Jenny recently brought it to my attention that Pitchfork Media has posted their Top 100 Albums of the 80s. Some of the selections were pretty interesting -- I was happy to see Duran Duran's Rio at 95 (this record should have been much higher on the list); The Police's Ghost in the Machine at 86; Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense at 68; Guns n' Roses' Appetite for Destruction at 59; Mission of Burma's Signals, Calls and Marches at 53 and Vs. at 49; REM's Document at 48; The Beastie Boys' Licensed to Ill at 41; U2's The Joshua Tree at 30; New Order's Power, Corruption and Lies at 28; Michael Jackson's Thriller at 27; The Pixies' Surfer Rosa at 7 and Doolitle at 4; and The Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique at 3.
It is disheartening to see an abject lack of appreciation for the female artists who pioneered musical forms in the 1980s - I should have known Pitchfork would completely ignore The Go-Go's (whose Beauty and the Beat reached unprecedented levels of success for any all-female group, not to mention they were the most successful female group of the punk and new wave movement in the early 80s), The Raincoats (who were major influences on later grunge bands such as Nirvana), as well as Pat Benetar, Madonna, The Bangles, Cyndi Lauper, The Pretenders, Joan Jett, and Blondie.
Barber shop in New Haven, CT.
St. Anthony's Hall at Yale seems to have an affinity for stuffed animals.
Duran Duran, Pop Trash
Gary Numan, The Pleasure Principle
Cyndi Lauper, She's So Unusual
Alphaville, Forever Young
The Vaselines, The Way of the Vaselines
Juliana Hatfield, Only Everything
P.J. Harvey, Is This Desire?
The Rolling Stones, Hot Rocks
Frente, Marvin the Album
Destiny's Child, The Writing's on the Wall
The Cars, The Cars
The B-52s, Cosmic Thing
Duran Duran, Arena
The Doors, The Soft Parade Saturday Night Fever soundtrack
L7, Hungry for Stink
The Dandy Warhols, The Dandy Warhols
The Beach Boys, Pet Sounds
Ace of Base, The Sign
The Waitresses, The Best of the Waitresses
Belle & Sebastian, Lazy Line Painter Jane
The Fad, The Fad The New Wave: Pop Music of the Early '80s
Goodbye Girl Friday, Mr. & Mrs.
Naked Highway, Hyperbollocks
Duran Duran, Pop Trash Classic Alternatives: '80s 12" Extended Rare Mixes
Phil Collins, Hits
Genesis, Turn It On Again: The Hits
Ladytron, Light & Magic
Ladytron, 604
The Go-Betweens, Before Hollywood
Beck, Midnight Vultures
Duran Duran, Seven & the Ragged Tiger
Abba, Arrival
The Cardigans, Long Gone Before Daylight
The Psychedelic Furs, All of This & Nothing
Air, Moon Safari
The Knack, Round Trip
Blondie, Parallel Lines
The Psychedelic Furs, Forever Now
The Donnas, Spend the Night
Nancy Sinatra, California Girl
Tatu, 200 KMH in the Wrong Lane
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Organisation
John-Manuel Andriote, Hot Stuff: A Brief History of Disco
Bret Easton Ellis, The Rules of Attraction
Tom Wolfe, The Bonfire of the Vanities
Jean Kilbourne, Deadly Persuasion
Nick Hornby, High Fidelity
Bret Easton Ellis, American Psycho
Eric Schlosser, Fast Food Nation
