What is your favorite song from this very limited 1985 list?

[SomeBadDrummer]

There were thousands of songs released in 1985, out of all of them here is a very small sampling of several genres. If you can choose a few without disparaging the choices then great/ please vote!
If you don’t see anything you like, then just move along to the next post and thank @Al Strange for making this possible.

 

[MrInsanePolack]

Honestly I like all the songs in the list. The choice was easy though, as there is only one metal song on the list.

 

[C.M. Jones]

Every track on this list is depressing in its own special way. I chose the Sting song, not because I'm in love with it but because Omar Hakim played drums on that album. I saw him live with Sting in 1985. I'd been drumming for about a year at the time and was thoroughly impressed.

 

[bud7h4]

I voted Tom Petty. I would have picked "Head Over Heals" by Tears for Fears but you messed up and entered the wrong song somehow.

 

[DrummingGravity]

voted for Madonna~Material Girl
Some boys kiss me
Some boys hug me
I think they're ok
If they don't give me proper credit
I just walk away

 

[SomeBadDrummer]

Every track on this list is depressing in its own special way.

This is an interesting take on such an innocuous list of mostly pop tunes. Is it the material or the era?

 

[SomeBadDrummer]

Honestly I like all the songs in the list. The choice was easy though, as there is only one metal song on the list.

Yeah, Wham! had it going on!

 

[jimb]

The Sting track. I played bass back in 85 during a summer residency in a small seaside hotel and it always got the floor packed.

 

[Al Strange]

This poll’s rubbish...how can you not include [insert personal favourite here]? We need a robust poll police policy; would you be interested in taking this forward @SomeBadDrummer ?

 

[Push pull stroke]

“Material Girl” was so emblematic of the 80s materialism and yuppie greed of the Reagan era. Clearly, it’s the most culturally important song. Although Madonna is not exactly an intellectual heavyweight, I do have to give her credit for reading the zeitgeist.

 

[C.M. Jones]

Is it the material or the era?

Maybe a combination of the two. Mid-'80s pop never did much for me. I was more into classic rock and country at the time.

 

[SomeBadDrummer]

This poll’s rubbish...how can you not include [insert personal favourite here]? We need a robust poll police policy; would you be interested in taking this forward @SomeBadDrummer ?

I think since you are the greatest Police supporter I know, perhaps you should take charge of this endeavor.

 

[SomeBadDrummer]

“Material Girl” was so emblematic of the 80s materialism and yuppie greed of the Reagan era. Clearly, it’s the most culturally important song. Although Madonna is not exactly an intellectual heavyweight, I do have to give her credit for reading the zeitgeist.

And also for learning to play the guitar along the way.

 

[Xstr8edgtnrdrmrX]

Every track on this list is depressing in its own special way. I chose the Sting song, not because I'm in love with it but because Omar Hakim played drums on that album. I saw him live with Sting in 1985. I'd been drumming for about a year at the time and was thoroughly impressed.

I also saw him live in 85 with Sting. He is one of the main reasons I play Pearl drums (him and The Phantom Regiment drum corps). I actually do like the song too. But it is not the strongest on that first album to me. That would be Children's Crusade

 

[C.M. Jones]

I also saw him live in 85 with Sting. He is one of the main reasons I play Pearl drums (him and The Phantom Regiment drum corps). I actually do like the song too. But it is not the strongest on that first album to me. That would be Children's Crusade

"Children's Crusade" is certainly the best song on the album. It was always a pleasure to practice to as well.

When I saw Sting in '85, he opened with "Shadows in the Rain." Hakim was superb from the outset. He secured his spot as one of my favorite drummers that night.

 

[Xstr8edgtnrdrmrX]

"Children's Crusade" is certainly the best song on the album. It was always a pleasure to practice to as well.

on every level. In fact, I think the whole song: drumming, feel, phrase development, lyrics, lyrical cadence, how the music supports the subject matter of the song; the build up to the 3rd verse through the solo section changed my world back t hen....how that completely described the build to chaos that t he words are talking about...like a big swirling "mess" (that drug addiction is). I did two differnet papers on that song in college. One in English class, and the other in Music Theory...

When I saw Sting in '85, he opened with "Shadows in the Rain." Hakim was superb from the outset. He secured his spot as one of my favorite drummers that night.

yep!!! We saw them in a small club in Cleveland called the Blind Lemon...it sat like maybe 200 people. I think he was on a series of warm up dates for the big tour. A friend of mine knew the sound guy there, and got us in. It was an "exclusive" show from what I understood. Branford was not there though...they had another guy sitting in. But Sting, Omar, DArryl Jones (a HUGE bass influence of mine) were there. They did everything off of the album except "We Work The Black Seam" <--- which is my 2nd favorite song on the album - plus Bring On The Night, a quick version of Roxanne that turned more into an improv jam, a medley of Demolition Man into Spirits in The Material World into Murder By Numbers...

that night also changed my life...and made up for my passing up of 2nd row tix to the Synchronicity tour a few years earlier.

 

[C.M. Jones]

. . . my passing up of 2nd row tix to the Synchronicity tour a few years earlier.

Love of God! That would have been a magical experience.

 

[Xstr8edgtnrdrmrX]

Love of God! That would have been a magical experience.

yeah....and I was an idiot teenage metal head at the time. There was NO WAY I was going to go a Police concert full of "normies" and threaten my Metal Cred (even though i secretly listened to and loved them back then...and Duran Duran. But I would have got my butt kicked if that became public knowledge)

 

[Bozozoid]

Easy choice..Tom Petty.

 

[SomeBadDrummer]

Maybe a combination of the two. Mid-'80s pop never did much for me. I was more into classic rock and country at the time.

I was TOTALLY into classic/hard rock during that time but still appreciate music from other genres including some pop music, probably because it permeated my life during my late youth... Radio was still king and the hit list was relentless on air. So probably familiarity created the affinity, as one grows more comfortable wearing a pair of broken in jeans.