80s | Musicosity

Bryan Adams

Bryan Adams OC, OBC, (born 5 November 1959) is a Canadian rock singer, guitarist, songwriter and photographer. Some of his best-known albums are Reckless, 18 til I Die, and Waking Up the Neighbours. Bryan Adams was already popular in Canada when the release of his third album 'Cuts Like A Knife' in 1983 brought him a large following in the USA. His fourth album, 'Reckless', often referred to as one of the most significant of the 1980s, sold over 4 million copies at the time and continues to sell now. His fifth album 'Into the Fire' went platinum.

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Van Halen

Van Halen is an international hard rock band formed in the early-1970s, originally called Mammoth (before being called Van Halen, one of the band's ideas for a name was Rat Salade). The band's first studio album, "Van Halen", released in 1978 is widely regarded as a milestone in rock music. With this first release, the band, featuring David Lee Roth on vocals, Michael Anthony on bass, and Dutch-born Edward Van Halen on guitars (and also keyboards later) and brother Alex Van Halen on drums, established itself as a leader in the emerging and commercially successful U.

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Blondie

Blondie is perhaps the most commercially successful band to emerge from the 1970s punk scene. They formed in New York in 1974. The original lineup consisted of Clem Burke (drums / percussion), Jimmy Destri (keyboards), Debbie Harry (vocals), Chris Stein (guitar / bass guitar) and Gary Valentine (bass guitar / guitar). Blondie released their first album Blondie in 1976. The album was mildly successful and spawned the Australian hit single "In The Flesh".

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Kool and the Gang

Kool & the Gang are an American jazz/R&B/soul/funk/disco group. They originally formed in Jersey City, New Jersey, U.S. in 1964. They went through several musical phases in their career, starting out with a purist jazz sound, becoming practitioners of R&B and funk, progressing to a smooth disco ensemble, and ended the successful period of their career producing pop/R&B crossovers. They have sold over 70 million albums worldwide.

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Models

Three bands share this page: an Australian rock group, a 70s punk rock band, and a Serbian pop band. 1. Models were an alternative rock group from Melbourne, Australia, active from 1978-1987. Various versions of Models have reformed for short tours. 1) They formed from two earlier punk/New Wave bands, Teenage Radio Stars (singer and guitarist Sean Kelly) and JAB (Ash Wednesday, Pierre Voltaire and Johnny Crash, keyboards, bass and drums respectively).

When they formed, Models were hailed as one of the most innovative and imaginative Australian bands.

Four decades later, nothing has changed.

Well, that’s not quite right – a lot of things have changed, but not the band’s approach to making music.

Models have always done things their own way.

As the authors of The 100 Best Australian Albums (which featured Models’ The Pleasure Of Your Company) stated: “Melbourne electronic outfit Models followed a distinctly perverse and disjointed course from the outset.”

The band actually had a “no singles” policy when they started – which annoyed Molly Meldrum. In 1980, Molly stopped his car on busy Chapel Street in Melbourne when he spotted a couple of Models. “He blocked traffic for several minutes to berate us,” singer Sean Kelly chuckles, “telling us that we were doing no one any favours and that our song ‘Happy Birthday IBM’ could’ve been a hit!”

(Molly didn’t hold a grudge, later calling Models “one of my favourite bands from the Countdown era”.)

Models rescinded their “no singles” policy with their second album, Local &/or General, and their chart-topping run of hits includes I Hear Motion, Big On Love, Barbados and Out Of Mind Out Of Sight.

Models are that rare breed of bands – one that has successfully straddled critical acclaim, cult appeal and commercial success.

“Alongside The Boys Next Door/The Birthday Party, Models were one of the first Melbourne bands to rise out of the ashes of that city’s hothouse punk/new wave explosion of the late 1970s with a clear vision and wider appeal,” says Ian McFarlane, author of The Encyclopedia Of Australian Rock And Pop.

Models were inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 2010.

“We might go into hibernation occasionally – actually, quite a lot,” Sean Kelly says, “but we have never broken up.”

Models have continued to record, recently releasing two EPs, GTK and MEMO. And live, the band pays tribute to the pop genius of James Freud, who died in 2010.
The songs still sound fresh. “We don’t think of them as being old,” Andrew Duffield says.
Models never go out of style.

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Chris Isaak

Chris Isaak (born June 26, 1956 in Stockton, California as Christopher Joseph Isaak) is an American Rock'n'Roll singer, songwriter, and occasional actor.
Isaak's music can be described as a blend of country, blues, rock'n'roll, pop and surf rock.

He signed a contract to Warner Brothers Records in 1984 for his first album "Silvertone". Isaak's contract was renewed in 1988 when Warner moved him to their Reprise Records label.

His best-known song is "Wicked Game". Though released on the 1989 album "Heart Shaped World", an instrumental version of the song was later featured in the David Lynch film 'Wild at Heart' (and also years later in the 2000 film The Family Man). An Atlanta radio station DJ began playing the full version and it quickly became a nation-wide top ten hit. The music video for the song was directed by Herb Ritts and was a big MTV and VH1 hit; shot in black and white, it starred Isaak and model Helena Christensen rolling on the beach, embracing and whispering in each others' ears.

In 1999, Isaak's "Baby Did A Bad, Bad Thing" was featured in Stanley Kubrick's final film 'Eyes Wide Shut', starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman.

In 2001, Chris Isaak starred in his own television show, 'The Chris Isaak Show'. It aired from March 2001 to March 2004 in the United States on the cable television network Showtime. This adult comedy show featured Chris Isaak and his band playing themselves with the episode plots based on fictional accounts of the backstage world of Chris Isaak - the rock star next door.

In 2004, his track "Life Will Go On" was featured on the 'Chasing Liberty' soundtrack, which starred Mandy Moore and Matthew Goode.

He hosted a talk show on the Biography cable channel in the United States in 2009 that offered a unique twist - each guest was a musical artist, and both Chris and the artist performed various songs throughout each show. Eight episodes aired in early 2009, featuring guests Trisha Yearwood, Stevie Nicks, Glen Campbell, Michael Buble, Chicago, The Smashing Pumpkins, Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens), and Jewel.

Isaak has also appeared in numerous films, mostly playing minor cameo roles, though he starred with Keanu Reeves and Bridget Fonda in the 1993 Bernardo Bertolucci-directed 'Little Buddha', and also played a major role in David Lynch's 'Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me' (1992). Other motion pictures include 'Married to the Mob' (1988), 'The Silence of the Lambs' (1991), 'That Thing You Do!' (1996), and 'A Dirty Shame' (2004). He also guest-starred on the Super Bowl Sunday (1996) edition of the television sitcom Friends and on the HBO miniseries, From the Earth to the Moon (HBO).

Chris is also an amateur boxer, avid surfer and a former Golden Gloves champion. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.

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The Morrisons

The Morrisons are from Torquay in Devon and were originally formed in 1986 by Phil and Ian who were both originally inspired to play guitar by the arrival of punk in the mid 70’s and both shared a love of 60’s music and decent tunes. Most of the original members of the band had previously played together in a band called Chapter 29 and other various locals bands. In 1987 John Peel played their debut flexi single Listen To Your Heart several times on his show.

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Mental as Anything

Mental As Anything is an Australian New Wave/rock music band who, since the late 70s have released numerous albums & singles and have produced many innovative music videos. Although they have worked in a much broader musical idiom, Mental As Anything are in many respects comparable to British band Madness, in that their music is typically delivered with a quirky, ironic sense of humour and a strong visual identity.

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Pseudo Echo

Pseudo Echo are an Australian new wave band. Formed in the early eighties by school friends Brian Canham (vocals, guitars, and keyboards) and Pierre Gigliotti (bass and keyboards), the band completed its lineup with Anthony Agiro (drums) and Tony Lugton (guitars and keyboards).

Their first album Autumnal Park was an Ultravox-influenced album that yielded the Australian singles "Listening" (produced by Peter Dawkins) , "Stranger in Me", "Dancing Till Midnight", and "Beat for You". It was a mature album that gave little indication of their youth.

Their climb to success in the summer of 1984 was rapid, and they quickly became the second biggest band in Australia after INXS.

"His Eyes", a track from their first album, received exposure overseas as it was used in the movie Friday the 13th: A New Beginning.

There was a lineup change before their second album with Tony Lugton being replaced by James Leigh (real surname: Dingli) after a dispute between Lugton and Canham over money, and another lineup change during the making of the second album with Agiro being replaced by James's brother Vince.

Their second album, Love an Adventure (1986), was also a success with several singles from that album topping the Australian charts including the title track, "Don't Go", "Try", and "Living in a Dream". The album was re-released the following year to include their remake of the Lipps, Inc. song "Funky Town", which brought the group their biggest international success, reaching No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the USA in 1987, as well as spending six weeks at #1 in Australia.

The overseas release of Love an Adventure featured a somewhat different track listing which included re-mixed versions of 3 singles from Autumnal Park: "Listening", "A Beat for You", and "Destination Unknown". These were remixed to sound more rock-oriented, to better-match the other tracks on the album. Brian Canham even re-recorded the vocals for a slicker sound to compliment these rock remixes. Once again, the overseas version of Love an Adventure was re-released to include the re-make of "Funkytown", replacing "Don't Go" in the original track list.

In 1987, the band re-released "Listening" for the movie North Shore starring Nia Peeples.

Their third album, Race (1989), went further in the direction of pop rock and metal. The album featured the Australian singles "Fooled Again", "Over Tomorrow", "Eye of the Storm", and "Don't You Forget". The album wasn't very successful, as the band's move to a more rock/metal genre had apparently alienated a good portion of their established fanbase. Pseudo Echo disbanded shortly after touring for Race in 1990.

The band reunited in 1999 to produce the EP Funkytown Y2K: RMX, which included 6 new remixes of "Funkytown". A year later, they released the double-CD Teleporter (2000), which featured 4 all-new tracks, 5 re-mixed tracks, and a live performance in Melbourne. The live performance featured all the tracks from Autumnal Park except for "From the Shore", along with a few tracks from Love an Adventure and a performance of the rare B-side "In Their Time".

Since reuniting in 1999, the band has been touring constantly in Australia, and were last seen touring with the "Idols of the 80s" in 2005.

In 2014 they released Ultraviolet, their first album in 14 years. Ultraviolet came about after Pseudo Echo gathered for shows in 2012 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their first hit song â€˜Listeningâ€™.

To fund recording of the new album singer Brian Canham approached PledgeMusic to use fan-power to finance the albumâ€™s recording and manufacturing. Via pledgemusic.com, Pseudo Echo fans could nominate the level they were comfortable with in supporting the funding of â€˜Ultravioletâ€™.

The Pseudo Echo campaign turned out to be one of the most successful take-ups for Pledgemusic generating 126% of the financial goal and guaranteeing the release of the album.

Pseudo Echo has stated they were originally influenced by Simple Minds, Ultravox, Japan and then later Duran Duran and Human League.

www.myspace.com/pseudoecho01 Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.

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Meat Loaf

Meat Loaf (born Marvin Lee Aday September 27, 1947 in Dallas, Texas) is an American actor and rock and roll performer who came to fame with his album Bat Out of Hell and for his movie performances, including Eddie in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Robert "Bob" Paulson in Fight Club and Jack Black's father in Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny. He has had a very successful music career spawning some of the greatest selling albums of all time and breaking various records.

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