Occasionally, a rock musician or band will dish out a hit with every intention of it being serious, only for it to take on some funny connotations. The following four rock songs from the genre’s past fit that bill, as they’re much more hilarious than their makers likely intended. Still, even though these songs are often the butts of jokes, they’re still really solid tunes. Let’s take a look!
Videos by American Songwriter
“Again” by Alice In Chains
The majority of Alice In Chains’ discography is golden, especially everything from Dirt. The band’s self-titled effort has a ton of grit to it, too. And despite Layne Staley’s addiction troubles, he still managed to maintain one of the best grunge voices of the era. The album opens with a few heavy-hitters before we get to “Again”. It’s a very menacing song for the first half, but that eventual “doot doot” bridge really gives the listener some hilarious whiplash.
“Troublemaker” by Weezer
Just about everything Weezer produces has an element of humor to it, but “Troublemaker” likely goes beyond what the band was expecting comedy-wise. This song from the Red Album is quite goofy and bit comedically pompous, and the juxtaposition between “I’m a troublemaker, never been a faker / Doing things my own way and never giving up” and the cute lyrics of the band’s most well-known song “Buddy Holly” are pretty funny to think about.
“We Built This City” by Starship
This 1985 song was quite a charting hit back in the day, and it’s all about celebrating rock music. However, despite the very honest intent to be an anthem, “We Built This City” has become a bit of a joke in retrospect. “Marconi plays the mamba” isn’t exactly a serious line, let’s be honest. It’s an unintentionally funny masterpiece, though, one that hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
“Bugs” by Pearl Jam
Eddie Vedder definitely concocted this song to be grating to the ears of their more “normie” fans, but the result ended up being much funnier than he likely intended. This entry on our list of hilarious rock songs features everything from the accordion to some Vedder-delivered spoken word lines about bugs being everywhere. I know Vedder must have known how funny this song was, but the real Pearl Jam fans were in on the joke, too.
Photo by Jeffrey Mayer/WireImage







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