1) Original Sin by INXS
This song is about social conditioning and growing up with the beliefs of your parents. It was produced by Chic guitarist Nile Rodgers who suggested introducing the interracial relationship which in 1984 was considered controversial enough to get the song banned from several US radio stations. It was a number one hit single in Australia and France and heralded the arrival of their fourth album The Swing.
2) The Killing Moon by Echo & The Bunnymen
Echo and the Bunnymen’s Ian McCulloch humbly describes this as “the best song ever written”. Undoubtedly it the best song ever written by him. He hasn’t described what the lyrics mean preferring to keep it mysterious and allowing the listeners to reach their own conclusions. Ian said the “Fate up against your will” refrain was influenced by “To Be Or Not To Be”. Typically Ian thinks his lyrics surpass William Shakespeare’s.
Peter Hook rates this as New Order’s greatest song. Appropriately for a song called Thieves Like Us, Hooky admits he stole the baseline from a 1974 Hot Chocolate song called Emma.
4) Sunlight Bathed The Golden Glow by Felt
Felt released ten albums between 1982 and 1989 before they disbanded leaving a distraught cult following. They were too cult for me so I was unaffected at the time.
5) Shout To The Top by The Style Council
Paul Weller takes his brand of white soul elevator music and sings "shout to the top" over it.
6) How Soon Is Now? by The SmithsT
his classic Smiths track was originally released as a B-Side to William, It Was Really Nothing. A distinctive guitar intro displaying some of Johnny Marr's tightest riffs and some of Morrissey's bleakest lyrics. A firm favourite of bedsitters wallowing in their self imposed isolation.
7) A Sort Of Homecoming by U2
The rousing opening track from U2’s fourth album. The lyrics include powerful imagery of bomb-blasts, explosions, fields of mourning and crucially “the land grows weary of its own”. But the message is of overcoming the troubles tearing down walls and building bridges.
8) Don’t Go Back To (Rockville) by R.E.M.
The Rockville in brackets could be replaced with any small town and the songs warns against moving backwards, wasting your time and getting stuck in a one horse town. A sort of homecoming to be avoided.
9) White Lines (Don't Do It) by Melle Mel & The Furious Five
Grandmaster Flash had already left the group over a dispute about the royalties from their previous hit The Message. Grandmaster Melle Mel, the leader of the Furious Five penned this social commentary on cocaine. To make it commercially acceptable Melle Mel cynically inserted the “don’t do it” refrain. Flash called out this hypocrisy saying “Now the guys are saying no to drugs on this new record, but I bet they’re out looking for the dope man just like me.” The music was a re-recorded cover of a song called Cavern by liquid Liquid.
Incidentally the story about the businessman caught with drugs and released on bail was based on John DeLorean owner of the iconic 80s car.
I always used to turn this off thinking it was an awful piece of jingoistic crap with his arse on the cover. It was only recently that I listened to the lyrics and realised it was actually a story about the psychological fallout of the kids drafted into the Vietnam War, brutalised and rejected by their society when they returned - with his arse on the cover.
11) Smalltown Boy by Bronski Beat
An autobiographical story from Jimmy Somerville about getting away from the gay-bashing provinces and seeking a new life in more cosmopolitan city.
12) Looking From A Hilltop by Section 25
A band five years ahead of their time - the opening beat sounds like The Shamen circa 1990. This is a Blackpool band on the Factory Records label.
13) I Walk Away by Split Enz
By 1984 Tim Finn had quit the band and his younger brother Neil had taken over as the main songwriter. I Walk Away was a taken from the final Split Enz album which was only released in Australia and New Zealand. Neil Finn loved the song but felt it was overproduced and it was re-recorded as a stripped down version two years later and included on the first Crowded House album. Whilst the best version is obviously subjective, and debate rages in some very nerdy corners of the internet, my preference is the Split Enz version.
14) The Caterpillar by The Cure
The Caterpillar was the only single taken from The Top - a collection of psychedelic Cure rock songs mixing paranoia, pop and Eastern influences with mixed results.
A song about searching for the promised land or the afterlife and when you reach it there’s “nothing on top”. A big influence on Nirvana who later toured together and performed this and two other Meat Puppet songs with them on their MTV Unplugged appearance.
16) Let's Go Crazy by Prince
Prince had a more uplifting view of the afterlife. Starting with organs and a sermon on never ending happiness in the next life, Prince advised enjoying your mortal life before the grim reaper visits you.
17) 2 Minutes To Midnight by Iron Maiden
Iron Maiden’s song about the Atomic Armageddon Clock and the vested interests of the military industrial complex pushing the nuclear arms race. It was released against a backdrop of increasing high tension between the West and the Soviet Union in the early eighties. President Reagan described the Soviets as an Evil Empire after the Russians invaded Afghanistan in 1980 and the US announced the development of a spaced based missile defence system dubbed Star Wars in 1983.
Two Tribes covers the same theme with pounding rhythms, American funk, Russian strings and a huge chorus. It spent 9 weeks at Number 1 in the UK and was a global hit. I had the 12” and liked the air raid sirens, Ronald Reagan impersonations provided by Chris Barrie and apocalyptic yet calming public service announcements about radiation fallout and tagging your dead grandmother.
This is the debut single from LA punk funk band Red Hot Chili Peppers.
20) Do They Know It's Christmas Time? by Band Aid
This charity record to raise money for the Ethiopian famine was written and recorded in a rush to be released in time for Christmas. Midge Ure of Ultravox and Bob Geldof of The Boomtown Rats collected their pop/rock star friends (Sting, U2, Bananarama, Duran Duran, Boy George) and gave them lines to sing. The charity record raised over eight million pounds in a month and became the UK’s highest selling single holding that record for 13 years. They followed Band Aid with the Live Aid concerts in 1985 to raise more funds.
Further Reading...
The Indie Years 1986
The Indie Years 1985
The Indie Years 1983
The Indie Years 1982
The Indie Years 1981
The Indie Years 1980
The Indie Years 1979
The Indie Years 1978
The Indie Years 1977
