The History Of Jop Part 8 aka It started with a little kiss, like this

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Away from the Hip-Hop Wars the Pazz and Jop poll moves smoothly onward to 1986 - some great singles here but very few names that had not previously appeared in P&J. You get NINE ticks from these 25 tracks.


[Poll #829550]


1985: The Joptimised Version

1. Into The Groove (45 votes)
2. How Soon Is Now? (40 votes)
3. Raspberry Beret (37 votes)
4. Running Up That Hill (35)
5. Walking On Sunshine (24)
6. The Boys Of Summer (23)
7. Money For Nothing (22)
8. And She Was (21)
9. Smooth Operator (19)
10. I Wonder If I Take You Home (18)

Surprising mass support for VER STRAITS there!

Comments

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I wonder how many of the voters here were people who put down whatever their dependable favourites were doing? Certainly this is a very familiar list, acts-wise (the Bangles are new tho! And good for them.)

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Oh and the Beastie Boys of course!! (Had to remind myself that at the time the BB's weren't boring!)

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

i voted for james brown not having hear it (there were precisely eight SOLID GOLD songs and then a DESERT)

[boyofbadgers.livejournal.com]

Weren't the Bangles on the 1983 one?

[epicharmus.livejournal.com]

I can't otherwise understand people's attractions to "One Hit to the Body," "War," "Higher Love," or "Living in America" -- they seem *really* ordinary.

OMG

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

I love 1986!! This was the first year 'music' really came into my life. e.g. a few years prior to this I can remember watching Cheggers Plays Pop, but hating the bands and liking the games! So I pretty much liked everything, and I could honestly tick all of the tracks here which I had heard at the time. I can remember asking for either Madonna or Paul Simon or Five Star for Christmas, and got the Madonna album, which was probably the best bet (for me, at the time -- I liked the Paul Simon stuff but even I was aware of a certain amount of controversy surrounding it, and felt it was a bit too serious compared with my pop thrills [Is this right or am I projecting?]).

But the first record which I ever really really loved, which leapt out from all the rest and said 'hey -- something else is possible' was the Beastie Boys. I loved the single, got the tape of Licensed to Ill for my birthday in June, and played it to death. I still know all the words, and I still play it and enjoy it (unlike say The Pixies, who I still love, but whose CDs never come off the shelf). Possibly the only other band in this category for me are AC/DC, and although I liked the singles from Blow Up Your Video, it was their early albums which I got into at school which stuck with me. I've thought that everything the Beastie Boys have done since has been pretty rubbish to be honest, but nothing was ever going to compare to first love.

Re: OMG

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

Actually I'm slightly surprised by the overlap between what I had heard on the commercial radio station in London I used to listen to, and what cooler-than-thou taste-master critics across the US were voting for. I think I must have known 13 of these; and I'm guessing probably also Janet Jackson, although I can't remember a note of it (I have a wierd blind-spot for her records, I honestly couldn't tell you a single thing about any of them!).

Re: OMG

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

this too was my break out year for really being more aggressive about listening to music and then seeking it out. i remember listening to a top 40 tape compilation that had nearly all the above on!

Meanwhile in Britain

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

Away from the hip hop warzzzzzzzz, here's the MM top 10 (cross-overs in bold):

1. Kiss - Prince
2. Some Candy Talking EP - Jesus and Mary Chain
3. Word Up - Cameo
4. Human - The Human League
5. Rise - PIL
6. E=MC2 – Big Audio Dynamite
7. Tokyo Storm Warning - Elvis Costello
8. Panic - The Smiths
9. Papa Don't Preach - Madonna
10. Who Snatched the Baby - The Band of Holy Joy

Re: Meanwhile in Britain

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

haha THANK GOD FOR BIG AUDIO DYNAMITE eh

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

is graceland this year? i do like a lot of that -- partly as an abreaction against the crass way the political wing of the nme attacked it -- yes yes simon (actually really) breached the cultural boycott -- but "he is an old-skool fart and therefore of no consequence" is not actually a position that ppl actively supporting say NELSON MANDELA can uncontradictorily take, i think

i guess it has always been a record i wanted to explore for the implicit politics of the music -- just to run against the way these were lost in the slightly cynical tactical jockeying (v.big name pop-star project exploited -- by being attacked -- in order to promote important political campaign)

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

Graceland won the album poll I think; Christgau's essay, which I read last night, seems to be mostly about this. Seems to have been era-defining in terms of the music-politics link.

Anger is an inner G

[koganbot]

I'm not one of those assholes that says, "It's gotta be black music. Everything else is bullshit." Not yet. The fact is I need some sort of punk rock basic fuck you, distancing, self-destructive edge - without it the music I listen to isn't me - it's not my music. So what's with this list? [Had just listed my 15 favorite records of the previous seven years, starting late '79, and had ended up with only two rock as such (Metal Box and Hex Enduction Hour) in the midst of a bunch of hip-hop and dance tracks] Answer: Punk of the '80s doesn't do it. Nor does avant music. Nor does alternative music. Here's my explanation. "The common quality or defect that unites apparently divergent artists like Antonioni, Truffaut, Richardson is fear, a fear of the potential life, rudeness, and outrageousness of a film." Manny Farber wrote that in 1962 in an article called "White Elephant Vs. Termite Art" - in 1980 I put that quotation upon my wall, and I wrote this under it: "The common quality or defect that unites apparently divergent artists like Costello, Gang of Four, B-52s, and Joe King Carrasco is fear, a fear of the potential life, rudeness and outrageousness of music." A few years later I put under that: "1983: Grandmaster Flash, Prince, the Police." Today I might add Sonic Youth, the Minutemen (no respect!), REM, and countless others. Most hardcore. Not that these are bad groups. They are just held back. (Like Antonioni, who is still one of the greats.)
--Frank Kogan, Readers' Poll #2, October 1986.

Re: Anger is an inner G

[epicharmus.livejournal.com]

This kinda underscores a key reason why I am not you: I have been contrary but I have never been punk rock. When I think of the umpteen records or so that come to mind when I try to think of the records that are hopelessly *me*, they're more like a day at the beach than a fuck you. They're more yes than no -- and here is where I may be fooling myself -- they seem to be beyond yes and no. Whatever I feel about artists I don't especially like, I wouldn't say their problems are about heldbackedness.

[awesomewells.livejournal.com]

I will actually be quite annoyed if the PSBs win this, mostly because I fear the later polls in particular turning into a boring consensus where the Jop polls generally agree with the Now! polls.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Also because "West End Girls" is nowhere near as good as "Word Up".

Your ugly face is going to bland

[koganbot]

Most so-called "heavy metal," "punk," "avant garde," and "alternative" music symbolizes outrageousness without doing it. "Outrageousness" merely fulfills a genre requirement instead of deriving from genuine, wild inner outrage. And then there's the problem of white boys and girls trying to keep a beat, which they're getting worse at. Even in the '70s, disco was a lot more vulgar and free than punk was. The tyranny of the commercial dance marketplace was less tyrannical than the tyranny of the punk ideas of "anarchy" and "freedom." The problem with rock today is really in the sound. What is missing is the voluptuousness of music, the basic throb of rock and roll. The stuff on my list does this rock 'n' roll throb better than "rock" does. When I listen for the rock-and-roll raving who-knows-what shit I listen to Spoonie Gee and Teena Marie. As for punk, your ugly face is going to bland. If you accept that punk of the '80s matters, you are betraying punk in its real essence. You are betraying the punk that really did matter.

Re: Your ugly face is going to bland

[koganbot]

P.S. A reason that "rockism" is a useless term: One cannot tell from my writing whether or not I am a "rockist."

(I would have worded things somewhat differently were I writing the rant today. I love the phrase "inner outrage," but the outrage doesn't have to be inner to be real.)

FYI

[koganbot]

The Future's So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades (nice sub-Dire Straits groove)

Re: FYI

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

hehe, i loved this song, i think it was on hits 8 (poor person's now compilations).

At the time

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

My top 15. Caveat: I didn't hear the #1 track until 1988, so there was some major ex-post readjustment of the list here. (The original list-topper was Psychic TV! I haven't listened to "Godstar" in years! My best friend was really into them, though, so...) The Madonna track is also a retrospective addition. Paul Simon and Elvis Costello got bumped down to make way.

1. Steinski & Mass Media - "We'll Be Right Back"
2. The The - "Sweet Bird of Truth" (LP & 12" single versions)
3. The Smiths - "The Queen Is Dead"
4. Age of Chance - "Kiss"
5. Run DMC & Aerosmith - "Walk This Way"
6. Madonna - "Where's The Party?"
7. Billy Bragg - "Greetings to the New Brunette"
8. Psychic TV - "Godstar" (EP version)
9. The Housemartins - "Get Up Off Our Knees"
10. A Certain Ratio - "Mickey Way (The Candy Bar)" (12" mix)
11. The Housemartins AGANE oh dere - "Sitting On A Fence"
12. The The - "Heartland"
13. The Primitives - "Really Stupid"
14. The Wedding Present - "This Boy Can Wait"
15. The Smiths - "Ask"

Re: At the time

[lockedintheatti.livejournal.com]

Any chance of a YSI of that Steinski track? I've had trouble tracking it down and I absolutely adored it at the time, on some early commercial house compilation.

[koganbot]

The only one I've never heard is "Levi Stubbs' Tears."

Meanwhile in NMEland

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Clearly the absence of the Band of Holy Joy invalidates this poll - HOWEVER in the interests of completism... (crossovers in bold)

Kiss - Prince
Word up - Cameo
Into the groove(y) - Ciccone youth
Walk this way - Run DMC
Bang zoom! lets go go! - The real Roxanne
Ain't nothin' goin' on but the rent - Gwen Guthrie
Pain - Betty Wright
Kiss - Age of chance
Levi stubbs tears - Billy Bragg
Still smokin' - Trouble funk
Almost prayed - The weather prophets
Baby I love you so - Colourbox
Nasty - Janet Jackson
Who the cap fit - Shinehead
Rise - PIL
I want you - Elvis Costello
Galveston Bay - Lonnie Hill
PSK (what does it mean?) - Schoolly D
Human - Human league
A screw - Swans
No conversation - View from the hill
Sweet bird of truth - The the
Panic - The smiths
Sweet love - Anita Baker
Starpower/Expressway to your skull - Sonic youth
Some candy talking - Jesus and Mary chain
World shut your mouth - Julian Cope
Love can't turn around - Farley Jackmaster funk
Ask - The smiths
Living to late - The fall
Safety net - Shop assistants
Mr Pharmacist - The Fall
Time is money (bastard) - Swans
You can call me Al - Paul Simon
Sho’ nuff bumpin’ - EU
Diggin’ your scene - The blow monkeys
Hard left - Gary Clail
What have you done for me lately? - Janet Jackson
Saturday night - Cherrelle & Alexander O’Neil
Sorry somehow - Husker Du
Rock the bells - LL Cool J
Wide open road - The Triffids
Greetings - Half pint
I’m Chilln’ - Kurtis Blow
Heartland - The the
Do fries go with that shake? - George Clinton
Lady Soul - The Temptations
Rubberband man - Youssou N’Dour
Once more - Wedding present
She’s on it - The Beast Boys
Poguetry in motion EP - The Pogues
Therese - The Bodines
Mind at the end of the tether - Tackhead
E=MC2 - Big audio Dynamite
Basslines - Mantronix
Jump back(set me free) - Dhar Braxton
Bahia girl - David Rudder
Rumors - Timex social club
Velocity girl - Primal scream
Whistling in the dark - Easterhouse

Almost NO crossover outside the top 20 or so!

Re: Meanwhile in NMEland

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Half of these are on my ace Electro compilation! Rock The Bells is proper ace, innit.

Billboard Top 26

[koganbot]

Billboard Top 26 Pop Singles of 1986 - * Song went #1

*1... THAT'S WHAT FRIENDS ARE FOR, Dionne and Friends (Arista) (#1, Jan)
*2... SAY YOU, SAY ME, Lionel Richie (Motown) (#1, Dec 1985)
3... I MISS YOU, Klymaxx (Constellation) (#5, Dec 1985)
*4... ON MY OWN, Patti LaBelle and Michael McDonald (MCA) (#1, June)
*5... BROKEN WINGS, Mr. Mister (MCA) (#1, Dec 1985)
*6... HOW WILL I KNOW, Whitney Houston (Arista) (#1, Feb)
7... PARTY ALL THE TIME, Eddie Murphy (Columbia) (#2, Dec 1985)
8... BURNING HEART, Survivor (Scotti Brothers) (#2, Feb)
*9... KYRIE, Mr. Mister (MCA) (#1, March)
*10.. ADDICTED TO LOVE, Robert Palmer (Island) (#1, May)
*11.. GREATEST LOVE OF ALL, Whitney Houston (Arista) (#1, May)
12.. SECRET LOVERS, Atlantic Starr (A&M) (#3, March)
13.. FRIENDS AND LOVERS, Gloria Loring and Carl Anderson (USA Carrere) (#2, Sept)
*14.. GLORY OF LOVE, Peter Cetera (Warner Brothers) (#1, Aug)
*15.. WEST END GIRLS, The Pet Shop Boys (EMI-America) (#1, May)
*16.. THERE'LL BE SAD SONGS (To Make You Cry), Billy Ocean (Jive) (#1, July)
17.. ALIVE AND KICKING, Simple Minds (Virgin) (#3, Dec 1985)
18.. NEVER, Heart (Capitol) (#4, Dec 1985)
*19.. KISS, Prince and the Revolution (Paisley Park) (#1, April)
*20.. HIGHER LOVE, Steve Winwood (Island) (#1, Aug)
*21.. STUCK WITH YOU, Huey Lewis and the News (Chrysalis) (#1, Sept)
*22.. HOLDING BACK THE YEARS, Simply Red (Elektra) (#1, July)
*23.. SLEDGEHAMMER, Peter Gabriel (Geffen) (#1, July)
*24.. SARA, Starship (Grunt) (#1, March)
*25.. HUMAN, The Human League (Virgin) (#1, Nov)
26.. I CAN'T WAIT, Nu Shooz (Atlantic) (#3, June)

[epicharmus.livejournal.com]

This, btw, is the first P&J I was ever really aware of, having had my mom's bf buy me a copy of the VV to see what it (meaning the VV) was all about. Boy was I surprised. When I started buying the VV regularly was I finally became aware of rockcrit as something that handled events As They Were Happening rather than from a rear-view mirror (in other words, this was really the first time I digested rock criticism per se from magazine/tabloid/alt-weekly rather than a book).

Think the Stones are getting overlooked here

[koganbot]

Actually did something a bit new: took their groove and had Keef play half with it, half against it, so uncharacteristically jittery.

Re: Think the Stones are getting overlooked here

[blue-russian.livejournal.com]

I agree - not a bad effort at all, but this is just too far along for most of us to care.

Points of order

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

- Even with such a good selection I am sad that Bruce Hornsby isn't doing better. For the benefit of the Lex, "The Way It Is" was sampled by Tupac for one of his "I'm Dead, Rly" hits. Lots of piano triplets.
- Walk Like An Egyptian is one of my favourite songs to sing at karaoke.
- Rise is better than all of the Sex Pistols' output put together.
- But then so is Cameo. Though I will always think of Mel B's effort on TOTP now.

Re: Points of order

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

For the benefit of the Lex, "The Way It Is" was sampled by Tupac for one of his "I'm Dead, Rly" hits
Also sampled for "Never Change" by MC Buzz B if anyone remembers that.