I know what you mean. At my age (52) I should have settled down to tuning my FM radio right to the bottom of the dial and locked myself into Radio 2. I have not, partly because a lot of Radio 2 is not for me (daytime mainly). Also, there is now that internet obviously, and the fact that I can listen to any number of radio stations on TuneIn. Dandelion Radio is great although I need to be in the mood for it, but there are also a few American, Canadian and European Jazz stations on it, which frankly blow the UK Jazz FM out of the water.

At the moment, I am transferring a lot of my old cassettes on to my MP3 player and am currently at the early 1990s. I am amazed that I listened to so much Atlantic 252 at the time (with its poor reception), but in all honestly, although I did not dislike BBC radio 1, the problem for me with Radio 1 is the endless chat between the records (which they still do these days). A252 kept chat to a minimum and also broke a few records onto the scene which were later picked up by other stations.

Listening today to my nineties phase on my cassettes is proof positive in my opinion, that 90s music was nowhere near as bad as some other posters are convinced that it was.

After about 2007 is around that time that I stopped listening out for chart music, as to be fair to everyone, top 40 music nowadays is not written for me. Spotify and Youtube are my saviours these days. If someone suggests a band which I may like, all I need to is check them out at those sites, and I can either become a fan, or not bother.

And in my case I am more of a melody person rather than lyrics, although one reason why I love the Divine Comedy are his great lyrics as well as his choons.

Ref your last point, one of the limitations on top 40 music is precisely that - there are only 40 songs available. Using my clever little laptop, I have access to thousands of songs whenever I like.

I couldn't see that myself.

Agree with most of this. I like the three singles from "Let's Dance" (plus, as you say, the original "Cat People"), but the rest of the album was a big disappointment at the time. Also like "Blue Jean" plus "Absolute Beginners" and adore "Loving the Alien". But, can't think of a lot of post 1986 stuff of his that I like (although, to be fair, I don't know a lot of it).

Disagree strongly about "Dancing in the Streets" though, love that, and it fitted in so perfectly with "Live Aid".

I know that many would disagree with me, but I am not actually that keen on the Lets Dance LP. I feel that it relies a little too much on the producer, rather than standing up on its own. But then again, I quite like the Tin Machine "project". The downside of Tin Machine is that there is not much that is innovative about it, but to be honest, does it deserve the large amount of slagging off that a lot of people throw at it? What I like about TM is the energy I can see in it.

And Stevie Wonder. His top 40 material from the 1970s is awesome - then you start to listen to his albums, and that is a few stages further up the scale. The Secret Life of Plants is a masterpiece. His 1977 album (forget the name)..... come on lets just die for it.

I think that by the 1980s / 1990s, Bowie had probably exhausted the gold mine of ideas and material that he had had in the 1970s, but in his case, even the stuff, that was not great......was still very good IMO. Instead of bringing out a classic every year, as he had done in the 1970s, He merely brought out a classic every five or so years. Nothing to be ashamed of. And although I have said that I am not that keen on Lets Dance, It is still a very good album - again nothing to be ashamed of.

Thanks Annielou.

I can't really remember which Summers were long & hot & which weren't - but I do remember having a photo of myself sunbathing in the garden in 1983 & also remember a family holiday that same year in Hastings & coming back with a wonderful golden brown tan - so you could well be right - (unless Hastings has exceptionally good weather!!)

Summer 1983 was also when the radio stations never stopped playing the irritating 'Give It Up' by KC & The Sunshine Band - so I was sick to death of it by the Autumn!

Me as well, though there are different kinds of 'melody'. For example some modern classical work is not always about to have a simple structured melodic idea. It may be a combination of different ideas working together. Sometimes more a dramatic interplay, same in other vastly different types of music. It may be tied more to a rhythmic idea. An ambient work might have a rather long undulating-like melody. I have my preferred melody which is more pop I guess, but I think I can enjoy various other kinds

Obviously good lyrics are a plus and as I said before here they can often inspire good music anyway. Sometimes just average lyrics can inspire good music too though.

Music is a combination of things. Performance can matter a lot adding that direct personal touch, arrangement can spice things up with the atmosphere, harmonic aspects can make the structure more interesting, and the dramatic structure is part of that, the melody takes you on the journey, the lyrics are another part. The lyrics alone therefore don't make a great song for me (if something else is really off it gets in the way), and of course some music doesn't have lyrics anyway.

Just a quick one Starry, and I know that it is a simplistic question, but one where the answers (when explained) can throw up a lot of light.

Who is your favourite Beatle? I promise you that I wont slag you off with your reply, as I am well past that stage these days.

Me, After years and years of veering towards Paul McCartney (but still being extremely fond of Lennon) my simple answer is George Harrison.

I never took much notice of Harrison until he died in 2001. For some reason, his death really affected me, more so than Lennons in 1980, and I borrowed a load his albums from our local library. Through doing that and checking my computer, I found that he was responsible for Here Comes the Sun, Something, I Me Mine, If I Needed Someone, Taxman, While my Guitar Gently Weeps, amongst others. Apparently, much of All Things Must Pass, was intended for the Beatles overall, but because of the split, went onto his solo work instead.

Outside of music, we cannot forget that George was responsible for a lot of the finance in "The Life of Brian" and again apparently, he helped to fund Radio Caroline for a good part of the 1970s.

Ringo was not a bad drummer, now, in my opinion.

Sorry for all the questions but I promise that this is the last one, - do you listen to Late Junction on Radio 3 by any chance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIA_NVFnXZ8&t=140s

Nice one. Made me laugh. Plus because I clicked your link, it led me onto a load of Big Train clips, which I have now stored on my laptop to watch on Thursday night, when I am off work.

Bless you my child.

Ah ok, that's why I've missed them. Thanks.

Cheers .... Unfortunately no iPlayer here in France.

Hey, don't push Oates over.



Ach...thwarted by the Channel.

83 was a genuine hot summer, also the Style Council track from August that year.

The songs I remember the most from that summer otherwise is Level 42, Living It Up, and the ubiquitous Club Tropicana, but more on that when the time is right. .

I await Wham and Young Guns soon on the current 82 shows .......

I say it is.

The song that was most overplayed for me in the summer of 83 was "War Baby" by Tom Robinson. The song that should have been been overplayed in the summer of 83 was "The First Picture Of You".

Right. You, me, outside now.

FIIIIIIIGHT!!!

The reason for little of Harrison's output being used was John's antipathy towards him in the later years. He would not turn up for recordings of Harrison songs from about '67 onwards. There are several hypotheses for this, but it is generally thought that John felt outflanked on all sides at the time - Paul was a better and more prolific writer and singer and the new burgeoning talent of George made him feel like a stranger in 'his band.'

This made the post 'break up' alliance films of the two of them making breakfast in John's kitchen and saying what great friends they were and the general 'We hate Paul' stuff rather strange.

If you want two instances of Ringo's absolute mastery of drumming listen to 'Rain' and 'She Said She Said'

Haha, nice reply LG!

This was one of the biggest hits of 1983 in Australia: Send Me An Angel by Real Life. The keyboards sound very much influenced by Talk Talk's The Party's Over album in my opinion:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCHE0Tjw6MA

Was the company named after the band?

I didn't like "Dancing In The Street" at all, and aside from the Live Aid charity connection, there is very little to commend it. David is literally swamped by Mick Jagger's vocals, and it wasn't an impressive Mick that was on display, but very much a caricature. All horrible echoey drums too, which was typical of the period, and the video, with regard to David, was even worse, because he appeared to have lost completely his enigmatic quality. In retrospect 'Dancing In The Street' appears like a huge embarrassment for all concerned, but i don't think Mick would have minded, as his solo career up to that point had been floundering, and a number one, even off the back of Live Aid could only result in heightening his profile.

'Let's Dance' is a very listenable album, with some fine guitar work, especially, but i think that the singles were the only truly essential tracks. David was suffering from writers block at the time, but the huge success of the single and album, managed to obscure that fact, but there was no hiding with David's next few releases.

Of David's later material, 'Heathen' sounds like his most impressive album, alongside his final release, 'Blackstar'. However, although i have listened to all his album releases, i haven't felt inclined to persevere with a number of them, so there may well be some great more obscure tracks hidden along the way. Generally, though, David's post 'Scary Monsters' work finds him lacking the more highly strung desire to be different, and challenging, that often made his seventies music to appear so cutting and inspirational.

BIB - I'd say the problem for Bowie by the time that 1980 reached its conclusion was that his influence had been picked up so heavily and so evidently by other new artists, so territory he'd kind of had to himself had suddenly generated replicas (Gary Numan) and an entire scene plus associated artists (New Romantics/Futurists). Plus his career in the 70s was very much built on constantly changing direction. Where was there left to go?

And even by the time the 80s had concluded and the 90s had kicked in, while Numan had faded and the whole New Romantic thing was well over, there were a new bunch of Bowie-philes making a major splash: Suede.

So for him to be cutting and inspirational was something that would be increasingly tricky for him - especially after the blander low points of the 80s. But at least he didn't stop trying (with varying degrees of success) - unlike Stevie Wonder, who seemed to give up in the 90s.

Yes, i do love David's work, and especially his seventies output, although i think the thing that made him so wonderful, as in his chameleon like changes etc. was also something that worked against him a little when he began to run out of fresh ideas, and interesting new personas that were different than anything he'd tried before. Like you say, others were adapting some of his ideas and making something new of their own from them.

One of his David's big influences, Lou Reed, could record some pretty way out material too (and arguably more extreme than David), but he was more inclined in his work to reflect the reality of what was going on around him, and especially in his home town of New York. Even during the eighties, when he perhaps was not recording his most cutting or extreme forms of 'music', he was always very good at observational type writing, and in a busy city like New York, you are never going to be at a loss with regards to interesting subject matter. I think Lou was also a much more autobiographical writer with regards to reflecting his own personal feelings. I think his eighties output is way ahead of Bowie's. Lou is worth checking out.

BIB - That is so true. I sometimes wonder (sorry) why a lot of SW's stuff post 1982 is so dull, for me. But then again, when you take into account his 60s and 70s material, I think that it is fair enough to let him sit on his laurels. Maybe someday he might come off with something new and amazing - but thats really up to him, I suppose.

'No iplayer here in the US' either but a good Smart DNS service solves that problem.

My American wife has never seen TOTP before but she is loving it. We only started watching the re-shows last month but it's bringing back so many memories. My wife has never heard of half of the acts but that is half the fun introducing her to stuff she didn't see on MTV.

I noticed a big jump from August to September 82. Couldn't the BBC just edit the episodes with just the acts for the DLT/Saville episodes? Apparently Jonathan King has US countdowns in these shows which are edited out so they do the same for the introductions. Shame to miss so many episodes because of this.

Edit - I should say Mari Wilson was worth the price of admission alone. I loved that song back in the day.