Stephen's 80s Music Blog

The nondescript title of this exhilarating track from 1980's Flesh & Blood gives absolutely no indication of the pure joy to be derived from its majestic chorus alone. In fact, come to think of it, it's amazing to me that as many times as pop music artists have conceived choruses over the years, they still have the ability to come up with melodies capable of bringing listeners back from the darkest depths no matter how suffocated and defeated they may have felt moments earlier. This transcendent Bryan Ferry composition, to me, projects such a light when it breaks into one of the loveliest choruses of the '80s: "There's a band playing on the radio, with a rhythm of rhyming guitars." It's a spine-tingling moment, one of those sublimely rare musical occasions that just happens to perfectly mirror one of the song's later lyrics, which spotlights music's uncanny knack at "drowning the sounds" of one's tears.

The timing of this entry turns out to be quite fortuitous, as just last night I went to see the Swell Season (Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova from the acclaimed film Once and their backing band) and, among other wonderful things, experienced this very same melodic genius in the group's passionate performances of tunes based on often remarkably simple melodies. I probably could have distilled this entry down to just a few words that pretty much say it all, but there is nobility in trying to express the inexpressible. Damn, I love music.

• Compare prices on Roxy Music's Flesh & Blood here.
• Compare DVD prices for Once here.
• Compare prices on the original soundtrack to Once here.

Now that I've touched on the vast majority of artists that spring to mind fairly universally when enthusiasts consider the decade's sonic offerings, I seem to have reached an intriguing stage of my tenure as your '80s Music Guide. Now I get to focus on the mid-level artists whose careers tend to go unnoticed in retrospect, especially in terms of consistency of output. I 've already compiled a hearty short-list of artists that fit into that category and are due some attention, and in many ways I feel that now I'm really getting to the fun part. After all, XTC, Dokken and Sheena Easton, to name but a few, were most definitely more than bit players in the decade's variegated musical scene, and it's nice to be able to champion their contributions.

Speaking of Easton, about whom I've already clearly stated a personal affinity on multiple occasions on this site, I was truly impressed in reviewing her career to realize just how consistent and versatile she was as a mainstream pop vocalist. A survey of her catalogue swiftly reveals that in a decade of persistent shifts in taste, Easton remained a solid, mid-major draw who often ignored trends in favor of her own singular path. The singer seemed to come by her dabbling pop music approach honestly, which combined well with her extremely photogenic appearance to create an ever-shining '80s star if never a volatile, explosive pop supernova.

• Sheena Easton Profile
• Top 8 Sheena Easton Songs of the '80s
• Compare prices on Sheena Easton CDs here.

Photo Courtesy of Disky Records

Canadian band Platinum Blonde may have looked as much like Poison as Howard Jones, but the group spent much of its understated '80s career cavorting in the expansive but sparsely populated musical territory directly between glam-inspired pop metal and New Romantic-styled, keyboard-heavy pop/rock. If for no reason than the band's willingness to draw equally from early alternative rock and the guitar-based foundations of arena rock, Platinum Blonde probably should have received far more attention and support in the States than ever surfaced.

This particular track, a latter-day effort from 1986 that became the group's only entry on the Billboard Hot 100, actually sounds far more like Echo & the Bunnymen than Europe, which impresses me as a bold, even defiant move considering how easily it would have been for Platinum Blonde to parlay its flashy look into a pure pop metal overhaul. After all, even a hardcore punk if similarly eclectic, keyboard-favoring band like TSOL eventually took a stab at a form of commercial hard rock dangerously close to hair metal during the late-'80s saturation of that style. So score one for a band that refused to allow the fumes of all its hair spray to squelch its sense of creative daring.

I had a professor in graduate school who loved to extol the artistic virtues of Irish poet William Butler Yeats but also lamented and insisted that no matter how hard he tried to remain prolific and profound, the revered writer suffered from an essentially inevitable decline in artistic quality as he aged. At the time I wondered if such a concept actually held up as a rule of thumb for artists of all stripes, a notion suggested firmly by my teacher. As I've grown older, however, I've certainly become more aware of the importance of time windows when it comes to music, film and literature as well as my own modest attempts at artistic achievement.

The bottom line, I'm afraid, is that it's a rare artist indeed (one whose degree of difficulty rises even as his or her odds grow increasingly faint) that can produce art at 70 on par with accomplishments from a peak period half a life earlier. Maybe Paul Newman comes to mind, or possibly John Fogerty, who both keep chugging along and producing vital work in their respective fields.

Anyway, so if recent brand new albums of fresh material from the original lineups of successful '80s bands Asia and the Hooters don't exactly set the world on fire, it's certainly nothing for them to be ashamed of. Don't get me wrong: Asia's Phoenix and the Hooters' Time Stand Still are far from embarrassing or even disappointing. There just seems to be a little something missing from the albums' anthemic lead-off tracks, "Never Again" and "I'm Alive," for example, that prevents these reformed bands from challenging the heights of their best '80s work. Judging from the album and song titles, it's clear that the will is there for both groups, but I guess the ravages of time continue their assault no matter how we may stand defiantly against them. I applaud the efforts in both cases and certainly don't intend to be ageist, but the rare feat of getting the original band into the studio for a new record doesn't necessarily equal a return to past glory. But please check out these new releases for yourself; at the very least we don't have artists here trying to trade exclusively on their names with little regard for purity in personnel. The attempt to rekindle past musical magic moments amounts to a winning-lottery-ticket-in-a-10-acre-haystack prospect, but these '80s veterans do make a worthy effort.

• Compare prices on Phoenix here.
• Compare prices on Time Stand Still here.

The unfortunate and ridiculous notion that the relationship between black musicians and aggressive, guitar-based rock music is a rare and odd one has always vexed me greatly. Luckily, there have always been prominent exceptions to this fictional rule, from Jimi Hendrix and Arthur Lee during the '60s to Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy in the '70s all the way up to the emergence of '80s underground legends Bad Brains.

Another major link in this disturbingly small but vital chain arrived at the tail end of that latter, ever image-conscious decade, in the form of a four-piece led by the powerful, soulful vocals of Corey Glover and the frenetic, creative riffing of guitarist Vernon Reid. Perhaps some of the band's somewhat surprising success can be attributed to the sheer novelty of a black, mainstream hard rock band, but I'd like to follow what, for me, is the unusual path of optimism and deflect this theory. I'd rather believe that music fans recognized a great band when they heard one, showing the sophistication to marvel at the way Living Colour incorporated all styles of pop and rock music to create something substantial amidst the fluff of hair metal and other styles relatively ignorant of music history. I could have easily chosen here any of a half-dozen tracks from 1988's excellent Vivid, but this one stands out as one hell of a heavy rock stomp through music's primal corridors. Colour notwithstanding.

On whatever day you may happen to be reading this, I want you to do me a favor tonight. Rest assured that it's for your own good and, more importantly, for the ultimate glory of rock. Sometime tonight, before you retire early because of a grueling week or you get caught up in whatever domestic endeavors may detain you, take some time, even just a few minutes... to Unchain the Night. Do it with your soul, your spirit and your loins. Do it like you mean it. Most of all, do it with a full understanding that you have made the world, permanently, a much better place.

If your face has crinkled up because you don't know what the hell I'm talking about, well, first of all, shame on you. Second of all, you mustn't have listened very much to the best American mainstream metal band of the '80s and, really, one of the most technically proficient and pleasingly melodic hard rock acts of all time. Come on, you know who I'm tokken about; do I really have to spell it out for you? As one of L.A.'s veterans of the late-'70s hard rock scene, Dokken got unfairly bundled at times into the mostly derisively regarded hair metal phenomenon. But this was a band that kept its fans delightfully off balance by rocking with far more ferocity than many expected and presenting melodies much more lovely and intoxicating than probably any bona fide metal band that came before. And with the powerful, swaggering guitar wizardry of guitarist George Lynch, the quartet had an ace in the hole to be feared and envied on the '80s hard rock scene.

So again, without any further prodding from me, you should have no problem at all making the pledge (and, perhaps, fulfilling the promise every single day for the rest of your life) to Unchain the Night. Take glee in releasing the mysterious fury of twilight and beyond, and if you're creative about it, you might even be able to combine it with some of those pesky domestic duties, if you know what I mean.

• Profile of '80s Metal Band Dokken
• Top 10 Dokken Songs of the '80s
• Top 10 Hard Rock Songs of the '80s
• Compare prices on Dokken CDs here.

Album Cover Photo Courtesy of Elektra Records

Maybe this 1981 tune remains underappreciated on a particularly high level for me because I've always lamented the fact that J.D. Souther, one of soft rock's best but too-often-relegated supporting players, is once again underutilized here. Yes, leading '70s singer-songwriter James Taylor gets top billing and released the song on his solo album, but it would have been nice to hear more of Souther's remarkable voice at the forefront of this gentle arrangement. The fact of the matter is that frequent Eagles songwriting collaborator Souther just may possess a better voice than anyone who's ever served as a full-time member of that band. And that's saying something major, as the high lead vocals and harmonies of relative unknowns like Don Henley and Glenn Frey (coughing chuckle) have always stood tall among the most impressive singers in pop/rock. Check out some of Souther's overly obscure solo work if you'd like to test this bold statement, starting with his only Top 10 pop hit, 1979's shimmering "You're Only Lonely." Of course I'm more than happy to acknowledge that Taylor's baritone here, as always, is as smooth as fresh creamery butter, but the passion and pure hurt both in Souther's harmonies and his few shining moments singing lead on this tune really make me wish his solo work would have received more of the attention he's always deserved.

• Compare prices on J.D. Souther CDs here.
• Compare prices on James Taylor CDs here.

Nobody saw Andy Partridge whooping it up as a guest MTV veejay during the '80s or Colin Moulding sweeping the land with his own line of men's fragrance, and that's precisely the reason why the British post-punk band was an absolutely necessary tonic for the excesses of one of entertainment's flashiest decades. Even after pervasive stage fright led Partridge to suspend XTC's touring days, the band simply continued to generate lively and organic pop/rock throughout the entire era, helping to invent alternative rock back when the music lacked that title and resided comfortably underground. This is '80s music at its most precise, intricate and uncompromising, and, partially because of XTC, the niche for slightly skewed pop has continued to grow despite the constant threat of obscurity. Click below for more specific XTC praise and analysis.

• Profile of XTC
• Top 8 XTC Songs of the '80s

In many cases throughout rock and roll history, the departure or death of a group's supporting band member has gone relatively unnoticed musically, even if on a personal level a huge impact is readily acknowledged. That, however, is supremely not the case when it comes to the April 17 passing of long-time Bruce Springsteen cohort and E Street Band keyboard player Danny Federici. This latest loss to the music world will almost definitely not suspend future performances of one of rock's most musically accomplished and tight-knit ensembles, but Springsteen's sound will forever be deprived by the absence of Federici's singular organ work, made so deservedly famous in songs such as "Hungry Heart," "Racing in the Street," and "You're Missing." Having succumbed to melanoma at the age of 58, Federici has certainly had his life and career prematurely ended (hell, Springsteen might still be putting on marathon live shows into his eighties, which would allow for a couple more decades of work for the E Street Band), but at least more than three decades of his work live on in the many major recordings on which he's appeared. Not that there's a shortage of reason to do so in general, but this somber occasion transforms a fresh listen to any of Springsteen's brilliant '80s releases (The River, Born in the USA and Tunnel of Love) to a brand new level of poignancy and melancholy beauty.

• Bruce Springsteen Profile
• Bruce Springsteen's Official Website
• Top 10 Bruce Springsteen Songs of the '80s, Part 1
• Top 10 Bruce Springsteen Songs of the '80s, Part 2

Album Cover Photo Courtesy of Music Master

Peter Gabriel's solo career has always been quite a mixed bag for me, shining at times with wit and elegance but enjoying undeserved radio saturation at others. I can't tell you how many times I've suffered through "Sledgehammer" and "Big Time" throughout my lifetime, either during the peak mid-'80s period of Gabriel's smash album So or more recently at a retail establishment on the sound system. Clearly, the sheer familiarity of tunes like these has a tendency to breed hostility among some listeners, but thankfully I have more positive things to say about the amnesia-themed track featured on Gabriel's third solo effort, from 1980. For one thing, this song rocks harder than Gabriel had done before or has probably done since. For another, the cryptic lyrical portrait of a shadowy character with memory problems accurately predicted shenanigans to come from Ronald Reagan's White House: "I don't remember, I don't recall, I've got no memory of anything at all." Who knew it could be almost as effective as a campaign slogan as it is a well-crafted chorus for a rock song? As a vocalist, Gabriel makes his greatest contributions when he barks cerebral lyrics in an aggressive style against the backdrop of nifty pop hooks, and he takes advantage of a golden opportunity to do just that with this (ironically) memorable song.

Album Cover Photo Courtesy of Geffen Records