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80′s One Hit Wonders

Topics: Music | 5 CommentsBy admin | July 23, 2009

Was the music & fashion so bad because we did so many drugs, or did we do so many drugs because the music and fashion was so bad?


At last, the “Official” video for
88 Lines About 44 Women.
Rather peculiar, and NGSFW*

I’d completely forgotten about the 80′s song “88 Lines About 44 Women” by The Nails until the other day when the “Official” video (also at left, NGSFW*) appeared on YouTube. I guess it isn’t so odd I’d forget about it; as much as I loved the song back then, I now remember clearly the drug-addled morning that I first heard it. I had just awakened in the San Francisco apartment of some woman I’d met the night before and she thought it really funny to play it under the circumstances. Honestly, I sometimes wonder if there were so many one-hit wonders in the 80′s simply because people were doing so many drugs that they couldn’t remember the bands’ names from release to release. I know that I, for one, remember very little of lasting value from the years 1983-1990, and given our hairstyles, clothing, and musical preferences, probably prefer it this way! But I thought it would be fun to try to recall – without using the Internet or VH-1 as a memory aid – a list of these tunes. By the way, compiling this list made me realize that there’s a previously un-named micro-genre in here somewhere that’s epitomized by tunes like Trio’s Da Da Da, The Flying Lizards’ Money (That’s What I Want), and The Nails’ song featured above. I hereby christen this genre “Clock Rock”. Remember me if that catches on. The list is below, feel free to share your own in the comments…

Artist Song Year
Links
Lipps, Inc. Funkytown 1980 YouTube Amazon
The Vapors Turning Japanese 1980 YouTube Amazon
Waitresses I Know What Boys Like 1982 YouTube Amazon
Wall of Voodoo Mexican Radio 1982 YouTube Amazon
Taco Puttin’ on the Ritz 1983 YouTube Amazon
Kajagoogoo Too Shy 1983 YouTube Amazon
Peter Schilling Major Tom 1983 YouTube Amazon
Dexy’s Midnight Runners Come on Eileen 1983 YouTube Amazon
After the Fire Der Kommissar 1983 YouTube Amazon
Nena 99 Luftballons 1984 YouTube Amazon
Musical Youth Pass The Dutchie 1984 YouTube Amazon
Frankie Goes to Hollywood Relax 1984 YouTube Amazon
Godley & Creme Cry 1985 YouTube Amazon
Sly Fox Let’s Go All the Way 1986 YouTube Amazon
Timbuk 3 The Future’s So Bright 1986 YouTube Amazon
Charlie Sexton Beat’s So Lonely 1986 YouTube Amazon
MARRS Pump up the Volume 1988 YouTube Amazon
Rob Base & D.J. EZ Rock It Takes Two 1988 YouTube Amazon
Modern English I Melt With You 1989 YouTube Amazon

You kind of had to be on drugs to dress like this:

*NGSFW = National Geographic Safe For Work

Read Comments

  1. Posted by TeacherPatti on 07.23.09 3:34 am

    Vixen, “Edge of a Broken Heart”
    LA Guns, “The Ballad of Jayne”
    Neheh (sp?) Cherry “Buffalo Stance
    Toni Basil, “Mickey”
    Madness “Our House”

    I’m just going from memories of the One Hit Wonders of the 80s shows that I just saw on VH1!!

  2. Posted by kristin on 07.23.09 7:20 am

    the whole family was “da da” ing to Tones On Tail’s “Go” last night. it was one of the coolest moments ever. and do you remember how sexy (well, you probably don’t) Charlie Sexton was in that video? and no, i’m not on drugs.

  3. Posted by admin on 07.23.09 7:33 am

    Yes I do remember how sexy he was in that video, and I’m straight. I’m amazed he didn’t become a screaming teen girl idol…

  4. Posted by Kevin Wisney-Leonard on 07.24.09 12:39 pm

    Loved this list…. perhaps you can make a playlist of the vaseline buttroom……

  5. Posted by admin on 07.25.09 11:42 am

    Thanks Kevin. It just hit me how funny our nickname for the Nectarine Ballroom would sound to the uninitiated. It’s even funnier that they changed the name to “The Necto”, which everyone in fact says with air quotes, ’cause it’s such a parody of its former self…which was always a little kitsch itself…