MTV in the 80s Song of the Day

[Jaq]

There was a period in the 80s where it seemed you could turn on MTV and wait for a while you either got a Phil Collins video, a Genesis video, or a song he produced or played drums on. It usually didn't take very long for that to happen, either. The man was everywhere for a while. This is a fun bit of harmless fluff, a nice little pop song.

[King Postwhore]

I really like that song.  Good harmonies and as typical Phil's unique drum sound.

[Big Hath]

Rebel Yell was cool because "Yeah, the song is okay, but the guitarist kicks fucking ass!"  I'm actually something of a Steve Stevens fan now, whereas Billy Idol never impressed me much.  "Eyes Without a Face" was cool because it has the break that somehow goes into double tempo without the beat actually changing.  I thought that was cool.

Completely agreed on Steve Stevens - criminally underrated.

Steve was on That Metal Show recently as the guest guitarist.  He was joking that Idol was always telling him to tone down his playing.  "instead of playing 40 notes, just play 10."  Stuff like that.

[KevShmev]

Debbie Gibson - Foolish Beat

Many would call this cookie-cutter pop, but I call it a well-written pop song that manages to have a hook in both the music (the sax) and the vocal melodies, which ain't easy to pull off.  The majority of her hits from the 80s haven't aged that well, IMO, but this one has, if you ask me. 

[DebraKadabra]

Steve was on That Metal Show recently as the guest guitarist.  He was joking that Idol was always telling him to tone down his playing.  "instead of playing 40 notes, just play 10."  Stuff like that.

That doesn't compute, but I guess Billy wanted a more toned down sound from Steve.  I haven't watched that TMS episode yet, but that definitely has me more interested in it now.

Easy Lover - cute song I guess, but I was never really a huge fan of it.  I liked the video more, but that's probably because Phil was such a ham in videos at the time.

Foolish Beat - ugh.  Never liked Debbie/Tiffany/any of the other "pop girls" that were popular at this time.  Side note:  Bill Hicks did a REALLY funny bit about Debbie, Tiffany, Jimi Hendrix, and the "mall culture".

[Orbert]

Phil Collins has an amazing ear for picking out great and unusual harmony lines.  He did it with Genesis for years, both behind Peter Gabriel and then just multitracking himself, then solo and with other people.  "Easy Lover" has one of my favorite PC harmony parts.  It's nuts, and Phillip Bailey also has an incredible voice and does some great harmonies on this song.  It's a true duet.

This might sound kinda lame, but something that my wife and I do is when we're driving around in the car, we always have tunes on and we sing along in harmony.  She sings the melody, and I pick out the harmony.  I sing tenor in the church choir, and of course background vocals in countless bands, so for me it's actually more natural than singing lead.  Try singing Phillip Bailey's high harmony (falsetto if necessary, which it is for most males) in "Easy Lover".  It's totally insane the way it jumps around.

[King Postwhore]

Debbie Gibson - Foolish Beat

Many would call this cookie-cutter pop, but I call it a well-written pop song that manages to have a hook in both the music (the sax) and the vocal melodies, which ain't easy to pull off.  The majority of her hits from the 80s haven't aged that well, IMO, but this one has, if you ask me.

Bubble gum music but at least she wrote her own songs and it fit her age at 17.  BTW.  There's an actor that plays her love interest in a few video's who in real life now is the guitarist for the band Tonic.

[KevShmev]

Phil Collins has an amazing ear for picking out great and unusual harmony lines.  He did it with Genesis for years, both behind Peter Gabriel and then just multitracking himself, then solo and with other people.  "Easy Lover" has one of my favorite PC harmony parts.  It's nuts, and Phillip Bailey also has an incredible voice and does some great harmonies on this song.  It's a true duet.

This might sound kinda lame, but something that my wife and I do is when we're driving around in the car, we always have tunes on and we sing along in harmony.  She sings the melody, and I pick out the harmony.  I sing tenor in the church choir, and of course background vocals in countless bands, so for me it's actually more natural than singing lead.  Try singing Phillip Bailey's high harmony (falsetto if necessary, which it is for most males) in "Easy Lover".  It's totally insane the way it jumps around.

Great post! I think Collins is a far better singer than he always gave himself credit (or lack of) for being.  And yeah, Bailey's high notes in this song are just bonkers.

[KevShmev]

Golden Earring - Twilight Zone

A legitimate rock song getting heavy airplay on MTV in the early days?  The hell you say! But yep, this video was played to death back in 1982, and it was always one of my favorites.  I mean, this was a video with an actual storyline, and a cinematic one at that, not a cheesy "normal" 80s one, for lack of a better term.  If you've never seen it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1sf2CzEq0w

[Jaq]

The first couple of years of MTV were great for how they pretty much said "is it rock and roll of any sort? WE'LL PLAY IT." (An aside: I became a fan of both Judas Priest and Iron Maiden because of videos MTV played.) Twilight Zone was definitely in the category of "WE'LL PLAY IT!" for MTV, but it's a great song-the video is the single edit, the actual track is just shy of eight minutes long-and a good video. What's amazing about Golden Earring is the band formed in 1961...and is still touring and releasing albums!

[King Postwhore]

Great song and great album.  I remember back when MTV played concerts on Saturday nights, (Remember those days?!  Sometimes simulcast on radio too?!)

Well, they had Golden Earirng live from that tour.  i only saw it once, was blown away and always forgot to check out youtube for it.  This thread just reminded me.

[DebraKadabra]

Eh, I've always liked Radar Love better than Twilight Zone.  Maybe BECAUSE radio drove TZ into the ground.

[jingle.boy]

Eh, I've always liked Radar Love better than Twilight Zone.  Maybe BECAUSE radio drove TZ into the ground.

Funny, I remember it the other way around.  TZ is a great song.

[jjrock88]

great classic rock, always enjoy it

[wolfking]

Eh, I've always liked Radar Love better than Twilight Zone.  Maybe BECAUSE radio drove TZ into the ground.

Funny, I remember it the other way around.  TZ is a great song.

Same, here in Oz, Radar Love was the only song getting airplay from this band.  Twilight Zone was never played on radio here.

[DebraKadabra]

Well, that would make sense being the other way around for you two if Radar Love was ran into the ground in your neck of the woods.

Both got play time in the States, it just seemed to me that Twilight Zone was played a whole hell of a lot more than Radar Love in my neck of the woods.

[Orbert]

When Twilight Zone came out, everyone was amazed because it was the same band that had done Radar Love so many years before.  "What, they're still around?  Or back together or whatever?"  What's even more amazing is that, if I'm not mistaken, it was the same lineup.  Golden Earring never had any personnel changes.

[lonestar]

FeeT song, I think it gets a shit tone more play now then back then.

[King Postwhore]

When Twilight Zone came out, everyone was amazed because it was the same band that had done Radar Love so many years before.  "What, they're still around?  Or back together or whatever?"  What's even more amazing is that, if I'm not mistaken, it was the same lineup.  Golden Earring never had any personnel changes.

I believe you are correct.

[KevShmev]

AC/DC - You Shook Me All Night Long

A hard rock classic, this video inexplicably got a resurgence in 1987 and got regular airplay on MTV for quite a while that year.  I remember getting into this and Back in Black (the song) in the spring and summer of '87 thanks to a friend from grade school who was a big fan.  In fact, at our annual school picnic (with rides and all of that fun stuff) in June 1987, weeks after we graduated from 8th grade(our Catholic grade school was K-8, so I never went to a middle school), I remember Back in Black being the most requested song of the night to be played by the deejay that they had for the evening portion of the picnic.  Suffice it to say, those two AC/DC songs take me back to 8th grade every time I hear them. #nostalgia

[Jaq]

Wasn't the video for You Shook Me All Night long made when AC/DC did the soundtrack for Maximum Overdrive? I know around the same time they had a video out for Who Made Who which was from that movie. I'm pretty sure there wasn't a video for anything off Back In Black that wasn't live before that. And as for the song, it's off Back In Black, which is right near fucking PERFECT. Of course it's a brilliant song.

[DebraKadabra]

Great song from a great album.  BIB is also the very first cassette I bought with my own $$$.  Good times, good music.

[Lowdz]

I've only ever heard 3 songs from Golden Earring (this, Radar Love and the brilliant The Devil Made Me Do It) and I love all 3. Never felt the urge to check anything else out strangely.

YSMANL is a classic. Video is funny too. Life's still like that in Geordie Land.

[King Postwhore]

Lowdz, did you ever here, When The Lady Smiles?  This was the first single off the next album after Cut which had Twilight Zone.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYxp6OIEZlk


Also can you ever name a band that was bigger after it's singer died like AC/DC.  That whole album is a classic. Maybe 5150 VH but I can't think of any other band replacing a singer and getting bigger on it's first album with the new singer.

[BlobVanDam]

Great song from a great album.

Great song, but very overplayed on the radio here, so that puts it down slightly for me. But the whole album is very strong.

[dbrooks22]

Lowdz, did you ever here, When The Lady Smiles?  This was the first single off the next album after Cut which had Twilight Zone.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYxp6OIEZlk


Also can you ever name a band that was bigger after it's singer died like AC/DC.  That whole album is a classic. Maybe 5150 VH but I can't think of any other band replacing a singer and getting bigger on it's first album with the new singer.

Dream Theater?

(i know, i know, but someone had to say it)

[KevShmev]

Olivia Newton-John - Physical

Never a big fan of this song, which unbelievably spent 10 weeks at number 1 on the billboard top 40, which I believe was the most for any song in the 80s.  Funny too, as when VH1 did a top 100 songs of the 80s a few years back, this song didn't even make it on there, which I guess shows that it hasn't aged well for a lot of people, despite its massive popularity at the time it was out.  The best thing I can say about the song is the appearance of it on The Office:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88N5n122ZiA

[King Postwhore]

Yeah, It's ok.  I'm more of a fan of Olivia's pants in Grease at the end of the movie then the song.

[KevShmev]

Okay, enough of that one already.

Michael Jackson - Billie Jean

A magnificent song by any standard or measure.  I have to question the sense of anyone who doesn't think this song is great.  Very cool and innovative video in its time as well.  This song is Exhibit A of Michael Jackson's greatness as a songwriter, pop star and visionary when it came to videos.

[BlobVanDam]

I don't care what genre it is, or how popular it is, I just find it impossible not to like MJ's classic hits. Billie Jean is one my favourites thanks to that bass riff, plus as usual catchy as hell melodies, with one of his many iconic music videos.
I could really apply this description to any of his 80s singles, and it would be just as apt.

[lonestar]

Ground breaking piece of music, took over the world, can't say enough.  And such a good song too.

[King Postwhore]

Great tune.  Funny I never owned it but I always watched it on MTV.

[dbrooks22]

much of this album was written and performed by the members of Toto.  Porcaro's drumming shines throughout, and especially on this track.

[KevShmev]

much of this album was written and performed by the members of Toto.

Not true.  Four of the nine songs were written by Jackson himself (including three of the biggest hits), and Human Nature is the only song on the album with a songwriting credit related to someone from Toto.

[King Postwhore]

Steve Lukathur did play the rhythm guitar on Beat It.