MTV in the 80s Song of the Day

[KevShmev]

Haha, yeah, that video would definitely have a different connotation if released nowadays.

As for Mutt Lange, he was married to Shania Twain for like 17 years, so he has lived a good life.

[KevShmev]

Ratt - Way Cool Jr.

Out all of the Ratt songs that were popular and had videos in the 80s, this was favorite back then; I loved this when it came out.  Sadly, my love for it has greatly dissipated, but my guess is hearing so much music since then that influenced it (see: Judas Priest) made me realize how average this band really was.

[bosk1]

Ratt

Nice.  In terms of the song, yeah, these guys wrote some really cool riffs.  I liked them a lot when I was in H.S., and then they just kind of fell by the wayside.  Couple of years ago, I picked up a greatest hits for $10, popped it in the car stereo, and had virtually the same reaction for every single song:
1.  Listen for about 30-45 seconds.
2.  "Yeah...I remember liking this back then...cool riff, but..."
3.  Listen another 30 seconds or so.
4.  "Man, I actually thought this was good back then?"
5.  Hit skip button.

Some catchy vocal hooks, creative riffing, and cool soloing.  But in terms of good songs, there is just no substance there.  It's kinda like eating Peeps at Easter.  When you are a kid, they are amazing.  Then you eventually get to an age where you can't stomach them anymore and actually get grossed out by them for being so over the top sugary emptiness.  Ratt are the Peeps of music.  Way Cool Junior would be the interesting looking and somewhat rare blue Peeps.

[DebraKadabra]

Stryper - Always There for You

No.

Huey Lewis & the News - Do You Believe in Love

Good song - always loved the vocal harmonies on this one.

Ratt - Way Cool Jr.

Anything much past their first three albums is dodgy at best.  It was okay back in the day, but... I suspect it hasn't aged too well.

Some catchy vocal hooks, creative riffing, and cool soloing.  But in terms of good songs, there is just no substance there.  It's kinda like eating Peeps at Easter.  When you are a kid, they are amazing.  Then you eventually get to an age where you can't stomach them anymore and actually get grossed out by them for being so over the top sugary emptiness.  Ratt are the Peeps of music.  Way Cool Junior would be the interesting looking and somewhat rare blue Peeps.

 

[KevShmev]

Haha, that is a great way to put it, bosk.  Any Ratt song that ends up on my 80 CDs usually gets skipped over pretty quickly, even the ones I really liked back in the day (Round and Round, Wanted Man, Dance, Slip of the Lip and Way Cool Jr.).

[bosk1]

Kev, forgive me for going a bit off topic, but given the audience in this thread, I figure this is as good a place as any to get relevant responses.  So, here's the deal.  My "band" (a group of us that get together casually to play every now and then and have had a handful over VERY low-key "gigs") is booked to play two hours or so of music at an outdoor cycling fundraiser at the beginnig of May (the Tour de Cure Diabetes ride, to be specific).  We played it last year, and it was cool.  Basically, we are providing background music and entertainment for a couple of hours for the families hanging out and eating lunch, and for the cyclists who are finishing their race.  Problem is, our drummer bailed, so we have having to re-shuffle the band around, which means having to scratch some songs from the list and learn some newer, easier ones to fill in.  For me, growing up on MTV, '80s MTV songs are my wheelhouse. 

So here's what I'm asking for:  Can you guys quickly give me some suggestions for songs you think would be appropriate for the crowd, catchy and recognizable, and fairly straightforward and easy to learn?  As far as instruments, we have drums, bass, guitar, and me on vox.  (one of our guitarists is moving over to fill in on drums, and we may be able to bring in a backup guitarist to fill in on the second guitar spot, but the guy who is now doing drums is somewhat limited in the drumming dept.)  So nothing overly keyboard heavy, or at least that can't have the keyboard part played on guitar, which is basically what we are doing with Just What I Needed (the Cars).

Suggestions?

To give a flavor of some of the stuff we are already doing:  Wanted Dead Or Alive (Bon Jovi), Still Rock And Roll To Me (Billy Joel), Back In The USSR (the Beatles), Purple Haze, a couple of Tom Petty tunes, etc.  I was thinking about maybe adding a Huey Lewis song--just trying to think of the best one that isn't too keyboard or horn heavy.  But '80s is mostly where it's at.  What do you guys suggest?

[DebraKadabra]

I'd say "Heart of Rock and Roll", but that's horn-heavy.

[Sir GuitarCozmo]

PM Sent

[jingle.boy]

PM Sent

And that's probably all that Bosk needs.  I could offer some thoughts, but have no idea whether they are hard/easy to learn and play.

[Sir GuitarCozmo]

You could say it's just what he needed.

[bosk1]

Nah, I needed someone to feed.

[KevShmev]

I think Hip to Be Square would be a good pick.  It has keyboards in it, but you could easily make it work with just guitar.  And it is upbeat and familiar enough to get people moving.

[King Postwhore]

Eddie Money -- Shakin
The Knack -- My Sharona
Foreinger - Hot Blooded
Kiss -- Love Gun
VH -- Everybody Wants Some

[jingle.boy]

Eddie Money -- Shakin
The Knack -- My Sharona
Foreinger - Hot Blooded
Kiss -- Love Gun
VH -- Everybody Wants Some

dude... I love that song.  Had the vinyl.  Quality fro on that one guy.  And I almost considered submitting it to Nem for her roulette!!!! 

Ok, here are my decent childhood rock memories:

Bob Seger - Shakedown
Dexy's Midnight Runners and the Emerald Express - Come on Eileen
John Cafferty - On The Dark Side
Kenny Loggins - Danger Zone
Kenny Rogers - The Gambler

:derail:

[King Postwhore]

I have the album on my I-Pod.  It still rocks.  It really does.

[KevShmev]

Jane Wiedlin - Rush Hour

By far the biggest hit the Go-Go's guitarist and main songwriter had as a solo artist.  I like it; it is oddly catchy, despite her chipmunk-like voice, which was normally better for background vocals rather than lead (or doing a bridge, like in The Go-Go's Our Lips Are Sealed).  Silly video, too, featuring her swimming around with dolphins.  I think this song is off the radar now for even most 80s fans, but I remembered it when it came time to assemble my ultimate 80s collection of tunes.

[DebraKadabra]

Didn't remember that one, so I pulled up the YT vid for it - didn't make it past about a minute or so.  WAY too cheesy.

[KevShmev]

Living Colour - Cult of Personality

Cool song.  I liked it a lot when it first came out, but it kind of wore off of me pretty quickly for whatever reason.  However, it's had a bit of resurgence with me since wrestler CM Punk has been using it as his entrance theme for the last year and a half.  Very much of a  song.

[Cool Chris]

Never liked this song, and for whatever reason, prefer when wrestlers don't use popular songs for their entrances. But, not a bad song, just one I never care to listen to.

[Jaq]

I loved Living Color's debut album. I bought it on New Year's Eve the year it came out and it was the album blasting when the clock hit midnight. Living Color should have been a lot bigger for a lot longer, but they kind of fell on their faces with their second album. They had huge crossover appeal and an audience that didn't really judge them in terms of race (well, to be fair, no one I knew who liked them did) but after their second album they just kind of faded away. Never really could figure out why.

[Orbert]

I like the song.  The guitarist has a great, crunchy tone, the singer is awesome, but somehow I was never motivated to check out the band any further.

[King Postwhore]

My brother and I saw Middle Man video on all things 120 Minutes show on Sunday nights.  I had to order the CD because no place had it around here.  So I play the CD at a party and none of my friends really say anything and then a few months later, "Cult" comes out and all the same friend try to talk to me about it.  "You hear that awesome song?!"

I tell them, yeah, 2 months ago when you all ignored it when I tried playing it for you.

[DebraKadabra]

Living Colour - Cult of Personality

Always loved this one.

[BlobVanDam]

I quite like this song, especially how it mixes it up with the little bars of 3/4 during the riff, and the pre-chorus of the 3/4 riff over a 4/4 drum beat. The guitar solo is absolutely horrid though.

[KevShmev]

My brother and I saw Middle Man video on all things 120 Minutes show on Sunday nights.  I had to order the CD because no place had it around here.  So I play the CD at a party and none of my friends really say anything and then a few months later, "Cult" comes out and all the same friend try to talk to me about it.  "You hear that awesome song?!"

I tell them, yeah, 2 months ago when you all ignored it when I tried playing it for you.

I have experienced that several times before, too.

[bosk1]

I like the song.  The guitarist has a great, crunchy tone, the singer is awesome, but somehow I was never motivated to check out the band any further.

Pretty much this. 

[Sir GuitarCozmo]

In Guitar Magazine's December 2004 issue, they had a joke article - The 100 Worst Riffs, Licks, and Solos of All Time.  They went through and took beloved solos and just roasted on them, poking fun and generally being mean for the humor in it.  For each one, it listed the artist, the song, the album, the year, and the guitarist.  Each one had little icons to indicate what sucked about it.  There were about 10 of them - things like "lazy", boring", and (among other things) "Involves C.C. DeVille".  The entire article can be found HERE.  Cult of Personality came in at #61:

61. LIVING COLOUR
“Cult of Personality”
Vivid (1988)
GUITARIST:Vernon Reid

Vernon Reid shows us what it would sound like if you tried to play a solo with a boat motor.

That said, I love this song.  Absolutely killer.

[jingle.boy]

The entire article can be found HERE. 

Some of these are brilliant - the comments, not the solo's.

[Sir GuitarCozmo]

Despite their harshness, some of them are right on.  What sucks is that in the original article, there were little sidebars that they didn't reprint online.  One was about the live version of "Freebird", noting that if their sound was known as the "triple guitar attack", then this song was the equivalent of the slaughter at Gettysburg.  Great stuff.

[DebraKadabra]

In this plodding, lethargic remake of the Guess Who hit, Lenny Kravitz sucks all the bounce and air out of Randy Bachman’s classic riff like a vampire performing cunnilingus on a blow-up doll. If songs could give out restraining orders, Kravitz would be forced to stay away from everything recorded between 1960 and 1979.

 

[Sir GuitarCozmo]

Yeah, sorry for the derailment.  Maybe I should make a separate thread for that particular article. 

[KevShmev]

Okay, I hate to break up the party, but a song as awesome as the one I gonna feature here demands out full attention...

Wham! - Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go



This song is just for you, Orbert.  Enjoy.

[Sir GuitarCozmo]

Wham! is the sound of the door slamming on Orbert's way out of this thread.

[Orbert]

I'll just say that when George Michael "came out" it was a surprise to no one who had ever heard this song.

In this plodding, lethargic remake of the Guess Who hit, Lenny Kravitz sucks all the bounce and air out of Randy Bachman’s classic riff like a vampire performing cunnilingus on a blow-up doll. If songs could give out restraining orders, Kravitz would be forced to stay away from everything recorded between 1960 and 1979.

 

Love it.  Even without the song title, I know exactly which song they're talking about, and I agree 100%.

[KevShmev]

I'll just say that when George Michael "came out" it was a surprise to no one who had ever heard this song.
 

Or seen the video.