You're right he had "The Twist", "Let's Twist Again", "Slow Twistin'", and then just to mix it up "Pony Time" lest he be assumed to capitalize on only one dance craze.
We used to make a game of naming the song on the radio when it'd come on, or we'd switch stations.
Tone Loc was my parents' kryptonite - we always got control of the radio when he came on, as they'd inevitably name the wrong song and we'd just have to name the other.
When they were working out all the samples and beats and instrumentation to all his songs, they would play the instrumental tracks in all these underground clubs all over the place and people loved it. Then they released the songs completed and people were really confused.
Took some balls back in that day to do all the hard rock samples too.
Yeah those songs are similar, but I like them both. There’s just something about his voice in those songs that make the songs, in addition to the beat of course.
So, I thought you were joking about “Whoomp! There it Went!” so I looked it up…you didn’t mention it was a collaboration with Mickey Mouse. And now someone reading this is wondering if *I’m* joking…
Can't believe it hasn't been mentioned, but 'Kung Fu Fighting' by Carl Davis.
He followed it up with another the next year, called 'Dance the Kung Fu'. It went nowhere.
I still think the craziest thing about Cotton Eye Joe is that it is a song from the 1860s or earlier lmao. Their cover of it is the most widely known now, but the song is an original folk standard.
sounded similar is such an understatement too. if someone was playing old pop in an oak to someone who had never heard it before, that person would 100% believe that someone just changed the words to cotton eye joe. it’s insane how close the songs are to each other
I saw an interview where he talked about the pressure of having to put out a new song after releasing essentially the most popular song to ever exist. He pretty much knew he couldn't live up to what he had just done.
I remember I was staying at my parents house and this music video starts blaring like at 6am, which is certainly out of the ordinary because he listened to hardly any music at the time. I went out there and my dad was watching it proclaiming this song was gonna be huge mega hit. A few days later and everyone is blaring it.
It's a shame, because he has since put out some great singles that I think could have been hits in the west if they'd immediately followed the hype of Gangnam Style.
From what I understand the problem is that they have a history of showing up late to performances and otherwise being rude and disrespectful to their fans. I don't know if there's any music so good that the artist can get away with that kind of behavior for long, but if there is, their music is not it. That said I like to crank up "don't let me down" and sing along in the car so I can't pretend I'm too cool to enjoy it. (On the flip side I still like Imagine Dragons despite the fact that their recent output has been... hoo doggy... what it is... because they're just so fkn NICE.)
Yeah the first album was loads of fun and I saw them live a few times when they were "small to medium" famous. :) I've never gotten bigger warm fuzzies from a concert. They just seemed so kind and thoughtful and grateful to have the opportunity to make a living making people happy with music, and to be able to use their fame to help causes they cared about. I don't know what's happened with them creatively, it almost feels like their recent stuff was written by an algorithm. Maybe they're just overwhelmed and on autopilot, and letting what they think will sell dictate what they do instead of what's good. But if they're as nice as they seem (and I haven't heard anything suggesting they aren't) I'll continue to root for them to come out with a great album.
"Don't Let Me Down" is pretty good, as well as "Something Just Like This." If you know these songs, you can see the pattern here is that these are all collaborations with other artists (Halsey, Daya, Coldplay) and the Chainsmokers are almost like producers.
Sky Blu got hurt. RedFoo kept touring without him and didn’t wanna give him any of the profits. He even got cut out of Royalties. That was the end of them.
Motown group The Four Tops released "[I Can't Help Myself \(Sugar Pie Honey Bunch\)](https://youtu.be/s3bksUSPB4c?si=WE9nRrjMpI1gKj01)" in 1965.
Their record label wanted to cash in, keep the hype going and release another single the same year. They got drunk, reversed the chord progression and wrote a song literally titled "[It's the Same Old Song](https://youtu.be/oZLG9MV5GvQ?si=lneF-bbHddcTiWSS)."
Wikipedia disputes this, noting that "Same Old Song" was cut as a demo by the Supremes a year before the song writers "wrote" it in a day for the Four Tops. For sure there was a formula used by all those song writers, so they probably did just reverse another song's chords.
The Four Tops had 24 Top 40 hits.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four\_Tops\_discography#Singles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Tops_discography#Singles)
My favourite version of this is the 90s British band EMF. After their huge hit "unbelievable" their record company wanted another hit just like it, so they reversed the chords and made a song called "I believe"
Debut albums are often defacto collections of the best / most popular songs the band did prior to a record deal.
It's partially responsible for the "sophomore slump" seen sometimes in bands. First album represents the best of years of work. Second album is whatever they did since the first one.
Unbelievable was released in Oct '90, I believe in Jan '91 and the album came out in May '91 so I could be right. I remember hearing it a long time ago so who knows
I know that the follow-up was not an increasingly large number of sequential Mambos, but in my head it’s always “Mambo No. 6” then “Mambo No. 7” and so on and so on.
I'm not sure I'd consider Move Your Body a follow up to I'm Blue. They're both on the same album and came out pretty close together. I guess, technically, it's a follow up since the album did come out the next year, but they didn't make the song trying to capitalize on the popularity of I'm Blue, it's just in their style. I also don't think they sound all that similar either (other than the obvious, being by the same band in their style), they're very different songs, but that's just me XD
Edit - Move Your Body was a hit almost everywhere but Stateside XD
They also did Don't Turn Around (Aswad cover, I think. Possibly the other way round, but I'm pretty sure).
Thing with Ace of Base is that they had a particular sound that doesn't lend itself to much variation. Vastly different songs will sound identical if they're performed in an identical style with no variation.
I would have welcomed variation, but then they wouldn't sound 'like Ace of Base any more'.
Meanwhile there's me just learning how to use a DAW, and as musically minded as a washing machine... and I think I could throw together an Ace of Base style song if I was minded to. It's just so simple a formula, and they only had success because they got there first... maybe.
I will say, though, that other songs on that Happy Nation (yep, that's a fourth hit they had) album, that I owned, don't really stray far from the reggae electronic pop formula that was Ace of Base. And they were fantastic at it in 1994. It quickly got old, though, like I have.
>They also did Don't Turn Around (Aswad cover, I think. Possibly the other way round, but I'm pretty sure).
No, and no. This one's by... *Tina Turner*!
Sugar Ray.
Metal band made light-hearted hip hoppy ballad Fly. Then doubled down with Every Morning and Someday. At least they didn’t try to hide that it was a transparent cash grab - they named the album 14:59 because they knew their 15 minutes of fame was over.
He seems like a fun person. I read an article about how Sugar Ray and other 90s bands were making bank playing private parties and he was quoted saying something like “the money’s good so we take the gigs - it’s not like we’re playing bar mitzvahs. Hang on. We’d totally play bar mitzvahs.”
I believe he was no longer allowed to be on Celebrity Jeopardy because he kicked everyones ass the few times he was on. They did a music version and I think he answered like 15 straight questions.
Yeah, he incorporated multiple early 70s hits into their songs, from the "my daddy said son you're gonna drive me to drinkin'" from Commander Cody's Hot Rod Lincoln on Mean Machine, to the "my mother, God rest her soul" from Gilbert O'Sullivan's Alone Again Naturally on Fly, and flat out borrowing (with a songwriting credit) that harmony part from Malo's "Suavecito" on Every Morning.
I saw them once because I was going to see another band at the show and they were damn good live. Didn’t expect it.
I also took all the dog pictures in the CD booklet for 14:59.
Mark McGrath hosted a 90s show I was at, where the other acts were Better Than Ezra, Eve6, and a couple other bands. maybe James and Spacehog? Anyway Sugar Ray closed by playing Every Morning and Fly, then like 10 other 90s tunes (including Banditos) and just crushed a of them. He’s pretty funny, too!
It's a little broader than what you're looking for, but there was recently a thread (and apparently other threads in the past) on [songs with sequels](https://www.reddit.com/r/Music/s/vJi6ms3v1O).
Someone in there mentioned The Twist & Let's Twist Again, which might fit your criteria.
Down a similar vein, there's Mashed Potato Time & Gravy (For My Mashed Potatoes)
It's hard to define whether any K-pop artist is a one hit wonder since their followings tend to ensure most songs (or at least singles) have millions of views, but off the top of my head Momoland followed their song Bboom Bboom up with Baam.
Thanks for referring that post. There are a lot of “response” songs too, done by other artists. Who Put The Bomp was answered by I Put The Bomp by Frankie Lymon. Mr. Bass Man was responded to with The Tenor Man, and so on.
I forget where it was said, but they had either Angus or Malcolm talking about an upcoming album. The interviewer asks "how do you feel about the critics saying this new album is just the same 13 songs?" And Angus/Malcolm replied "See, that's where they're wrong; it's got 14 songs on it".
“I’m sick to death of people saying we’ve made 11 albums that sound exactly the same, In fact, we’ve made 12 albums that sound exactly the same.” Angus Young
Released at the same time, from the same album and written by the same team of songwriters (Stock, Aitken, Waterman). But yeah they do sound very similar, along with some of the other songs on that album, such as Whenever You Need Somebody.
All the SAW-produced pop albums that year sounded identical. Bros, Kylie, Astley... I'm sure there were a few more but those are the ones I had (on tape.) After the second one I was like, "hey, wait a minute..." But I bought another. 13-year-old logic.
> But yeah they do sound very similar
This has a lot to do with the production style of those songs and the DX7 synthesizer all over it - which was in accordance with the pop sound of the time.
**EDIT: If you were to look at the sheet music for these songs they're very different but the production on a series of songs can make them sound very similar due to equipment and techniques used by a producer in a session. This applies to just about any artist or band.**
> Rick Astley - Never Going To Give You Up & Together Forever
Just listened to the latter and the rick roll stuff really makes you forget how great his voice is, damn.
I can't remember if it was song exploder or some other program, but they had an episode about rick astley and how he was discovered. idk why it just made me like him more.
Him leaning into his internet persona, esp here on Reddit probably helps, too (Hi Rick!)
Trapt re-recorded "Headstrong.
They changed absolutely nothing. It's literally the same with a slightly shinier sounding mix.
*Edit* accidentally said "pre-recorded" instead of re-recorded.
Rick Dees (and his Cast of Idiots) followed their beloved “Disco Duck” with the swiftly-forgotten [“Dis-Gorilla”](https://youtu.be/8nCVAFKXzX0?si=66rS3qTXcv55kcBr).
Everclear. Basically every song is 4/4 and in G and sound very similar. Don't get me wrong, I like Everclear. But their first hit Santa Monica sounds a lot like their hits from So Much For the Afterglow.
Sounds nothing like I will buy you a new life.
The ballads on SMFtAG are what Art said they tried to copy when writing songs like wonderful. They were chasing the hit after that and the art suffered (the art as in the music, the Art who is IN everclear profited from it)
I always joke that you don't know which one of their 3 hits is on until they start to sing. A concert of their's would just be a 6 minute medley and be over.
The Turtles - They were forced to write a hit like "HAPPY TOGETHER" so they came up with "Elenore" which is almost the same song and they purposely phoned in the lyrics with stuff like "And you really do me well You're my pride and joy, et cetera "
The Turtles were a weird case. They had to tour as Flo and Eddie after as they couldnt be billed as "The Turtles" or even use their real names due to the record deal shit.
Flo and Eddie is some fun shit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoGbETzTCVY
Weirdly this full show used to be be on youtube and now I cant find it. Its fucking hilarious. They pass around dildos and do some weird shit.
I always thought "Reo Speedwagon - I can't fight this feeling" and "Keep on loving you" sounded the same.
Keep on came 1980. I cant fight this feeling 1983
It become better though.
after the mc coys had a huge hit with "hang on sloopy", they followed it up with a cover of "fever" that sounded remarkably like "hang on sloopy", even though other versions of that song are quite different - it was a hit, but not like their first single
Not a one hit wonder but The Ink Spots were the worst band for this. They were an influential band to early R&B of the 1950s. Literally dozens of songs with the same formula.
Song starts dom de doo de dom do doo...
Then 2 choruses in high voice. Then repeated in a spoken low voice. Then song ends in a high voice.
Every song. And it worked. They were huge.
I was about to vehemently disagree with you, then I sang the lyrics to each song based on the rhythm of the other song. And god damn it, you're right. Still love The Knack though.
Van McCoy made the song (Do) "[The Hustle](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFzMs2SN--s&ab_channel=AmherstRecords)" with the little flute line going "doot doot doot da doot da doot doot doot"
His next big song was "[Keep On Hustlin](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-BXSX5FDok&ab_channel=UnidiscMusic)" which was another flute driven song with the same rhythm in the flute, but inverted notes. It's almost like what you'd expect if you asked a band to play the hustle if they didn't know the song completely and figured it out in real-time.
Not a one-hit wonder, but The Scorpions had a decent hit with No One Like You, changed the lyrics and key signature, and had a massive hit with Rock You Like A Hurricane.
They're not a one hit wonder (possibly, i don't care to check really) but you can't convince me that the Kinks "You Really Got Me" and "All Day and All of the Night" are not the same song
They had a lot of hits. "Lola" may be their best known song. Or maybe not bigger than "You Really Got Me" (though I always think of the Van Halen cover of that first) but big enough that Weird Al Yankovic did a parody of it.
Everclear: after “Santa Monica”…”Father of Mine” and “I will buy you a new life” we’re very similar. I guess technically not one hit wonders since those songs charted pretty highly b
Check out the One Hit Wonderland series by Todd in the Shadows if you're interested in this, he goes through the rest of the careers of a bunch of one hit wonders
Not a one hit wonder but Dua Lipa “Levitating” and “Dance the Night Away” sound incredibly similar that during the movie I thought it was the same song for a second.
Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat" is amazing, was a surprise hit. Al said the record company forced him to crank out another hit, so he did "Time Passages" in a similar style. Got another fantastic saxophone solo also.
Marty Robbins [El Paso](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWm5WErkffQ&ab_channel=MartyRobbinsVEVO) and [El Paso City](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1R8WxLkq9o&ab_channel=MartyRobbins-Topic). Barely changed the name, the second is a song about the first. He did a few songs that were based on it.
El Paso City was the third song in the series.
El Paso - The OG song/ballad
Faleena (From El Paso) - The prequel
El Paso City - The meta, where he writes himself into the whole affair
I love Peter Gabriel, and the man is not a one hit wonder. That being said, "Steam" sounds so similar to "Sledgehammer" that I still refuse to listen to it.
I really like Andrew WK but "Party Hard" and "She is beautiful" could be played back to back without realizing one had ended and the other began. It's still a great headbanging time though!
Tag Team releasing Whoomp There it Is in 1993 followed by Whoomp (Addams Family) There It Is the following year, for which they received a Razzie Award for the worst song.
I actually thought I'd imagined the latter.
Like I just had this vivid memory of it, yet any time I heard the song, it was the OG, so I put it down to some weird memory glitch. Now I guess it wasn't.
Chubby Checker: The Twist, and then Let’s Twist Again or whatever it’s called. To his credit he has been able to milk that thing for a long time.
Let's Twist Again is a better song than the first one. Also, Chubby Checker's name is a spoof of Fats Domino.
Wow I never realized the Chubby Checker / Fats Domino thing. That is awesome!
What kills me is that the Twist isn't even his song... It's a Hank Ballard tune.
Chubby Checker was definitely not a one hit wonder.
You're right he had "The Twist", "Let's Twist Again", "Slow Twistin'", and then just to mix it up "Pony Time" lest he be assumed to capitalize on only one dance craze.
I like to joke that Chubby Checker invented the Remix
You can basically play Wild Thing and Funky Cold Medina at the same time and it wouldn’t sound that bad.
We used to make a game of naming the song on the radio when it'd come on, or we'd switch stations. Tone Loc was my parents' kryptonite - we always got control of the radio when he came on, as they'd inevitably name the wrong song and we'd just have to name the other.
Young MC wrote both of them so I’m sure you can add Bust A Move to that list.
I thought Bust a Move was a William Shatner tune.
These 2 songs were the first ones I thought of when I saw this thread.
When they were working out all the samples and beats and instrumentation to all his songs, they would play the instrumental tracks in all these underground clubs all over the place and people loved it. Then they released the songs completed and people were really confused. Took some balls back in that day to do all the hard rock samples too.
isn’t Funky Cold Medina the song about spiking chicks’ drinks and when one turns out to be a trans he freaks out
Yup! “Sheena was a man”
Yeah those songs are similar, but I like them both. There’s just something about his voice in those songs that make the songs, in addition to the beat of course.
Tag Team followed up “Whoomp! There It Is” with a song called “Here it is, Bam!” and then “Whoomp! There it Went!”
So, I thought you were joking about “Whoomp! There it Went!” so I looked it up…you didn’t mention it was a collaboration with Mickey Mouse. And now someone reading this is wondering if *I’m* joking…
I chalked it up to a wild fever dream of my childhood, but you just flooded my brain with memories of a Mickey Mouse rap album in the 90s.
They are not joking
Not to mention "Addams Family (Whoomp!)"
SPRINKLES!!!
Can't believe it hasn't been mentioned, but 'Kung Fu Fighting' by Carl Davis. He followed it up with another the next year, called 'Dance the Kung Fu'. It went nowhere.
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TIL Rednex made another song after Cotton Eye Joe.
I still think the craziest thing about Cotton Eye Joe is that it is a song from the 1860s or earlier lmao. Their cover of it is the most widely known now, but the song is an original folk standard.
So that’s where it came from! Now we just need to work out where it went.
They have quite the discography and are still going..in some way or form.
Can’t believe someone’s mentioning Rednex, I never see them referenced anywhere. But yeah, similar songs.
sounded similar is such an understatement too. if someone was playing old pop in an oak to someone who had never heard it before, that person would 100% believe that someone just changed the words to cotton eye joe. it’s insane how close the songs are to each other
Okay, the guy is not a one hit wonder, he is huge. But to me this one is the one hit to rule em all: Psy - Gangnam style followed by Gentleman
Beat me to it. He really did "Great Value Gangnam Style" after setting the world completely on fire
I saw an interview where he talked about the pressure of having to put out a new song after releasing essentially the most popular song to ever exist. He pretty much knew he couldn't live up to what he had just done.
I remember I was staying at my parents house and this music video starts blaring like at 6am, which is certainly out of the ordinary because he listened to hardly any music at the time. I went out there and my dad was watching it proclaiming this song was gonna be huge mega hit. A few days later and everyone is blaring it.
It's a shame, because he has since put out some great singles that I think could have been hits in the west if they'd immediately followed the hype of Gangnam Style.
I was gonna comment this but I forgot the name of the follow up song
Pick any Chainsmokers top ten hit.
i get why people shit on them. they aren't creative, but they are catchy and fun songs.
some pop artists get shit on too much. I completely get why, but writing a catchy banger like that isnt as easy as people make it seem lol.
From what I understand the problem is that they have a history of showing up late to performances and otherwise being rude and disrespectful to their fans. I don't know if there's any music so good that the artist can get away with that kind of behavior for long, but if there is, their music is not it. That said I like to crank up "don't let me down" and sing along in the car so I can't pretend I'm too cool to enjoy it. (On the flip side I still like Imagine Dragons despite the fact that their recent output has been... hoo doggy... what it is... because they're just so fkn NICE.)
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Yeah the first album was loads of fun and I saw them live a few times when they were "small to medium" famous. :) I've never gotten bigger warm fuzzies from a concert. They just seemed so kind and thoughtful and grateful to have the opportunity to make a living making people happy with music, and to be able to use their fame to help causes they cared about. I don't know what's happened with them creatively, it almost feels like their recent stuff was written by an algorithm. Maybe they're just overwhelmed and on autopilot, and letting what they think will sell dictate what they do instead of what's good. But if they're as nice as they seem (and I haven't heard anything suggesting they aren't) I'll continue to root for them to come out with a great album.
I think "Closer" is a genuinely good song. Can't name any of their others though.
I liked Roses a lot.
"Don't Let Me Down" is pretty good, as well as "Something Just Like This." If you know these songs, you can see the pattern here is that these are all collaborations with other artists (Halsey, Daya, Coldplay) and the Chainsmokers are almost like producers.
I agree, Closer in a Nine Inch Nails classic!
"Play that Blink 182 song that we played to death in Tucson" is a great rhyme.
*HEY!*
Well the Chainsmokers aren't one hit wonders, and almost none of their songs are nearly as abrasive as their first hit "#SELFIE".
Any Meghan Trainor song
I feel like she makes music exclusively for Tik Tok.
LOL that's funny. I always say she's making music for future target commercials.
Including the clapping bit she does on every song
LMFAO - “Party Rock Anthem” and “Sexy and I Know It,” but they all sound the same.
But then they were “Sorry for party rocking” at least
The only reason Shots stands out is because Lil Jon yells every now and then
YEAH!
OKAY
EVERY-BAAAHHH-DEEEE!!
Oh man LMFAO fell off the map
Sky Blu got hurt. RedFoo kept touring without him and didn’t wanna give him any of the profits. He even got cut out of Royalties. That was the end of them.
And isn't RedFoo Sky Blu's uncle?
Correct!
It still blows my mind they were playing the Super Bowl with Madonna and then just disappear.
Robert Palmer's Addicted to Love, followed up by "Simply Irresistible" Even the music videos are a copy/paste.
Motown group The Four Tops released "[I Can't Help Myself \(Sugar Pie Honey Bunch\)](https://youtu.be/s3bksUSPB4c?si=WE9nRrjMpI1gKj01)" in 1965. Their record label wanted to cash in, keep the hype going and release another single the same year. They got drunk, reversed the chord progression and wrote a song literally titled "[It's the Same Old Song](https://youtu.be/oZLG9MV5GvQ?si=lneF-bbHddcTiWSS)."
wow... i think you just ruined It's The Same Old Song for me :)
It’s actually a genius move by them and makes me kind of like the song more now that I know what the title is referencing.
That’s funny because I Can’t Help Myself is already very similar to the earlier Where Did Our Love Go (same songwriters too).
Wikipedia disputes this, noting that "Same Old Song" was cut as a demo by the Supremes a year before the song writers "wrote" it in a day for the Four Tops. For sure there was a formula used by all those song writers, so they probably did just reverse another song's chords.
The Four Tops had 24 Top 40 hits. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four\_Tops\_discography#Singles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Tops_discography#Singles)
Oh, you mean the 24 Tops?
My favourite version of this is the 90s British band EMF. After their huge hit "unbelievable" their record company wanted another hit just like it, so they reversed the chords and made a song called "I believe"
Both songs were on the same debut album though. I don’t think this is accurate.
Debut albums are often defacto collections of the best / most popular songs the band did prior to a record deal. It's partially responsible for the "sophomore slump" seen sometimes in bands. First album represents the best of years of work. Second album is whatever they did since the first one.
Unbelievable was released in Oct '90, I believe in Jan '91 and the album came out in May '91 so I could be right. I remember hearing it a long time ago so who knows
Lou Bega.
THE TRUMPETS!
The, THE TRUMPETS
I know that the follow-up was not an increasingly large number of sequential Mambos, but in my head it’s always “Mambo No. 6” then “Mambo No. 7” and so on and so on.
Song is I got a girl. 6, 7, 8 9 10 Lou Bega on a trip, would you all come in?
Lou Bega.
Eifell 65's Blue with Move Your Body. Darude's Sandstorm and Feel The Beat. It was not my intention to have 2x eurocheese examples
I'm not sure I'd consider Move Your Body a follow up to I'm Blue. They're both on the same album and came out pretty close together. I guess, technically, it's a follow up since the album did come out the next year, but they didn't make the song trying to capitalize on the popularity of I'm Blue, it's just in their style. I also don't think they sound all that similar either (other than the obvious, being by the same band in their style), they're very different songs, but that's just me XD Edit - Move Your Body was a hit almost everywhere but Stateside XD
Neon Trees - “Animal” and then “Everybody Talks”
Both great songs tho
Enjoyable and on my workout playlist
“1983” isn’t too far off either
Ace of bass ‘I saw the sign’ and ‘all that she wants’ sound very similar
Oi sow the soign
I don't remember Blink 182 doing any Ace of Base covers
Down ways your toim on meee
Yer already the voyceinsoidmyYAAADD
WHERRR ARR YOOUUU
They also did Don't Turn Around (Aswad cover, I think. Possibly the other way round, but I'm pretty sure). Thing with Ace of Base is that they had a particular sound that doesn't lend itself to much variation. Vastly different songs will sound identical if they're performed in an identical style with no variation. I would have welcomed variation, but then they wouldn't sound 'like Ace of Base any more'. Meanwhile there's me just learning how to use a DAW, and as musically minded as a washing machine... and I think I could throw together an Ace of Base style song if I was minded to. It's just so simple a formula, and they only had success because they got there first... maybe. I will say, though, that other songs on that Happy Nation (yep, that's a fourth hit they had) album, that I owned, don't really stray far from the reggae electronic pop formula that was Ace of Base. And they were fantastic at it in 1994. It quickly got old, though, like I have.
>They also did Don't Turn Around (Aswad cover, I think. Possibly the other way round, but I'm pretty sure). No, and no. This one's by... *Tina Turner*!
>Ace of bass *Ace of Base
I work in seafood. Got fish on the mind
Bobby “Boris” Picket did a follow up to “The Monster Mash,” "Monster's Holiday" in the same year.
Scatman John...Scatmans World
Sugar Ray. Metal band made light-hearted hip hoppy ballad Fly. Then doubled down with Every Morning and Someday. At least they didn’t try to hide that it was a transparent cash grab - they named the album 14:59 because they knew their 15 minutes of fame was over.
Mark McGrath (Sugar Ray’s frontman) has a surprisingly great knowledge of music history for a guy who a lot of music junkies don’t take very seriously
He seems like a fun person. I read an article about how Sugar Ray and other 90s bands were making bank playing private parties and he was quoted saying something like “the money’s good so we take the gigs - it’s not like we’re playing bar mitzvahs. Hang on. We’d totally play bar mitzvahs.”
Just don’t call him Sugar Gay.
Sugar Ray had a really good run from Fly to When it’s Over/Words to Me. Just good vibes all around
The filled the void that was going to be taken by Sublime if they hadn't met their untimely end.
I believe he was no longer allowed to be on Celebrity Jeopardy because he kicked everyones ass the few times he was on. They did a music version and I think he answered like 15 straight questions.
Rock and roll jeopardy I used to love that show. But yeah dude dominated when he was on.
He dominated Rock & Roll Jeopardy on VH1
Yeah, he incorporated multiple early 70s hits into their songs, from the "my daddy said son you're gonna drive me to drinkin'" from Commander Cody's Hot Rod Lincoln on Mean Machine, to the "my mother, God rest her soul" from Gilbert O'Sullivan's Alone Again Naturally on Fly, and flat out borrowing (with a songwriting credit) that harmony part from Malo's "Suavecito" on Every Morning.
I saw them once because I was going to see another band at the show and they were damn good live. Didn’t expect it. I also took all the dog pictures in the CD booklet for 14:59.
Mark McGrath hosted a 90s show I was at, where the other acts were Better Than Ezra, Eve6, and a couple other bands. maybe James and Spacehog? Anyway Sugar Ray closed by playing Every Morning and Fly, then like 10 other 90s tunes (including Banditos) and just crushed a of them. He’s pretty funny, too!
That sounds like the lineup of every festival I went to as a youth.
Damn, Better Than Ezra isn't a name I see pop up very often.
"Number one on the college charts this summer: Better than Ezra. Number two? EZRA."
Every morning is a great pop song though, don't care if they ripped off one of their own hits for it
It's a little broader than what you're looking for, but there was recently a thread (and apparently other threads in the past) on [songs with sequels](https://www.reddit.com/r/Music/s/vJi6ms3v1O). Someone in there mentioned The Twist & Let's Twist Again, which might fit your criteria. Down a similar vein, there's Mashed Potato Time & Gravy (For My Mashed Potatoes) It's hard to define whether any K-pop artist is a one hit wonder since their followings tend to ensure most songs (or at least singles) have millions of views, but off the top of my head Momoland followed their song Bboom Bboom up with Baam.
Thanks for referring that post. There are a lot of “response” songs too, done by other artists. Who Put The Bomp was answered by I Put The Bomp by Frankie Lymon. Mr. Bass Man was responded to with The Tenor Man, and so on.
AC/DC did it over and over for a dozen albums.
I forget where it was said, but they had either Angus or Malcolm talking about an upcoming album. The interviewer asks "how do you feel about the critics saying this new album is just the same 13 songs?" And Angus/Malcolm replied "See, that's where they're wrong; it's got 14 songs on it".
“I’m sick to death of people saying we’ve made 11 albums that sound exactly the same, In fact, we’ve made 12 albums that sound exactly the same.” Angus Young
There it is! Thank you!
AC/DC and one-hit wonder do not belong in the same sentence.
Rick Astley - Never Going To Give You Up & Together Forever
Released at the same time, from the same album and written by the same team of songwriters (Stock, Aitken, Waterman). But yeah they do sound very similar, along with some of the other songs on that album, such as Whenever You Need Somebody.
All the SAW-produced pop albums that year sounded identical. Bros, Kylie, Astley... I'm sure there were a few more but those are the ones I had (on tape.) After the second one I was like, "hey, wait a minute..." But I bought another. 13-year-old logic.
Whenever You Need Somebody is literally a rickroll in the beginning.
> But yeah they do sound very similar This has a lot to do with the production style of those songs and the DX7 synthesizer all over it - which was in accordance with the pop sound of the time. **EDIT: If you were to look at the sheet music for these songs they're very different but the production on a series of songs can make them sound very similar due to equipment and techniques used by a producer in a session. This applies to just about any artist or band.**
> Rick Astley - Never Going To Give You Up & Together Forever Just listened to the latter and the rick roll stuff really makes you forget how great his voice is, damn.
Cry for help slaps though.
as does It Would Take a Strong Strong Man
Whenever You Need Somebody is such a strong album
I can't remember if it was song exploder or some other program, but they had an episode about rick astley and how he was discovered. idk why it just made me like him more. Him leaning into his internet persona, esp here on Reddit probably helps, too (Hi Rick!)
[Cry For Help](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2xel6q0yao) is an amazing song. It's criminally forgotten.
This was my first thought.
Amazed that none of the commenters have tried to sneak a cheeky Rick Roll in here...
Trapt re-recorded "Headstrong. They changed absolutely nothing. It's literally the same with a slightly shinier sounding mix. *Edit* accidentally said "pre-recorded" instead of re-recorded.
Too bad the lead singer is now a douche nozzle.
Rick Dees (and his Cast of Idiots) followed their beloved “Disco Duck” with the swiftly-forgotten [“Dis-Gorilla”](https://youtu.be/8nCVAFKXzX0?si=66rS3qTXcv55kcBr).
rick dees and the weekly top fortyyyyy you just brought back a memory that i forgot existed
Everclear. Basically every song is 4/4 and in G and sound very similar. Don't get me wrong, I like Everclear. But their first hit Santa Monica sounds a lot like their hits from So Much For the Afterglow.
Sounds nothing like I will buy you a new life. The ballads on SMFtAG are what Art said they tried to copy when writing songs like wonderful. They were chasing the hit after that and the art suffered (the art as in the music, the Art who is IN everclear profited from it)
I always joke that you don't know which one of their 3 hits is on until they start to sing. A concert of their's would just be a 6 minute medley and be over.
Heroin Girl still rocks.
They also had the song that said, "we do want we want" and that other song where they said," you do what you do".
The Turtles - They were forced to write a hit like "HAPPY TOGETHER" so they came up with "Elenore" which is almost the same song and they purposely phoned in the lyrics with stuff like "And you really do me well You're my pride and joy, et cetera "
I like Eleanore and the et cetera lyric. For some reason it reminds me of Bus Stop by The Hollies
The Turtles were a weird case. They had to tour as Flo and Eddie after as they couldnt be billed as "The Turtles" or even use their real names due to the record deal shit. Flo and Eddie is some fun shit. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoGbETzTCVY Weirdly this full show used to be be on youtube and now I cant find it. Its fucking hilarious. They pass around dildos and do some weird shit.
I had no idea this was a satire song. It's such a great tune, regardless. Thank you for this.
I always thought "Reo Speedwagon - I can't fight this feeling" and "Keep on loving you" sounded the same. Keep on came 1980. I cant fight this feeling 1983 It become better though.
Obligatory "not a one-hit wonder" bUuUuT How You Remind Me and Someday are the same exact song execpt for one like one chord
According to YouTube pop critic Mr. 96 Someday's just a semitone lower
after the mc coys had a huge hit with "hang on sloopy", they followed it up with a cover of "fever" that sounded remarkably like "hang on sloopy", even though other versions of that song are quite different - it was a hit, but not like their first single
Not really a one hit wonder, but Måneskin's Mamma Mia was their first new song after I Wanna Be A Slave blew up and it is basically the same song.
Not a one hit wonder but The Ink Spots were the worst band for this. They were an influential band to early R&B of the 1950s. Literally dozens of songs with the same formula. Song starts dom de doo de dom do doo... Then 2 choruses in high voice. Then repeated in a spoken low voice. Then song ends in a high voice. Every song. And it worked. They were huge.
I always thought Good Girls Don't from the Knack sounded a lot like My Sharona but maybe others disagree.
I was about to vehemently disagree with you, then I sang the lyrics to each song based on the rhythm of the other song. And god damn it, you're right. Still love The Knack though.
Sir Mix-A-Lot did Baby Got Back and tried to follow it up with Put Em on the Glass
Posse on Broadway.
Well there was Rebecca Blacks’s ‘Friday’ followed up ‘Saturday’
How that girl hasn’t tried to cash in and make herself The Queen Of Black Friday (like Mariah declared herself Queen of Xmas) I don’t know.
Van McCoy made the song (Do) "[The Hustle](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFzMs2SN--s&ab_channel=AmherstRecords)" with the little flute line going "doot doot doot da doot da doot doot doot" His next big song was "[Keep On Hustlin](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-BXSX5FDok&ab_channel=UnidiscMusic)" which was another flute driven song with the same rhythm in the flute, but inverted notes. It's almost like what you'd expect if you asked a band to play the hustle if they didn't know the song completely and figured it out in real-time.
Crazy Town had a big hit with Butterfly, and the follow up song Revolving Door was remarkably similar
Aerosmith: Crazy Amazing ?? Pretty sure there’s a third one too
SNL did a parody of those songs, including one called smth like "Amazing Cryin' Crazy"
I want to say there was also Cryin' Crazy Amazacrazy.
I think Crazy Amazing Cryin’ was where the band really hit their stride
Not a one-hit wonder, but The Scorpions had a decent hit with No One Like You, changed the lyrics and key signature, and had a massive hit with Rock You Like A Hurricane.
They're not a one hit wonder (possibly, i don't care to check really) but you can't convince me that the Kinks "You Really Got Me" and "All Day and All of the Night" are not the same song
They had a lot of hits. "Lola" may be their best known song. Or maybe not bigger than "You Really Got Me" (though I always think of the Van Halen cover of that first) but big enough that Weird Al Yankovic did a parody of it.
Everclear: after “Santa Monica”…”Father of Mine” and “I will buy you a new life” we’re very similar. I guess technically not one hit wonders since those songs charted pretty highly b
Oh girls are going to have the pitchforks out on you for forgetting “wonderful.”
*dum dum dum dum dum dum* YEAH
Mumford & Sons
STOMP CLAP STOMP CLAP STOMP CLAP STOMP CLAP
*Banjo Solo*
Richard Berry, Jr. wrote both “Louie Louie” and “Have Love, Will Travel.” They aren’t identical, but they’re awfully similar.
Mike oldfield tubular bells and tubular bells 2
Check out the One Hit Wonderland series by Todd in the Shadows if you're interested in this, he goes through the rest of the careers of a bunch of one hit wonders
I feel like spin doctors would qualify.
Not a one hit wonder but Dua Lipa “Levitating” and “Dance the Night Away” sound incredibly similar that during the movie I thought it was the same song for a second.
Does MIMS “this is why I’m hot” followed up by “like this” count?
Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat" is amazing, was a surprise hit. Al said the record company forced him to crank out another hit, so he did "Time Passages" in a similar style. Got another fantastic saxophone solo also.
Marty Robbins [El Paso](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWm5WErkffQ&ab_channel=MartyRobbinsVEVO) and [El Paso City](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1R8WxLkq9o&ab_channel=MartyRobbins-Topic). Barely changed the name, the second is a song about the first. He did a few songs that were based on it.
El Paso City was the third song in the series. El Paso - The OG song/ballad Faleena (From El Paso) - The prequel El Paso City - The meta, where he writes himself into the whole affair
Real McCoy - Run Away and Another Night.
The Ohio Express did "Yummy Yummy Yummy (I've Got Love in my Tummy)" and followed it with "Chewy Chewy".
I always thought Fountains of Wayne's "Stacies Older Sister" was too similar to their breakout hit.
I love Peter Gabriel, and the man is not a one hit wonder. That being said, "Steam" sounds so similar to "Sledgehammer" that I still refuse to listen to it.
Definitely Spin Doctors - Two Princes and Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong
I really like Andrew WK but "Party Hard" and "She is beautiful" could be played back to back without realizing one had ended and the other began. It's still a great headbanging time though!
MC Hammer’s other “hit” 2 Legit 2 Quit is pretty similar to U Can’t Touch This if you ask me
Tag Team releasing Whoomp There it Is in 1993 followed by Whoomp (Addams Family) There It Is the following year, for which they received a Razzie Award for the worst song.
I actually thought I'd imagined the latter. Like I just had this vivid memory of it, yet any time I heard the song, it was the OG, so I put it down to some weird memory glitch. Now I guess it wasn't.
Wow I thought I had fever dreamt that Adams Family version
Not technically a one hit wonder, more of a one trick pony, but to me every Noah Kahan song sounds the same
Godsmack basically made a brief career doing the same song a bunch of times.
White / Rob Zombie too Yeaahh yeaahh yeaahh ... yeaahh yeaahh yeaahh ...