Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
From CEO: Jen ‘Skewed View‘ Kehl III and COO: Kristi ‘Finding Ninee‘ Reiger-Campbell the Wakefield Doctrine presents:
Twisted MixTape Tuesday 15
I propose leave to writers of greater skill, the daunting task of tying together the shiny threads and fuzzy twisted yarn that was the fabric of the musical/cultural environment c 1980 to 1989. I simply cannot get a handle on this here decade here, except to say, for a decade that started with a lot of promise, it really wasn’t all that great. Like a married couple submitting to a timeshare sales pitch, still humming tunes from the 1970s, we found ourselves held hostage to our collective greed and vanity. We surely could have it all, couldn’t we? The music tottered and staggered, like a an executive in the NY Athletic Club, desperately trying to shake off the cocaine hang-over, at once aggressive and peevish. With the exception of giant talents like Prince and exciting groups like, whats-that-band-with-the-really-hot-chick-singer, you know the one I mean! As I try to hear the music in my ear, from that era, I just get 10 years of one hit wonders and ‘music by movie screenplay’.
You know, if we were inclined to characterize the whole decade using the descriptions of the three worldviews of the Wakefield Doctrine, I don’t know how I can go with anything else but…rogerian. A truly rogerian* musical decade. Exceptionally talented performers, creating music that, for the most part was part of the packaging of some (other) un-needed product, meant to be sold to a listening audience that was the modern era’s version of the the weird-ass people that made up the dramatis personae of Fellini’s Satyricon.
Radioactive – The Firm
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Jessie’s Girl – Rick Springfield
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Spirit of Radio – Rush
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Dr. Feelgood – Motley Crue
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Rock Me Amadeus – Falco
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Don’t Be Cruel – Cheap Trick
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Talk To You Later – The Tubes
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I give up on the 1980s! here ….it’s a song, it’s a movie …it was the 80’s
Stonehenge – Spinal Tap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Zdyo4vJuCU*rogerian: the worldview of the Herd. People with this as a predominant worldview are: technically adept, able to concentrate on the minutiae of ‘process’, lovers of tradition and history, natural engineers, accountants, fire fighters, will maintain that the world is a quantifiable place, very social and very, very social able , natural politicians, will kiss the baby and get the mother to want to kiss them, have bridges and financial schemes names after them… rogers. Examples: Kathy Bates, Paula Deen, James Spader, (at least 3 of) the Supreme Court, Christopher Columbus, Mary Queen of Scots, William Hurt, Barack Obama, Angie (of Angie’s List)
About clarkscottroger
Hi Clark, loved Jesse’s Girl! Wonder what Rick Springfield is now up to. Thanks for sharing!
@Michelle
probably still playing somewhere…these videos are such time machines!
Such a diverse list of great songs. I think I’ve got all of these on my iPod. Also, yes, Rick Springfield is still playing and touring. He just played a festival in my neck of the woods last month.
@Dream
(other than not being able to identify with many ‘overwhelming’ contributors to the music scene (Prince being the first exception that comes to mind)) I do enjoy this diversity. How else to explain putting Falco and Motley Crue in the same list? lol
While it’s true that the 80’s were all about music selling crap we don’t need, it’s also when MTV was born and when I* was in high school. I think there’s something about music that people listened to at age 16 that stays with us for life. For me, anyway. Yeah, some of it was bad but it was oh so good. ha to one-hit-wonders! I’d forgotten about so many of them (Boom boom boom let’s go back to my room was one that I remember dancing like a crazy fool to, Relax by Frankie Goes To Hollywood** was another).
By the way – Rock me Amadeus is still on my ipod and I turn that sucker way up every time it comes on.
*Because the 80’s were all about moi
**I can’t believe that song didn’t make my list – apparently there are parts of the 80’s I’d totally forgotten and I’m not admitting to it having anything to do with the hangover you mention above because I was a good girl. At 16 anyway. 3 years after that? Hm.
@Kristi
Totally agree with your point about the age of the listener… what I am looking forward to (and I think I am already seeing it) is the perspective being elicited by the age (of the) writers here at this blog.
diversity is it’s own reward.
Testing…testing…getting frustrated.
Oh so good. You summed it up just right! It’s funny though… I think depending un your age *ahem* that poppiness is almost like acid stuck in your system FOREVER. You think it’s gone, and then you have a flashback. BOOM. and it’s Pop Goes The World.
@Kristi
ayiiee what a blood-curdling idea i.e. with increased age the musically-intolerable songs become favorite!! (the remaining synapseses are too tired to fight about it*)
*Eagles sometime in the ’80s
Touche on the Spinal Tap call out! A generation-defining movie. As to the music end of things, I’m thinking that maybe you weren’t hanging at the same clubs as I?
@troy
it’s really weird, now that the time dilation effect is, very very paradoxically, putting the decades of music farther from view (in terms of the memory of the songs, as opposed to the direct recollection of hearing them in contempores!
(you know, then the scene from the movie that, though I didn’t include it (not being a song) presents the zeitgeist perfectly?)
Spinal Tap for the Win!
@Traci
lol… I found myself laughing (as I watched the video)… frickin geniuses
LOL at your into paragraphs.
Fee Waybill was underrated. Good songwriter. The Tubes did good stuff.
@Lance
the entire ‘The Completion Backward Principle’ album…not a bad track on the thing. I suspect I must have been cross-channelling Gordon Geeko and Jimmy Swaggert or some damn thing… I am not normally concerned with the doings of the culture and I bet I have some memories of the Decade that are not quite…er strident as today’s sounded.
I am genuinely looking forward to the 90s… some fresh air and the Offspring and Green Day
*yeah technically 80s but I only herd them in the 90s
Aw Clark man…I wish I could high five you on this. Spinal Tap?! Stonehenge?! YES!!! And I love that you picked Jessie’s Girl. And you’re a guy. You get points for that. That’s the number one karaoke song of all time and I don’t care what anyone says, it’s fun. The Tubes! That’s quintessential ’80s right there, as is Rock Me Amadeus. I have that on my iPod. Oh yes I do. And Cheap Trick. “Fast Times…” I saw Rush in the 80s at Madison Square Garden. What a great show that was. All that sound coming out of 3 guys.
@Linda
well, the thing about clarks* we gots pretty liberal tastes in music, the Cheap Trick I loved ’cause they managed to capture the sound/feel for huge volume. Somehow they improved the song without changing notes or keys or rhythm, just the dynamics and the volume.
Spinal Tap! I wrote in another Comment how I did not put in one clip that I felt totally captures the 80s but that everyone who knows what I mean will know the scene…
*the worldview as well the person typing, is that we have a natural eclecticism driven by two of the fundamental characteristics of (our) worldview, a) Outsiders (to everything) we are spared the blinders that are part of belonging (rogers) or the curiosity-phobic over emphasis on focus (scotts) and 2) insatiable curiosity clarks are driven by the need to learn anything and everything that we think we don’t know
Dude… on the same page with Rush & Cheap Trick (as you alluded to). So remember Radioactive. Has there ever been a more “cool” entrance into any building by anybody other than the Falco entrance in that video??? Very smooth!!! Ha…
Totally enjoyed, Slu
@Slu
funny about the giant volume songs (Rush and Cheap Trick and even Motely Crue) it was not the raw power of the 60s (Marshall stacks and 2 pedals) but it was not the semi-too clean volume of the 70’s. the break in the Cheap Trick song is exactly what I mean… for anyone who has had the pleasure of playing at that volume there is the somatic element… an almost tangible and physical feeling when you start to pile on the dBs
Great List! I am a total Rick Springfield loving dork so of course I LOVE Jessie’s Girl and of course I am a closet Rush fan so I have to give you total props for putting them on your list! Nicely Done! ;)
@MM
Thank you, I’ve been getting props for including Rick and it’s a good example of what I hoped to say about the decade… I was aware of the song when it came out, (people we all, ‘hey man a soap opera actor trying to be a rock n roll singer’ ) but it’s just a fun, catchy song. (that and the fact that he uses the word ‘moot’ in the lyrics). lol
I just checked out Spinal Tap at the library. I’ve NEVER seen it. I’m looking forward to finally watching it.
@Kate
You will *so* not regret it, lol (Will resist the urge to foreshadow scenes that I especially enjoyed).
Ah, the 80’s. Or, should I say, “A-ha, the 80’s.” To me, music died in this decade as producers canned the electronic sound and only the voice tones changed. The Divinyls, touching themselves, Duran Duran, howling like the wolf, and Hair Bands, making a mockery of the rock that brought them to the forefront. Run DMC and Tone Loc, making RAP acceptable for those who could not carry a tune, set the tone (no pun intended) for today’s farce of a music industry. Heart lost their edge, REO Speedwagon became a Pop Band, and The Romantics talked in their sleep. Janet Jackson danced, Michael Jackson didn’t stop when he had enough, and Lionel Richie left the Commodores to dance on the ceiling. Even Eric Clapton, Elton John and Gino Vannelli left their roots to pursue the coinage of the dance electronics of the day. The biggest deal of the day was replacing LP’s and Cassette Tapes with CD’s … a must as auto manufacturers made the switch mandatory. Hyundai entered the picture and Yugo went out of it. Datsun became Nissan, and Toyota joined Chevy in a joint venture in Freemont, California, producing the Corollas and “new” Nova’s in the same factory. Huey Lewis & the News were working for a living, Madonna was under a lucky star, and Tiffany … well, Tiffany and Debbie Gibson both proved Pop Queens could come and go before you knew what they looked like. Dire Straits loved their MTV, and the Buggles proved Video Killed The Radio Star. God, it really did suck. Good post, Clark! But, you did omit one classic … Heavy Metal (both the cartoon movie and the song). Rock goes Pop … and that was proof! :) But, twenty bonus points awarded for Spinal Tap!
@Rich
(and I couldn’t say it better…)
Another great list. I was almost certain I wasn’t going to know some of these songs (specifically The Firm and The Tubes as I was like who the fuck are they?), but once hearing them I recognized them. This is likely because I was so young and didn’t associate most bands with music until the 90s and by then only the prominent songs my parents listened to (or bands that continued on through the 90s) did I connect the dots.
I love the end of that Spinal Tap video (both of them actually).
Jak