This series takes a look at a year at a time and gives a quick shout-out to a half dozen records that, to me, didn’t crack the public consciousness to the degree they should have. Most are referred to as “cult favorites” these days, meaning not enough people found them to make them a hit, but the ones who did treasure them. There are a lot more undiscovered gems than my top six in any given year, so I’d recommend a quick search for yourself. Your next favorite album just might be waiting on you.
"Beware the savage jaw / of 1984" 1984 saw an important shift in music buying around the world. CDs had been introduced commercially a couple years before, but weren’t much of a factor yet. It was cassettes that were leading the way, outselling vinyl for the first time. ’84 was the year the industry recognized that music lovers, deep in their heart of hearts, preferred portability, accessibility, and ease of storage over sound quality, a trend that carried through the CD era and into music streaming. MTV was still the primary influencer on the U.S. pop scene, careers rose and fell according to a video’s popularity. Music sales increased over the previous couple of years, mostly because 1984 saw the release of a handful of true worldwide blockbusters, albums that continue to sell well to this day.
THE ONES THAT HIT IT BIG:
Sitting at the top of the heap was Springsteen’s Born in the USA, with 30 million copies moved. Right behind was Bob Marley’s Legend greatest hits collection at 28 million. Hard to believe Purple Rain was only third, MTV made it seem like the-artist-still-known-as-Prince was the rightful ruler of the galaxy. Right behind him was Madonna’s Like a Virgin, Tina Turner’s Private Dancer, U2’s The Unforgettable Fire, and wildly successful soundtracks from Footloose, Ghostbusters, and Beverly Hills Cop. A few perennial mega-sellers had significant misses in ’84, though. Queen, Paul McCartney, Roger Daltrey, and the Steve Miller Band all released albums that stiffed.
THE ONES THAT GOT AWAY:
• Lou Reed, New Sensations – Lou with a hit single? It happened in ’84, sort of. New Sensations’ leadoff track, “I Love You Suzanne,” hit #56 on the Billboard charts, saw a little rotation on MTV, and led to the bizarre sight of Lou and his band playing to the big crowd at Farm Aid that year, alongside Willie and Neil. Even more surprisingly, the whole album is upbeat and optimistic, not Lou's usual take on things. A great batch of songs with memorable hooks and Lou’s typically brilliant guitar work. I never mind listening to Lou’s more challenging records, I love ‘em all, but this one works as an excellent palette cleanser once in a while.
EARWORM: “I Love You Suzanne” - Lou making nice with his audience, a rare occurrence.
• Rickie Lee Jones, The Magazine – Rickie Lee’s third album, following the hipster beatnik jazziness of her debut and the big band sonic journey of Pirates. Holed up in Paris, kicking her substance abuse issues, she was trying to exorcise some demons through her songwriting. The Magazine is more complex and less commercial sounding than her first two records, and was something of a flop with her fans. It actually placed higher on the Billboard jazz chart than the pop chart. I think of The Magazine like Joni Mitchell’s Hissing of Summer Lawns. Not the most accessible album in her catalog, but deeply rewarding if you give it a chance.
EARWORM: “Jukebox Fury” - After a lullaby intro, it turns into one of her catchiest songs.
• UB40, Geffery Morgan - UB40 unexpectedly hit the top of the pops with their fourth record, Labour of Love, released the year before. It was an outlier in their catalog, all covers of early reggae singles, done in a very commercial, sunny style that captured the ears of people that typically didn’t listen to the genre. “Red Red Wine,” a bouncy, reggae-pop take of the Neil Diamond hit, cracked the Billboard top 100, something they had never even sniffed at previously. To follow it up, the Campbell brothers released Geffery Morgan, hands down their finest batch of original reggae-influenced pop songs. A wonderful album, but without the obvious singles of Labour, it faded into obscurity. UB40 would have another hit with Ali Campbell and Chrissie Hynde’s duet on “I Got You Babe” a year later, but couldn’t keep that success rolling with their own material. Which explains the subsequent releases of Labour of Love II, III, and IV.
EARWORM: "Riddle Me This" - The opener - lean, slinky, and catchy as hell.
• Joe Jackson, Body and Soul – Mr. Jackson hit it big with his fifth album, Night and Day, in ’82, everybody remembers “Steppin’ Out.” Fans of Steely Dan were no doubt drawn to its sophisticated cocktail-jazz pop sound. After massive sales, heavy rotation on MTV, and two Grammys, he followed it up with an album of songs and music for a mediocre Debra Winger film, Mike’s Murder. The movie stiffed and his excellent soundtrack wasn’t promoted.
The true follow-up to Night and Day is Body and Soul. Like he’s done so many times in his career, Joe took a path other than the most commercially obvious one. Body and Soul doubles down on the jazz side of Night and Day, with arrangements heavy on horn charts and lighter on pop melodies. It sold well, the first single “You Can’t Get What You Want (Till You Know What You Want)” was a Top Ten Billboard hit, but didn’t move the kind of numbers the label was expecting. It doesn’t have the level of name recognition these days as a few of his others, but diehard fans, including me, consider it one of his essential albums.
EARWORM: “You Can’t Get What You Want (Till You Know What You Want)” - In case you forgot what a great song this is.
• R.E.M., Reckoning – R.E.M.’s debut, Murmur, is perfectly named. The folky, jangly rock album gained a lot of notoriety due to Michael Stipe’s unintelligible singing style. Little snippets of lyrics popped out here and there, without any clear meaning behind them, the rest became an ongoing (to this day) guessing game for critics and fans. The unexpected success of Murmur had their followers (and label) expecting the band to clean things up a bit on the second one, positioning themselves for a wider audience. That’s not what happened.
Reckoning took the idea of Murmur’s in-and-out-of-focus lyrics and vocals and made it deeper, more sophisticated. Their songwriting took a leap forward from the debut, perfecting their trademark Byrds-like jangle to give the songs effortless propulsion and ear-catching hooks. Some of the choruses ring out with crystal clear vocals, “(Don’t Go Back to) Rockville” is a terrific example, others leave you straining to understand what Stipe’s on about. That carefully constructed interplay between meaning and abstraction gives Reckoning a depth like few other rock records, and keeps it endlessly fascinating. They would slowly lift the murky curtain going forward, and become immensely successful here and abroad, but the deep mystery of their first few albums never gets old for me.
EARWORM: "So. Central Rain" - You can really only make out Stipe repeating "I'm sorry" as the chorus. Catchy and eerie.
• Replacements, Let It Be – These hard-drinking punks from Minneapolis, when they were finally able to keep it together in the studio for their third album, made one of the absolute best rock albums of the 80s, or any other decade. The ‘Mats’ early career was a ramshackle mess – quickly recorded, fast and sloppy albums, and live shows that were either brilliant or a waste of everybody’s time, depending on the band’s level of inebriation that night. Let It Be, cheekily named after the Beatles’ record, still veers damn close to out-of-control territory, but never gets there. Singer/songwriter Paul Westerberg’s songs are brilliant piss-and-vinegar takes on being a struggling young adult in America, straddling a line between bitchy and defiant. “Gary’s Got a Boner,” “Tommy Gets His Tonsils Out,” “I Will Dare” - Paul was taking in the world around him and spewing it out as truly epic rock and roll. “How do you say goodnight / to an answering machine?” was a prescient lyric for the modern age, hammered home by the frustration in Westerberg’s voice. The one cover on Let It Be, Kiss’ “Black Diamond,” removes the original’s cartoonishness and makes it 100% a 'Mats song.
EARWORM: "Sixteen Blue" - As hard as the record hits, the best song may very well be the ballad.
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