You’re the perfect one
For me and you forever will be
And I will love you so for always
Always by Atlantic Starr was released on May 13, 1987. It was the second single from the album All in the Name of Love.
The song reached No. l on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and No. 3 on the UK Singles Chart.
Watch the official music video.
If you’re lost you can look and you will find me
Time after time
The U.K. and other versions of the Time After Time 7″ single came with this picture sleeve. The U.S. version did not.
As I mentioned in a previous post, I was a huge fan of Cyndi Lauper in the 80s, and She’s So Unusual was one of my very first albums. It still holds a lot of significance for me because it came out at a time when I was just starting to discover my own musical tastes and interests. Cyndi wasn’t my parents’ favorite singer or my brothers’ favorite band – she was all mine.
Time After Time is an absolutely stunning song and one of my all-time favorites. Released in 1984, it was the second single off of She’s So Unusual, after Girls Just Want to Have Fun, and Cyndi’s first No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Continue reading
Like so many others, I became obsessed with the Purple Rain soundtrack in 1984, the year of its release. I proudly hung the poster of the album cover on my wall and spun the record over and over and over again, memorizing every beat, every lyric. I was 12 years old at the time, and music tends to shape us so profoundly at that age. Today, I hear When Doves Cry and I’m instantly a preteen, standing in front of my bedroom mirror singing into a hairbrush. I Would Die 4 U comes on and once again I’m preoccupied with mimicking the hand motions that accompany the chorus (point to self, point to head, hold up four fingers …).
I was 12 years old, and as with so many things when you’re too young to do them, I was frustrated and furious that I couldn’t get in to see the R-rated Purple Rain with my friends at the local theater. I eventually saw it on cable and was mesmerized, the songs I knew by heart springing to life in a way they never had before. Prince, the man, seemed other worldly – different, creative, passionate, a little dangerous, and a lot sexual. So different. In the best possible way.
I finally saw Prince in concert in 2004, and it still stands, will likely always stand, as one of the best concerts I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen a lot of concerts in my life. I always meant to see him again, but life got in the way. I’m thankful I had the one experience that I did, sharing a space and slice of time with Prince and thousands of other diehard fans for a night of incredible music.
David Bowie’s death hit me hard. Prince’s death hits me just as hard. All I can think is that heaven is going to have an amazing jam session tonight.
Blame it on Ice Cube… Because he says it gets funky
When you got a subject and a predacit
N.W.A’s been in the news a lot lately, thanks to the success of the movie Straight Outta Compton, their recent induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and reunion at Coachella over the weekend.
N.W.A
Straight Outta Compton LP
Contact is all it takes
To change your life to lose your place in time
Cover of Van Halen’s 5150
As much as I loved Van Halen with David Lee Roth (1984 was an epic album as far as I was concerned), I made the transition to a Sammy Hagar-fronted Van Halen pretty smoothly. 5150 was one of my favorite albums in 1986, and I still have the copy of the record I purchased that year – impressive considering I traded most of my records, except for a select handful, for CDs in the 90s.
Love Walks In, one of five singles from 5150, was one of my favorites off the album. I would listen to it over and over and over again. I was 13 at the time, so even though the lyrics were a little odd (aliens pulling strings and travels across the Milky Way), I read it all as a tale of first love throwing your world upside down. And at 13, that was right up my alley. The song was a moderate success for Van Halen, reaching No. 22 on the Billboard Hot 100. Continue reading
Every time I see you falling
I get down on my knees and pray
U.S. 7″ promo copy of Bizarre Love Triangle
Bizarre Love Triangle is one of my all-time favorite songs and the reason why I fell in love with New Order. If I had a dollar for every mix tape I started with Bizarre Love Triangle, I’d be vacationing in St. Bart’s right now. It’s a great song to listen to, a great song to dance to, and it has lyrics that grab ahold of you with all the beauty, turmoil, and confusion of young love. (Did I mention I really love this song?)
New Order’s fourth album, Brotherhood
Released in 1986, Bizarre Love Triangle was a single from New Order’s fourth album, Brotherhood. It reached No. 56 on the UK Singles chart and No. 4 on the US Dance Club Songs chart. In 1995, a new mix of the song, included on The Best of New Order album, cracked the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 98. Continue reading
Temptation, frustration
So bad it makes him cry
The Police’s hit single Don’t Stand So Close to Me dealt with the subject of teacher-student affairs long before they became common fodder for TV specials and Internet headlines. The song was inspired by Sting’s experience as an English teacher before he became famous (although he denied ever having an affair with a student while he was a teacher) as well as his admiration for Vladimir Nabokov’s classic Lolita. The novel tells the story of a literature professor in his late 30s – “the old man in that book by Nabokov” referred to in the song – who becomes obsessed with a 12-year-old girl.
Don’t Stand So Close to Me was released in 1980 as a single from The Police’s third studio album, Zenyatta Mondatta. It was a No. 1 hit and the best-selling single of 1980 in the United Kingdom. In the United States, it peaked at No. 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. Continue reading
I’m never gonna dance again
Guilty feet have got no rhythm
It’s impossible to have a conversation about 80s pop music without including George Michael. Between his time with Wham! and his solo career, the man absolutely owned the decade and is one of the most successful recording artists of all time because of it.
Careless Whisper was the second single from Wham!’s second album, Make It Big, released in 1984. The song was a follow-up to Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, the duo’s first No. 1 hit in both the United States and the United Kingdom.
Even though it appeared on Make It Big and was credited to “Wham! featuring George Michael” in a handful of countries, including the U.S., Careless Whisper was George’s first solo effort. Unlike most Wham! singles, the song was co-written with the other half of Wham!, Andrew Ridgeley. Continue reading
She turns herself ’round and she smiles and she says
“This is it, that’s the end of the joke”
I was twelve when the Pretty in Pink movie came out in 1986, and I actually fell in love harder with Richard Butler’s voice on the song of the same name than I did with Andrew McCarthy’s irresistible grin. (And that’s saying something. Andrew McCarthy’s grin is pretty irresistible.) 
It was the first time I had heard the Psychedelic Furs, but it only made me want to hear more.
In the years since, I’ve become a huge fan of the Furs. Speaking of Richard Butler’s voice, I can listen to it for hours, and if you ever get the opportunity to see the band live, I have one word for you: go! And while I’ve grown to like some of their songs more than Pretty in Pink, you never forget your first. Plus, I love the Pretty in Pink movie, and there’s just something about hearing the opening notes of the song that bring you right back to 1986 and watching Molly Ringwald’s character Andie getting ready for school in the first scenes of the movie. Continue reading
Give no mind to what they say
It doesn’t matter anyway
I was only 7 years old when the Go-Go’s debut album, Beauty and the Beat, and its first single, Our Lips Are Sealed, were released in 1981, but I still remember standing in the middle of a department store begging my mother to buy me the record. The cover art – with the Go-Go’s wearing towels and face cream – was mesmerizing, and it was impossible not to start moving and singing along immediately upon hearing those first notes of Our Lips Are Sealed.
From that first song, the Go-Go’s made a huge impression on me when I was younger. They made me want to start my own all-girl band (until years later when I realized I had absolutely no music talent). They were more relatable somehow than many other music acts at the time – like they could be your older sister and her friends, only much, much cooler. Continue reading
Eighties Grooves 