John Lennon – ‘Birthday’

John Lennon and Paul McCartney frequently had creative clashes, which led to both band members somewhat resenting a lot of the songs that The Beatles wound up releasing. One of these was ‘Birthday’, a song that Paul McCartney felt inspired to write after he saw the rock ‘n’ roll film The Girl Can’t Help It. While McCartney was a big fan of what he wrote, Lennon was slightly more reserved.

“‘Birthday’ was written in the studio. Just made up on the spot,” said Lennon, “I think Paul wanted to write a song like ‘Happy Birthday Baby,’ the old ’50s hit. But it was sort of made up in the studio. It was a piece of garbage.”

Bob Dylan – ‘Ballad in Plain D’

Bob Dylan was always adamant about writing songs that were an accurate reflection of what he was going through in that particular moment. This means that a lot of his tracks are deeply personal, some so much so that it’s hard for him to look back on them, and one of these is ‘Ballad in Plain D’, which he wrote about his domestic issues with Suze Rotolo.

“Oh yeah, that one! I look back and say, ‘I must have been a real schmuck to write that’,” admitted Dylan, “I wouldn’t really exploit a relationship with somebody. Whereas in ‘Ballad in Plain D’ I did. Not knowing that I did it. At that time, my audience was very small. It overtook my mind, so I wrote it. Maybe I shouldn’t have used that.”

Phil Collins – ‘Burning Rope’

Phil Collins has always been a drummer keen on pushing the boundaries of what the instrument can do. His approach to rhythm is unique, and it’s led to a number of really out there songs. A lot of these have aged well; however, the song ‘Burning Rope’, Collins believes, is incredibly dated. He doesn’t like his approach to rhythm on the track, as he believes it’s far too over the top.

“To me, this song is a period piece. It doesn’t make it in the 20th century. I know there are people who like this music, but I just couldn’t get up on stage and play or sing this kind of material anymore,” said Collins, “I had a lot of tom-toms back then. The fill just keeps going down and down and down. I think I played this kind of thing back then because I didn’t like some of the material. I was trying to come up with ways to make it interesting.”

Roger Waters – ‘Point Me at the Sky’

Originally, when Pink Floyd first started making music, it was Syd Barrett who was at the helm and predominantly in charge of writing. When he left, it fell to Roger Waters to try putting pen to paper. He tried to stick with the style of music that the band had become known for, which meant being experimental and really pushing the boat out with their approach to psychedelic rock.

However, it turns out Waters didn’t have much of a penchant for experimental music. You can hear this on their track ‘Point Me at the Sky’, which he can’t stand listening to and has previously called “one notable failure when Syd left the band”. While he might resent the song, it helped him stumble upon the more elongated, concept-heavy music that Pink Floyd eventually became renowned for.

Paul McCartney – ‘Little Child’

There was a period when writing with The Beatles that things became incredibly regimented. The band would go into the studio, write music, have lunch, write some more music, and then go home. A structure can work well, sure, but it can also lead to the creation of songs that no band members are particularly connected with.

This is what happened with their track ‘Little Child’, as Paul McCartney said it was a song they wrote because they needed to work, not because they actually liked it, noting, “‘Little Child’ was a work job. Certain songs were inspirational, and you just followed that. Certain other songs were, ‘Right come on, two hours, song for Ringo for the album’.”

Radiohead – ‘Creep’

Has there ever been a band that hates their biggest hit as much as Radiohead hates ‘Creep’? They disdain this song’s success so much for a couple of reasons. The first because it became the only song that fans who came to shows wanted to see, and secondly, they thought it got the attention of the wrong kind of fans.

“We seemed to be living out the same four and a half minutes of our lives over and over again. It was incredibly stultifying,” said Johnny Greenwood. Additionally, when a fan called for the song at a show in Montreal, Thon Yorke yelled out, “Fuck off, we’re tired of it”.

Slash – ‘Sympathy for the Devil’

It’s always a bold move to cover an incredibly famous song, which is why Guns N’ Roses were divided on whether or not they should take on The Rolling Stones ‘Sympathy for the Devil’. Slash wasn’t too keen, but Axl Rose was adamant, and so the band piled into the studio to start working on it, with the lead singer’s primary critique for Slash being that his version of the iconic solo at the end of the song didn’t sound enough like Keith Richards.

“That was the last thing I wanted to do,” he said, “Keith’s playing is so awesome on that song that I didn’t want to even come near it, but I did. And doing so left me feeling even more pissed and put out than ever.”

Slash has said that the track is, in his opinion, one of the worst songs that Guns N’ Roses ever recorded, and one which he’d rather forget they ever made. “If you’ve ever wondered what the sound of a band breaking up sounds like,” he said, “listen to Guns N’ Roses’ cover of ‘Sympathy for the Devil’. If there is one Guns track I’d like to never hear again, it’s that one.”

Paul Stanley – ‘God of Thunder’

It wasn’t that Paul Stanley doesn’t like the song ‘God of Thunder’, but he hates listening to it because it was taken away from him. He penned the track and saw it as a real triumph, and so, excited to record the song, went into the studio and showed it to his bandmates. To Stanley’s horror, the track was taken from him and given to Gene Simmons to record, a move that he still can’t come to terms with.

“I was devastated,” said Stanley, “I was broken […] I brought the song in and I thought it was this signature song for me. We brought in a producer for many reasons, and one of them was to be the tiebreaker between Gene and I, because there certainly were times where Gene and I were at odds. So I played ‘God of Thunder’, and Bob goes, ‘That’s great, Gene is singing it’, and we go on to something else. And I’m just there, shattered.”

Angus Young – ‘Love Song’

AC/DC’s sound is pretty difficult to deny, and you can’t really imagine them playing anything else; however, in the early days, the band received a lot of pushback on their hard rock sound. The musical landscape was changing, and label executives said if they wanted to get airtime on the radio, they had to pivot. They did, for a moment, and it led to one of the worst AC/DC records of all time.

“I remember that song because the guy who worked for us at our record label told us that’s what was on the local radio at the time: very soft music,” said Angus Young, “He thought we should release that song, because it’ll probably get some airplay. I remember thinking, ‘Who in their right mind would want this to go out?’”

Noel Gallagher – ‘Sunday Morning Call’

Following their recent reunion tour, people are going to be pretty hard-pressed to say that Oasis are anything other than one of the greatest bands of all time. Night after night, they went to different stadiums and reached into their back catalogue to play a plethora of hits. They don’t have a bad song that could have made that setlist…maybe one.

Noel Gallagher has always been pretty vocal about the fact that he can’t stand ‘Sunday Morning Call’, so don’t hold your breath about seeing this in a setlist anytime soon. “Because it’s shit. I hate that song,” he explained, “I hate it so much [that] I left it out of the Oasis singles album. That’s how much I fucking hate it. And I wrote it!”