It seems the Internet has always been a rather unruly place, a no man's land of opinions that don’t hold back and thoughts that spare no one.
In 2008, Celine Dion fell victim to a wave of online criticism when her 2002 performance of AC/DC’s ‘You Shook Me All Night Long’ took out the number one spot on a list of the world's worst cover songs ever.
Published by Total Guitar Magazine, which closed its doors last year, the original article and list have disappeared from records, although there is proof of their existence from other news sources.
From what we gather, it started with a poll led by a panel of experts, which may have included the magazine's editor at the time, Stephen Lawson, who called the song “sacrilege” and an “offence against music”.
Clearly, Dion’s performance with singer Anastacia ruffled some feathers. But was it really that bad?
Watch below and judge for yourself.
Of course, it doesn’t compare to the AC/DC original, but the hate doesn’t seem justified.
A quick scroll through the comments on the Dion video (which has 13 million views) and you won’t find much hate. Granted, most of those comments are probably from her fans.
But even those outside the fan club didn’t seem to have put much faith in the list.
In a 2008 forum, users jumped to the defence of the song and others on the list.
One was “unimpressed with their picks” and even rather enjoyed the ‘Wonderwall’ version by The Mike Flower Pops that had come in fifth.
Of Dion’s version, he said simply: “I’ve seen worse on American Idol for sure."
Others shared the sentiment that there were far more terrible covers to be heard.
“Someone posted an 80s Sting cover of 'Little Wing'… made me want to vomit,” said one commenter.
Another said they have “a hard time believing any [on the list] are worse" than Mindless Self-Indulgence’s cover of ‘Tom Sawyer’, adding: "It makes me cry.”
Now that 17 years have passed, there’s probably a lot worse out there, but we won’t delve into that today.
Instead, let’s end on the great piece of music that is ‘You Shook Me All Night Long’ by AC/DC.
You just can’t beat the original.
