for reasons you can make up for yourself, imagine you're a prisoner of something for some reason and you're forced into secluded room with only potted meat and saltines for sustenance, and a bucket in which to defecate. the form of torture is your choice: rednex' "cotton eyed joe" or aqua's "barbie girl", on repeat, turned up to concussive levels of volume.

suicide is not an option...

Erm...?


Ok, Cotton Eyed Joe.

When I was in high school, I was once hanging out in the theater basement, watching some of my friends who were rehearsing in their improv comedy club. For some reason, there was a lot of noise coming from upstairs, and being that I wasn't a member, one of the guys dispatched me to find out what the fuck was going on.

So I climb up the stairs and enter the theater, which was set for a stage adaptation of Dead Man Walking- the set was just an enormous square cement slab in the middle of the stage (it was set "in the round"). My friends in theater tech had effectively turned the theater into a fucking dance club, complete with my friends dancing on the slab, the stage lights repeatedly flashing, and Cotton-Eyed Joe blaring over the PA.

For that memory alone, Cotton-Eyed Joe is NOT CRAP.

Dude, I listen to Barbie Girl on purpose sometimes.

Cotton Eyed Joe, not so much. The first day at my internship a bunch of coworkers spontaneously began doing the Cotton Eyed Joe dance. Freaked me the fuck out.

"Cotton Eye Joe" for me too.....athough it is more frantic-sounding than Aqua's (presumably sole?) hit and would induce madness...it's a good thing this room is padded.

Barbie Girl is going to be pummelled here.


Can't I have Whigfield's "Sexy Eyes" instead? That song barely registers and I would begin to believe - consolingly so - that I have sexy eyes and am going to paradise.

I could still jam my fist down my throat, yes?

Dear god, no.

I'd have to take the dulcet tones of Rednex over that Aqua song.

Clearly, both are horrible, but the Aqua chick's shrill vocals and the song's grating bounciness are the deciding factors here. If I'm not mistaken, there is also a male vocalist in "Barbie Girl," singing in an unbelievably obnoxious pitched-down voice.

I cannot hear a few seconds of that song without wanting to gouge out my ears. It is--hands down--one of the worst things I have ever heard.

Compared to the girl in Aqua's screeching and "Barbie Girl"'s overwhelming obnoxiousness, "Cotton-Eye Joe" seems relatively innocuous.

Taken on its own, the Rednex song is inexcusably awful euro-horseshit. For some reason, I remember an MTV News clip with these Rednex people talking about how their one-song hillbilly schtick would be "zee next beeg theeng." I hope none of these buffoons ever made music again.

Also, if I'm not mistaken, Aqua are from Denmark. I like to imagine them hanging out with King Diamond. If he was singing "Barbie Girl," I'd change my vote.

Please, for me, make the RANK:

"Barbie Girl" by Aqua
"Cotton-Eye Joe" by Rednex
"Scatman (Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop)" by Scatman John

I can not listen to Cotton-Eye Joe without getting really really upset. Barbie Girl I can tune out.

Barbie Girl it is.

To be honest, I really don't mind either one

Barbie Girl.

I really liked the video. The tune just makes we want to hum along.

You can do a lot with potted meat.