Prince - Dirty Mind

Although Prince was a huge success in the 1980s, this is his second time on the blog ("Controversy" was posted on September 23, 2011).  And we believe that this is justified -- both Prince posts are great songs and rare videos.  In fact, we don't believe that "Dirty Mind" was even played much on MTV -- the only time we recall seeing it was on the old USA show Night Flight (and yes, we did watch Night Flight a lot).

(In fact, seeing this video as a young lad in the early 1980s was a memorable experience.  My thought process went something like this ... "hey this is a really good song ... wait, is that dude wearing panties and garters and a trench coat?  Man, he seems odd ... but I really dig the song.")

"Dirty Mind" was the title cut of the 1980 LP that showed the eccentric music genius of Prince.  He had released two solid, if unspectacular albums in the late 1970s.  However, on the Dirty Mind album, he broke all of the rules, fusing rock, pop, new wave and R&B in a way that hadn't been done before.  He also went way over the line of good taste -- it was an insanely raunchy album for the time.  This combination of weirdness, hyper-sexuality and great music in many different styles would lead Prince to superstardom in a few short years.

The song itself  is driven by a keyboard riff by Doctor Fink, one of the few Prince songs that he did not exclusively write.  It also does not have a chorus -- it is a groove driven song (unconventional, and very cool).  While the Dirty Mind album is now regarded as a masterpiece by many critics, it was not a huge commercial success, peaking at #45 on the album charts.  The single did not even chart.  However, Prince was comfortable with the new direction, and it would lead to tremendous commercial and artistic successes just a few years later.

Ladies and gentlemen, for your audio and video pleasure ... His Purpleness.

Cool trivia fact:  Rolling Stone rated Dirty Mind as the 18th best album of the 1980s.  Purple Rain was ranked second (behind The Clash's London Calling), making Prince the only artist to have 2 LPs in the top 20.

Note that "Uptown" was posted on ERV in January, 2015.

Go West - We Close Our Eyes

Few acts capture that somewhat hard to describe "mid-80s sound" as well as Go West.  The English duo of  Peter Cox and Richard Drummie released a bunch of cotton-candy sweet, but really likable dance/pop/synth songs from 1985 to 1992.  While they are best-known for "King of Wishful Thinking" (their only top 10 hit, from the soundtrack of Pretty Woman), they actually had 7 charting singles, 3 of which broke the top 40.

"We Close Our Eyes," the duo's first single, barely missed being a top 40 hit (and we do mean barely; it peaked at #41 in April of 1985).  The relentlessly happy song, accentuated by keyboards was also an MTV favorite for a time.  The video, directed by 80s video savants Godley and Creme, contains marionettes, lots of exercise, and a really big wrench.  It also feature a cut about every second or so, and seems well-matched to the almost unnaturally happy song.

Go West went on hiatus after 1992's Indian Summer CD, and were dropped by Chrysalis Records.  However, Cox and Drummie remained on good terms, and continue to perform (and even release new material) to the present day.

John Hiatt - Slow Turning

How can you tell if an artist is a great singer-songwriter?  Well, how is this for a partial list of performers who have covered John Hiatt songs:   Bob Dylan, Willy DeVille, Linda Ronstadt, Bonnie Raitt, Eric Clapton, B.B. King, Willie Nelson, Three Dog Night, Joan Baez, Paula Abdul, Buddy Guy, Jimmy Buffett, Mandy Moore, Iggy Pop, Emmylou Harris, Dave Edmunds, Nick Lowe, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Rosanne Cash, Jewel, Aaron Neville, Jeff Healey, Keith Urban, Joe Cocker and Chaka Khan.  Impressive, yo.

John Hiatt put out his first record in 1974, but it took him years to find his voice (and his audience).  In addition, his career was almost ruined by years of alcohol abuse.  His breakthrough came on 1986's Bring the Family, which had two notable songs -- "Have a Little Faith in Me" and "Thing Called Love."  Since then, virtually all of his album have had strong sales, and end up peaking between 110 and 50 or so on the album charts.

Amazingly, in spite of critical acclaim and solid LP sales, Hiatt has never had a top 100 single.  "Slow Turning," from the 1988 LP of the same name, is his biggest hit -- it reached #8 on the Mainstream Rock Charts.  It is also a great song and quirky, cool video.  And, as a bonus, it has one of the great lines in rock and roll:

"Now I'm in my car

Ooh, I got the radio on

And I'm yellin' at the kids in the back

Cuz they're banging like Charlie Watts"

Joan Jett & the Blackhearts - I Love Rock 'n' Roll

Yes, this is not a rare song or video, but our loyal reader(s) will know that we like to post songs that you didn't know were covers, and this puppy qualifies.  "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" catapulted Joan Jett to stardom, and was a monster hit -- 7 weeks at #1 in early 1982, and it became the 56th best selling single of the rock era.

What you may not know was that the song is a cover of an Arrows song.  Who are Arrows?  (We're glad that you asked).  The Arrows were a British pop rock band active from 1974-77, who had a TV show on Granada Television in the UK (this becomes important in a moment).  The song was written in response to the Rolling Stones "It's Only Rock and Roll;" the Arrows felt that the Stones' song was an apology, and this was their response.

The Arrows version was originally released as a B side, then re-recorded and released as an A side in 1975.  However, it did not chart -- but it did show up on the Arrows' TV show.  (Remember how we stated that this was important ...)  Well, Joan Jett saw the song on the TV show while she was touring with the Runaways in 1976, and liked it ... a lot.  She apparently tried to convince the Runaways to record a cover, but her bandmates did not feel the same, so they passed.

Jett eventually recorded a version in 1979, as part of three songs that she recorded with Paul Cook and Steve Jones (of the Sex Pistols) as she tried to start a solo career, but the songs were not released (until years later).  Finally, Jett recorded the song on her second album, which she also titled I Love Rock 'n' Roll ... and the rest, as they say, is history.

Here are the two videos, starting with the original Joan Jett & the Blackhearts vid from 1981 (we love how it starts with Jett's "Bad Reputation" from the her previous album of the same name):

And here is the Arrows version, from TV -- which is, we believe, the version that Joan Jett saw in 1976 (and loved):

Lastly, we recently found a color version of the video, which is below.

The Hooters - Karla With a K

The Hooters were formed in Philadelphia in 1980, and were driven musically by the partnership between Eric Bazilian and Rob Hyman (who met at Penn in 1971).  The band's style was rocked up folk music (or, if you prefer, folk influenced rock) and sounded quite a bit different from most of what was on MTV in the mid 1980s.

"Karla With a K" was the third single off 1987's Long Way Home, and (unfairly, we think) broke the band's streak of six consecutive singles that charted in the U.S.  The video is a performance clip, with some European travel shots thrown in.

In retrospect, "Karla" was the beginning of the end for The Hooters; while the band's cover of "500 Miles" from 1989's Zig Zag did chart, it was the last Hooters song to do so.  In fact, the poor sales of Zig Zag led Columbia to drop the band.  Although The Hooters soldiered on, and even released an album on MCA, they had little success.  The band unofficially broke up in 1995.

Bazilian and Hyman have remained active in the music industry to this day.  Fittingly, their biggest success was as a team; they co-wrote and performed on Joan Osborne's triple platinum 1995 album Relish ("One of Us" in particular, sounds like it could have been a Hooters song).

Cool trivia fact:  The band took its name from the Melodica (which they called a "hooter"), a combination keyboard/harmonica instrument played by both Bazilian and Hyman.

The Hooters' highest charting single, "Day by Day" was posted on ERV in February, 2016.

Y & T - Summertime Girls

Y&T was a band that was playing the right kind of music at the right time, but somehow never really broke through.  The band formed in Oakland in 1974, and were named after the Beatles LP, Yesterday and Today.  After they signed to A&M in 1980, they shortened their name to Y&T, probably because it sounded more metal.  They would go on to release six radio-friendly hard rock albums in the 1980s, but somehow never found their audience, in spite of the fact that their high energy live shows were legendary.  In retrospect, much of the blame likely lies with the label, as A&M had few hard rock bands (and seemingly had no idea how to promote them).

"Summertime Girls," from the 1985 album Down for the Count was the closest thing to a genuine hit that Y&T had, but it peaked at #55 on the Billboard charts, so the band does not even count as an official one hit wonder.  The video is a cheesy masterpiece of 1980s fun, complete with lots of girls in bikinis, a few metal babes, and roller skates.  And, we found a version that includes the somewhat rare 30 second intro.

While the band broke up in 1991, they reformed in 2001 and are still performing, although we believe that the only original member left is singer/guitarist Dave Maniketti.

Missing Persons - Surrender Your Heart

Missing Persons were an iconic early 1980s MTV band.  With their visually flamboyant style, including singer Dale Bozzio's pink highlights and fishbowl bras, they seemed tailor-made for the new music video channel.

The background story of the band goes back to 1976, when Bozzio ran into Frank Zappa in LA (after walking out of an interview with Hugh Hefner to be a valentine for the annual Playboy party).  Zappa hired her on the spot, and she performed with him throughout the late 1970s.

In 1980, Dale Bozzio, along with her husband Terry and several other member of Zappa's band ventured out on their own as Missing Persons.  Two years of working the LA club scene led to a record deal, and Spring Session M (an anagram of the band's name) was released in 1982.  It became a huge hit, and videos for "Words" and "Destination Unknown" went into heavy (and we do mean heavy) rotation on MTV.

For their second album, the band decided on a somewhat more experimental sound.  Although many critics think that 1984's Rhyme & Reason was their strongest album, it did not resonate with fans.  1986's Color in Your Life did even worse, perhaps impacted by the deteriorating marriage of the Bozzios (they divorced and the band broke up in 1986).

Dale Bozzio went on to record one album on Prince's Paisley Park Records, and then mostly disappeared from view.  Terry Bozio continued on as a session musician, and worked with Andy Taylor (of Duran Duran fame) on his only solo hit, "Take It Easy."

For the blog, we went with "Surrender Your Heart" from Rhyme and Reason.  The video uses paintings from Peter Max and is one of the more interesting/artistic videos of the era.

Missing Persons' video for "Destination Unknown" was posted on ERV in October 2022, as part of our annual All Hallows Even party.

Dire Straits - Skateaway

Picking the strongest song from Dire Straits classic album Making Movies is almost like picking your favorite finger.  The LP (justly ranked as the 52nd best album of the 1980s by Rolling Stone) is incredibly solid from start to finish, and well worth a listen for any 1980s music fan.

We eventually settled on "Skateaway," partly for sentimental reasons, as it was the first song that we heard from the album.  Coincidentally, it was the only single from Making Movies to chart in the U.S., reaching #58, while the LP hit #19.  The song is classic Dire Straits, with a great beat, cool lyrics and interesting, artistic guitar work by Mark Knopfler.

The song was inspired by a girl on roller skates in New York City, and the somewhat dated video (featuring "it girl" Jayzik Azikiwe)  does reflect the story line.  We liked that the band is barely present in the video, and when they do appear, it is a humorous, awkward moment.  (We especially liked that the Stratocaster gets better lighting and more air time than the band).

Dire Straits would go on to have tremendous success with the somewhat more commercial-sounding Brothers in Arms, but in my opinion Making Movies was their masterpiece.

The Church - Under the Milky Way

A lush, haunting song, "Under the Milky Way" almost did not make it on to The Church's 1988 album, Starfish.  When bassist/singer Steve Kilby first played the song to the band, they were unenthusiastic, although the drummer and manager liked it enough to push for its inclusion on the LP.  The band eventually came around enough to release it as a single, and it went on to become a huge hit.  In fact, The Church are a classic one hit wonder in the U.S. -- one hit single (in the top 40) and no other charting songs.

While "Under the Milky Way" was ostensibly written about Kilby's then-girlfriend, Karin Jansson, it was really about nothing, according to Kilby.  He wasn't terribly bothered about the lyrics, instead working on the song to create an atmosphere, which he did exceedingly well.  The 12-string acoustic guitar (which starts the song) and the Ebow solo (providing a strange, bagpipe-esque sound) all combine to make this an unusual, and interesting song.

The Church remained successful through the mid-1990s in their native Australia, and continue performing to this day.  "Under the Milky Way" would go on the be voted the best Australian song of the past 20 years (in 2008) by The Australian newspaper.

Cool trivia fact:  The song's title comes from the English translation of the Amsterdam music hall called the Melkweg, which is still around.

A Flock of Seagulls - Space Age Love Song

One of the prototypical early MTV bands, A Flock of Seagulls gets a bad rap as "that one hit wonder band with the hair."  In fact, they were not even a true one hit wonder, as two songs from their debut album broke the top 40 in the U.S.  ("I Ran," #9 and "Space Age Love Song," #30), while the LP, a concept album about an alien invasion of earth, peaked at #10 in the U.S.  They also had one top 40 hit from their second album, Listen ("Wishing (I Had a Photograph of You)" which peaked at #26).

The band began in Liverpool in the late 1970s, and got their name from a line in The Stranglers song, "Toiler on the Sea." And, in one of the least surprising factoids ever, lead singer Mike Score was a former hairdresser.

"Space Age Love Song" tells a love story in three verses, each verse starting with "I saw your eyes."  The songs' structure is unconventional, with no apparent chorus or bridge, just the verses linked with a catchy guitar line.  While the sound is a bit dated, we think this ranks as a great rock love song.

As is often the case, A Flock of Seagulls were unable to replicate their success.  Although they released several follow on albums, they saw steadily declining sales and finally broke up in 1985.  However, in recent years, they have reunited from time to time, and lead signer Mike Score continues to tour under the Flock of Seagulls name.