Ronald Reagan was president. The Nintendo Entertainment System was released in the U.S., along with the Sony Walkman. The Titanic wreckage was discovered. The ill-fated New Coke made its debut. So did the Apple Macintosh computer. Rocky IV, Teen Wolf, The Goonies, and Legend were in the theaters, and Amadeus won an Academy Award.
It’s hard to believe that 1985 was 40 years ago.
Musically, it was a year defined by two major global fundraising events for famine relief, the Live Aid concert, as well as the release of ‘We Are the World,” sung by that ragtag group of musicians, U.S.A. for Africa, featuring Michael Jackson, Bruce Springsteen, Cyndi Lauper, and 40 of the most successful artists on the planet. In between these giant musical moments, a lot of great songs were released. And a lot of bad ones.
In celebration of the songs that have stood the test of time (for better or worse), we give you our best and worst songs of 1985.
Bob Guccione Jr., Acting Editor in Chief
Best
“Rain on the Scarecrow,” John Cougar Mellencamp
“Rain On The Scarecrow,” title track though it is of Scarecrow, Mellencamp’s 8th album—and last with the millstone of Cougar in his name—wasn’t even one of the LP’s three Top 10 hits. Yet it was, probably, the pivotal song of his career, and undoubtedly one of his best. It helped inspire Farm Aid, and certainly made the plight of the American farmer, hitherto not one of the sexiest topics in rock ‘n roll, a centerpiece issue in the MTV generation’s consciousness.
Most of all, endearingly and enduringly, it’s a great song. Anthemic, powerfully lyrical, gorgeously rendered. It’s the raw rock ‘n roll that makes your soul dance. And the video was a next-gen, next level piece of moviemaking, a cinema verité of the raping of the American farm, a vast, cynical travesty played out in broad daylight in Reagan’s twisted America.
“The Whole of the Moon,” The Waterboys
The song exists because Mike Scott’s girlfriend at the time asked him, innocently enough, if writing a song was hard. Showing off, he wrote one on the spot, on the back of an envelope on a street in NY (although, slightly less mythically, he added lyrics later on at his hotel, and further again when he returned to Britain). Because the world works like this, because God has a wonderful sense of whimsy, an act of flippancy birthed one of the simplest but most transcendent, swirling, soaring pieces of music ever committed to magnetic tape (as it was in those days). The gloriously enigmatic lyric “I saw the crescent, but you saw the whole of the moon” has inspired a thousand theories as to who and what it’s about, including, nonsensically, Prince, which still persist, even though he has denied them all and actually told us who it’s about: “someone like CS Lewis, who seemed to see so much… but it’s not specifically about anyone.”
Charles Moss, Associate Editor
Best
“The Power of Love,” Huey Lewis and the News
Picture this: It’s 1985 and you’re in a darkened movie theater watching Back to the Future. Marty’s on the phone with Doc at his place and suddenly, seemingly hundreds of wall clocks start ringing. Doc’s experiment works! “Damn! I’m late for school,” Marty says. And that’s when Sean Hopper’s keyboard (Buh Buh! Buh Buh! Buh buh! Buh buh!), Mario Cipollina’s driving bass, and Chris Hayes’ electric guitar start blaring as Marty rushes off to school on his skateboard, hitching rides on the back of a Ford pickup truck and then again on a Jeep Wrangler; one of the coolest things this ’80s kids had ever seen. Huey Lewis’ “Power of Love,” which was written specifically for the movie, appears three times in the film. There was also the music video that played constantly on MTV that features Doc and the real star of Back to the Future, the DeLorean, and an extended seven-minute “dance version” that, if you were lucky, would play on the radio and if you timed it just right, could record by holding your Califone 3430AV Auto Stop Cassette Recorder up to the speaker. The song became Huey’s first No. 1 hit on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, won “Favorite Single” and “Favorite Video Single” at the 13th Annual American Music Awards, and was nominated for an Academy Award and a Grammy, but lost out to songs that, if you’ll notice, made our “Worst Songs of 1985” list.
“Take On Me,” A-ha
What a damned catchy song. Even 40 years later, it’s gone viral on YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok, in large part thanks to dancing-Spider-Man-guy. To be fair, there were three earlier versions of this song. The first was called “Miss Eerie” and supposedly sounded like a commercial jingle. Tweaked a bit after handsome frontman Morten Harket joined the band, it was then recorded as “Lesson One.” Then it was re-recorded with the name changed to “Take On Me,” accompanied by a video of the guys performing it in front of a blue screen. The song, however, failed to chart. So another version was released, along with the groundbreaking video using rotoscoping by film director Steve Barron. This time, the Norwegian synth-pop band had a hit on their hands, coming in at No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and No. 2 on the U.K. Singles Chart. The video won six MTV Video Music Awards, which was more than any other artist in the previous three years combined. And awww…Bunty Bailey, the actress in the music video, reunited with Harket in 2024 in the same cafe where the music video we all know and love was shot.
“Driver 8,” REM
The second single from R.E.M.’s third album, Fables of the Reconstruction, “Driver 8” is one of the group’s best-known songs, with quotable lyrics (which is almost unheard of for a pre-Out of Time R.E.M. song), a locomotive-like chugging rhythm and that train-whistle harmonica in the bridge. It’s a Southern song by a Southern band without sounding stereotypically Southern. Released in September of ’85, the song reached No. 22 on the U.S. Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and has been covered a lot over the years, most recently by Jason Isbell.
The song—about an overworked train conductor—represents “mythological America,” according to Michael Stipe, who was not yet comfortable lip-syncing when it was time to make the music video. So train footage was used instead. By the way, the Southern Crescent, the passenger train referred to in the song, is real, and still runs today.
Worst
“We Built This City,” Starship
Ah…Starship. A somewhat convoluted continuation of Jefferson Airplane, then Jefferson Starship, with Grace Slick and Mickey Thomas sharing vocals on this stinker of a song; one that I’ve despised since it was released. Though, in 1985, a lot of people apparently liked it because it was No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was a hit in Australia, Canada, Sweden, and Switzerland. But what’s even more surprising is that it was co-written by Bernie Taupin, Elton John’s creative partner who helped pen “Tiny Dancer,” “Rocket Man,” and many other of John’s best songs. Why, Bernie, why? The song is supposedly about how corporations care more about profit than creativity but this song was made to be a commercial jingle, as this Quilted Northern commercial so aptly illustrates. The more I hear this song, the more it sounds like a parody of what someone who didn’t grow up in the ’80s thinks music sounded like then. Unfortunately, thanks to songs like this, a lot of it did.
“We Are the World,” U.S.A. For Africa
Look, I know this song was made for a good cause. I know it was written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, who are both legends in the music industry. I saw the Netflix documentary about how miraculous it was to get so many of the era’s most-popular artists—Bruce Springsteen, Paul Simon, Willie Nelson, Tina Turner, among others—together in a room for one night to record this song. But watching the video, you can feel the awkwardness of the chaos. Just look at Bob Dylan. It’s a terrible song. The lyrics, while sincere I’m sure, are cheesier than Kraft Mac & Cheese (and it’s the cheesiest!). Cyndi Lauper summed it up best when she whispered to Billy Joel during the recording, “This sounds like a Pepsi commercial.”
“St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion),” John Parr
I’ll be the first to admit, I love this song. But I love it for personal reasons. And when I listen to it, I make damn sure nobody else is around. Is it a good song? Absolutely not. British singer John Parr and Canadian composer David Foster were contracted to write a song for the Brat Pack movie St. Elmo’s Fire about a bunch of college graduates figuring out the “real world.” But Parr had a hard time finding inspiration for a tune that would fit the film. But here’s where it gets confusing. The finished product has nothing to do with the movie. Instead, Parr found inspiration through Rick Hansen, who made news by travelling around the world in his wheelchair. That’s where the “Man in Motion” subtitle comes from. I mean, I get it. “I can see a new horizon underneath the blazin’ sky / I’ll be where the eagle’s flying higher and higher.” It’s supposed to be anthemic and optimistic about the future and all that. But between the keyboard and the use of three different wind instruments, the only thing it inspires in anyone is the desperate need to switch stations when it comes on the radio (just ask my wife). And because I like to base a 1980s song’s merits on its accompanying music video, let’s just say it doesn’t do it any favors; it only highlights how weird of a song choice it was for the movie in the first place. I mean, the cast of the movie is just standing around awkwardly in a bar while Parr lip syncs. Maybe the song would have worked better if it had been featured in a movie about, I don’t know, men in motion, or anyone in motion. For years I thought the song was written for some movie about racing that never saw the light of day. Knowing that this song was created in a day explains a lot.
Jonathan Cohen, News Editor
Best
“Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God),” Kate Bush
Ruminations on the need for a deity to intervene in age-old, male vs. female communication conundrums aren’t exactly pop song fodder, but they’re the backbone of one of the most enduring hits of the 1980s thanks to the singular voice of Kate Bush. With its galloping beat, never-quite-released tension and clever usage of the Russian string instrument the balalaika, “Running Up That Hill” still shoots straight for the ventricles nearly 40 years after its release. Just ask your favorite neighborhood teens, whose collective jaws dropped upon hearing it for the first time in a climactic 2022 episode of Stranger Things.
“Into the Groove,” Madonna
If this ode to the delights of the dance floor from Desperately Seeking Susan doesn’t get you all hot and bothered, you may need to consult a medical professional. “Touch my body and move in time / now I know you’re mine,” Madonna commands, and if you close your eyes tight, you can almost see her flip her hair, smirk, and slink away amid the sweaty, Ecstasy-d throngs at Danceteria. Fun fact: due to the usual label bullshit, “Groove” was not included on the Desperately soundtrack and never released as a proper single, yet it still made such a cultural impact that Billboard voted it the best dance song of the 1980s. Take that, Sire Records!
“E=MC2,” Big Audio Dynamite
Mick Jones’ multicultural, genre-jumping post-Clash outfit make memorable use of the au courant art of sampling and replacing real drums with programmed beats on this head-nodding earworm, which weaves dialog from six different Nicolas Roeg films (why not?) into a certified club banger. If you can name another ’80s hit that references untrustworthy dwarves, friendly Aborigines, hoodlum politicians, baseball legends, and the paradigm-busting equations of Albert Einstein, we’re all ears.
“When Love Breaks Down,” Prefab Sprout
Paddy McAloon and company were always just a bit too literate and incisive for mass consumption, yet even this uncompromising snapshot of matters of the heart became a feel-bad hit in Prefab Sprout’s native U.K. as well as on the U.S. rock chart. Love, of course, breaks down with alarming regularity, and lyrics about what we do “to stop the truth from hurting” and telling lies that “only serve to fool ourselves” will stop you cold in your tracks. Seek out McAloon’s absolutely gorgeous solo acoustic re-record on the 2007 Steve McQueen reissue, which tolls the bell of heartbreak anew.
Worst
“Dancing in the Street,” Mick Jagger and David Bowie
Look, this Martha and the Vandellas cover was recorded as part of the Live Aid campaign, so we can’t knock the humanitarian intent. But not even that noble cause can tip the scales in favor of “Dancing in the Street,” one of the most irritating and ridiculous singles of its era and truly a low point in the otherwise storied careers of Jagger and Bowie. Everything about this recording feels phony, phoned in, or coked up, from the sterile ’80s production to Jagger’s incessant yelps (“Tokyo! Australia! Germaaaaaany!”). You’ll likewise never be the same after watching the accompanying video, in which the two blouse-attired stars shout in each other’s faces and make goo-goo eyes while jumping around an abandoned flour mill after dark.
“Say You, Say Me,” Lionel Richie
Only in 1985 would a leading pop star such as Richie be commissioned to write an original song for a (checks notes…) ballet-centric Cold War drama starring Mikhail Baryshnikov. Compared to Lionel’s numerous other hits from the time period, there’s nothing particularly awful about “Say You, Say Me,” but its corny melody and even cornier lyrics (“I had a dream / I had an awesome dream / people in the park / playing games in the dark”) reveal it to be just another crass ’80s cash-in. As for that out-of-nowhere, electric guitar-heavy bridge, which shares zero melodic or rhythmic elements with the rest of the song, Jheri curls are still being scratched in bewilderment.
“Oh Yeah,” Yello
This Swiss electronic/dance duo enjoyed several hits before “Oh Yeah” became ubiquitous thanks to its use in the “steal Dad’s priceless Ferrari” scene from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, leading to a string of similar syncs in like-minded ’80s films. Before long, it was a lazy music supervisor’s default to soundtrack any time a character laid eyes on the dream guy or girl of their choice, and soon every kid at your school was muttering “chick … chick chick-aaaah” in your general direction. For the love of God, enough! The one exception: a masterful needle drop in a 2008 episode of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, where Mac and Charlie attempt, and fail, to engineer a The Secret of My Success-style double life in corporate America (they also think the song is called “Day Bow Bow”).
Liza Lentini, Executive Editor
Best
“Don’t You (Forget About Me),” Simple Minds
I mean…does it really get more anthemic than this? Fewer songs have harkened a triumphant fist-in-the-air before or since, an iconic ’80s song to open and close one of the most iconic ’80s films. It’s always strange to think of what could have been, since apparently Simple Minds initially didn’t want to record a song they didn’t write (it was written by Steve Schiff and Keith Forsey, specifically for The Breakfast Club). Alas—it was a breakout hit for Simple Minds, reaching No. 1 in both the U.S. and Canada, and indisputably one of the most beloved pop songs of all time.
“Everybody Wants to Rule the World,” Tears for Fears
Ever since their 1983 debut The Hurting, Tears for Fears have been reflecting the best and the worst of our humanity, guiding us through the darkness with beautiful/passionate/melodic poetry. With the third single off their sophomore album, Songs from the Big Chair, and their first to reach No. 1, Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal have created a song which, against its foreboding message of the universal quest for power—“Welcome to your life / There’s no turning back / Even while we sleep / We will find you”—will forever be one of pop music’s most timeless adult lullabies. The result, as only Tears for Fears can do, is a complex message of hope.
“In Between Days,” The Cure
The last time I wrote about The Cure was in December when we named their 14th album, Songs of a Lost World, our Album of the Year. By stark contrast, in 1985, they could not have been farther from the themes on the 2024 record I called both “gut-wrenching” and “an absolute masterpiece,” instead thoroughly embedded in their sad-but-hopeful pop-punk goth era. “In Between Days” was the first single from the band’s sixth LP, The Head on the Door, and though the lyrics depict a story of undeniable love trouble, the single is the embodiment of the aforementioned “sad-but-hopeful” and very much mainstream.
Worst
“Sussudio,” Phil Collins
In the grand tradition of Candyman and Bloody Mary, if you say “Sussudio” three times, we’re pretty sure ’80s Phil Collins will appear to haunt your waking dreams. (You’re singing it right now, aren’t you? I’m..so…sorry…) Inspired by a (shockingly) nonsensical word made up by Collins in the stu-stu-studio, “Sussudio” did reach No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot 100, which we’re pretty sure can be attributed to its earworm-esque, zombie-horror hypnotism.
“Tears Are Not Enough,” Northern Lights
Whoever said “Canadians do it better” clearly never heard their inclusion on the We Are the World album, the Great White North’s answer to famine relief, which is so bad it’s only created more audible suffering in the decades since. With music written by David Foster and English lyrics by Bryan Adams and Jim Vallance (yes, it’s in French, too, because no one is escaping this merde). In the world of ’80s music lore, the melody was a rejected leftover from St. Elmo’s Fire, then turned into a charity single which somehow finished the year at No. 1 on the Canadian singles chart. You can witness the fascinating mesh of performances—from Gordon Lightfoot and Neil Young, to Anne Murray and Corey Hart—in a feature-length documentary released in December of that year. Still, something good came from this torture: the song raised $3.2 million for charity.
“Yo’ Little Brother,” Nolan Thomas
What in the ’80s fever dream actually is this? And how did it reach No. 57 on the Billboard singles chart? It’s tough to say which is more puzzling—the song, the video, or the story behind it all? Nolan Thomas (real name Marko Kalfa) has song credit—and he did sing all of the songs on the Yo’ Little Brother album (yes, there’s a whole album!). But the title track is the only one actually sung by studio vocalist Elan Lanier. So, when you see Nolan jumping around in the trippy ultra-’80s bizarre world of the video (where “Little Brother” is apparently a pre-pubescent Billy Idol-like punk) he’s lip-syncing. The video was the brainchild of Vid Kid creators Stu Sleppin and Bob Teeman, and if you stick around long enough, you’ll witness a certifiably spooky parade of knock-off kiddie celebs.
“Tarzan Boy,” Baltimora
Some songs are so bad they’re great—this is not one of those. The lead single off the Italian synth-pop project Baltimora’s debut LP has stalked our social media feeds in recent years, giving it a much deserved spotlight in absurd infamy. Still, there has to be something said for a song so wonderfully misguided that it sparks the age-old question: Why? (And there’s even a lip-synced “live” performance where some poor guy dressed up like a gorilla gyrates with a Tarzan-clad girl, and that only provokes more questions.)
Matthew Thompson, Senior Editor
Best
“Tupelo,” Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
From a thunderclap emerges the hungry, itchy lurch of Barry Adamson’s guttural bassline in the opening of this startling incantation from Nick Cave’s Faulknerian daze. Writing here about Cave’s unhinged vision of Elvis Presley’s birth in Tupelo, Mississippi, however, with his Revelation-on-a-moonshine-and-smack-bender shtick, is kind of beside the point. So I won’t blather on but instead urge you to now dim the lights, max the volume, and hit play on this monstrous track. Yes: Join the cursed children of Tupelo as they “listen to the beating of their blood.” For this is Cave and the Bad Seeds at their finest extremes, back when the brutal theatricality of Cave’s formative crew, the Birthday Party, still infused his music but came with more accomplished structures.
“It’s Alright (Baby’s Coming Back),” Eurythmics
This song opens with corny ’80s synthy-soul shit that fills me with disgust and makes me look for nearby objects to crack and smash—unlike with the band’s far musically-sharper tracks, such as “Doubleplusgood,” “Love is a Stranger,” and “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This).” But then comes the commanding contralto of Annie Lennox, and all that is overcome. Annie and her voice sweep me into her swooning flow. If only she’d had a band, a surrounding sound, as rich and erotic as her singing. There are better and more interesting Eurythmics songs overall, but, if you’ll allow me a cliche, this one transports me: I soar with her voice; I feel the tale she tells here of a joy so ripe with a lover’s return that she will be a storm and stop time and they will fly together into eternity as the world falls into decline. Damn, bitch. Choose me.
“Electrical Storm,” Ed Kuepper
While such antipodean pretty boys as Michael Hutchence of INXS flounced about on the front pages and Wembley stages of 1985, the real steeled soul and mind of Australian rock was Ed Kuepper, co-founder of the Saints (punk mofos that predated the Sex Pistols), founder of the post-punk art-rockers the Laughing Clowns, and then, from 1985, a solo artist prodigious and moody as fuck. This title track from Kuepper’s first solo album (he’s since exceeded 20 solo albums) is a deft short story, sharp in its sense of place (lying on a bed in a “one storey town” watching an electrical storm through a window; hearing thunder crack over the fields) and astute in its minimalist portrait of stasis. The narrator, whose lover did what he should have done and left this desolate life, lays on the bed in a hell that brings to mind the punchline of the great neo-noir flick, Romeo is Bleeding: “What’s hell? The time you shoulda walked, but you didn’t.” Only difference is that Kuepper’s song is even bleaker, as at least Gary Oldman’s character stayed for passion, whereas Kuepper’s singer stayed for nothing—because sometimes we’re so down we just can’t even move to save ourselves.
Worst
“Who’s Zoomin’ Who?,” Aretha Franklin, from Who’s Zoomin’ Who?
I’d rather eat fistsful of pug turd and get tumbled downhill in a diarrheal porta potty than hear this musical excrement ever again. It’s either the Queen of Soul turning into a giant asshole and shitting directly into the ears of anyone who loves her magnificent work of the 1960s and 1970s, or it’s a cry for help. A fatly rewarded cry for help, as it happens. The album of the same name sold north of a million copies, propelled by the single, “Freeway of Love,” which I also hate—just not with the violence of my hatred for this song. What’s so awful about it? Let me count the ways: the cheesy synth; the “bouncy” tempo; the cornball backup singing; the lightweight lyrics; and in sum Franklin’s complete lack of presence as compared to her masterpieces of previous decades. Play “I Never Loved a Man the Way I Loved You,” and then play “Who’s Zoomin’ Who?” Enough said. It’s not even fit to be cruise-ship shite.
“Life in a Northern Town,” the Dream Academy, from The Dream Academy
Described by the New York Times as a “richly textured nostalgic ballad,” this song is actually a nightmare of bullshit—from its hokey tale of a mysterious wise man dropping in on a declining northern English town where the village folk sit as his feet as he smokes a fag and talks wistfully of the early ’60s to its laughably stupid “African-style chant chorus,” as the precious git who wrote and sings it, Nick Laird-Clowes, described what he was aiming for with that interminable “Ah-hey-ma-ma-ma/Dee-doo-din-nie-ya-ya” blackvoice dreck. And you know what is even more preposterous? Laird-Clowes dedicated this soggy turd to Nick Drake. Nick Drake! I don’t normally endorse violence against musicians, but fuck me if anyone runs into Laird-Clowes … No don’t—obviously that would be wrong. But … this Dream-twat even said he wrote the song on Nick Drake’s guitar. Jesus. Now I’m fucking livid.