Musical Monday - I Want to Know What Love Is by Foreigner

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: February 2, 1985 through February 9, 1985.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: The week of February 2, 1985.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: January 19, 1985 through Fabruary 2, 1985.

This song is another example of an instance in which a band's most successful song is not, in my opinion, their best song. In fact, I Want to Know What Love Is isn't even Foreigner's best ballad - that would be Waiting for a Girl Like You. Of course, power ballads weren't what made Foreigner a great band. The real crime is that they had so many great songs like Cold as Ice, Double Vision, Hot Blooded, Urgent, and Juke Box Hero, but it was this treacly piece of pabulum that turned out to be their most successful hit.

This is a pattern that is repeated over and over again: There are rock bands that create fantastic song after fantastic song, but it is only when they produce some bland and boring fluff that they are truly rewarded. I don't blame Foreigner for putting out this puffball of a song, I blame popular culture for waiting until they did so to reward them with a number one hit.

I mean, seriously, not only is I Want to Know What Love Is not one of Foreigner's "A List" songs, it isn't even one of their "B List" songs. It's barely hanging on to their third tier by the skin of its teeth. It is barely album-filler quality. And this is what turned out to be their biggest hit? The world is just inexplicably stupid sometimes.

Previous Musical Monday: Like a Virgin by Madonna

Subsequent Musical Monday: I Know Him So Well by Elaine Paige and Barbra Dickson

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Like a Virgin by Madonna

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Careless Whisper by Wham!

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Like a Virgin by Madonna

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Easy Lover by Phillip Bailey and Phil Collins

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Do They Know It's Christmas? by Band Aid

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Know Him So Well by Elaine Paige and Barbra Dickson

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Foreigner     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Do They Know It's Christmas? by Band Aid

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: December 15, 1984 through January 12, 1985 and December 23, 1989 through January 6, 1990.

In 1984, Boomtown Rats frontman Bob Geldof saw a news report about a famine in Ethiopia. Moved to do something, he wrote one of the most white savious songs of the era, used his connections to recruit a Who's Who's of British pop music personalities, and recorded this single, pledging all of the proceeds to charitable famine relief. It was one of the iconic moments of the 1980s, and one of the most culturally imperialistic events of my lifetime.

To be fair to Geldof, his heart was probably in the right place. He really did want to help, and the single and resulting concert series (named Live Aid) raised millions of dollars, most of which apparently did go to food aid. I must confess that I am doubtful as to the actual impat of this fundarising on the actual famine - most famines in the modern era are not due to an actual lack of food, but rather due to poor infrastructure hampering distribution networks or political instability (or outright political repression) halting the flow of food from where it is produced to where it is to be consumed. Whether the aid was useful or not, Geldof actually did raise money and it seems to have actually been used for its intended purpose. What uis also undeniable is that Band Aid and Live Aid resulted in some of the signature moments of the 1980s, most notably a performance by Queen at Wembley Stadium, and stunts like Phil Collins playing in Live Aid events in both Britain and the United States on the same day.

That said, that doesn't make the song any less cringe-worthy. Many of the individual lines are somewhat offensive (the most obnoxious being "[t]hank god its them instead of you"), but on top of that, the entire premise of the song "do they know its Christmas?", is a very religiously imperialistic in tone. Africa is an incredibly religiously diverse continent. There are Christians to be sure, but the continent is populated with large numbers of Muslims, vast numbers of people who follow aboriginal African faith traditions, and a smattering of Hindus, Jews, and Buddhists as well as many others. To reduce this rich and varied collection of relgious beliefs to a question about whether the beknighted natives kow whether it is Christmas is stunningly offensive in its reductiveness.

In any event, the critiques of the song didn't dampen its pop culture dominance. The idea of a group of pop artists getting together to record a song for charity spread like wildfire through the music world of the 1980s. Band Aid's charity single was soon followed by USA for Africa's recording of the almost as cringey We Are the World. Live Aid was copied by Farm Aid, an effort spearheaded by John Mellencamp to raise money to save failing family farms. Ronnie James Dio and his bandmates got together a bunch of metal artists who put out the charity album Hear'n Aid. And so on. By the end of the 1980s you couldn't fall over without landing on one charity single or another. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Geldof should be the most flattered man of the decade.

Previous Musical Monday: The Wild Boys by Duran Duran

Subsequent Musical Monday: Like a Virgin by Madonna

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: The Power of Love by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Want to Know What Love Is by Foreigner

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Let's Party by Jive Bunny and the Mastermixers

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Hangin' Tough by New Kids on the Block

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Band Aid     Band Aid II     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - The Power of Love by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: The week of December 8, 1984.

The song The Power of Love is kind of tangentially a Christian themed song. The video that accompanies the song explicitly tries to connect it to the Nativity story in what was clearly a gambit to try to score a Christmas day hit for the band (Christmas day hits are, or at least were, apparently a big deal in the U.K.). One thing I have always thought odd about the story is kind of highlighted here - God could arrange for shepherds to get a visitation from an angel and for wise men from distant lands to show up bearing kingly gifts (gifts of a nature that should have ensured that Jesus' family would be quite wealthy), but could not coordinate events in such a way that Jesus could be born somewhere other than a stable.

In any event, the song is okay, but kind of mediocre and Frankie Goes to Hollywood joins dozens of other bands that are one hit wonders in the United States but have multiple number ones in other countries. More to the point, this song didn't really land the way the band clearly wanted it to, and has been overwhelmed in the public consciousness by the song that followed it on the U.K. charts.

Previous Musical Monday: I Should Have Known Better by Jim Diamond

Subsequent Musical Monday: Out of Touch by Hall and Oates

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Should Have Known Better by Jim Diamond

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Do They Know It's Christmas? by Band Aid

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Frankie Goes to Hollywood     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - I Should Have Known Better by Jim Diamond

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: The week of December 1, 1984.

This is a song that I missed in the 1980s. I have basically no recollection of this song or this singer, which isn't entirely surprising, since he apparently only had success in Europe. That said, if I had first heard it in 1984 when it was released, I probably would have thought it was a hopelessly romantic, albeit super sappy song. On the other hand, first hearing it now, this song bothers me a bit. The lyrics - I should have known better/Than to lie to someone as beautiful as you - seem to imply that there is some level of plainness that makes lying to them acceptable. That sits wrong with me now in a way that it probably wouldn't have when I was a teenager. The implication just would not have occurred to me back then.

Previous Musical Monday: I Feel for You by Chaka Khan

Subsequent Musical Monday: The Power of Love by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Feel for You by Chaka Khan

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: The Power of Love by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Jim Diamond     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - I Feel for You by Chaka Khan

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: The week of December 8, 1984.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: November 10, 1984 through November 24, 1984.

This is another post about Prince. To be clear, Chaka Khan was (and is) an overwhelmingly powerful force in the rhythm and blues world. By 1984 she had carved a career that marked her as not only one of the top female vocalists in the genre, but one of the top female vocalists period. Between 1978 and 1983, she had hit the top of the R&B charts three times, but had not had a top hit overall. Thus, it is notable that it wasn't until she covered a Prince song that she managed to top out not only the Cash Box Top 100, but the U.K. Chart as well. This marked the start of a trend of artists covering Prince songs (or Prince simply writing songs for other artists to record) that turned into big hits. Given his own ability to turn songs into hits during the decade, it is hard to overstate how influential Prince was on the shape of music in the 1980s.

This version of I Feel for You was the first big hit that paired a singer with a rapper, featuring Melle Mel on the recording. So, for anyone who doesn't like this practice, you have Chaka Khan to blame. This arrangement also led to the kind of odd result of Khan not actually singing until almost a minute into the song. As noted before, Khan was a dominant force as a vocalist, and she was acting as a solo artist for this song, which makes sidelining her for the first quarter of the song seem like an odd choice. I guess it was the right choice though, given the result.

All that said, I didn't really like this song all that much when it was released. I was aware of some of Chaka Khan's other output, including I'm Every Woman and her collaboration with Rufus in Tell Me Something Good, and I thought they were far superior to this song. I still do. Just as with Steve Wonder and I Just Called to Say I Love You, Chaka Khan's biggest hit was, in my estimation, far from her best song.

Previous Musical Monday: Purple Rain by Prince

Subsequent Musical Monday: I Should Have Known Better by Jim Diamond

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go by Wham!

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: The Wild Boys by Duran Duran

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Freedom by Wham!

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Should Have Known Better by Jim Diamond

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Chaka Khan     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Freedom by Wham!

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: October 20, 1984 to November 3, 1984.

Wham! had a few top hits in the United States in the 1980s. The duo had a few more top hits in the U.K. This song reached number one in the U.K., and was only slightly less successful across the Atlantic. The thing about Wham! is that even though they are one of the iconic bands of the 1980s, they only released a total of two studio albums, and their heyday only lasted for about two years. Michael and Ridgeley somehow managed to help set the tone for the entire decade with a handful of songs and some fairly suspect dancing.

The weird thing about this song is that even though it is super-peppy and upbeat, the lyrics tell the story of a one-sided, almost abusive relationship. It seems odd to have a toe-tapping dance song that features lyrics about a narrator whose significant other apparently routinely cheats on them, but the narrator is so smitten that they always forgive their wayward partner. This is a strangely happy sounding tune with a dark core behind it. I suspect that few people who put this on for a turn at cutting the rug spent much time thinking about the words being sung at them. I kind of wonder if it would have mattered if they had.

Previous Musical Monday: Let's Go Crazy by Prince

Subsequent Musical Monday: Caribbean Queen (No More Love On the Run) by Billy Ocean

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Just Called to Say I Love You by Stevie Wonder

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Feel for You by Chaka Khan

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Wham!     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - I Just Called to Say I Love You by Stevie Wonder

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: October 20, 1984 through October 27, 1984.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: October 13, 1984 through November 3, 1984.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: September 8, 1984 through October 13, 1984.

If there is anything that demonstrates that success on the pop charts is mostly determined by the preferences of suburban moms, it is the fact that this song is Stevie Wonder's best-selling single. Wonder has had a long and prolific career, churning out musical masterpiece after musical masterpiece - Fingertips, Part II, Uptight (Everything's Alright), Superstition, Master Blaster (Jammin'), Sir Duke, and so many more. And yet, this milquetoast love ballad is the most successful song he ever wrote or recorded. To be clear, this isn't a bad song, it is just that compared to his greatest works, I Just Called to Say I Love You is just ordinary at best. It is, to be blunt, the epitome of Mom-pop.

This song was also on the soundtrack to The Woman in Red, which, once again, highlights the connection between pop music success and the movie industry. This song won an Academy Award as a result, although the movie - a mostly unfunny Gene Wilder vehicle featuring Kelly LeBrock and Gilda Radner - was simply not very good.

Previous Musical Monday: What's Love Got to Do With It by Tina Turner

Subsequent Musical Monday: Missing You by John Waite

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Let's Go Crazy by Prince

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Caribbean Queen (No More Love On the Run) by Billy Ocean

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Let's Go Crazy by Prince

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Purple Rain by Prince

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Careless Whisper by George Michael

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Freedom by Wham!

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Stevie Wonder     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Careless Whisper by George Michael

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: February 16, 1985 through March 2, 1985.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: February 16, 1985 through March 2, 1985.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: August 18, 1984 through September 1, 1984.

At the outset, I will admit that I didn't much like George Michael's music in the 1980s. I'll also go ahead and admit that I don't much like George Michael's music now. I can appreciate his talent, and the artistry, he just doesn't perform a style of music that appeals to me. That there is music that is immensely popular that I don't personally find particularly appealing should not be particularly surprising. I'd venture that pretty much everyone has some piece of popular culture that just doesn't appeal to them. George Michael (and Wham!) fall squarely into that category for me.

Disliking popular things other people like is perfectly okay. Being a dick about disliking popular things other people like is well, being a dick. I don't care for Michael's music, but if you like it, I hope you get a lot of joy from listening to this video.

One odd thing I noticed about this song is that it is often presented crediting George Michael as the artist. it is true that he sings the song, but it appeared on a Wham! album by Michael was a member of Wham!, so I wonder why the song is presented this way. This isn't universal - sometimes the song is presented crediting Wham! as the artist, which makes the mystery a little deeper. I don't know if this has any meaning, but it is quirky.

Previous Musical Monday: Ghostbusters by Ray Parker, Jr.

Subsequent Musical Monday: What's Love Got to Do With It by Tina Turner

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: I Want to Know What Love Is by Foreigner

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: I Can't Fight This Feeling by REO Speedwagon

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Easy Lover by Philip Bailey and Phil Collins

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: I Can't Fight This Feeling by REO Speedwagon

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Two Tribes by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: I Just Called to Say I Love You by Stevie Wonder

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

George Michael     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Two Tribes by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: June 16, 1984 through August 11, 1984.

In the United States, Frankie Goes to Hollywood was basically a one hit wonder. In the U.K., they had multiple songs reach the top of the pop charts, including this one, which dominated the British pop charts for pretty much the entire summer of 1984. The thing is, while I can see why this song was not a big hit in the U.S., and why it might have resonated in other parts of the world, I am of the opinion that it is just not a very good song that happened to be attached to a fairly compelling music video.

The lyrics of the song are a pretty blunt assessment of the dangerous and potentially destructive rivalry that existed at the time between the United States and the U.S.S.R., taking some pretty sharp jabs at both sides, and Ronald Reagan in particular. Given the nature of American popular culture at the time, this probably served to limit the song's popularity in the U.S., an issue that obviously would not be a problem for U.K. audiences. The larger problem is that while the lyrics do have a handful of bitterly satirical turns, they descend into being annoyingly repetitive, matching the pounding but kind of boring music that backs them.

Where this song really shines is the music video that was made for it which depicts a no-holds barred grudge match between a Reagan caricature on one side and a Chernenko-like character on the other. The pair go back and forth taking shots at one another between grandstanding for the crowd of world leaders crowded around the ring. The members of Frankie Goes to Hollywood appear in the video as a sportscasting team broadcasting the match and offering color commentary. Although the video is just as blunt in its messaging as the lyrics of the song, somehow the satire works better visually than it does as lyrics.

The fact that the video elevates a kind of mundane song into an iconic cultural artifact is more or less the story of the 1980s. The rise of MTV, and as a result the rise of music videos, transformed the world of pop music, making the visual offering as important as (and sometimes more important than) the auditory portion of a pop song.

Previous Musical Monday: Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper

Subsequent Musical Monday: Dancing in the Dark by Bruce Springstein

Previous #1 on the UK Chart: Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go by Wham!

Subsequent #1 on the UK Chart: Careless Whisper by George Michael

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Frankie Goes to Hollywood     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go by Wham!

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: November 17, 1984 through December 1, 1984.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: November 24, 1984 through December 1, 1984.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: June 2, 1984 through June 9, 1984.

Peppy dance beat? Check.

Mostly meaningless lyrics? Check.

Goofy dance moves? Check.

Big, brightly colored clothes? Check.
.
Ridiculously short shorts? Check.

Black light sequence? Check.

I am starting to think that between Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Duran Duran, Prince, and so on, 1984 may have been peak 1980s. Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go is pretty much a prime example of the music and music videos of the era. Peppy, poppy, with performers in shirts shouting slogans in big letters who are also wearing brightly colored fingerless gloves, and just generally over the top, the song and video are more or less symbolic of the era. As Deadpool says in the movie Deadpool, Wham! earned their exclamation point.

Previous Musical Monday: Let's Hear it for the Boy by Denice Williams

Subsequent Musical Monday: Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Caribbean Queen (No More Love On the Run) by Billy Ocean

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Out of Touch by Hall and Oates

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Purple Rain by Prince

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: I Feel for You by Chaka Khan

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: The Reflex by Duran Duran

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Two Tribes by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Wham!     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - The Reflex by Duran Duran

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: June 23, 1984 through June 30, 1984.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: June 16, 1984 through June 23, 1984.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: May 5, 1984 through May 26. 1984.

The Reflex is one of those iconic 1980s era songs that is emblematic of the era, and also highlights one of the worst things about music from that time period. The song is catchy and danceable, like pretty much everything else that Duran Duran produced. It is also complete nonsense, like pretty much everything else Duran Duran produced. This is kind of a running theme with a lot of popular music on he U.S. music charts in the mid-1980s - it is often upbeat and fun, but it is empty and meaningless. Duran Duran generally, and The Reflex specifically, is more or less the poster child for this phenomenon.

Previous Musical Monday: Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now) by Phil Collins

Subsequent Musical Monday: Let's Hear It for the Boy by Denice Williams

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: When Doves Cry by Prince

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Dancing in the Dark by Bruce Springstein

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Hello by Lionel Richie

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go by Wham!

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Duran Duran     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Hello by Lionel Richie

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: May 12, 1984 through May 19, 1984.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: May 12, 1984 through May 19, 1984.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: March 24, 1984 through April 28, 1984.

Lionel Richie was the master of Dad pop in the 1980s. Hello is pretty much Dad pop distilled to its purest essence. A soft-rock ballad in which the singer pines for a woman he has apparently never directly spoken with, this song's narrator is pathetic in ways that would not be equaled until James Blunt's You're Beautiful. After leaving the Commodores, Richie more or less settled into producing commercially successful albeit mostly forgettable songs for the entire decade.

The thing about this song is that while the song is bland and fairly boring, the video is creepy as hell. Apparently, Richie decided to not only be the king of Dad pop, but also the king of Dad stalking. The entire video depicts Riche as a teacher who is apparently smitten with an attractive blind student in his class. He spends the entire video silently stalking her, looming creepily behind her in several scenes, calling her house in the middle of the night, and generally behaving like the villain in the first half of a horror movie. At the end of the movie, it is revealed that the blind student has sculpted a bust of Richie that somehow looks a little bit like him. This video is genuinely weird and off-putting. It certainly made me reevaluate Richie's character given that he didn't look at this concept and say "no way in hell".

Previous Musical Monday: Girls Just Wanna Have Fun by Cyndi Lauper

Subsequent Musical Monday: Footloose by Kenny Loggins

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now) by Phil Collins

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Let's Hear It for the Boy by Denice Williams

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now) by Phil Collins

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Let's Hear It for the Boy by Denice Williams

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: 99 Luftballoons by Nena

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: The Reflex by Duran Duran

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Lionel Richie     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - 99 Luftballoons by Nena

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: The week of March 10, 1984.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: March 3, 1984 through March 17, 1984.

In 1984, Germany was still divided, and Berlin was still split by a wall. The world was held in the grip of a cold war between the U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R. who essentially kept the world more or less constantly on the brink of nuclear annihilation. Nena's song imagines that a misunderstanding - a red balloon floating over the Berlin Wall is mistaken for a UFOs, leading to a sequence of events that ratchets cross-border tensions up and results in an nuclear exchange. At the end of the song, the narrator walks through the ruined wasteland that the world has become and says that ninety-nine years of war have left no possibility for anyone to be the victor. The English language translation is slightly different, but fundamentally tells the same story.

It shouldn't be surprising that a band from West Germany, a nation situated on the literal front lines of this worldwide conflict, would come up with an antiwar song. What makes this song chilling in retrospect is that in 1983, a false alarm in the Soviet early-warning system indicated that five nuclear missiles had been launched at the country. It was only the clear thinking of Soviet lieutenant colonel Stanislav Petrov that prevented the U.S.S.R. from launching a retaliatory strike and kicking off what would have almost certainly been an apocalyptic nuclear exchange. Though no one outside of Soviet missile command knew about this until decades later, the fact that this song recounts a scenario disturbingly similar to an event that almost destroyed the world is somewhat terrifying.

Previous Musical Monday: Jump by Van Halen

Subsequent Musical Monday: Girls Just Wanna Have Fun by Cyndi Lauper

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Jump by Van Halen

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Girls Just Wanna Have Fun by Cyndi Lauper

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Relax by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Hello by Lionel Richie

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Nena     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Relax by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: January 28, 1984 through February 25, 1984.

It is difficult to explain just how big, albeit short-lived, a cultural phenomenon Frankie Goes to Hollywood was in early 1984. I lived through it, and it is difficult for me to comprehend. There was about a four to six month period when Frankie Goes to Hollywood was everywhere, mostly based on the strength of this song. White t-shirts with giant black letters declaring "Frankie Say Relax" were the fashion statement of the year. You couldn't turn around without finding another Frankie Goes to Hollywood reference. This moderately obscure group of Liverpudlians simply took the pop culture world by storm, and didn't let go for months.

The extent to which the pop culture world took this song to its heart is somewhat surprising. As I have pointed out before, the death of the disco era was in large part a reaction to that music's "urban" connection, where "urban" is more or less a code word for "black" and "gay". In that light, the cultural rise of a song that is an almost explicit paean to gay sex that was accompanied by a music video that made sure to provide text for anyone who didn't get that subtext, is notable. Frankie Goes to Hollywood didn't try to hide any of this. Relax is a song that is openly, unashamedly, unabashedly gay. The music video is so homoerotic that it could almost be mistaken for a parody if one didn't know the band members were serious.

That said, Frankie Goes to Hollywood had to create an entirely different, much less overtly sexual video in order to get any airplay on MTV, so it is pretty clear that homophobia was still alive and well in the pop culture landscape of the U.S. at that time.

Previous Musical Monday: Pipes of Peace by Paul McCartney

Subsequent Musical Monday: Owner of a Lonely Heart by Yes

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Pipes of Peace by Paul McCartney

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: 99 Luftballoons by Nena

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Frankie Goes to Hollywood     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Pipes of Peace by Paul McCartney

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: January 14, 1984 through January 21, 1984.

Last week's Musical Monday was a kind of masterclass in nonsensical imagery supporting a virtually meaningless song. This week, on the other hand, is an example of a song and video using beating the audience about the head and shoulders with its point. Pipes of Peace is an anti-war song (or at least a pro-peace song) and the video uses the 1914 Christmas truce to drive its point home. The one really brilliant bit is having McCartney play both an English and German soldiers who have parallel experiences in the story, emphasizing the commonality of the two opposing sides. The message is direct, unsubtle, and effective.

One cultural note here that distinguishes the United States from the United Kingdom is World War I, which looms incredibly large in the memories of, and consequently the art of, the United Kingdom, and is more or less a footnote in the United States - it is often seen as little more than a prelude to World War II. This makes some sense: The United Kingdom was involved in the First World War for far longer than the United States was, and the United Kingdom was at the very least a coequal partner with France in that conflict. On the other hand, the United States was far more involved in World War II, in some ways pushing the United Kingdom into second banana status in the conflict, and from the United Kingdom's perspective the Second World War more or less set into motion the dissolution of their world-spanning empire. Plus, there is a cogent argument that can be made that World War I really was just a prelude to World War II, as evidenced by (among other things) Ferdinand Foch's 1919 quote concerning the Versailles Treaty: "This is not a peace. It is an armistice for twenty years."

Despite the hopes expressed in the song and video, it is sobering to remember that the Christmas Truce of 1914 wasn't peace. It was an armistice for, at most, a few days.

Previous Musical Monday: Union of the Snake by Duran Duran

Subsequent Musical Monday: Relax by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Only You by the Flying Pickets

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Relax by Frankie Goes to Hollywood

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Paul McCartney     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Only You by the Flying Pickets

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: December 10, 1983 through January 7, 1984.

Until I pulled up this song for the Musical Monday feature, I had never heard it. When I saw the title, I assumed that, given the love affair between the U.K. charts and 1950s era do-wop music, that this was a cover of the 1955 Platter's hit Only You (and You Alone).

It isn't. It is still a cover song - but the original band for this song was the 1980s synth pop group Yazoo. While the Yazoo version is catchy and interesting, this a capella version by the Flying Pickets is perfect. Using just voices captures the plaintive poigancy of the lyrics, while preventing the song from descending into maudlin self-pity. Setting the video in a slightly run-down pub just adds to the atmosphere of the piece, reflecting the general malaise of the early 1980s in the U.K. The fact that the Flying Pickets were originally named as a reference to some members' experience participating in miner's strikes just makes this background richer and fuller.

Previous Musical Monday: All Night Long (All Night) by Lionel Richie

Subsequent Musical Monday: Say Say Say by Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Uptown Girl by Billy Joel

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Pipes of Peace by Paul McCartney

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

The Flying Pickets     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Uptown Girl by Billy Joel

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: November 5, 1983 through December 3, 1983.

All songs are snapshots in time. Sometimes those snapshots are relatively short-lived. The song Uptown Girl and its related video were made during the rush Joel was experiencing from his new relationship with Christie Brinkley. You can see and hear the joy and exuberance of that fresh and exciting moment in the performance. There is simply so much hope, exhilaration, and expectation evident here.

And of course, now, in 2021, we know that Joel and Brinkley did go on to get married, have a child, and then get divorced. The oddity of moments like that depicted in Uptown Girl is that we now know the ultimate outcome of the events that will flow from that moment, and it casts them in a different light. I will always remember when I found out that the marriage at the centerpiece of John Denver's Annie's Song fell apart, and how that just seemed so wrong. This seems similarly tragic in a way - none of the people in this video know what is in store for them over the next few years, both the highs and the lows. It is a moment in time caught forever, with all of the emotions of those involved untainted by what was to come.

Previous Musical Monday: Islands in the Stream by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton

Subsequent Musical Monday: All Night Long (All Night) by Lionel Richie

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Karma Chameleon by Culture Club

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Only You by the Flying Pickets

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Billy Joel     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Karma Chameleon by Culture Club

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: February 4, 1984 through February 18, 1984.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: February 4, 1984 through February 18, 1984.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: September 24, 1983 through October 29, 1983.

Karma Chameleon is a song that seems like it should have some sort of subtle subtext in its meaning, but it really doesn't. It seems like it should be a roundabout way to talk about a break up, or a piece of political satire that uses imagery to avoid directly complaining about a particular political movement, or something like that. The song is, however, simply about karma, like the title says. Basically, the song's meaning amounts to "what goes around, comes around", with nothing deeper or more complex than that. Sometimes things are what they seem at first glance, and this song is one of those things.

Over all, Karma Chameleon turned out to be one of the signature songs of the decade. Although Culture Club entered a stormy (and ultimately destructive) period following the success of this song resulting from romantic entanglements within the group gone sour and other issues, and Boy George's incresingly difficult time dealing with both fame and drugs, Karma Chameleon, by itself, cements them into the pantheon of iconic 1980s musical acts.

Previous Musical Monday: Tell Her About It by Billy Joel

Subsequent Musical Monday: The Safety Dance by Men Without Hats

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Owner of a Lonely Heart by Yes

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Jump by Van Halen

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Owner of a Lonely Heart by Yes

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Jump by Van Halen

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Red Red Wine by UB40

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Uptown Girl by Billy Joel

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

Culture Club     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Red Red Wine by UB40

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: The week of October 15, 1988.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: The week of October 15, 1988.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: September 3, 1983 through September 17, 1983.

This version of Red Red Wine is a cover version of a cover version of a 1967 Neil Diamond song that was rereleased in the U.S. five years after it was a top hit in the U.K. That's a pretty long and winding road for a song to take.

This song is actually an example of something that probably can't really happen any more. The song was a big hit in the U.K. in 1983, but went almost entirely unnoticed in the U.S. Five years later, it was promoted by some interested music industry folks following a performence of the song at Nelson Mandela's birthday celebration, and it became a top hit in the United States. This sort of delayed flow through the cultural psyche just doesn't happen in the modern interconnected world where pop culutre flashes around the globe so quickly that if you blonk you miss it.

The delay in the song reaching popularity in the U.S. did create a kind of oddly jarring circumstance in which a song made during the ennui of the economic malaise of the early 1980s in the U.K. became a big hit in the U.S. in 1988, when the country was kind of riding high. The song and the video that goes with it depict a kind of depressing existence in which drinking is the only respite from a life of underemployment and disappointment, which fit perfectly with the zeitgeist of the recessionary economy of the early-1980s. It also fit perfectly with a band whose name was a reference to a government form used for claiming unemployment benefits. By 1988 though, the song felt kind of weirdly out of place.

Previous Musical Monday: Give It Up by KC and the Sunshine Band

Subsequent Musical Monday: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) by Eurythmics

Previous #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Love Bites by Def Leppard

Subsequent #1 on the Billboard Hot 100: A Groovy Kind of Love by Phil Collins

Previous #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Love Bites by Def Leppard

Subsequent #1 on the Cash Box Top 100: A Groovy Kind of Love by Phil Collins

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Give It Up by KC and the Sunshine Band

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Karma Chameleon by Culture Club

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

UB40     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home

Musical Monday - Give It Up by KC and the Sunshine Band

#1 on the Billboard Hot 100: Never.

#1 on the Cash Box Top 100: Never.

#1 on the U.K. Chart: August 13, 1983 through August 27, 1983.

This is a song by a band at the end of its life, bereft of interesting ideas, desperate to churn out anything that will keep it relevant and failing badly. By 1983, the career of KC and the Sunshine Band was on life support. Their last notable hit had been in 1980 with the eminently forgettable Please Don't Go. They were, by 1983, a disco-era band that was trying to make it in a pop music landscape that was extremely hostile to disco music.
It doesn't help that this song is simply not very good. It has a dance beat, but everything about it seems almost like the band is just going through the motions. There's no real hook, no real substance to the lyrics, nothing particularly interesting about the vocal delivery, and nothing particularly memorable about the instrumentation. This song is bland, generic, and boring.

The blandness of the song isn't really helped by the video, which doesn't really do anything to illustrate or highlight the song. In the past I highlighted a couple of music videos that had inexplicably science fictional themes, and this one goes onto that list. The song is a generic dance song, while the video is a badly acted oddball fantasy horror quest where the climax is untying some ropes and an almost completely random deus ex machina. There's literally no connection between the music and the images presented, and that makes the entire thing almost entirely unmemorable.

This was the last gasp of KC and the Sunshine Band, and I can only say that after this they deserved the obscurity that awaited them.

Previous Musical Monday: Wherever I Lay My Hat (That's My Home) by Paul Young

Subsequent Musical Monday: Red Red Wine by UB40

Previous #1 on the U.K. Chart: Wherever I Lay My Hat (That's My Home) by Paul Young

Subsequent #1 on the U.K. Chart: Red Red Wine by UB40

List of #1 Singles from the Billboard Hot 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles from the Cash Box Top 100 for 1980-1989
List of #1 Singles on the U.K. Chart for 1980-1989

KC and the Sunshine Band     1980s Project     Musical Monday     Home