It’s June 1999. The TRL studios in Times Square are vibrating with the screams of teenagers. You’ve got the Backstreet Boys, Christina Aguilera, and Britney Spears fighting for the top spot on the charts. Suddenly, a guy with a messy beard and a manic grin appears. He’s singing about rubbing his butt on a piece of cheese.
This was the birth of the Tom Green bum song, technically titled "Lonely Swedish (The Bum Bum Song)." It didn't just chart. It broke the system.
The Accidental Origin of the Bum
Most people think this was a corporate-produced joke. Honestly? It was way more chaotic than that. Tom Green was filming a sketch for his MTV show on a cruise ship. He was basically just wandering around bothering people, which was his whole brand back then.
After a heated argument with a ship employee, Tom started rubbing his bottom against a railing. He began chanting, "My bum is on the rail, my bum is on the rail." It was pure spite. That moment of weirdness evolved into a full-blown music video featuring Tom in a superhero suit, a duck decoy, and a very confused Swedish man.
When the Tom Green Bum Song Destroyed TRL
The year 1999 was the peak of "Total Request Live." Host Carson Daly was the gatekeeper of cool. Then Tom Green happened. He told his viewers to go to his website, download the MP3, burn it onto CDs, and call MTV to request it.
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It worked. Too well.
The Tom Green bum song shot to number one, dethroning the biggest boy bands on the planet. This created a massive problem for MTV. The show was supposed to be "live," but they often pre-taped episodes. When Tom’s song hit number one, they didn't have the footage ready because they never expected a song about "getting the poo off my bum" to beat 98 Degrees.
The Forced Retirement
Tom famously went on air and "retired" the song immediately after it hit number one. He claimed it wasn't "fair" to the other artists.
- The real story? MTV executives were reportedly panicking.
- They pressured him to take it off the countdown to maintain the illusion of their chart’s integrity.
- If a joke song could win that easily, the whole TRL brand looked fake.
Why We Are Still Talking About It
You can't talk about the Tom Green bum song without talking about Eminem. Seriously. Go listen to "The Real Slim Shady." Eminem literally raps, "It's cool for Tom Green to hump a dead moose." He even wore a similar superhero outfit in his music video.
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Tom Green was doing "Internet humor" before the social media era even existed. He was a precursor to TikTok pranks and YouTube "vloggers." He proved that if you had a weird enough idea and a direct line to your audience, you could bypass the gatekeepers entirely.
The Weird Lyrical Legacy
The lyrics are total nonsense. We’re talking about placing a bum on:
- A taxi.
- A piece of gum.
- A captain’s hat.
- The actual letters of the word "SWEDISH."
It sounds like something a five-year-old would write, and that was exactly why it worked. It was a giant middle finger to the polished, over-produced pop music of the late 90s.
The Impact on Modern Comedy
Without Tom Green, do we get Jackass? Probably not. Do we get The Eric Andre Show? Unlikely. He pioneered the "confrontational absurdity" style that defines so much of modern digital content.
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The Tom Green bum song was the first true viral moment of the broadband era. Even if it was just a guy singing about his backside, it changed how we think about "making it" in the entertainment industry.
If you want to revisit this piece of history, you can find the original video on YouTube. It’s a grainy, 480p relic of a time when the world felt a little more unpredictable. Just don't blame me if you have "my bum is on the cheese" stuck in your head for the next three days.
What to do now
- Watch the "Lonely Swedish" video: Look for the 1999 TRL broadcast to see the pure confusion on Carson Daly's face.
- Listen to Organized Rhyme: Before he was the "bum bum" guy, Tom was in a legitimate (and actually good) rap group in Canada.
- Check out "Freddy Got Fingered": If you think the song is weird, the movie is a whole other level of surrealist art.
The era of the Tom Green bum song might be over, but its spirit of chaotic, DIY creativity is everywhere you look online today.