What is the remedy for having a nostalgia towards an era that you never quite lived through? You create a fantastic playlist filled with songs from that said era. That is exactly what I did! I created a playlist that I named An 80s Frame of Mind, spanning now more than one hundred songs of eighties fun and about to reach the ten-hour mark. I put on this playlist when I am indecisive on choosing among my long list of other unique and specific playlists, and it does not matter what time of the day it is, or what my mood is, this playlist always feels right. It is a playlist that is always in the making as I keep adding more and more songs that I might hear someplace, and immediately add if it sounds cool. Am I saving this playlist for a future eighties dance party I will someday host? Maybe.
This playlist has, of course, the songs from my dad’s CD that we would play on morning car drives, and songs that are favorites of my mom’s, too. However, most of the songs in here do not come specifically from my dad or my mom but are songs I have discovered on my own. One such song is “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” by Eurythmics. What is it about this song that makes it so exceptionally good? Maybe Annie Lennox’s practically perfect background vocals? Or is it the synthesizer used here that gives it an unparalleled intensity?
Since forever, singing has been my talent and growing up I had two special icons that I looked up to and adored, inspiring me to want to become a singer on a stage with a microphone. Those were: Britney Spears and… Madonna. She has been my idol since the beginning of time, the first artist I ever was a fan of, and the one that I always dance to in my room, as if I were in one of those eighties’ rom-coms. Madonna is the most obvious repeating pattern that you would find in my An 80’s Frame of Mind playlist. I have all of her classic hits such as “Material Girl,” “Like a Virgin,” and more underrated but just as amazing songs such as “Angel.” The list of Madonna songs continues on and on with her other songs that are simply contagious and that I have to sing along to whenever I hear them such as “Into the Groove,” ‘Papa Don’t Preach,” and “Open Your Heart.”
Apart from the unprecedented presence of Madonna in my playlist, you will also find “Easy Lover” by Philip Bailey and Phil Collins. This is one I never get bored of listening to, as it is just epic. And then there is “Africa” by Toto, the epitome of music from the eighties, having those signature distinct sounds everywhere. It is as eighties as it could have possibly gotten.
My An 80s Frame of Mind playlist is the remedy for my longing towards the eighties, and guaranteed to make anyone that listens to it just as nostalgic as me with its songs I could spend hours talking about. “Eyes Without a Face” by Billy Idol? Nostalgic. “Take on Me” by a-ha? Nostalgic. “Space Age Love Song” by A Flock of Seagulls? Absolutely freaking nostalgic. And I cannot forget “Rio” by Duran Duran.
Even one of my most treasured bands, Fleetwood Mac, has found its way there with “Little Lies,” sung by the Christine McVie, and “Seven Wonders” by Ms. Stevie Nicks, among many others. “Seven Wonders” is a song that is close to my heart. I love the fated and meant-to-be circumstances she sings about in here with the line of: “so long ago, it’s a certain time, it’s a certain place.” And then, of course, there is The Police. “Every Breath You Take” – one of the best written love songs that stands the test of time (anything by The Police will do that), and the record where this song is from, Synchronicity, is an eighties must listen.
Ever heard of a song called “Bizarre Love Triangle” by New Order? Well, this song is also in my playlist and I have a story to share about it! As a little girl, I would play a cover of the song nonstop by a band named Frente! I found this song from my dad’s iPod a really long time ago, and I had to be either six or seven years old. Mysteriously, yet kind of cool, Angie Hart’s voice spoke to me and now “fits” perfectly with my own voice. I learned its lyrics by heart, and it is one of my favorite songs to sing. Yet, when I was little, I could not understand a thing of what the song and its lyrics were about. I spent my whole life thinking this cover by Frente! (which is awesome, by the way) was the original “Bizarre Love Triangle”. Then, one day, I heard the original song by New Order that came out in 1986 play when I was shopping a thrift store. It was a serious moment of realization for my then middle school self, and it was interesting to listen to the very same words that always perplexed me in the form it was first presented to the world.
My playlist contains many more songs that would probably take me an entire day to write about. But, there is one song that is what completes it and that is “Always Something There to Remind Me” by Naked Eyes; my favorite song ever from the eighties that I first heard when I was ten years old, and also found from my dad’s iPod (I wonder where it might have ended up?) I fell in love with the guy’s voice singing the lovey-dovey lyrics, and to this day, I am just like the ten-year old little me.
So, based on this “love letter” towards (mostly) love songs from the eighties and the era itself, was it easy to tell that I am a romantic?