Michael's comment about "Time Has Come Today" compels me to start this thread:

We've often discussed what purportedly great artists and supposedly classic albums leave you scratching your head, wondering what all the fuss is about. What about songs? What song(s) have been exalted by fans, covered by multiple artists, yet still haven't revealed their essential worth to your ears?

"Knockin on Heaven's Door." Utter tedium. Like "American Pie," it's the very definition of the word "interminable," but without even "Pie's" goofy lyrics that "hip" English teachers used to analyze..

But, like "Time Has Come Today," "Heaven's Door" is easy for beginner guitarists to play, which may explain it's ubiquity.

Stairway to Heaven.

American Pie, post first verse and chorus.

Black Betty needs to be erased from humankind (unless its being used sarcastically like in Eastbound and Down.)
I don't get any popularity pushed that way.

Mr. Jones - Counting Crowes. "I wanna be Bob Dylan".... you're not, so shut up and go away. Whiney ass vocals over a meandering beat telling the story of two friends who try to outdo each other -- tell me, what's the point?

I love the city of Chicago, but any time I hear some lame-ass blues bar band launch into "Sweet Home Chicago," I want to hold a black mass to raise Mrs. O'Leary's cow from the dead and put the beast in the cockpit of one the planes spewing napalm at the end of Apocalypse Now and send it off in the direction of Cook County.

I think I've mentioned before my complete loathing of the song "Birthday" by the Beatles. It was terrible when the Beatles recorded it and even worse any time some idiot band covers it in honor of some drunk chick in the audience's birthday. The song is so terrible that I would almost consider it a good trade-off for the Beatles to never exist just to make sure that piece of shit ditty never did, either.

But then I listen to "Tomorrow Never Knows" and all is forgiven.

Beatles - Abbey Road. People seem to rave about it, but I still think it's even worse than Let It Be.

The past 10 years of Wilco releases.

Great image, Reno. If Gary Larson had come up with that, it would've made an awesome Far Side.

Hoip, I may have an answer to your question. I remember reading an interview with Adam Duritz (what can I say, it was a long plane flight) in which he whined about all the fans he'd met who thought they'd figured out the secret meaning of that song. He mentioned one guy who'd told him, "Everyone else thinks they got it figured out, but I got it for sure. Mister Jones is your dick! Right? Am I right?"