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therecordconnection · 3 months

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Playlist: The Record Connection's Top Thirty Hit Songs of 1981

(Bear with me, gonna try something new here.)

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The Record Connection's Top Thirty Hit Songs of 1981

Playlist Description: "Exploring the strange year of 1981 by choosing 30 of the best representatives from Billboard's Year-End Hot 100 Singles of 1981"

Track Listing:

"(Just Like) Starting Over" - John Lennon

"I'm Coming Out" - Diana Ross

"Another One Bites the Dust" - Queen

"Sukiyaki" - A Taste of Honey

"Together" - Tierra

"(There's) No Gettin' Over Me" - Ronnie Milsap

"Queen of Hearts" - Juice Newton

"9 to 5" - Dolly Parton

"Suddenly" - Olivia Newton-John & Cliff Richard

"Guilty" - Barbra Streisand & Barry Gibb

"Just the Two of Us" - Grover Washington, Jr. & Bill Withers

"A Woman Needs Love (Just Like You Do)" - Ray Parker Jr. & Raydio

"Lady (You Bring Me Up)" - Commodores

"Celebration" - Kool & the Gang

"Don't Stand So Close to Me" - The Police

"Urgent" - Foreigner

"Take It On the Run" - REO Speedwagon

"Too Much Time on My Hands" - Styx

"Miss Sun" - Boz Scaggs

"Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)" - Christopher Cross

"Hey Nineteen" - Steely Dan

"Tell It Like It Is" - Heart

"Boy From New York City" - The Manhattan Transfer

"Hungry Heart" - Bruce Springsteen

"Hold On Tight" - Electric Light Orchestra

"Kiss On My List" - Daryl Hall & John Oates

"Jessie's Girl" - Rick Springfield

"Time" - The Alan Parsons Project

"For Your Eyes Only" - Sheena Easton

"The Winner Takes It All" - ABBA

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A Few Words About 1981

Time, Electric Light Orchestra's 1981 science-fiction concept album tells the story of a man who is transported to the far distant future of 2095. The album explores his homesickness while observing the many ways the world has changed around him. During "The Way Life's Meant to Be," bandleader Jeff Lynne sings, "I wish I was back in 1981." Lynne has never explained why he chose to use the year the album was made as the year the time traveler comes from (probably just convenience), but I've always found that yearning to return to 1981 in particular to be funny, because if people had a time machine to go back to the eighties, I highly doubt anybody would pick 1981.

For a long time, I've loved looking through Billboard's Year-End Hot 100 singles list for [insert year]. I think it's really fun to look through them and often times you can really get a good idea of what was insanely popular during a given year. Lots of stuff gets big or falls through the cracks in a given year, but this one is the stuff that everybody vibed with (or got utterly annoyed with).

1981 is a weird one. 1980 is considered a much worse year (a lot of really boring, nothing ballads got super big that year) but '81 isn't the winner that the '83-'85 years are considered. When people (over)romanticize the eighties, they're mostly going crazy about that chunk of the decade and 1987. The early eighties have no idea what the hell they're going to be yet. Then again, no decade ever knows what it's gonna be right out the gate. I think people tend to have this idea that the ball dropped on December 31st, 1979 and suddenly it was THE EIGHTIES! It doesn't work that way. Often times, the first two years of a decade are strange and they serve as a transition point.

1981 is definitely a transitional year. It's one of my favorite years in music due to just being an oddball time. Lot of strange new wave stuff was slowly crossing over, arena rock bands were really ramping up and beginning their reign, early eighties R&B was starting to find its groove, and more. The Hot 100 list doesn't reflect most of what was happening. It rarely does, but it is a really good starting point when trying to figure out what some of the biggest stuff was for a good chunk of the year. If you ask me, the eighties don't become the decade everybody loves until Duran Duran releases Rio and Michael Jackson makes the video for "Thriller." You can start to see the beginnings of what the eighties will become with 1981, but it's also not quite there yet.

So, this playlist explores that Year-End singles list and attempts to give a good overview of what was going on at that time. I listened to all one-hundred songs and cut it down to the best thirty. It was originally going to be twenty, but I found that I liked too much of the list to limit it that small. These songs are not arranged from #30 to #1, rather they're arranged in a way that highlights connections between certain songs, common themes, and hopefully ends up highlighting all the different musical worlds that were enjoying success during the year.

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Some Words Regarding The Process Behind This Track Listing

There were three John Lennon hits that year, which is fitting, considering he was killed in December, 1980 and everybody was still shaken about it for most of '81. I picked "(Just Like) Starting Over" as the representative, since I think it's tragically ironic and also reflective of why people were so upset about Lennon's murder. (Note: For the curious, "Woman" and "Watching the Wheels" were the other two hits that got big from Double Fantasy).

After Lennon, the next four songs highlight the last of the disco refugees (Diana Ross, Queen, and A Taste of Honey) and the final whispers of the previous decade (Tierra). "I'm Coming Out," "Another One Bites the Dust," and "Sukiyaki" are the songs that are just on the cusp of being eighties funk, but they're still clinging to disco in a lot of ways. "Together" by Tierra sounds has all the sonic hallmarks of a seventies one-hit wonder... but somehow came out in 1980. That's what I mean when I say that you can hear those final whispers of the previous decade.

There was a good deal of country crossover on the list. Not a lot of it survived the cut for me, mostly because a lot of it is corny and lame in a bad way. Kenny Rogers had three soft ballads get big in 1981 and I dislike all of them. Unless names like Eddie Rabbitt, Terri Gibbs, or Rosanne Cash mean anything to you, I don't think you'll be upset. Personally, I'm a much bigger fan of country in the nineties. The very best of the country crossovers are represented here. I went with Ronnie Milsap's "(There's) No Gettin' Over Me," Juice Newton's cover of "Queen of Hearts," ("Angel of the Morning" almost beat it, but I think this one is more fun) and finally, "9 to 5" by Dolly Parton. The three country songs here are light and super fun and I think represent that the country music world was having fun during the start of the decade and finding crossover appeal with the masses beyond Nashville.

After our journey to country, we explore some of the team-ups that got big during the year. "Suddenly" (a great love song from the not-so-great movie Xanadu) sees Olivia Newton-John and Cliff Richard together, "Guilty" sees Barbra Streisand and Bee Gee Barry Gibb at their best, and Bill Withers lends his vocals to an all-time classic Grover Washington, Jr. cut ("Just the Two of Us").

Ray Parker Jr. (still with his band Raydio) shows us some early eighties R&B magic and good advice with "A Woman Needs Love (Just Like You Do)" and the Commodores and Kool & the Gang bring the funk and the party with the classics "Lady (You Bring Me Up)" and "Celebration" (the definitive party song to end all party songs). These songs are missing the disco elements that were still found with Diana, Queen, and A Taste of Honey and represent the direction funk music was heading in. Lionel Richie would pivot away from the funk as the decade went on, but the funk was just getting started for Kool & the Gang.

After the funk, we take a look at what arena rock bands were doing. In 1981, they were worried about romantic relationships. "Don't Stand So Close to Me" finds a teacher being in a secret relationship with a young student and worried about people finding out. "Urgent" finds Foreigner in panic mode. The narrator is worried that his love is being taken advantage of and only used for one night stands. REO Speedwagon enters into the frame, worried that a certain someone has been doing some cheating (though they heard this from a friend who heard it from a friend who heard it from another...) Styx lightens things up by having fun and goofing around while Tommy Shaw laments that he has "Too Much Time On My Hands." These four bands are good indicators of where rock was heading in a world where a lot of the seventies rock giants were beginning to find themselves in unknown waters.

Speaking of unknown waters, Yacht Rock was still sailing the seas in the early eighties and three representatives are found here. Cool cat Boz Scaggs sings a groovy song for "Miss Sun," Christopher Cross sings about the movie Arthur and tells you the best thing you can do when you're caught between the moon and New York City in "Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)," and Steely Dan tells the tale of pathetic older dude pining for the past and finding it hard to relate to a nineteen year old girl he's trying to pick up in "Hey Nineteen." These three represent the smooth cool cats that weren't pop, but weren't rolling with the arena rock of the moment either.

Speaking of pining for the past, 1981 was a year where some bands and artists gave us some throwbacks and tried to capture that old rockabilly jukebox sound that Lennon was doing at the start of the playlist. Heart provides a wonderful cover of the 1966 Aaron Neville classic "Tell It Like It Is" and The Manhattan Transfer present a lovable and fun little cover of the 1964 Ad Libs song "Boy From New York City." Bruce Springsteen gets in on the throwback fun with the awesome "Hungry Heart," and Electric Light Orchestra lead us into the future while still writing a love letter to the past with "Hold On Tight." These songs all have the common thread of "everything old becomes new again" and are the earliest examples of the eighties bringing the sixties back to life and turning it into something brand new.

The last five songs presented have no unifying theme, they just ended up being my five favorite songs on the list. "Kiss on My List" and "Jessie's Girl" are both fan-fucking-tastic songs and show how good both Hall & Oates and Rick Springfield were as songwriters. I never get sick of those songs. "Time" by The Alan Parsons Project is my favorite ballad on the list. Vocalist Eric Woolfson had this whisper like quality to his delivery that nobody else had. The entire song is just this beautiful, melancholic, transcendent song. The whole thing feels like it's floating. It sounds the way that the bright stars at night look. Just wonderful.

The final two songs feature fantastic performances from two dynamite women. Sheena Easton's "For Your Eyes Only" is my second favorite Bond theme ("Nobody Does It Better" beats it) and "The Winner Takes It All" is the greatest song ABBA ever laid to tape. Both are these sweeping pop masterpieces and Sheena and Agnetha Fältskog deliver some of the finest performances of their careers on them. You feel every emotion and every detail is done so incredibly well. I'm hopeful that you'll find the playlist ends on a high note!

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(Thank you for indulging in this little experiment. :) Making playlists is a lot fun and I'd love to make this a semi-regular thing if there's an interest for it. So let me know your thoughts and opinions if you have them! I would love to hear from you! Thank you.)

#original post #playlist #spotify playlist

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