Welcome to the latest of our listening marathons, covering every UK Top 40 single from the start of the 1980s!

 

I will host the listening sessions for this series, which will run from 16:00 to 19:00 UK time on Sundays (19:30 including bonus tracks). I'll be playing every song in chronological order of when it first entered the UK Top 40 over sessions of approx. 3 hours, starting in January 1980, then in the next session I'll pick up where we left off.

 

We will be using Synctube for the sessions. Anyone is welcome to join, even if just to listen in, why not give it a go? Feel free to join for as much or as little of the session as you like, and join in the live chat if you wish. Unless otherwise stated during the thread, the Synctube link will be:

 

https://sync-tube.de/room/2gHBerpI

 

The first session will take place this Sunday (22 June) and will cover the first 6 weeks of 1980. I’ll plan the sessions on a year-by-year basis, so I’ll run the 7 or 8 sessions for 1980 and see how they go. All being well, I’ll carry on through 1981, 1982, and so on, with the aim to eventually cover every year of the 1980s, albeit with a few breaks along the way – so the whole project will take a few years, if it does ever get finished!

 

Alongside these sessions, @Julian_ will run reviews of each song, as part of his project to review every Top 40 hit in chart history: the existing 20^th Century thread https://www.buzzjack.com/forums/topic/259820-julian-rates-every-20th-century-top-40-hit starts in 1952 (currently complete to the end of 1971) and the 21^st Century thread https://www.buzzjack.com/forums/topic/270110-julian-rates-every-21st-century-top-40-hit starts in 2000, so this will be a third line of approach – but it should all join up eventually. (Maybe there’ll be some 1990s sessions at some point, but I’m tentatively committing to more than enough as it is!!)

Here is his 1980s thread: https://www.buzzjack.com/forums/topic/280473-julian-rates-every-top-40-hit-the-1980s-edition

 

I will end each session with a number of bonus tracks in the following categories:

 

New UK Top 3 singles and #1 album tracks - as we have already done listening marathons for each of #1 singles, #2 singles, #3 singles, and #1 albums, I will keep these topped up as and when there are new songs that fall into these categories!

New US #1 singles - as the most recent listening marathon hosted by @Brer went through every US #1, I will play any new ones (although if they coincide with one of the above categories in the same session, they won’t get played two times over!)

RIPs - whenever someone notable from the music world passes away during the week, feel free to nominate a track of theirs or relating to them to play (does not have to be a chart hit).

Birthday slot - if you have a birthday on the day of a session or during the week before or after, you can PM me with a random track of your choice. 

Jamelia slot - when somebody thinks of a random track people want to hear for no particular reason. I’ll try and limit these this series to finish as close to 19:30 as possible though.

After each session, I’ll share the list of songs played in the main session, which will also serve to open a poll for the best Top 40 hit from the timeframe covered! The winner of each poll will be played at the start of the following session, and may eventually go into a poll of polls. I’m not planning to include a poll of worst songs, but by all means post your least favourites as well as your favourites if you so wish.

(The other difference to previous series is there won’t be a poll for bonus choices – generally these were songs which peaked lower than the series covered over the same timeframe, e.g. #4-10 singles for the #2 & #3 series, #2 album tracks for the #1 album series – however at some point I’ll collate all new songs in all these previous bonus categories since the last series ended, so that they can have their chance to shine too!)

 

Hope you enjoy the series!

Edited 23 hours ago23 hr by jimwatts

Excellent news. This is my favourite decade for top 40 singles. I'll be there on Sunday.

Looking forward to this as a major 80s synth-pop / new wave / post-punk nerd

I have a driving lesson on Sunday evening but should be able to make the first couple of hours at least!

Wow, so this is gonna take 10 years? or am I understanding it wrong? :D

It's just the new entries from each chart so I think it will take about one year to get through, if we assume there are about five new entries for each chart week.

We’ve already worked out that 1980 will take 7 weeks, so allowing for breaks here and there it could take 1.5-2 years to cover the ‘80s.

oh so only the newbies? I was thinking it was 1 full chart show per week, so 10 years :D hahahaha

Starting at 4pm today!

https://sync-tube.de/room/2gHBerpI

Are you planning to catch up with the number one albums over the next few weeks rather than doing them all tonight?

yay! not the biggest fan of the early 80s but gonna give it a try, love the 80s but mainly from Madonna on ;)

10 minutes ago, Suedehead2 said:

Are you planning to catch up with the number one albums over the next few weeks rather than doing them all tonight?

I have planned to catch up on #1 album tracks tonight, and RIPs next week.

Thanks all who joined today's first session! Here's the 44 hits covered today:

Madness - My Girl

Dr Hook - Better Love Next Time

Positive Force - We Got The Funk

The Inmates - The Walk

Styx - Babe

Bee Gees - Spirits (Having Flown)

Jon And Vangelis - I Hear You Now

Joe Jackson - It's Different For Girls

Azymuth - Jazz Carnival

The Regents - 7 Teen

UFO - Young Blood

Fleetwood Mac - Sara

Rupert Holmes - Escape (The Pina Colada Song)

The Specials - Too Much Too Young (The Special AKA Live! EP)

New Musik - Living By Numbers

Kool And The Gang - Too Hot

Matchbox - Buzz Buzz A Diddle It

Kenny Rogers - Coward Of The County

Sister Sledge - Got To Love Somebody

Sad Cafe - Strange Little Girl

Amii Stewart - Paradise Bird/The Letter

Commodores - Wonderland

The Boomtown Rats - Someone's Looking At You

The Selecter - Three Minute Hero

Queen - Save Me

Jefferson Starship - Jane

Suzi Quatro - Mama's Boy

The Buggles - The Plastic Age

Ramones - Baby I Love You

The Whispers - And The Beat Goes On

Keith Michell - Captain Beaky/Wilfred The Weasel

The Shadows - Riders In The Sky

Cliff Richard - Carrie

John Foxx - Underpass

Michael Jackson - Rock With You

Brass Construction - Music Makes You Feel Like Dancing

Dexy's Midnight Runners - Dance Stance

Elvis Costello - I Can't Stand Up (For Falling Down)

The Tourists - So Good To Be Back Home Again

AC/DC - Touch Too Much

Rainbow - All Night Long

Peter Gabriel - Games Without Frontiers

Dave Edmunds - Singing The Blues

The Chords - Maybe Tomorrow

Votes welcome for up to five of your favourites, with the song with the most votes played at the start of next week's session!

My votes:

The Specials - Too Much Too Young

New Musik - Living By Numbers

Amii Stewart - Paradise Bird

The Buggles - The Plastic Age

John Foxx - Underpass

Edited yesterday at 18:531 day by jimwatts

Damn. I missed this.

It was great to have this back today! Hopefully can be there for the full session next week.

Top 5 favourites:

John Foxx - Underpass

Jon And Vangelis - I Hear You Now

Michael Jackson - Rock With You

New Musik - Living By Numbers

The Specials - Too Much Too Young (The Special AKA Live! EP)

Best:

Jon And Vangelis - I Hear You Now

Azymuth - Jazz Carnival

The Specials - Too Much Too Young (Live)

John Foxx - Underpass

Michael Jackson - Rock With You

Worst:

Kenny Rogers - Coward Of The County

Commodores - Wonderland

AC/DC - Touch Too Much

Here's my playlist which I am going to try and keep updated with all my faves per week (going to playlist anything that I'd rate 7.5/10 or higher, which is a nice round 20 songs for this first week, including both sides of the Amii Stewart double A).

My top 5:

Amii Stewart - Paradise Bird

Azymuth - Jazz Carnival

The Buggles - The Plastic Age

John Foxx - Underpass

Michael Jackson - Rock With You

Azymuth - Jazz Carnival

New Musik - Living By Numbers

Amii Stewart - Paradise Bird/The Letter

The Buggles - The Plastic Age

John Foxx - Underpass

All new to me (apart from Underpass from the Retro song contest) so good start x Honourable mention to the session spanning Captain Beakey

Best

Jon And Vangelis - I Hear You Now

Joe Jackson - It's Different For Girls

The Specials - Too Much Too Young (The Special AKA Live! EP)

The Tourists - So Good To Be Back Home Again

Peter Gabriel - Games Without Frontiers

Hon mention - Captain Beaky

Worst

Kool And The Gang - Too Hot

Commodores - Wonderland

Sister Sledge - Got To Love Somebody

Thanks for the votes so far. Thanks also to @Julian_ for the Polyhex chart runs I'm using as each song comes up on the Synctube sessions. These will appear in his reviews thread whose link (also added to the opening post) is: https://www.buzzjack.com/forums/topic/280473-julian-rates-every-top-40-hit-the-1980s-edition

Julian has also prepared the accompanying Spotify playlist (which is being added to in advance of future sessions) - all songs in today's session appear there except: Keith Michell - Captain Beaky/Wilfred The Weasel and Dave Edmunds - Singing The Blues.