Zip up the Bugle Boy jeans, find a slap bracelet (or 50), break out the Doogie Howser, M.D. Season 1 episodes on VHS and search frantically for Young MC's Stone Cold Rhymin' cassette. A musical journey to the year 1989 is waiting.
Suite101 flashed back previously to the summer of 1984. And now it's almost unfathomable that the music playing in October 1989 turns 20 years old. It's fascinating yet again to discover so many iconic songs joining together on the countdowns at this time.
So what did this music teach fans? One, don't mess with Janet Jackson as she momentarily usurped her brother. Two, rhyming "Pasternak" with "Kerouac" is cool. And three, Tina Turner can live up to her own song title.
With a tip of the hat to Tunecaster, here's a closer look at some of these songs from 20 years ago which represent quite a wide cross-section of genres.
The Songs: "We Didn't Start the Fire," "Love Shack" and More
- "The Best," Tina Turner. Turner's last hit, "I Don't Wanna Fight," coincided with the 1993 film What's Love Got to Do with It. But "The Best" felt like Turner's valedictory song, and it became one of her most well-known hits. In a decade of great saxophone solos, Edgar Winter's equal parts smooth-and-growly solo ranks right up there.
- "If I Could Turn Back Time," Cher. Her outrageous outfit in the music video notwithstanding, the then-43-year-old Cher announced her first of many comebacks in 1989. Written by Diane Warren, who seemed to take over the industry in the latter part of the decade, the title was used for a greatest-hits album in 1999.
- "Love Shack," B-52's. Simply an epic party song. "Love Shack" peaked 20 years ago this week, and it was rarefied air for the rockers out of Athens, Georgia. Fred Schneider's odd spoken word/singing hybrid hardly worked better, and his "bang-on-the-door" banter back and forth with Cindy Wilson and Kate Pierson builds to a wild crescendo.
- "We Didn't Start the Fire," Billy Joel. Pure novelty from a guy whose expertise is narrative songwriting. Managing to pack 40 years of history in five minutes, it became the inevitable poor substitute for actually teaching history in public schools. Is there a faster, easier way to learn about Boris Pasternak, Charles de Gaulle and Juan Peron? But nobody before or since really jumped on the bandwagon of rattling off historical figures and events as lyrics. Most recently, NBC's The Office lampooned the chorus in Season 2, when temp Ryan Howard started a fire in the Dunder Mifflin kitchen.
- "Bust a Move," Young MC. Fresh off co-writing "Funky Cold Medina" and "Wild Thing" for resident two-hit wonder Tone Loc, MC broke off some of the wittiest, cleverest rhymes in hip-hop with his biggest hit. Too many great lines to mention, but this is one for the books: "You say neato / Check your libido / And roll to the church in your new tuxedo / The bride walks down just to start the wedding / And there's one more girl you won't be getting."
- "Miss You Much," Janet Jackson. Although she has recorded subsequent albums that sold well, Miss Janet reached a creative apex with Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814. The first single, "Miss You Much," marched to No. 1 within weeks of Rhythm Nation's September 1989 release. Jackson and the writing team of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis produced musical riches that still sound fresh 20 years later.
- "Back to Life (However Do You Want Me)," Soul II Soul. A foretaste of how R&B and soul would develop in the 1990s, this was far and away the British group's most popular song in the states. The beats and instrumentation are entirely indicative of the time period. And who hasn't sung, "Back to life, back to reality," at least once to themselves?
- "Personal Jesus," Depeche Mode. The UK masters of synth and electronica did a complete about-face in terms of style for an absolutely scalding song. The one major change? A wicked guitar part. This first single from Violator, which didn't come out until 1990, surfaced in the fall of 1989 to widespread acclaim. The song caught the eye of Johnny Cash, who covered it for his album American IV: The Man Comes Around.
Honorable mention: Motley Crue and Paula Abdul
Other songs that broke through around this day in 1989 reflect the variety that typified 1980s music. On one hand, Motley Crue's "Dr. Feelgood" is prime heavy metal. On the other, Paula Abdul somehow stockpiled hits with slick pop numbers like "(It's Just) The Way That You Love Me," which followed "Straight Up" and "Forever Your Girl."
The 1980s take their lumps sometimes, but the decade will never be accused of creating homogeneous musical assembly lines. The sounds of the '80s were multifaceted, distinct and unique. To quote the last line of "Miss You Much": "That's the end?"
