1984
Prince and the Revolution: Purple Rain
This isn't the album from 1984 that I still listen to the most (that would be Unforgettable Fire), but it is the album I wore out. Twice.
Yes, kids, back in the '80s when state-of-the-art music recording technology was cassette tapes you could actually wear out an album just by playing it over and over again every single day. Which is certainly what I did with this one.
I was a late adapter with Prince as I usually am in general. All of my friends were already nutso for him thanks to 1999, but I had to be dragged to his movie in order to fall in love with his stuff. I can't say that I'm still a fan, but I followed him up through Sign o' the Times and was crazy about him during that time. Even though I liked Sign o' the Times, by the time Lovesexy came out I'd figured out that I was mostly a fan of the Revolution-era Prince and didn't so much want to follow the rest of his career.
As usual, I can't embed any video from my top pick, so here are a couple of songs from one of the runner up albums.
Man, my runners up and singles lists are getting long for this period. I was good and truly into music by now. I also had a job and could afford to buy my own stuff. My first stop after cashing my paycheck every week was usually the K-Mart next door to the grocery store where I worked. I'd buy at least one album a week.
Runners up:
The Cars: Heartbeat City
Eurythmics: 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother)
A Flock of Seagulls: The Story of a Young Heart
Frankie Goes to Hollywood: Welcome to the Pleasuredome
Howard Jones: Human's Lib
Cyndi Lauper: She's So Unusual
Talk Talk: It's My Life
Twisted Sister: Stay Hungry
Van Halen: 1984
"Weird Al" Yankovic: "Weird Al" Yankovic in 3D
Wham!: Make It Big
U2: The Unforgettable Fire
Singles:
Bananarama: "Cruel Summer"
Band Aid: "Do They Know It's Christmas"
David Bowie: "Blue Jean"
Depeche Mode: "People are People"
Foreigner: "I Want to Know What Love Is"
The Go-Gos: "Head Over Heels"
Murray Head: "One Night in Bangkok"
Icicle Works: "Whisper to a Scream"
Nik Kershaw: "Wouldn't It be Good"
Billy Ocean: "Caribbean Queen"
The Pretenders: "Back on the Chain Gang"
Ratt: "Round and Round"
Rockwell: "Somebody's Watching Me"
Sade: "Smooth Operator"
Slade: "Run Runaway"
Thompson Twins: "Hold Me Now"
Thompson Twins: "Doctor! Doctor!"
Matthew Wilder: "Break My Stride"
5 comments:
How sad is my life that I look so forward to your weekly trip down musical memory...
Talk Talk - won many an air guitar contest with me and my mates with ITS MY LIFE...we even smoked out the college theatre with our pyrotechnics...
Thompson Twins - We would sing HOLD ME NOW while working at Cadet Camp..its was like our anthem..hey is was the eighties..we were ignorant but beautiful
Prince - Purple Rain..I wish I could send you the picture of our camp air guitar group...in fact you can see it on my blog here
http://calvinscanadiancaveofcool.blogspot.com/2008/11/was-i-ever-so-young-part-1.html
Paul and the Chesterfields...those were out album photos...we won of course...we were a mashup of Adam Ant and Prince
Thanks again for the memories
Ha! I replied over there about the photo. That's fantastic!
I know what you mean about being a little embarrassed over how seriously we took certain songs. I don't know that "Hold Me Now" was one of them for me, but "I Want to Know What Love Is" certainly was. It's such a generic love ballad, but I used to crank that puppy up and belt out the lyrics with complete sincerity.
Sigh.
By the way, I'm sure I look forward to your comments as much as you look forward to these posts. You're reminding me of a lot of stuff I'd forgotten too. :)
Thanks for all that...but what will happen when we reach a time when we no longer know every song that came out...because we both know that day is coming - like my mother who only knows "Achy Breakie Heart" When I reach that point I hope that as a brother you would do the right thing and put me down like the dog I will have become...
Yeah, there are dark days coming. Once I graduated from college, I had a hard time adjusting to Life After New Wave and finding stuff to listen to in the Grunge-filled '90s.
It'll be interesting (to me, anyway) to remind myself of what few gems I was able to find during that time.
don't say just you...I will be interested to see how our lives went parallel with the music...I am already missing it
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