[erix]

Sure, I hated Reagan, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, and a sinister new movement in music called 'Rap', but were they really that bad?

When I first started to listen to music in the late 70's and all my older friends were listening to what is now known as 'Classic Rock' (only it was new then - I remember when 'The Wall' came out.. ) I used to think I was so much more evolved than them by listening to jazz fusion and this new kind of rock music that was being played on KUNV, from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Jazz from noon til 8 pm, Rock Avenue till10 the next morning.

Then Madonna came along. And Culture Club. And, Oh God, Dexy's Midnight Runners. Commercial radio turned to crap! Yet my friends still listened to the same songs they were listening to 20 years earlier and I was laughing at them for doing it.

KUNV held fast on a quirky, always wavering path towards music left of center and I listened all the way. Remember where you were when you first heard Talking Heads? B-52's? Black Flag? The Sugarcubes? Those were the days, my friends, I thought they'd never end.

Of course they did. Right after an 'Alternative Rock' station came to town. The publicly funded KUNV, forced to compete for pledge money, turned to the only listeners who actually pledged real money - the old time jazzers. (You must remember - a lot of the old be-boppers and hep cats moved to LV to play in the shows. There were jams at the local musicians union hall that would bring tears to your eyes. Never recorded)

So now, at 36, with wife, kid, mortgage, what do I want to listen to? The music of 20 years ago - I've turned into one of them!!!

What are your memories of the Eighties? Favorite radio station? But most importantly - what are you listening to now, online, when you want to hear eighties music like it was played back then - not just the hits.

ok,
erix

 

[gorgon_123]

the 80's

I was only born in '81 so my memories of that decade probably aren't the same as everyone else's.

I remember loving Michael Jackson - my parents have pictures of me wearing my red leather jacket (with zippers all over it), white glove, dancing around. Those were good times

Now that I'm older and wiser I still listen to a great deal of 80's music: Elvis Costello, The Pogues, Depeche Mode, The Pixies, Violent Femmes, Dead Kennedys . . . . . . . and I gotta admit Boy George is pretty damned cool. And who doesn't know all the words to "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" ???

 

[coolvij]

Quote:

And who doesn't know all the words to "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" ???

Me

I was born in 87, so I really can't comment on this topic, but I did hear Cindy Lauper sing that song live at Boston for the 4th this summer - not only was (is?) atrocious, the sibilant speakers and her habit of shoving the mic right upto her lips ... well.... made it sound worse....

 

[rickcr42]

Quote:

sinister new movement in music called 'Rap'

Curtis Blow RULES (early rapper) !!!!!!!!!!!! And how can you not like The Sugar Hill Gangs Rappers Delight-full version thank you,I still play it for yuks.Took my wife to a concert earlier this year-KC And The Sunshine Band,their album was THE party record in the '80s if you wanted the fair sex to show up .Not ONE still tushie in THE HOUSE man,
"do a little dance/make a little love/get down tonight/get down tonight"
Reaganomics made me a lot of loot.Sadly I was a single man and had a little "wild" in me so.................had to re-group

But bottom line,the eighties were so damn superficial.Was all about me,me,me.We thought that party would last 'til we dropped.It did,I did not

NOW IF YOU WANNA TALK THE '70s (or even the late sixties) the rickster could tell you stories to scare the kiddies with

 

[Budgie]

80's were okay. Pop music sucked, but pop music has always sucked. The 70's were a bitch. "Disco" pretty much decended on America, like the plague. (I called it "the Disco Disease".) Many of my close friends were lost to it.
But if you dug real hard you could find little bits of good music to get you through the hard times. In many ways, the 80's were a breath of fresh air after that crap. The record company's really had way to much control of music back then.
The advent of small labels really opened up the music industry. Sure, alot of them were bought out by bigger concerns, but new ones have always sprung up in their place. We have so many choices today in a large part due to the small labels that find the new talent. If not for them we would have nothing but pre-formed, processed music, built for a certain demographic, like N-Sync, etc.

 

[MacDEF]

I was in high school and college in the 80s, and IMO the 80s and 60s were the best musical decades. The 80s were the decade where pop/rock music really "branched" into many different genres and sub-genres. There was a lot of cheezy pop in the 80s, but there was also a lot of *great* music (rock, pop, alternative, industrial, rap, and new wave) that I still listen to on a regular basis. A lot of innovation in music, too (unlike the 90s). I probably have a few hundred CDs from the 80s.

P.S. Rap actually started in the 70s. Late 70s and early-to-mid 80s rap is still the best rap ever.

 

[joelongwood]

There was music in the 80s?

 

[rohorn]

As someone who graduated high school (really!) in 1980, I thought the '70's were pathetic - even before it ended. I listened to classical, early Moog stuff (Walter Carlos back when he was still a he) and my Dad's old Chet Atkins LPs.

Then I went to England from '81 to'83. The music over there at the time really stuck with me. Every Sunday night, I would tune into the BBCs top 30 program and get an earful of stuff that was vastly more fun than anything I heard in the '70's. The best acts either never came across the pond due to a lack of marketing gimmicks or never saw their best singles get any airplay. At the time, I thought Culture Club, Duran Duran, etc. were all over rated over promoted marketing excesses - and still do. While it is somehow considered hip to bash synths as being not "real", most people have never heard the good stuff.

The both sad and funny thing about all this is that I hear the rap fans say the same thing.

And speaking of synth bashing, an electric guitar is nothing more than a very crude analog synthesizer. Anything played over loudspeakers isn't "real", either.

 

[morphsci]

Quote:

Originally posted by joelongwood There was music in the 80s?

Can't agree more

The late 60's to mid 70's (without disco!) were definitely the best IMO. But it is really an age thing as to when the best music was for any inidividual. (Wow that was way to politically correct for me, where's Mike Walker!).

 

[rohorn]

Oh, yes - I'm on my 4th pair of Ray-Ban Wayfarers. The ones I had for the first half of the '80's were mirrored. I haven't found any like that since then.

The local '80's station (KXPK) has 18 of my CDs on loan, if that tells you anything about my CD collection.

 

[skippy]

personally, i have a penchant for cheesy 80's pop music. i think pop was much better then than it is now. i'm a big fan of 80's synthpop like, erasure, depeche mode, new order, human league, OMD...

and btw, i like 80's rap much better than the mainstream rap they play nowadays.

 

[XXhalberstramXX]

'nuff said. although Steely dan's Gaucho and the safety dance and blondie, and punk rock, and hardcore, and rap... all that stuff. wonderful. a very interesting time for music.

 

[kerykeion]

Ugh! Topics like this give me a weird feeling of nostalgia and regrets.

Otherwise, the 80's (sans the clothing and hair) were decent...alot new music types began to surface. 80's rap was good too...but I didn't start listening to it until the early 90s.

ADDED: Just wanted to say... movies of the 80s were even better.

 

[DarkAngel]

1980s were great! There is so much quanity/quality of good music it is mind boggling. I am still to this day discovering new groups that have tremendous talent but went almost unkown
in 1980s because of the overabundance of good stuff, and I have over 1000 CDs. Groups were much more creative musically then,
back when they actually had bands.

The absolute worst period of music is 1995 to present, it really sucks in a major way. Nothing but karioke performers with no bands, doing silly dance moves while lip sync performing, what a joke! Rap sucks beyond belief, had some good stuff back when
NWA, 2 live crew, early beastie boys were around....now it is laughable. Music now is RIP, must go back in time to discover real music.

 

[Beagle]

I own a lot of great albums that came out in the 80's. There has been good and bad music in every decade. Bubblegum in the 60's, disco in the 70's, bad electro-pop in the 80's and Pearl Jam clones in the 90's/00's. There has been creative music in every era. You just have to seek out and listen to the stuff that appeals to you and ignore the mass market crap (assuming you hate it). That's the way I've always done it. Same with television, people, food, headphones...