The WORST Music Videos EVER Made!

How hard is it to make a music video? I mean, nowadays, there’s not much in the way of video budgets to play with, but back in the day, there were really no excuses. Bands in the past were always looking for ways to make their promos stand out on MTV, and let me just say that some bands were better at it than others.

Today, I feel like brightening your mood by introducing you to some of the most abominable music videos that exist. Some truly terrible, wretched pieces of film, mostly by people who really should know better.

What makes a video bad? Well, I can make it clear to you that money isn’t a factor. A cheap video is not necessarily a bad one at all, and in fact, you’ll see today that it’s the extra-spendy videos that tend to make our toes collectively curl the most. Basically, bad concepts married to poor execution result in videos that belong on this list. It’s all good-hearted fun though, and I should also say that some of the songs here are excellent, they just have really, really bad videos.

Let’s check these out…

Oh, Billy. What are those moves all about? Did this creepy clip make anybody want to ‘rock’ Billy? It in fact killed his career stone dead. As an ironic pastiche, it would be pretty on-point, but there is no hint of irony in Billy's gyrations as he skids about his ultra 80s room, from silk bedsheets to pink, dry-ice encrusted mirrors. Calm down, lad.

There is a great comment on YouTube about how somebody uses this video to break up family arguments, so in that way, its wretchedness has actually found a useful utility. Life after death, as it were!

How can two of rock music’s most obviously charismatic frontmen come together and completely dissolve each others’ vibe? This cheesefest from the mid 80s (Jagger’s silk ‘blouse’, David’s jumpsuit) is overwhelmingly horrible, from the teetering foot taps at the beginning to the excruciating dance/jog down the dark road at the end. 

No way is that a bunch of cars behind them, it’s sad crew members with lights! Was Jagger doing some Pepsi product placement with that super-awkward drink slurping moment mid-video? Did they really choreograph that bit where they take turns to glance round and scream at us? Did this whole video take 25 minutes in total to make?

So many questions. Obviously it’s time to watch it again…

I would have LOVED to have been sitting in the creative committee meeting - for this is surely the work of multiple troubled minds -  when this video was pitched. The first of today’s clips blending dogs with horrible CGI, Offspring’s shouty punk song Hit That comes complete with a hugely dodgy video featuring some character/creature/humanoid searching the night streets for his computer-animated dog.

In order to get the dog castrated.

Yes, that’s the big reveal, and I don’t suppose it’s surprising to tell you that it doesn’t land well. The graphics are hopeless - this was 2003, not 1994, people - and why is it set in what looks like London? The Offspring are Californians! But that’s nothing compared to the horror of the main character: an angry, purple-faced ‘street hood’ who has nothing to do with the band nor objective reality. Is this some MTV exec’s idea of ‘youth culture’? WHY is Dexter Holland always shouting? Would an actual human and canine duo not work better and work out cheaper?

Even if you don’t get the dry heaves at the very thought of Maroon 5’s nightmarish vocalist, this video is such a desperate example of male wish fulfilment and misfiring smugness that your stomach will definitely be turning by the end.

If you asked Chat GPT to make a sexy video about a troubling relationship, then its mangled AI would no doubt spew out something like this. (Don’t, though). There is no sexiness here, only deeply questionable choreography, horror and an empty vacuum where ‘vibe’ died and disappeared. Are Maroon 5 not meant to be a band? Where is everybody else? Ah, they stayed at home? Good call.

Blur sit around a council flat playing a board game which they then get somehow sucked into, enduring live farm animals, haybales, really bad sets and Keith Allen pratting about as only he can. There’s camping it up, and then there’s just faffing about and pretending to be all arch about it. 

Whether you liked the song itself or not, there’s an iffy classism at foot in this video, which was directed by 90s flavour-of-the-moment artist Damien Hirst. You can almost hear everybody involved congratulating each other about how smart they’ve been, but the overall video falls flat and cannot stand back up under its own Benny Hill-esque podge.

There is a word created especially for this sort of video. That word is ‘agony’. It’s a curious misstep from a band whose decision making is normally much less clueless and flatulent.

During the late 90s and early noughties, metal veterans Metallica went through a number of strange phases. This video stands as a document to one such phase, where the band went ‘alternative’, started playing Stratocasters, and spent a city’s worth of money on a really terrible video.

This is from a Mission: Impossible movie (which is why Tom Cruise shows up inexplicably climbing a mountain in the desert), a film which bizarrely already had Limp Bizkit doing a theme tune. In the 90s, one mega tie-in simply was not enough!

Anyway, this horror of a video has each band member dealing with ‘terrible’ situations that are mostly only terrible if you are an out-of-touch millionaire: Lars at least runs away from a swooping tornado (why does he wait so long before running? Can he not see it? It’s huge!); but the rest are just at it. Kirk dresses up in a leather suit and regrets it as he wanders the desert alone (presumably looking for Cruise); Hetfield simply drives a muscle car around San Francisco (guess who the leader is?), and bassist Jason Newstead? He gets pushed around a lot by glamorously dressed people at a society do. Sounds awful. Did he not get the boot not long after this?

It’s a bunch of embarrassing nonsense, and not even in a ‘so bad it’s good’ way. Run, Lars! RRRRUNNN!!!!

Did you ever want to see Johnny Cash acting?

Nah, I didn’t either, but I didn’t have much choice after I opted to watch this utter stinker of a video. From what I gather, the tune is about a chap (Cash) who somehow gets a brain transplant with…a chicken. Or something? 

I’m really not too sure, because my brain was sidetracked by seeing this most dignified of gentlemen at the nadir of his career, mumbling about like an extra in a Marx Brothers film. I mean, by all means watch it, but I guarantee you’ll just feel sad afterwards. Johnny Cash? Mugging it for the camera and ‘acting up’? Puh-lease.

It is time now for my second installment of Odious Music Videos That Contain Dogs and CGI. Really, this one is equal amounts hilarious and unnerving. The concept is brief: there’s a bunch of wild dogs cutting about barking and being dogs, except they’ve all got the faces of Korn band members.

That’s it. You’ll start off by laughing when you see the ‘buy one get one free’ CGI, but that laughter wears off pretty soon, to be replaced by a small but insistent sense of dull horror. Which never goes away.

Now, before you start, I’m very glad to see Megadeth kicking some ass right now, at the end of their careers. But I don’t want to see this sort of ass-kicking going on, like a Z-list Cobra Kai knock-off mixed with a pastiche of a 30 year old video game.

Like all recent Megadeth videos, the cringe factor is high. Even if you are able to block out the excruciating lyrics and focus on the (admittedly impressive) shredding, you’re still left with a horribly embarrassing video that falls flat on its ass and rolls around the ‘dojo’ wailing. This is not what we want from one of the Big Four! Metal and humour really need to walk a fine balancing act in order to avoid falling into a pit of rank rubbish. But hey, at least there’s no CGI dogs!

Unlike this video. Ah. Here we are with one of the most awful wastes of time and money that I could ever dare to show you. Motley Crue - an acquired taste for sure, but a band with a legacy and an aesthetic - somehow thought it would be super rad or something to make their video for Dogs of War look like a session of Guitar Hero 3 on the Xbox 360. CGI (aaargh!) versions of each band member flail around plastically like reanimated balloons, inside a CGI (Yyyeeeaaarrrgh!) aeroplane/gig venue.

Yes, a CGI plane that’s also a gig venue. Okay? And there are yet more CGI (&%$*!) dogs in this video too! What do rock music video directors have against regular, real-life dogs?

Here we are. This one takes the biscuit. Actually, it takes all the biscuits, and the tea tray and the kettle, and throws them all out the window. This is objectively the worst music video that anyone has ever created.

Again, this opinion isn’t based on the song (in all honesty, I’ve watched this twice in a row and cannot remember it), but on the idea and the execution of the visuals. It’s abominable.

Imagine James Cameron wanted to make a hard rock insect version of Avatar, but could only scrounge up an overall budget of 50p. Imagine then, that Cameron pocketed said 50 pence and walked away from the project, cackling like a villain. What’s left is what you’ll see on your screen now, if you choose to click the ‘play’ button.

I’m sorry in advance. I’m sorry that you’ll see all the members of Creed as CGI (AAAARGHHH!!!!) insect warriors. I’m sorry that the band seem to be taking the whole preposterous notion quite seriously, and I’m sorry that you live in a world where this sort of thing is allowed to happen.

We all deserve better. But hey, here it is! Enjoy!

I questioned at the start of this ordeal how hard it must be to make music videos. I feel like it can’t be that difficult, but maybe I’m just being naive, judging by this lot. And there are more, oh so many more. Below, you’ll find a list of Dishonourable Mentions, and I’ll sign off by passing on what I’ve learned from this experience.

Don’t mess with CGI and do not include dogs in your video. For any reason.