Category Archives: Crap Songs

1980s Rock/Pop Acts I Should Like But Don’t

Posted on by

Everyone knows a few: those acts that got great reviews, named some of your favourite bands as influences and sold a few records in the process, but there was just something about their music that you couldn’t hack.

Maybe it was their vocals, their outlook, their politics, their songwriting, or a mixture of all four.

Well I know some too. Here’s a totally subjective, wildly judgemental – no offence intended – list of 1980s pop and rock artists who leave me cold, despite most being critical and commercial successes. Believe me, I’ve tried. Like they could care less…

King’s X
My muso mates waxed lyrical about their tricky riffs and tight musicianship but I’ve never got beyond the guy’s not very good singing, their weirdly unmemorable songs and rather naff pomp-rock tendencies.

World Party
Perpetually spoken about in hushed tones of reverence when I was at college but their music singularly failed to grab, despite the Beatles/XTC/Prince influences, possibly due to Karl Wallinger’s rather wimpy voice. See also: Crowded House, REM, Waterboys

The Blow Monkeys
Somehow got filed under the ‘sophistipop’ banner courtesy of their flirtation with ‘slinky’ grooves and soul influences, but for me Dr Robert’s absurd voice and the lack of songwriting imagination never got them past first base. See also: Kane Gang, Simply Red, Johnny Hates Jazz, Black, The Big Dish.

Marillion
Decade-ending Season’s End had some brilliant moments but for me most of the Fish era was a succession of quite badly-played/badly-sung rip-offs of Gabriel-era Genesis. It Bites did it better and added some much-needed pizzazz and groove. See also: IQ, Jadis, Tony Banks/Chris Squire/Mike Rutherford solo albums…

Deacon Blue
I liked the soppier/poppier elements of their debut album Raintown but the game was up when the truly irritating ‘Wages Day’ and ‘Real Gone Kid’ swept the airwaves at the end of the decade. They took Prefab Sprout’s basic concept to the bank whilst shaving off the weird edges.

Paul McCartney
Sheer melodic brilliance time and time again of course, but for me his 1980s work generally flatters to deceive, outside of a few random favourites (‘Pipes Of Peace’, ‘Once Upon A Long Ago’). Yes, even the album he did with Elvis Costello (of whom more below…).

The Style Council
Only a musical moron would deny the power of ‘You’re The Best Thing’ and ‘Walls Come Tumbling Down’ and you have to admire Paul Weller’s songcraft, politics, guitar playing and ability to laugh at himself, but generally it was hard to shake off the naffness. Mick Talbot must take a lot of the blame…

Mick Jagger
He employed some of my favourite producers and musicians (Jeff Beck, Sakamoto, Bill Laswell, Herbie Hancock, Doug Wimbish, Simon Phillips etc. etc.) but failed to produce even one memorable or interesting single or album track during the 1980s. See also: Pete Townshend, Eric Clapton, Nick Heyward, Jerry Harrison

Pages
This yacht rock supergroup had a great singer (Richard Page) and sh*t-hot musicians (Vinnie Colaiuta, Jay Graydon, Jeff Porcaro, Steve Lukather etc.) but the songs weren’t strong or memorable enough. See also: most of Toto, Mr Mister

Elvis Costello
Weirdly his ‘Less Than Zero’ was one of the first singles I loved as a kid, but his desperation to be a serious ’80s ‘artist’ fell on deaf ears despite the fact that he obviously knew a lot of chords and retained some of that new-wave angst (but even I couldn’t resist his fine run of 1990s form, from the superb ‘London’s Brilliant Parade’ to Bacharach). See also: The Cars, The The, Squeeze.

Van Morrison
To my ears his 1980s music is like Joni Mitchell and John Martyn without the melodic/harmonic/lyrical depth, apart from the sublime ‘Rave On John Donne’. People tell me he always uses great bands though, but they often barely register…

Todd Rundgren
I’m more of a fan of his 1980s producing work (Pursuit Of Happiness, XTC etc) than his solo music. Never bought into this whole ‘he’s a genius’ thing, save the wonderful ‘The Verb To Love’ – but that’s from the 1970s, innit…? See also: Lenny Kravitz.

Depeche Mode
Yes they’ve got a few pop hooks, the Mute Records cred and ‘edgy’ image but never been able to shake off an ineffable naffness for me. And despite being ‘synth pioneers’, they didn’t seem to push the sonic envelope much in the 1980s at all. ‘Everything Counts’ was superb though and I got on board later with Ultra. See also: Kraftwerk, New Musik, Visage, Ultravox, New Order, Howard Jones

Pink Floyd
If you want to put me to sleep, put on any of Pink Floyd’s 1980s work. Bring back Syd. See also: Fleetwood Mac, Pink Floyd solo projects, except Nick Mason’s Fictitious Sports, which is brilliant…

Bad Brains
Dub/thrash/funk pioneers and a huge influence on bands I really like such as Living Colour, Fishbone and 24-7 Spyz, but their music seems a little amateurish to me and, again, their singer was not blessed with a great set of pipes (unlike the singers of bands above).

Housemartins
Fondly remembered until you actually hear those singles again – ‘Build’, ‘Happy Hour’, ‘Caravan Of Love’. Annoying, a bit puny, and apparently the more irritating side of the C-86 generation.

The Jesus and Mary Chain
Bowie summed them up well for me: ‘I tried the Jesus and Mary Chain but I just couldn’t believe it. It’s awful! It was so sophomoric – like the Velvets without Lou. I just know that they’re kids from Croydon! I just can’t buy it…’

Nearly the Greatest Pop Albums of the 1980s (The One-Crap-Track Theory)

Posted on by

It’s been a bit of a movingtheriver obsession over the past few weeks as summer finally kicks in and the album format makes a seasonal comeback.

You’re enjoying the music, hailing a ‘classic’ record and then…damn. It’s the track you always skip, the runt of the collection, the song that tarnishes a perfectly good album.

Maybe the band was ‘letting their hair down’ after a few pints in the pub down the road. Maybe it was the drummer/producer/bass player’s vanity track. Maybe it’s the overplayed hit. Maybe the album sequencing isn’t quite right. To be honest, often it’s just something irrational that you can’t quite put your finger on.

For whatever reason, here are movingtheriver’s almost perfect 1980s ‘pop’ albums, and the tracks that just don’t quite sit right:

Scritti Politti: Provision (skipped track: ‘Boom! There She Was’)

Prefab Sprout: Steve McQueen (skipped track: ‘Horsin’ Around’)

Prefab Sprout: Protest Songs (skipped track: ‘Tiffany’s’)

Prefab Sprout: From Langley Park To Memphis (skipped track: ‘I Remember That’)

Talking Heads: Remain In Light (skipped track: ‘The Overload’)

Phil Collins: Face Value (skipped track: ‘I’m Not Moving’)

Propaganda: A Secret Wish (skipped track: ‘Jewel’)

Wendy & Lisa: Fruit At The Bottom (skipped track: ‘Tears Of Joy’)

China Crisis: Diary Of A Hollow Horse (skipped track: ‘Age Old Need’)

Danny Wilson: Meet Danny Wilson (skipped track: ‘Nothing Ever Goes To Plan’)

Danny Wilson: Bebop Moptop (skipped track: ‘NYC Shanty’)

Frankie Goes To Hollywood: Liverpool (skipped track: ‘Watching The Wildlife’)

David Bowie: Let’s Dance (skipped track: ‘Cat People’)

Kate Bush: Hounds Of Love (skipped track: ‘Running Up That Hill’)

The Police: Synchronicity (skipped track: ‘Every Breath You Take’, and sometimes ‘Mother’ too…)

Joni Mitchell: Wild Things Run Fast (skipped track: ‘Solid Love’)

Roxy Music: Avalon (skipped track: ‘Take A Chance With Me’, but I love the intro…)

Hue and Cry: Remote (skipped track: the title track)

Prince: Batman (skipped track: ‘Arms Of Orion’)

Swing Out Sister: It’s Better To Travel (skipped track: ‘Breakout’)

Thomas Dolby: The Golden Age Of Wireless (skipped track: ‘Windpower’)

(In the name of balance, I’ve listed my all-thriller/no-filler 1980s albums here. )

Do chime in with the tracks that, for you, muck up otherwise excellent 1980s albums.

1980s ‘Classics’ I Don’t Need To Hear Again (AKA The Bland Files)

Posted on by

Noel Coward famously noted the strange potency of ‘cheap’ music.

There was certainly a lot of cheap, potent music around in the 1980s.

But as the nostalgia industry has grown, so has the dossier of seemingly ‘untouchable’ ’80s pop songs, tracks that are staples of daytime radio but, to many ears, lack distinctive grooves, beguiling melodies or interesting hooks.

If you were being cruel, you might say it’s music for people who don’t really like music. And, weirdly, it mostly comes from established, experienced campaigners who have a lot of other strings to their bow. But we only ever seem to hear one or two of their songs.

Here are those overplayed tracks that always have me reaching for the ‘off’ switch but have retained a weird grip on radio programmers for over 30 years. We consign them to Room 101, here and now, never to be heard again…

Dire Straits: ‘Walk Of Life’/’Money For Nothing’

Yazz: ‘The Only Way Is Up’

King: ‘Love And Pride’

Whitney Houston: ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’

Tina Turner: ‘Simply The Best’

The Beautiful South: ‘Song For Whoever’

Spandau Ballet: ‘Through The Barricades’

Dream Academy: Life In A Northern Town

Anything by The Proclaimers

Anything by Texas

Chris Rea: ‘The Road To Hell’

Sade: ‘Your Love Is King’/’Smooth Operator’

Steve Winwood: ‘Higher Love’

Mike And The Mechanics: ‘The Living Years’

Anything by Fleetwood Mac

The Cars: ‘Drive’

Mental As Anything: ‘Live It Up’

Soul 2 Soul: ‘Back To Life’

Anything by U2 apart from ‘Pride (In The Name Of Love’)’ or ‘The Unforgettable Fire’

Cyndi Lauper: ‘Time After Time’

Depeche Mode: ‘Personal Jesus’

Talking Heads: ‘Road To Nowhere’

Tracy Chapman: ‘Fast Car’

Anything by Tom Petty

Simply Red: ‘Holding Back The Years’

Prince: ‘When Doves Cry’

Womack & Womack: ‘Teardrops’

Anything by Duran Duran except ‘Notorious’ or ‘Skin Trade’

Anything by Bon Jovi

Culture Club: ‘Karma Chameleon’

Anything by Pet Shop Boys except ‘Suburbia’

Where ’80s Pop Went Wrong (In Five Songs)

Posted on by

screaming-man-with-headphonesAt some point in the ’80s pop parade, the subtle became bloated, the charmingly-naive became coarse and the modest became overblown.

As the decade’s greats and not-so-greats limbered up for Live Aid, artistic judgement started getting skewed, recording budgets sky-rocketed and egos rampaged out of control.

The blueprints were drawn up for pop travesties of the future. We present, in chronological order, the five singles which illustrate where things went wrong in ’80s pop. (How the hell could Nile Rodgers have produced two of these?! Ed.)

5. Duran Duran: The Wild Boys
Released 26 October 1984

The sound of money. And not in a good way. Aiming for a Frankie Goes To Hollywood-style sex-groove, the dandy Brummies contrive to create a ramshackle piece of over-produced, under-performed pub-funk. Nick Rhodes plays like he’s just been taught a few minor chords and Le Bon’s vocal is consistently just out of tune (why didn’t they change the song’s key before recording?). And we haven’t even got to the drummer’s ‘solo’ yet. Even Nile’s production can’t save this one.

4. Thompson Twins: Revolution
Released 29 November 1985

This was the worst song performed during Live Aid. And that’s really saying something. It’s murder, sacrilege, an aural travesty. It’s even worse than Paul Young’s version of ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’. Tom Bailey delivers the lyrics like a sozzled Stoke middle-manager on karaoke night. Guitars are ladled on willy-nilly and multiple percussion effects merely serve to drive one to distraction. A triumph of vapid tastelessness. What was Nile thinking?

3. The Police: Don’t Stand So Close To Me ’86
Released October 1986

A weary exercise in career suicide and musical emasculation. Copeland phones in his programmed drum pattern (he broke a collarbone just before the recording). Summers’ once-vibrant, nuanced sound has become a post-Edge blur. Sting’s considerable bass skills are booted into touch in favour of a crude, mushy-sounding sample. Depressing synths chart the chord changes like clouds eclipsing the sun while Mr Sumner succeeds in removing all emotion from his vocal. ‘Dark’ doesn’t begin to cover it. Why why why?

2. U2: With Or Without You
Released 21 March 1987

The barely-scanning, bet-hedging lyric (‘You give yourself away’? How? With your eyes, your body? Something you said? What, what?!) aims for a kind of Bowie/Ferry mystique but is basically meaningless and the precursor to all those Snow Patrol/Coldplay list songs that crowbar in increasingly-inane words to fit a flimsy melody. Adam Clayton’s remedial bassline, badly played at that, slavishly outlines a dull chord sequence which should never have left the rehearsal room. Bono attempts the first verse in a sub-Bowie croon, but you can tell he’s just itching to hike it up an octave. And when he does it’s no better than Tony Hadley. The song runs out of steam at around the three-minute mark but then aimlessly drags on for another two minutes in the vain search for ‘dynamics’.

1. Michael Jackson: Bad
Released 7 September 1987

Where to begin? The crude, obviously looped bass vamp (close listening reveals the ‘joins’ at the beginning of every two bars); poor Michael’s adolescent lyrics displaying a wronged teenager’s obsession with point-scoring and fisticuffs, a videogamer’s take on violence; a poor verse melody which never engages followed by the endless repetition of a weirdly unmemorable chorus; Quincy Jones trying to throw a ‘Beat It’-style curveball by getting jazz legend Jimmy Smith in for a Hammond organ solo which barely registers. Michael’s vocals are powerful but comparing this track to almost anything on Thriller reveals a sad indictment of late-’80s pop.