The Greatest of All Time Pop Songs III: Katy Perry is a Serial Killer Edition

Back at it with part three of these "Greatest of All Time Pop Songs" list with numbers 21-30. Last time was sort of a mixed bag with mostly decent to good songs except that one Ke$ha song that was just.. amazing. This week was a little more all over the place with two songs I don't even remember ever hearing included.

21. Savage (no relation) Garden - Truly Madly Deeply

The 90's were truly an interesting time in music and 1998 was one of the more interesting years in music. Hip-Hop and R&B slowly getting stronger and stronger in the charts, grunge and adult alternative still had a strong presence and boy bands were becoming the next big thing. Then there's Savage Garden, two Australians who got four big hits, the biggest one here called "Truly Madly Deeply" from their 1997 self titled album. The song went on to be the 4th biggest song of 1998 just behind the massive 90's music star Shania Twain. This was one of those songs that you couldn't escape if you were alive during 1998, it was played on the radio non-stop. 

1998 was full of these slow, pop love songs with songs like "You're Still The One" by Shania Twain, "All My Life" by K-Ci & JoJo and "How Do I Live" by LeAnn Rimes to name a few. "Truly Madly Deeply" is still an interesting song 20 years later. It's oozing that 90's nostalgia charm that seems to be really popular these days and honestly I think it mostly holds up. The melodies are extremely catchy and the lyrics are extremely memorable so much that I remember a lot of it even after years of not listening to this song. Musically there's nothing that really stands out except for a short and sweet acoustic guitar solo that's fine. This song really is just all about the vocals anyway and the music does a good enough job to drive the song and support the vocals. It's not a song I could just put on at any time, but it's worth going back to every now and then. At least it's better that other song they did... To be continued?

22.3 (not 22.3, but...no nevermind) Doors Down - Kryptonite 

If I go crazy will you still call me Superman? Superman references are really overused in music, and here's probably the most famous song that uses one. I also noticed that almost all of 3 Doors Down's hit songs start the same, with guitar picking by itself. Anyway, if you're an adult reading this than no doubt you've heard this song at least 1000 times in your lifetime.

 Even though "Hanging By a Moment" and "Here Without You" are more successful songs, this is the song I always think about first when early 2000's rock comes up in topic. The late 90's and early 2000's were a point where rock music was slowly making it's way out of the pop music charts and post-grunge era was sort of the last hoorah for high charting rock bands. Lots of great bands that would go on to shape modern rock were appearing at this time. Artists like Animal Collective, The White Stripes, The Strokes, Blink 182, Radiohead and Arcade Fire were helping change rock music and take it to new and interesting places, while artists like 3 Doors Down and Creed were riding the last few years of the 90's love of post-grunge. 3 Doors Down is an okay band that helped keep rock in the charts for a little while longer before rap and R&B took over in the mid to late 2000's. "Kryptonite" is a fun, fast and catchy song that brings pleasant memories of a time where mainstream rock music really wasn't all that good. Thanks to the internet though, we were able to find more and more indie bands that didn't sound like the Post-Grunge we were getting on rock radio all the time. The early 2000's seem to be the last time that a very specific genre of rock dominated. With so much out there for us to listen to now, it might never happen again. 3 Doors Down and other Post-Grunge bands of the early 2000's could very well be the last time that was a thing. 

23. Katy Perry - Dark Hoarse*

This song was actually the top song when I first started following the Billboard Hot 100 back in late 2013/early 2014. I remember nothing could take this song out for what seemed like months until Pharrell's song "Happy" took over and ended up being the number one song of 2014. In Dark Horse, Katy Perry continues her famous formula of Verse-Chorus-Verse-Chorus-Guest Rapper-Chorus. This time she brings the super talented and not at all irrelevant in 2014 rapper Juicy J of Three 6 Mafia fame. Throughout the song Katy Perry is trying to convince everyone that she is a person you don't want to mess with or she will destroy you with her magic powers or something. Doesn't really make sense that she's calling herself a dark horse when she also has magic powers that she can destroy you with if you cross her. I don't think she knows what a dark horse is... I did kind of enjoy the "She eat your heart out, like Jeffrey Dahmer" line though. I'm starting to think this whole song is just about Katy Perry's secret life of killing men. 

24. Kelly Clarkson - Since U Been Gone (Since You've Been Gone?)

Back in 2002 there was a small show by the name of American Idol created to find a new music star. The winner of the first season was Kelly Clarkson and she went on the be one of the few stars from the show to actually crossover to the Billboard charts. Kelly Clarkson's fame is one that shows like The Voice have been trying to create again with not much success. Using her success on American Idol and her first album, she released the album "Breakaway" which I guess was her not so subtle way to show that she wanted to separate herself from the reality TV show a little more. "Since U Been Gone" ended up being a massive hit in 2005, being the 4th biggest song of the year here. It's a song that still holds up really well even more than 10 years later. Kelly Clarkson's vocals carry the song very well, with the softer verses exploding into the powerful and catchy chorus eventually leading into the even louder bridge. Just like the Savage Garden song earlier, the music really helps drive the song and elevate the Kelly's vocals. Sadly for me, none of her other hits really stuck with me like this one. 

25. Britney Spears - ...Baby One More Time

One of the biggest teen pop stars of all time in her first big single of her long and strange career. It's easy to hate a song like this for it's stupid lyrics, Britney's weird pronunciation of certain words, and the cheesy-ass music. It all mostly works... at least for what I think it's trying to do. It's a strangely sexual song coming from a girl who's still in High School, but I guess that's normal for the music industry (Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, Michael Jackson, Justin Bieber). Besides that, it's a very memorable song from the 90's that everyone remember. That piano right at the beginning instantly takes you back to the 90's and transports you to the era of boy bands and blonde teen pop stars. I can instantly recall the ridiculous music video at the high school. It's tough to say if I would even like this song if it came out when I was older an actually had opinions on music, but for now I remember as a fun song from my childhood that's still okay to go back to for some memories. Surprisingly, Britney managed to make it through the tough life of teen stardom (with some bumps along the way) and is still out there making hits and maintaining her pop star status. I have to give anyone who can do that kudos, because most of those child stars sadly don't make it out okay.

26. Timbaland - The Way I Are

Timbabland's (yep) 2007 album "Shock Value" is one of the strangest things I've seen in a while. Every song of course features guest artists and it's really a who's who of of artists. Elton John, Fall Out Boy, The Hives, Justin Timberlake, Missy Elliot, OneRepublic are all artists on here. AND somehow we get stuck with this song featuring two unknowns Keri Hilson and D.O.E. This song is just really boring. I know Timbaland was a huge name in the 2000's, but I don't know how such a bland song managed to make it so high up on this list. I gotta listen to something else FAST.

27. Kelly Clarkson - Because of You

Kelly comes back to save the day from bad music. Honestly a lot of what I said about "Since U Been Gone" can pretty much be copied and pasted here. "Because of You" is another great pop song by Kelly that still holds up pretty good. It carries the same emotion that "Since U Been Gone" with the powerful choruses and the music drives it all well. It's the perfect showcase for Kelly's Talent. 

28. Jay Sean and some gross dude - Down

A nice return to the crappy heartless pop music of the late 2000's. Jay Sean is about as exciting as a cardboard box, but at least a cardboard box is useful. The auto-tune is very strong in this one, making Lil Wayne sound somehow worse than his normal self. Jay Sean tries his hardest to sound like he can actually sing, but it just doesn't work. This song is about as generic as a pop song could be in 2009 and it brings nothing interesting to the table, which makes it sad that it was one of the highest selling songs of 2009 AND 2010 (as if 2010 couldn't get any worse with Kesha topping the charts). Thankfully I can go back to forgetting this song exists now.

Black Eyed Peas - Where is the Love?

Black Eyed Peas first album after adding Fergie to the group was when the group really started to see chart success. Not really sure if it was because of Fergie or maybe also because slowly changing to a pop sound from a more funky hip-hop sound. At this point Black Eyed Peas were an interesting group that was making some cool music that felt different from other songs on the chart. They later went on to make some of the most annoying pop music of the of the late 2000's with terrible songs like "Imma Be", "Boom Boom Pow" and butchering a classic song with "The Time (Dirty Bit)". But before all that was "Where is the Love", a song that talks about all the mess that the United States was going through post 9/11. An inspirational song that asks of course, Where is the Love? Most of the topics brought up in the song were totally relevant back in that time period, but it's hard to hate a song that actually is trying to bring up and talk about serious topics and trying to bring people together at a time where everyone was on edge. It's strange to think a group that can make something this meaningful and powerful can go on to make a crappy song all about Fergie's body and use the line "Milk with my coco puffs"... then again they did make a song called "Let's Get Retarded" in the same album as "Where is the Love?" so maybe I should have seen that coming. 

30. Ed Sheeran - Shape of You

This song has only been about a year an it's already at the 30th spot, which goes to show the power of Ed Sheeran. I've talked about this song a few times before as it was number one on the charts earlier this year for a pretty long time. I really liked his album "÷", it was one of the bright spots of pop music this year, though "Shape of You" is one of my least favorites of the album. It's still a good song and I don't mind listening to it when i'm going through the album at all. I still think it feels kind of out of place in the album and was just included to be a hit song and help sell his new record, but I think that's okay since the rest of the album is worth listening to. Ed Sheeran is one of the few big music stars of today that I actually like and look forward to listening to alongside artists like Bruno Mars and Adele. 

and that's all for this time, but here a preview of next time...

- You Got moves like a really old white dude?

- Wearing fur boots in a club?

- The biggest surprise on this list. 

- One of the most made fun of bands and songs of the early 2000s

-  PAUSE: (Shake That.)

- 2004 in a nutshell

- Rapey song with lawsuit

- Bruno before the charisma

- Hello Kitty obsessed Canadian pop star's first hit

- That song from the 90's you forgot existed.