Bask in the 80s wrongness

In 1985 I had a really shit haircut. I thought I’d be as cool as MJ Fox in Back to the Future breaking the speed limit in a DeLorean. Man he was so hot I bet he had a good go on the entire cast of The Breakfast Club, even that Emilio Estevez. You don’t tend to hear about MJF anymore, wonder if he’s stuck back in time again? I bought him an Etch-A-Sketch for Christmas last year but I didn’t get a thank you note. The ungrateful quiff that he is.

Look at all the music from back in the day…

Indeep – Last Night a DJ Saved My Life
This is art, because when they say the line “away goes trouble down the drain” you hear a toilet flushing. Awesome. When they sing “Called you on the phone” – you hear a ringing phone. Subtle. Like a car crash. You’d think it’d be enough to have a driving baseline, so typical of the early eighties, and two chicks singing along. But look at that bearded chap in the middle – what are you for?! I’m gonna put curse on him just for doing a rap which probably inspired John Barnes’ dismal effort. What an idiot. On your rug.



Alphaville - Forever Young
This would be the shittest song ever if it wasn’t for its appearance in Napoleon Dynamite. It teaches us a few things. Firstly, pop stars are not actors and look stupid trying to feign emotions; look at the singer’s stupid face at 2min 40s. Secondly if you aren’t English, don’t write in English. Music lyrics are bad enough with their underperforming metaphors and cliché’s, without having some pidgin version lambaste itself into puerile quasi-polemic nonsense. Actually it isn’t as bad as some of the Emo nonsense I’d been subject to recently – just wait till you all grow up, you’ll be so ashamed of yourselves.



Cutting Crew – I Just Died in Your Arms Tonight
During Christmas party at primary school, we each had to take along a record to have with our dry cake and sausage rolls. I took this little number in an attempt to woo Jackie Ley, who had spent the year flitting between me and Jamie; she was undecided as to who was the better boyfriend. When I finally got to kiss her I bit her lip. Accidentally…. I wasn’t trying to kill her in my arms. I’m not that stupid. I still bite now when I’ve had a bit to drink. On purpose though. Anyway, this song is fucking magic to the ladies. I should know I’ve kissed two.



Sisters of Mercy – This Corrosion
In the eighties the NME was still trendy cause of its excellent journalism and students had fucking no computers or TVs so they’d all crowd around a copy in a vague attempt to know what was happening in London. Everyone cool liked this song. I didn’t.



Flying Pickets – Only You
Black people weren’t allowed in the seventies, but by 1983 they even got onto Top of the Pops. Unfortunately it was with the stupid eye-boggling video of Don’t Worry Be Happy which is a shame cause McFerrin is a jazz beatbox crossover master. White people didn’t master beatboxing until much later on. Here’s an early attempt by the Flying Pickets. This song had so many alternative playground lyrics (“Looking from a window above, someone gave me a shove…”). But mainly it's video has some wicked sideburns.


Pretty boring that last song. Whilst I check the spelling of this nonsense have a dance…


And on a final note.....

.....eighties, we’ll always be together in electric dreams.

Someone else has collated over 1400 music videos on the interweb and made a lovely site here. Go find your own disasters by clicking on this really really long sentence which describes the link that contains the website I'm talking about.


tags ( Eighties Music | Cutting Crew | Back to the Future | Indeep | haircuts )