Artists/bands that saved the 80s from total oblivion

[Big Ears]

Although Greg Lake's input was fairly clear, many did not recognise the contribution made by Ian McDonald. In hindsight, when he and Lake departed, King Crimson were trading on the first album and could never recapture the magic. They became more like the Robert Fripp Band. It is funny how McDonald's band Foreigner were closer to Free than King Crimson.

It is interesting you found there was a continuous decline after Discipline (I have only heard Discipline and Beat).

Robert Fripp and Toyah Wilcox were recently on a TV game show called Mr & Mrs. It was fascinating how Toyah believed she was the musical talent in the partnership and Fripp was in the background. I suppose he has become used to massaging her ego.

 

[CP/M User]

I like listening to all sorts of 80s music, perhaps the bands I play more often are Dire Straits, The Church, Split Enz, Toto, R.E.M., The Stranglers, early U2, Goanna, Flowers/Icehouse, Roxy Music, Mental as Anything.

 

[Khor1255]

Although Greg Lake's input was fairly clear, many did not recognise the contribution made by Ian McDonald. In hindsight, when he and Lake departed, King Crimson were trading on the first album and could never recapture the magic. They became more like the Robert Fripp Band.

The Lake McDonald era (along with the Giles brothers) was definitely something very very special but I think they were on the serious return trail with each progressing Wetton album. They were headed in more of a hard rock even heavy metal direction but it was absolutely another golden era to me. I like the three other albums as well (with Gordon Haskell etc) but my two favorite eras will always be Lake/McDonald/Giles and Wetton/Cross. The major difference in the Lake albums (to me) is that in their intentional non fluff material (everything except the Mars practices) every single song was at least very good. Some of the Wetton songs lacked something I can't put my finger on but were definitely less than stellar.

It is funny how McDonald's band Foreigner were closer to Free than King Crimson.

That was always surprising to me as well. I either chalked it up to him wanting to become more commercially acceptable (changing with the changing tide) or that the Giles brothers had every bit as much actual input into the songs as everyone else. If you hear the Giles Giles and Fripp stuff you can see there was something rather unique brewing even before KC. I'm nogt really a big fan of that stuff but it is a new take in it's own way.

It is interesting you found there was a continuous decline after Discipline (I have only heard Discipline and Beat).

To me every album has good and bad songs but by the time of Three of a Perfect Pair the not so good songs greatly outnumbered the good ones. Some of it borders on boring.

Robert Fripp and Toyah Wilcox were recently on a TV game show called Mr & Mrs. It was fascinating how Toyah believed she was the musical talent in the partnership and Fripp was in the background. I suppose he has become used to massaging her ego.

Fripp seems a surprisingly unassuming individual at times and at other times he is anything but. I'd really like to hear something good from him again while there is still time.

 

[Big Ears]

I haven't heard Giles, Giles & Fripp (or McDonald and Giles) although they are something I have always wondered about. Like you, I would also be interested to hear new material from Fripp again.

 

[Sweaty]

WTF's with all this talk about 80s being a bad decade in music!?
Along with the '70s, by far the best era of pop & rock music.

There were a lot of good bands in the 80's but they didn't get the airplay and there was a lot of bad pop music around from 1983 onward. Some artists made wimpy albums in the 80's IMO, the music industry was flooded with dance music like house and techno.

I loved the 50's, 60's, 70's, the 80's were ok but you had to know your music imo

 

[terry ells]

one of the bands that got me through the worst 10 years of garbage known to man, was the hip

 

[CP/M User]

I loved the 50's, 60's, 70's, the 80's were ok but you had to know your music imo

Or have a station where you can sift through all kinds of music and pick the ones you like. However if anyone read my initial comments for The Best Of R.E.M., they'd think I was nuts Unfortunately I didn't consider the Anything can grow on you element.

 

[Khor1255]

There were a lot of good bands in the 80's but they didn't get the airplay and there was a lot of bad pop music around from 1983 onward. Some artists made wimpy albums in the 80's IMO, the music industry was flooded with dance music like house and techno.

I loved the 50's, 60's, 70's, the 80's were ok but you had to know your music imo

Really? You just 'had to know'? Please tell me who I may have missed because I was surrounded by musicians that loved the shit music that was being put out in the 80s. Perhaps I missed something.

 

[Hurdy Gurdy Man]

While it's true that for every period of pop music history,there were always great bands that you might have had to be "in the know" for,there was plenty of sensational music in the '80's that this simple didn't apply to.Right off the top,"Purple Rain","Born In the USA" the comings up of the legendary U2 and REM.While I agree with the many who say the decade pales in comparison with the 60's and 70's,just keep in mind,those were EXTREMELY HIGHLY AND DEEPLY REVOLUTIONARY YEARS!I was there as a teen watching these things from the wings in the 80's and I know that a whole lot was seeming to revolve around the MTV explosion,but the bottom line is there were some really GREAT tunes and some really GREAT,GREAT videos.80's FOREVER!!

 

[Big Ears]

According to my memory, the peak for rock music was the mid-sixties to the end of the seventies. I say this because I was an adolescent during this time. How I would feel if I was a teenager now, I dread to think. Rock music then went into decline in about 1980, from which it did not rise again until about 1990, on the coat tails of grunge. Of course this is a vague generalisation, there was some great music in the early eighties and some rubbish in the late seventies. Part of the problem was that cheap drum machines and synthesizers could be bought at the turn of the seventies/ eighties decade and young people who played guitars in their parents' front rooms, switched to this newly available technology. It seemed to open a whole new vista of music, but led to the synth-pop, techno, acid house, sampling and reverb-soaked material of the eighties. Guitar bands had to struggle like hell, commercially and artistically, in the face of a tsunami of synthesizers. Neo, new-age (I don't care for that term), AOR and NWOBHM managed to cope, but this was cold comfort. Insult had been turned to injury after punk rock, new wave and Phil Collins's solo efforts and little did we know that rap was not a passing trend. It took nearly another decade and the rise of Oasis, with their emphsis on live guitars, to turn the tide (and I am not an Oasis fan).