ONE HIT WONDERLAND: "Disco Duck" by Rick Dees and His Cast of Idiots

I would like to see a One Hit Wonderland video on "Move Ya Body" by Nina Sky.

GUESS WHO'S BACK, BITCHES!?

Jordan Cline

Oh gosh, the way this connects two things from my childhood... seeing clips of Disco Duck on those ads for disco compilations, and KIIS FM billboards. I guess for the latter, I just assumed he came from the mythical land all DJs come from.

RumRay

As Stereogum’s Tom Breihan put it best in his review, “This manager obviously did the rest of us a favor, since we can now enjoy the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack without having to hit skip on “Disco Duck.”

I'm so sorry, I can't stop thinking about this stupid song: Did you know there was a kids Christmas album knockoff, complete with Santa disco dancing with ducks on the cover?? Peter Pan Records did some cheap unauthorized bootleg recordings of Sesame Street and The Electric Company at the time as well. This time they literally took Disco Duck and plugged the words "Merry Christmas" into the chorus with an even lamer Donald impression -- you can even hear the original singers in the background. It's a bit shameless. On YouTube if you're morbidly curious.

Justin V

To keep the disco theme going, it'd be interesting to see a Trainwreckords for the Village People's "Renaissance" - the album where they scaled back the outfits and all got new-wave haircuts. Outside of one good song ("Food Fight") that sounds nothing like them, it's one of the most painful attempts to stay relevant after the fad is gone.

Justin V

I am all for 45+ year old one-hit wonders featured on One Hit Wonderland; bring me that (time) horizon. Best of luck finding an adequate amount of footage!

Phoenician

I definitely thought this was going to be some kind of Rick Roll for the first 30 seconds at least.

Anirien

Disco Disco Duck It's really bad but it quacks me up!

Josh Liller

Surely he picked his name for a punchline: Rick Dees nuts. As in "wreck these nuts" and "Rick Dees is nuts."

Josh Liller

i'd definitely rather listen to this then anything by talentless hacks like Post Malone, Bieber and Shawn Mendes.

RedBedroomRecords

I know this is still 6 months off but if you're afraid you're out of Halloween One-Hit Wonders, have you considered "A Girl Like You" by Edwyn Collins?

Simon Ritter

I feel sorry for all of the dancers who had to dress up in those terrible duck costumes for the tv spots.

James

Okay, you can blame me and about 1 million 10-12 year olds that made this song a number 1 hit. We were still in elementary school back when it went to sixth grade and hearing a song with a Donald Duck sounding voice was funny. I hate to say it, but this song still brings a smile to my face and reminds me of a time when even Disco Duck could get on the airwaves. I will take this song over 90% of the junk on top 40 radio today, prove me wrong.

The song that Disco Duck reminds me most of is Baauer‘s Harlem Shake because: (1) it’s a song based off some weird jokey-joke, (2) it rides on prevalent music trends at the time (EDM drop in the chorus) that would persist on for a few more years (3) was inexplicably a #1 hit cementing the artist as one of the definitive one-hit wonders, and (4) is actually pretty catchy and memorable regardless of all that.

Franco del Rosario

They had "Not Gonna Get Us" too.

Jon Heiman

Great episode! There's a weird footage flash at 9:26.

Jon Heiman

God the girl at the front at 13:00 DOES NOT want to be there; you can TELL.

Pietro Gagliardi

"So far up their ass, all they know is shit" is QUITE a quote and I will definitely be stealing it.

Owen W

Not gonna lie, I’ve never heard of this song before, and when I read the title I thought this was an April Fools shitpost. This is a real song? A real NUMBER ONE SONG??

Christina Kelley

(Teenage Dream wins by a mile for me)

Shiny Skunk

My father remembers Disco Duck. I didn't believe him for the longest time.

re: the poll. Poker Face is one of my favorite pop stars releasing a fire single after an explosive debut. Teenage Dream is an absolutely perfect pop standard from an artist I can otherwise take or leave

Shiny Skunk

Woot! New One Hit Wonderland. Guess I'm going to put up my semi occasional fervent request for T.a.T.u's All The Things She Said. I really want to see Todd go through the trainwreck of a band history that one has. And Russia jokes. Russia jokes are always good.

Angela

The 70's had the worst #1 hits. This, Convoy and a plethra of others are sooooo bad

The part I love is Sliver Convention singing "Get Up and Boogie" while the audience sits there like they're being held at gunpoint.

Kristopher Bluth

I'm probably outing myself as someone who spends WAY too much time rewatching these videos, but I'm pretty sure the dancers from the BBC footage were the same ones who were in Van McCoy's "The Shuffle." Glad to know that Her Majesty's broadcasters had a legion of young people on hand to get down to every crappy disco hit.

Kristopher Bluth

This episode brings back memories. I remember Todd ripping Disco Duck to shreds on his Top Ten Worst Hit Songs of 1976 Episode. BTW, I wanted to put this comment bu I think todd banned me from his comment section. :(

KenTerminatedDQ

Wow! I refuse to believe that the same year that brought us Evil Woman and Bohemian Rhapsody also brought us Dis Gorilla and Bad Shark.

*looks at the date* *looks at the title* Ok, is this just twenty minutes of Todd making fart noises?

We're all trying.

Justin V

"Just remember this is the '70s. "Disco Duck" was a hit. White people had afros, mom. Nothing made sense."- George Lopez

This. The Beach Boys is my favorite band, but their disco version of "Here Comes the Night" is damn near unlistenable...and it goes on for ten minutes.

Kristopher Bluth

There WAS a lot of bad disco music, is the thing. Most of it was made by white (or at least non-disco) hangers on who jumped onto the trend. Rod Stewart going disco was...not a positive development. It's not much of an oversimplification to say that white people ruined disco and then blamed black people for inventing it, making the Top 40 landscape of 1980 a VERY white place.

maruhkati

I'll second "Pop Muzik." It's the song that showed that new wave could be a major commercial force in America and nobody talks about it anymore.

Kristopher Bluth

I knew a guy in high school who could do a great one. I was pretty easily amazed back then.

Kristopher Bluth

OT, but you could probably get a pretty good Trainwreckords out of ...But The Little Girls Understand by the Knack.

Kristopher Bluth

My dad can also do a decent Donald Duck impression. Guess this was a missed opportunity for him.

Vanessa Picard

Holyshit this guy is from my hometown. I know like 20 people that went to Grimsley High School LMAO. Im glad Greensboring, North Carolina gets to be famous for something hahaha

Sierra Reppert

I've never been so happy to upgrade to the $10 tier on the same day as Disco Duck! (Too late to get my name at the end but oh well.) I play the 1976 video heavily in my rerun rotation.

He specifically means on the US charts, where Crazy Frog had one song hit number 50 and literally no other charting singles.

Teddy Haines

"Has anyone in this song even SEEN a duck?" Excellent Arrested Development gag. Appreciated.

The notion of novelty songs dying in the 70s is at odds with my early 00s memories of Crazy Frog. (Though the UK had comedian-led songs in the charts for much longer anyhow, as Todd has often mentioned).

Georgie Rowe

OK now that you've done this you HAVE to do "Dog Police"

Jasper Phua

I first heard Todd talk about this song my freshman year of high school and I graduated from college a year ago.

John Rogan

Won't lie, the shark one was actually pretty funny.

Canary

Props for the "Disco Duck Dynasty" line! That's quality wordplay. After this review I'm torn. I've always wanted to recommend another #1 one-hit wonder from the disco era that I find baffling (1979's Pop Musik by "M"), but your comment about novelty songs got me wondering about both Pac-Man Fever by Buckner & Garcia (#9 on Billboard) and The Curly Shuffle by Jump 'N the Saddle (#15). They might not have been the last non-Yankovic novelty songs to break the top 20, but they were the last ones I recall getting anything close to Disco Duck attention when they came out (especially Pac Man Fever).

Pooga

You're not, but I think that's more because Tarzan was racist than intentional racism.

sugarfrosted

I'm sure a music critic genuinely critiquing Disco Duck must feel like being a seasoned food critic and attempting a serious analysis of a McNuggets combo.

Adequately Sized Dog

Am I the only one who felt like "Disgorilla" and the way it was presented in that clip was somewhat... racist?

Cassandra Gelvin

My favorite factoid about Disco Duck is that it was featured briefly in the movie Saturday Night Fever, but left off the soundtrack album because Rick’s manager apparently thought it would negatively impact sales of the Disco Duck album if they could get the song elsewhere. That soundtrack went on to sell over 40 million copies - I don’t know how many Dees’ album sold, but it probably wasn’t that many...

the purple shaman

One of my favorite TitS moments is still "seriously look at this shit" from the Disco Duck part of the Worst Songs of 1976 video.

Russet Burbank

I still hate disco. It’s just I-IV repeat. The songs don’t end. At some point they just give up.

Paggy

Song vs Song - Disco Duck vs What Does The Fox Say (Irlande Douze Points is the actual winner)

Alina

Shoutout to the Lena Dunham lookalike at 7:53 giving "please send for help" eyes to the camera.

Anthony Hansen

... I thought this was an April Fools Joke.

I needed this laugh today.

SJ

"Nowadays even your most musical comedy songs don't chart high." Wow Todd has really been successful in purging Lil Dicky from his memory.

Anna Midkiff

So I guess I need to ask...would the song still make your list of the Top 10 Worst Hit Songs of 1976 after all of this?

Kyle LeClair

Beavis And Butthead riffed the naked song.

GeddyLeeRoth

My timely request (every time you do one hit wonderland) of asking you to do Kreayshawn's Gucci Gucci please

BMJ614

Life is like a hurricane...here in...Duckburg.

waywardlaser

I... didn't think we were ever going to revisit this one. Well, alrighty then.