A few times a year, a song sucks so much that it doesn’t simply suck. It transcends to the Land of the Disasterpieces–where the crimes against pop music are so heinous they inspire awe.

Courtiers in this foul kingdom include “Call on Me” by Janet Jackson & Nelly, “Just Lose It” by Eminem, and “Blue (Da Ba De)” by Eiffel 65. The dread lord is “I Believe” by Blessid Union of Souls. 

And now there’s a new hellish citizen in the realm : “Angel” by Natasha Bedingfield.

Learn more after the jump… if you dare.

Before we get to this travesty, let me clarify something: Declaring a song a disasterpiece is not the same as writing off an artist’s entire career. There are plenty of songs by Eminem and Janet Jackson that I like, and Natasha Bedingfield has gotten serious airtime on WMRK, Mark’s Hits All the Time. 

But just because I like “Pocketful of Sunshine,” that doesn’t mean I’m deaf. Take a listen to “Angel,” Bedingfield’s follow-up to that hit:

First of all, did Rodney “Dark Child” Jerkins produce this song while he was making Spin Art? The pieces of are so randomly squished together that they become a wall of indistinguishable noise. Around 3:30, when things are supposed to get “passionate,” they just become incoherent. I mean, where are we supposed to focus our ears when Natasha is wailing, a distorted version of her voice is spelling “Angel,” and the drum track is stuttering all over the place? And could the volume levels shift any more rapidly on her money notes?

And let’s talk about that spelling lesson. It can be an awesome trope in pop music–when Aretha spells “respect,” she’s clarifying what she wants–but in this song, Bedders spells the word “angel” so many times that it loses all impact. The repetition is distracting and eventually numbing.

And when she’s not spelling, Natasha’s dropping lyrical bombs like this one:

I’ll make it great to be a man
with a woman who can stand
on every promise given–
making vows to please her man

If the song were interesting, I could overlook the rhyming of a word with itself, but instead, I’m almost forced to notice the lazy wordsmithing.

Plus, lines like “making vows to please her man” gross me out. Subservience isn’t the same as love.

And yet… though all these elements certainly make the song suck, they don’t make it a disasterpiece. To earn that title, a song must suck in a larger context, and here’s the context for “Angel:” It strips Natasha Bedingfield of her personality.

Hits like “Pocketful of Sunshine,” “Single,” “Unwritten,” and “These Words” are all distinctive, showcasing their singer as an intelligent firecracker. Even on “Love Like This,” a reggae-lite duet with Sean Kingston that was clearly created to please market forces, you can hear Natasha’s sassy edge. 

But on “Angel,” she heads for Genericsville. Anyone could sing this cynical business strategy of a song, and the fact that an otherwise interesting artist is wasting her time with it absolutely makes it a disasterpiece.