Author: MR90

The 12 Offspring songs that made the Modern Rock chart in the 90s covered a lot of ground. A surf punk tune about gang violence. A self loathing grunge anthem. An 80s style power ballad. A serious rave up about disenfranchised kids. A novelty song about a white guy obsessed with black culture (coming up real soon). And this. An anti-freeloading piece of junk that rips off of the most annoying song in the Beatles catalog, and starts with the line, “My friend’s got a girlfriend, man he hates that bitch.” On the plus side, the second verse flips things to prove these guys are equal opportunity anti-scrubs, and not just sexist. So there’s that.

Every generation of teenagers gets a popular cover song that infuriates an older generation. For me, that was the Lemonheads’ take on “Mrs. Robinson,” a track we’ll get to eventually, and one that caused liberal baby boomers to plug their ears with the nearest copy of the New Yorker. And then there’s this. A song that takes New Order’s iconic fusion of post-punk and disco and turns it into a nu metal wet fart. The song’s wikipedia page features a quote from Orgy’s guitar player saying he “expected more criticism” of their cover. Well, here you go dog.

#1,638
Marilyn Manson
“Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)”
Chart Debut: May 4, 1996
Chart Peak: 31
Artist Appearance: 1 of 5

Is Marilyn Manson’s Spirit Halloween-fueled cover of Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” actually the worst of the 1,638 songs to appear on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks in the 1990s? I suppose that depends on your appetite for unnecessary covers of 80s classics slathered in industrial butt goth spooky season vibes — a surprisingly crowded microgenre that the next song on this list is a proud member of as well.

Part of the exercise in compiling this list is to highlight how Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks, a chart that in the first week of January, 1990 featured artsy college rock acts like Kate Bush, David Byrne, The Psychedelic Furs, Laurie Anderson and The Ocean Blue (as well as Nine Inch Nails and the Red Hot Chili Peppers) transformed into something populated by conservative lunkhead bozos like Creed, Kid Rock, Korn, and Staind (as well as Nine Inch Nails and the Red Hot Chili Peppers) in the week leading up to Y2K.

As for Manson’s “Sweet Dreams,” it’s not only unpleasant to listen to, but at least partially responsible for a number of awful things, including (but not limited to): the career of a truly shitty human, the proliferation of snail’s pace, moody covers of hit songs that now permeate countless movie trailers, and the slew of WWE-makeup smeared AJ Soprano-core bands that dominated the Modern Rock chart in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Say what you will about Marilyn Manson, but at least we got one of the best-ever Onion headlines out of him . Can’t say that about Powerman 5000.