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Music in the 80s Sucked
American Greatness ^ | July 12, 2019 | Erik Rook

Posted on 07/23/2019 6:59:49 AM PDT by C19fan

In an excellent essay making the case that pop music was at its zenith in 1984, Julie Kelly writes that the era represented a patriotic swoon. She might also have mentioned that the same year, Lee Greenwood released “God Bless the U.S.A.,” the most patriotic song of the year though it was not, strictly speaking, a pop song.

The year 1984 may have been the high point of pop and rock, but that is not saying much. The entire decade is more notable for the musical malaise it created. As a music director for radio stations during that decade, I should know. It was during the ’80s that radio stations began to tighten their playlists all to the happy applause of corporate music execs. The rapid creativity of the 1970s radio stations died, to be replaced by preplanned and survey-tested radio formats. The most significant of these were the songs stations received from the radio syndication company Drake-Chenault.

(Excerpt) Read more at amgreatness.com ...


TOPICS: Music/Entertainment
KEYWORDS: music
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If the 80s sucked, what adjective would one describe today's music?
1 posted on 07/23/2019 6:59:49 AM PDT by C19fan
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To: All

Ed Driscoll at PJMedia wrote a rebuttal piece:

https://pjmedia.com/eddriscoll/did-music-in-the-80s-suck/


2 posted on 07/23/2019 7:00:39 AM PDT by C19fan
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To: C19fan
Pop music in the 80s sucked. There, I fixed it.
3 posted on 07/23/2019 7:00:48 AM PDT by al_c (Democrats: Party over Common Sense)
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To: C19fan

80’s music was great compared to today.


4 posted on 07/23/2019 7:02:21 AM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: al_c

Agreed. Old people who hate rock altogether and think it’s the devil’s music hate 80s rock.

SMH


5 posted on 07/23/2019 7:02:35 AM PDT by dp0622 (Bad, bad company Till the day I die.)
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To: C19fan

Van Halen! Rest my case. Better then stupid 70’s disco.


6 posted on 07/23/2019 7:03:07 AM PDT by napscoordinator (Trump/Hunter, jr for President/Vice President 2016)
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To: al_c

Pop music has always sucked (unless you were/are one of the ones making it).


7 posted on 07/23/2019 7:03:12 AM PDT by VietVet876
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To: VietVet876

Ah ha! Duran Duran was pretty cool.


8 posted on 07/23/2019 7:04:32 AM PDT by DIRTYSECRET (urope. Why do they put up with this.)
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To: al_c

True.

There was a LOT of music being put out in the 80s, and a lot of diversity, and it’s easy to pick out play-lists now that make it easy to romanticize about 80’s music, but if you got into a Delorian and went back to 1985 and had to listen to the crap they played on the radio over and over and over and over, you’d swear there were no music choices at all.


9 posted on 07/23/2019 7:04:36 AM PDT by z3n
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To: DIRTYSECRET

Euryithmics.


10 posted on 07/23/2019 7:05:04 AM PDT by DIRTYSECRET (urope. Why do they put up with this.)
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To: central_va

You could enjoy some many different genres back in the 80s. You had rockers like Billy Idol, The Police, and Van Halen, New Wave groups, more pop sounds, for example, Huey Lewis and the News, and the emerging rap genre.


11 posted on 07/23/2019 7:05:14 AM PDT by C19fan
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To: VietVet876

From a baby boomer who brought the world peter Paul and Mary. Yeah add that the 60’s music sucked if we are going to pick and chose.


12 posted on 07/23/2019 7:05:36 AM PDT by napscoordinator (Trump/Hunter, jr for President/Vice President 2016)
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To: C19fan

I won’t comment on music in the current century, since I’ve not really listened to it, but in terms of the 50’s 60’s, 70’s 80’s and 90’s....the 80’s was a horrible decade for music, with some exceptions. But in the aggregate, most music in the 80’s was stupid and creepy.


13 posted on 07/23/2019 7:05:55 AM PDT by big'ol_freeper (If your opponent is of choleric temper, irritate him. ~ Sun Tzu)
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To: z3n

Although that is what made the tape cassette great. One was free to create your own playlist and play it in the car, at home, and on a Walkman.


14 posted on 07/23/2019 7:06:42 AM PDT by C19fan
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To: C19fan

I wouldn’t say “sucked.” It wasn’t complex or artfully composed, but 80s music was fun, whimsical and often silly. If you were looking to meet a girl at a club by asking her to dance you’d have a much more happy, upbeat start after dancing to ‘Rock Lobster’ than you would have a few years earlier trying to dance to ‘Free Bird’ or ‘Stairway to Heaven.’ 80s music was different no doubt, but it didn’t “suck.”


15 posted on 07/23/2019 7:07:37 AM PDT by ElkGroveDan (My tagline is in the shop.)
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To: C19fan

Crap.


16 posted on 07/23/2019 7:10:04 AM PDT by Howie66 ("...Against All Enemies, Foreign and Democrat.....")
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To: C19fan

What are we really talking about here?

Are we talking about the types of music that were popular in the ‘80s, or are we talking about corporate operations of radio stations, which restricted the ability of radio stations to introduce listeners to various new musical acts and types of music?


17 posted on 07/23/2019 7:10:04 AM PDT by Dilbert San Diego
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To: C19fan

It depends on what you listen to music for.

I don’t listen for lyrics much because I really don’t care about what they think. Story songs are a different matter but you don’t here those much anymore ‘Gently On My Mind’ comes to mind.


18 posted on 07/23/2019 7:11:19 AM PDT by ImJustAnotherOkie (All I know is The I read in the papers.)
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To: C19fan

Most music critics suck.


19 posted on 07/23/2019 7:11:46 AM PDT by P.O.E. (Pray for America)
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To: napscoordinator

To be fair, 1984 is indeed the drop off. The big bands had hit their zenith. Definitely Leppard peaked with Pyromania, Van Halen with Mean Street, Ozzy with Bark at the Moon, Iron Maiden with Power Slabe, the Scorpions with Love at First Sting, Rush with Moving Pictures.... You could go on and on. The corporates took control in 85 and its sucked since.


20 posted on 07/23/2019 7:11:55 AM PDT by Jim Pelosi
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