A 1980s Childhood Read online

  The band’s next major success was Hungry Like the Wolf, released in 1982, which is considered by many to be one of the greatest new wave songs ever recorded; in the same year they reached number two in the charts with Save a Prayer and number nine with Rio. Their first number one came in 1983 with Is There Something I Should Know? This was quickly followed by another number one hit, The Reflex, in 1984 and shortly after that was The Wild Boys, which made it to number two.

  Perhaps their most notable success came in 1985 after John Taylor, the bassist, approached James Bond producer Cubby Broccoli at a party and reportedly asked, somewhat drunkenly, ‘When are you going to get someone decent to do one of your theme songs?’ Surprisingly, instead of being hurled out of the nearest window, the band was offered the opportunity to work with John Barry to create the theme song for the next Bond film, A View to a Kill. The eponymously titled song became a worldwide hit, reaching number one in the US and number two in the UK, as well as making the top ten in various other countries.

  In total, the boys achieved fourteen top-ten (UK) singles, released thirteen studio albums, sold over 100 million records and broke the hearts of millions of teenage girls.

  Michael Jackson

  For a while in the 1980s, I became a huge Michael Jackson fan, to the point where I started wearing Michael Jackson pin badges, bought a baseball cap at Blackpool Pleasure Beach that said ‘Bad’ on it and even asked my mum for some bits of white tape so that I could put them on my fingers, just like my hero. Of course, I looked like a right muppet and my brothers didn’t hesitate to tell me so, especially when I combined all this with my usual outfit at the time of a pair of blue checked trousers and a burgundy cardigan. Eventually, I started to become self-conscious in my pink and black ‘Bad’ baseball cap, so I used a marker pen to alter the first letter so that it now said ‘Rad’, which was way cooler.

  My obsession with Michael Jackson started when I was given my first ever vinyl record, the 1982 Thriller album, which featured a very young-looking Jacko reclining on one elbow in a brilliant white suit and black shirt. I needed a record player to play it on and since my older brother had recently been given one of the new Sony tower hi-fis for his birthday, I inherited his old record player that was mounted in a big wooden cabinet, with ample space below to store my one and only record. Since I only had the one record in my collection, that’s all I played, over and over again, and it wasn’t long before I knew the lyrics of all the songs: Wanna Be Startin’ Something, Baby Be Mine, The Girl is Mine, Thriller, Beat It, Billie Jean, Human Nature, P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing) and The Lady in my Life.

  Michael Jackson in 1984 attempting to prove that 4 inches of white sock and a single sparkly glove can look cool. (Public Domain)

  Michael Jackson’s musical career is nothing short of astounding, with an unsurpassed track record of thirteen Grammy Awards, twenty-six American Music Awards and dozens of other music awards to make him the most awarded artist in the history of popular music. His album Thriller became the bestselling album of all time with 110 million copies sold and, in total, he is estimated to have sold over 750 million records worldwide.

  Not only was Michael Jackson a talented musician and singer, he was also a fantastic dancer and entertainer with a unique style of dancing that included the famous Moonwalk and crotch-grabbing moves that have since been much copied and parodied. I never tried the crotch-grabbing move personally but I do remember shuffling around on the lino floor in the kitchen trying in vain to do the Moonwalk.

  There is no shying away from the fact that Michael Jackson led a very mysterious and eccentric personal life that was plagued by controversy and allegations, but I prefer to remember Michael for the music he brought us and the fashion sense he taught me.

  Falco

  I will always remember Christmas 1985 as the year my brother was given the number one hit single Rock Me Amadeus by Falco. Having excitedly opened his gift first thing in the morning, he immediately put the new record on, turned the volume up loud and my brothers and I danced to it, singing along with the catchy and somewhat repetitive chorus:

  Amadeus Amadeus, Amadeus

  Amadeus Amadeus, Amadeus

  Amadeus Amadeus, oh oh oh Amadeus.

  As soon as the song finished, he put it straight back on so that we could hear it again and this time we worked on improving our Austrian-accented rap technique as we tried to copy whatever it was that Falco was saying in between the choruses. Due to Falco’s strong Austrian accent and rapid-fire rap technique, we struggled to make out most of the lyrics and so we kept playing the record over and over again, trying to piece together the little bits that we could understand. Of course, it wasn’t long before my parents had had enough of the song and threatened to take the record away if we didn’t stop playing it. We never did figure out all the lyrics but realised that the song was something about the life story of the classical composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

  Rock Me Amadeus was such a catchy and anthemic song that it topped the charts in dozens of countries around the world and became the first single by an Austrian ever to reach number one in the UK charts. Many people think of Falco as being a one-hit wonder of the eighties, but in actual fact he made dozens of records and was hugely popular in his home country where he had eighteen top-ten hits, including five number ones.

  Kajagoogoo

  In 1982 a relatively unknown avant-garde instrumental group called Art Nouveau placed an advert in Melody Maker, the music newspaper:

  Good looking, talented singer/songwriter/frontman, looking for musicians to form what should be a successful band, influences: Japan, Yazoo, Soft Cell … no Des O’Connor fans.

  As a result of the advert, the band auditioned and selected Christopher Hamill, who went under the stage name Limahl (an anagram of his surname), and the band changed their name to Kajagoogoo. Shortly afterwards, the newly formed band were spotted by Nick Rhodes, the keyboard player from Duran Duran, who co-produced their first single Too Shy with EMI Records.

  The single was released in January 1983 and rocketed to the top of the charts where it spent two weeks at number one; it turned the mullet-headed band into a household name virtually overnight. Kajagoogoo had further success with their follow-up singles Ooh to be Ah and Hang on Now, but barely a year after their first single was released, tensions within the band resulted in Limahl being fired and replaced by Nick Beggs as front man. Another hit single, Big Apple, was released in 1984, which reached number eight in the UK charts, but after this the band’s popularity declined and their subsequent singles failed to repeat their earlier success.

  Freshly fired Limahl decided to use the opportunity to attempt a solo career and sang the theme song to the film The NeverEnding Story; it became hugely successful and reached number four in the UK charts. Sadly for him, this was his one and only solo success and poor old Limahl and his famous mullet disappeared into relative obscurity.

  Wham!

  Having met each other at school in the 1970s, George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley formed a band called Wham! and, while still just teenagers, released their first record Wham Rap! in 1982. The record made it into the top ten in the UK charts, while their next record, Young Guns (Go for It!), climbed even higher to achieve a number three position. Over the course of just four years, between 1982 and 1986, the boys released eleven singles, four of which made it to number one in the charts and the remainder making it into the top ten.

  Their first number one hit was the unforgettably catchy Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, with a music video that featured Michael and Ridgeley prancing around the stage, dancing like drunken uncles at a wedding party, wearing baggy white t-shirts with the slogan ‘Choose LIFE’ printed on them. The backing singers, who included the soon-to-be-famous-in-their-own-right Pepsi and Shirlie, all wore white t-shirts with ‘GO-GO’ written on them.

  By this time, the boys had become enormously successful, especially with teenage girls who found the combination of espadrilles, rolled-up jac
ket sleeves and bouffant hair too heady a look to resist. Their antics of placing shuttlecocks down the front of their shorts during concerts helped them to gain publicity and notoriety, and just one year after their debut, Wham! was already rivalling Duran Duran and Culture Club for the title of Britain’s biggest pop act.

  Their next song Freedom also reached number one in the charts and was closely followed by Everything She Wants and Last Christmas. In 1985 and 1986, Wham! released three more hits which all made it to number one: I’m Your Man, The Edge of Heaven and Where Did Your Heart Go? before deciding to quit while they were ahead having sold 25 million records together.

  A final, emotional farewell concert was held at Wembley Stadium on 28 June 1986 where 73,000 fans witnessed the duo perform for the very last time.

  A-ha

  In 1982 a trio of Norwegian musicians formed a band called A-ha and left Norway for London to see if they could make a career for themselves in the music business. Morten Harket, the front man, Magne Furuholmen, the keyboard player, and Paul Waaktaar-Savoy, the guitarist, ended up at the studio of musician and producer John Ratcliff, reputedly enticed by the prospect of his Space Invaders arcade machine; they ultimately ended up hiring Ratcliff and his manager, Terry Slater, to manage their own band.

  Two years later, A-ha debuted with their first single, Take on Me, which reached number two in the UK charts and number one in the US. The accompanying music video, now considered to be one of the best music videos of all time, helped to boost the popularity of the song and featured a young woman drawn into a fantasy comic-book adventure with lead singer Morten. For some reason, A-ha never really made it big in America and are considered as something of a one-hit wonder there, with Take on Me being the only one of their songs to make it into the top ten. But in the UK it was a very different story as their very next single, The Sun Always Shines on T.V. from their debut album Hunting High and Low, made it straight to number one.

  The next four singles from A-ha all made it into the UK top ten and in 1987 the band reached the peak of their career when they wrote the theme tune for the next Bond film, The Living Daylights. One more top-ten track followed with Stay on These Roads, but then their popularity began to wane and the chart positions began to drop off. The band continued to perform together right up until 2010 when they announced that they would split.

  Spandau Ballet

  Some people know Martin Kemp as that bloke who snogged his own mother on EastEnders; others know him as the sofa salesman from the SCS television adverts; but I prefer to remember him as the bass guitarist from the New Romantic band Spandau Ballet.

  Martin was actually a relatively late addition to the band which had already been started in 1976 by his brother Gary and school friend Steve Norman. By the time Martin joined, the band comprised Gary and Steve on guitars, Tony Hadley as lead singer and John Keeble on the drums.

  After signing with Chrysalis Records, the band released their debut single To Cut a Long Story Short, which shot to number five in the UK charts in 1980 and catapulted the fashion-conscious quintet to immediate stardom. This success was followed by more hits, such as The Freeze, Musclebound and the Gold-certified album Journeys to Glory, which became one of the defining albums of the early eighties New Romantic movement.

  Known as much for their distinctive dress sense as for their iconic music, Tony Hadley once described how his grandfather had refused to travel in the same train carriage as him to show his disapproval of the singer’s bizarre outfit. At the time Hadley was wearing ballet slippers, white socks, wraparound Iranian, Cossack-type trousers, tight at the ankles and baggy with a flap up the front, a silk shirt with Greek imprints, make-up and a headband. I sympathise with his grandfather entirely.

  In 1983 Spandau Ballet made it to number one with True which was closely followed by the anthemic single Gold, arguably marking the high point in their musical career. The band continued to churn out singles right through to the end of the eighties, when the band split up and legal proceedings began between band members following a row over royalties. The dust settled eventually and after twenty years apart, the band reunited in 2009 to make a welcome comeback, this time dressing a little more sensibly.

  Beastie Boys

  The first I heard of the Beastie Boys was in 1986 when my dad read out an article from the newspaper expressing outrage at the sudden spate of thefts of VW badges from the front of cars all over the country. The thieves were stealing the VW badges so that they could wear them around their necks as a fashion accessory, just like their heroes, the Beastie Boys, who had started the trend earlier that year. The situation became so serious that Volkswagen reportedly began offering free replacement badges to all of its customers, and, spotting a marketing opportunity, even provided free badges to Beastie Boys fans. The newspaper article piqued my interest in the band and it wasn’t long before I had my hands on the Beastie Boys’ debut album Licensed to Ill.

  Having started out as a hardcore punk band in the late 1970s, the Beastie Boys didn’t actually make the transition to their more familiar hip-hop style until 1984, which meant that their music had a unique sound to it, combining elements of both genres. Consequently, their first album included tracks like Fight For Your Right, which was very much a punk track, and Paul Revere, which was more of a hip-hop track; and then bridging the two different styles completely were tracks like No Sleep Till Brooklyn that incorporated the hard guitars of punk and the rap and drum loops of hip hop.

  The debut album was a huge success, particularly in the USA where it reached the number one spot in the charts. In 1989 the boys released their second album Paul’s Boutique, which was artistically more mature and less commercially focused. More albums followed in the 1990s and 2000s, and by 2010 the Beastie Boys had sold 40 million albums worldwide.

  Prince

  Pint-sized, pop prodigy Prince is, without a doubt, one of the most prolific artists in the history of pop music having released hundreds of songs under his own name and under various pseudonyms, as well as writing songs which have been recorded by other artists such as Sinéad O’Connor, The Bangles and Chaka Khan. In addition to his published catalogue of work, he famously has a private vault of unreleased works which is said to include hundreds more songs and over fifty fully produced music videos that have never seen the light of day.

  Bruce Springsteen performing at a concert in East Germany in 1988, shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall. (Courtesy of Bundesarchiv, Uhlemann, Thomas/Wikimedia Commons)

  Having released his debut single Soft and Wet in 1978, it wasn’t until the 1980s that Prince really became popular, beginning with chart successes in America before most of us in the UK had even heard of him. His first foray into the UK charts, with the memorable songs 1999 and Little Red Corvette, resulted in a lukewarm response initially, and the two singles only made it into the charts at positions 25 and 54 respectively. It wasn’t until several years later, when his popularity and credibility were firmly established, that these songs were re-released and achieved the more rewarding positions of numbers 10 and 2 in the charts.

  Prince’s first big hit in the UK came in 1984 with When Doves Cry from the Purple Rain album, reaching number four in the charts; this was quickly followed by Purple Rain, which made it to number eight. The flamboyant and eccentric pop star went on to release hit after hit throughout the eighties, racking up numerous top-ten singles and producing six studio albums, five of which went platinum, with his recording success continuing into the next decade and beyond.

  Huey Lewis and the News

  If I had to pick just one band that summed up the eighties for me, Huey Lewis and the News would probably be my first choice. There’s something so uplifting and fun about their upbeat, pop-rock sound that just seems to sit perfectly with all my favourite memories of my 1980s childhood. However, I’m heavily biased in my opinion because Huey Lewis and the News wrote the soundtrack to my favourite film of all time, Back to the Future, and as well as writing the sound
track, entitled Back in Time, their other hit record The Power of Love was also featured in the film.

  While everyone knows that Ray Parker Jr wrote the theme song to the film Ghostbusters, few people realise that the song was actually a direct copy of the Huey Lewis hit I Want a New Drug, which sounds laughably similar. In fact, Huey Lewis had originally been asked to write the theme song for Ghostbusters but had declined due to his work on Back to the Future; his song I Want a New Drug was added to the film as a temporary measure during production until Ray Parker Jr concocted his own version of the song. Of course, Huey Lewis wasn’t amused at this turn of events and sued Ray Parker Jr for plagiarism, eventually reaching an undisclosed out-of-court settlement.

  Shortly after their success with Back to the Future, the band went on to release three more hit songs in quick succession: Stuck with You, Hip to be Square and Jacob’s Ladder. Two of the songs reached number one in the US charts but achieved more modest results in the UK.

  The band’s iconic sound became so representative of the 1980s that in the early 1990s its popularity faded and their last major success came in 1991 with Couple Days Off.

  Guns N’ Roses

  One of the kids in my class at school became obsessed by Guns N’ Roses for a while, in particular the song Sweet Child o’ Mine, which he would sing over and over again as he stood on his imaginary stage and played his air guitar. Now, it is a great song and many consider it to be one of the best rock songs of all time, but not many people know that it started life as a bit of a joke, when lead guitarist Slash was messing around in a warm-up session and played the now-famous guitar riff while making faces at drummer Steven Adler. Rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin asked Slash to play the riff again and a jam session began which inspired lead singer Axl Rose to write some lyrics based on his girlfriend. While the band treated the song flippantly and thought of it as more of a filler track, it became a huge success and made it to number one in the US charts and the UK Rock Chart.