image of a "best of Paper Lace" compilation with only three songs on it.
• In addition to his judgment that Paper Lace seemingly did everything they could not to have a lasting career, Todd has an epiphany regarding '70s music in general:
  Todd: The perceived Baby Boomer wisdom always said The '70s were worse than The '60s for music, and I finally get it. It's not that the good music was less good. It's that your average music got so much worse. Like, it wasn't Motown anymore, it wasn't Garage Rock, it was shit like this.
• Todd’s sheer incredulity at the lyric “a hundred cops were dead”
  Todd: …A HUNDRED COPS! ONE ZERO ZERO!!!

The New Radicals - "You Get What You Give" (1998)

• Todd flat-out calls it one of the best songs of the 90s, and he's not alone...
  Todd: In fact, it's only grown more and more acclaimed as the years go by. The Edge said he was jealous of it. Joni Mitchell called it the only song in decades that really excited her. YouTube star Todd In The Shadows called it one of the best songs of the 90s. [caption: *FIVE SECONDS AGO]
• Before the hit: Gregg Alexander's solo stuff in the early 90s. It's such a messy Audience-Alienating Era for Gregg that Todd mostly lets it speak for itself.
  • This line from one of his songs; good Lord.
    Gregg: "I AM A JEW! A JEW! AND YOU'RE MY HITLER!"
    Todd: ...oh. Oh no.
  • Gregg just blatantly rips off the chorus of Foghat's "Slow Ride" for... some reason (complete with a lampshade-hanging "Here comes the lawsuit!"), and Todd can't believe what he's looking at.
  • Todd sums up Gregg's old look perfectly:
    Todd: I think maybe banking on Gregg Alexander's boyish sex appeal was also a mistake. Like, 'what if Beck thought he was Jim Morrison?' Well, now you know.
• Todd is surprised that the "failed followup", "Someday We'll Know", has actually has been covered by prominent artists like Mandy Moore (said cover even appearing on her film A Walk to Remember), Hall & Oates and America.
  Todd: This is so weird to me. I am not used to these failed followups getting any attention after they flop. There were no covers of "Dance the Kung Fu".^ExplanationThe failed followup of Carl Douglas' "Kung Fu Fighting", previously featured in One Hit Wonderland.
  • When praising the full album that "You Get What You Give" and "Someday We'll Know" came from, he calls it "definitely the New Radicals' best album". It was their only album.
• Ironically, years after insulting Hanson in his one hit as a performer, Gregg went on to write one of their songs:
  Todd: See, he did kick their ass... with awesome songwriting!

Van McCoy - "The Hustle" (1975)

• Todd takes a brief detour to discuss Van's early solo efforts, including his debut vocal album, Night Time is Lonely Time; it was produced by bandleader, conductor, choir leader, talent scout, and all-around industry fixture Mitch Miller of "Sing Along with Mitch" fame... meaning that, for a soul record released in 1966, it was hopelessly corny and dated. He even contrasts the syrupy and overdone title track with Sam & Dave's "Hold On (I'm Coming)".
  Todd: I mean, I guess there's always room in music for throwbacks, but, you know, I don't think he can be surprised he didn't take off trying to be Nat King Cole in a James Brown world.
• The song starts with some wordless harmonizing, which Todd compares to an angelic choir:
  Todd: God is a DJ ^note (referencing song titles by both Faithless and P!nk) and he is ready to boogie.
  • The first proper lyrics are a repeated whispered command to "Do it!" - Todd admits this is actually kind of creepy and refers to it as "Son of Sam voices".
    Todd: Do it. Get the gun.
• In regards to "The Shuffle" Van McCoy's follow-up hit in the UK, Todd is impressed... Not by the song itself, but by the fact the British had a Dance Sensation in Uncommon Time.
• Meta: Todd has had to re-upload the video four times. One of the postings was a segment of unedited footage, the fourth reupload was due to an error.
  Todd's Comment: Caught an error, and you know what... screw it, I decided to reupload a fourth time. I mean, why not, who cares at this point. Sorry to be screwing around with this so much, I genuinely hate it. It's been a frustrating couple of days.
  • As one of the comments points out:
    "The Hustle" is to Todd what "I Got You Babe" is to Bill Murray.

Asher Roth - "I Love College" (2009)

• In keeping with the "college party" theme of the song, Todd sets a box of Natural Ice beer ^note an inexpensive drink that was ubiquitous at college parties in the US circa 2009 on the piano, and kicks off the review proper by taking a sip. He immediately regrets it - the end of the review is a quick montage of him attempting to drink it and making disgusted noises.
• "Obama or Flo Rida, two equally important men" (In context he was speculating about what caused 2009 to have so many pop hits about partying- the optimism brought about by Barack Obama's election, or the fact that Flo Rida already had multiple hits on the subject in 2008).
• On Twitter, Todd revealed an extract of a conversation where he is doing research with The Rap Critic. Todd mentions that Scooter Braun (Justin Bieber's manager and the current owner of Taylor Swift's back catalogue.) managed to find a replacement white guy rapper following Asher Roth leaving his employ. The Rap Critic IMMEDIATELY guesses Lil Dicky, a fact that they both lament.
• Todd reveals that the song was originally based on a sample of the Weezer song "Say It Ain't So", then says that he prefers the non-sampled version for sounding better, as well as the sample not fitting due to it being a harsh, angry song ^note and while "I Love College" is full of references to how fun drinking is, the lyrics to "Say It Ain't So" are specifically against alcoholism. But he does concede...
  Todd: "Say It Ain't So" is absolutely a song you would hear some guy playing on guitar in the corner of a frat party.