The Indie Years 1982

By 1982 indie music was heading in numerous directions - old punks were branching out into pop, jazz, funk, dance and erm ...poetry.  Hip Hop also got political and the Falklands War inspired several of the songs on this playlist.

1) Rip It Up by Orange Juice
Edwyn Collins Scottish indie band takes a poppy soul direction whilst singing about his favourite Buzzcocks song.

2) Carnival Of Sorts (Boxcars) by R.E.M.
Taken from their debut Chronic Town E.P., R.E.M. emerged from Athens Georgia as a mumbling art rock party band and went on to become one of the great rock bands of the Twentieth Century.

3) A Strange Day by The Cure
The Cure had evolved from a post punk band into masters of minimalism and on their fourth album they went full blown gloomy goth.  After this they evolved again adding chirpy guitar pop to their repertoire and started troubling the charts with a string of catchy singles. 

4) The Missionary by Josef K
Another Scottish band on the Postcard label who recorded this spiky single during a John Peel Session, released it and then split up.

5) Suburban Home by Descendents
L.A. band with witty lyrics celebrating being average in a furious punk racket. "I wanna be a clone, I wanna suburban home".

6) Jet Set Junta by The Monochrome Set
Recorded in the aftermath of the Falklands War, this is a great poppy satirical song.

7) The One Thing by INXS
INXS began as the Farriss Brothers oiginally formed in 1977 in Perth Western Australia.  By 1980 they had renamed themselves for their debut album and this early classic displays all the elements that they would be known for - synthesizers, guitars, drums, big choruses and err...saxophone solos.

8) Are You Ready by Crispy Ambulance
On Manchester's Factory Records label they released a handful of singles and one album but were unfairly panned by the critics of trying to be Joy Division as they shared the same manager and label.
Tony Wilson Factory Records owner said they had the worst band name of all time.

9) Blister In The Sun by Violent Femmes
One hit wonder from this Milwaukee band.  But what a great hit!

10) Temptation by New Order
Producer Martin Hannett was largely responsible for the Joy Division sound and whilst he produced New Order's 1981 debut album Movement, he failed to hide his contempt for the band members who weren't Ian Curtis.  When New Order started programming sequencers and drum machines and producing their own records they soon decided they were better off without Hannett. They released a trilogy of seminal electronic tracks Everything's Gone Green, Temptation & Blue Monday.  New Order rarely played encores and decided they should program some songs that the machines could play so they could knock off early.

11) Lucinda by A Certain Ratio
A great Mancunian indie funk workout released on Tony Wilson's Factory Records label.

12) The Message by Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five
This was one of the first political hip hop tracks.  Before this it was mostly party music with daft rhymes then they decided they could put a social message on their records and changed the direction of hip hop and rap.

13) Town Called Malice by The Jam
The Jam had been together for six years and Paul Weller was more interested in expanding his musical horizens beyond their punk origins.  The motown and jazz influences of The Jam's later work were alienating some of the band's fanbase and when Paul Weller decided that his band mates lacked the musicianship to match his artistic vision, he decided to end The Jam in 1982.

14) Under The Big Black Sun by X
Another melodic LA punk band that was largely ignored by the mainstream - they were around fifteen years earlier than Nirvana and it may have been a different story if they had been contemporaries.

15) Down Under by Men At Work
Reggae inspired, Australian New Wave band who enjoyed their Vegemite and spliffs in equal measures.

16) Urban Struggle by The Vandals
Punk cowboy anthems is a genre I never expected to discover.

17) Over The Edge by Wipers
Powerful alt-rock from Portland, Oregon. 

18) Six Months In A Leaky Boat by Split Enz
One of my favourite songs by Split Enz which was written by Tim Finn inspired by his unhappy experiences of  his short lived marriage.  Banned in the UK during the Falkland's War as they didn't want to hear songs about leaky boats. 

19) Shipbuilding by Robert Wyatt
Keeping on a nautical theme is this anti-war protest song based in a port where the local population scrape a living working for the military industrial complex.

20) Cocktails by Attila The Stockbroker
British poet who recorded this brilliant take down of the early 80's yuppy scene - hilariously vicious.


Further Reading...
The Indie Years 1986
The Indie Years 1985
The Indie Years 1984
The Indie Years 1983
The Indie Years 1981
The Indie Years 1980
The Indie Years 1979
The Indie Years 1978
The Indie Years 1977