Rock of Ages - Jobriath

[link] Didn't really know anything about these guys until I read about them on Wikipedia when looking up glam rock.  They were one of the major American glam acts.  There is a dissonance here between the music, which is pretty conventional hard rock that looks somewhat forward to some aspects of punk and metal, and the look, which is conceptual and futuristic. In my mind, they don't go together.

Rain on the Scarecrow - John Mellencamp

[link] Really great song.  Mellencamp is a modern American classic and has a lot of great ones.  This is one of my favorites.

Four Engines Burning Over the USA - Screaming Blue Messiahs

[link] Always had a thing for SBM. America reflected back to us through British, 80s, punk (and who knows what else) addled, male, eyes.

I Still Do - Cranberries

[link] One of my favorite bands of the 90s and one of my favorite songs of theirs.

Applause Applause - Lady Gaga

[link] Ru-Jun dances to this in her hip hop dance class and she saw it in a Kia Soul commercial.  I haven't followed Lady Gaga closely but she has a couple of good things that I've heard and this is one of them.  She's about more than the music, the whole pop/celebrity package, like Madonna is/was.  And in a pretty sophisticated way. Madonna got a lot of help on the musical side and maybe Lady Gaga does as well, I don't know.  Gaga seems to exploit stock dance/pop chord progressions more than Madonna, but she does a good job with them.  She's interesting, but I'm a bit repulsed by her strictly because of her popularity.  Maybe that's my loss, or maybe there's not much there there.  I probably won't ever study it enough to figure that out.

I Do the Rock - Tim Curry

[link] Fun to see him working live.  Fun guy at a fun time. (on edit: although this is likely to be lip-synched b/c no monitors, and it sounds a lot like the studio track; and the fadeout).

Totally novel ideas

in dreams, that I never would have thought of awake always fascinate me.  Had another one last night; not going to mention what it was.  Why (and how) does the brain do that?

Transponder snails

Just one of the examples why I love One Piece.  Bizarre and wonderful creativity.

Criteria for a good Halloween costume

1. warmth (for trick or treating or outdoor Halloween parades in these parts and where I grew up)
2. no makeup (it's a pain in the ass)
3. no masks (uncomfortable)

A Woman Needs Love - Ray Parker Jr. and Raydio

The pop charts in 1981 were still a miasma of 70s influences; this song is an example.  Very light fare. Bouncy.  Things weren't so severe back then.

Welcome Back Kotter theme/opening

[link] This was a great song (by John Sebastian) and intro.  The show was one of several classic 70s pop cultural attempt's at social progressivism (like Good Times, and All in the Family). The 70s ended with the dawn of the conservative era that we are currently still in, which was a fear- and hatred-based reaction to social progress of the 60s and 70s.

Biology doesn't have this problem

I like reading about quantum physics even though I don't have a feel for the mathematical side of the theory. All of the non-intuitive stuff, like entanglement, is really fascinating. What's also fascinating is that all of it is subject to a bewildering number of (and number of kinds of) interpretations and even though there are now realms of experimental data supporting the predictions of quantum mechanics, there is not yet a consensus on what the theory means in the real world.

Cat People (Putting Out Fire) - David Bowie

[link] Couldn't find the studio version from the Let's Dance album, which is better than this version, IMHO.  I don't remember seeing the movie, but I may have seen it back in the 80s sometime.  This is a great song (from a great album). Extremely atmospheric.  I'm not a huge Bowie fan except for the Let's Dance album, which I think is one of the best 80s albums. Bowie's detached vocal sound works perfectly in this song.

fashion

In terms of what I wear, I have two goals: (1) comfort, and (2) timelessness, which is that it would not look out of place in any of the last few decades.

Every Breath You Take - The Police

This is of course an ironic song.  It is about the creepiness of stalking.  It is not a romantic song.  People who think it's romantic are not intellectually mature enough to autonomously understand irony.
And, as overplayed as the song has always been, it's still a powerful piece of pop on the musical side.

Faded Flowers - Shriekback

[link] A dark and beautiful song.  No one was better than these guys in setting up an organo-SF atmosphere.  The beautiful melodic-romantic edge that makes goth, although Shriekback wasn't primarily known as a goth band (that I know of). Saw them open up for Simple Minds at Buff State College in 1985 (or possibly early 86).  They were great, especially the backing singers.  Good show.

Warcraft

I was really into Blizzard's real-time strategy game Warcraft.  But went to role playing in World of Warcraft, they lost me.  I don't have time for that kind of gaming these days; I really like real time strategy.  Just playing the against-the-computer modules was fun enough; I never played much against other people.  I tried Starcraft but the visuals were too dark; I literally couldn't see anything.  I liked the bright visuals of warcraft.  Warcraft III is available as the continuation of the Warcraft real time strategy game but I don't really have time to check it out.  It probably has a lot of changes.  I wonder if it still plays like Warcraft II.

You Might Recall - Genesis

[link] This is an immaculate song.  Genesis purists tend to like the earlier Peter Gabrial material.  But Phil Collins was supremely good and they cranked out a whole bunch of excellent songs right through the yellow eponymous shapes album in the early 80s. Collin's solo stuff was also pretty good right into the mid 80s.
I love how this song consists of this large cycle.  The driving bass line, the arpeggiating guitar with keyboard backing it.  The whole thing is really driving.  Then there's the key change toward the end.  These guys fused amazing pop out of art rock.

Come to My Aid - Simply Red

[link] Wasn't much better soul-pop than Simply Red in the mid 80s. The UK and Europe kept the 70s alive so that the US could rediscover everything about them in the 90s and after.

All For Leyna - Billy Joel

[link] I really liked this 1980 song. Piano driven like most of his stuff. It's in tune with the new wavey inflences that were trickling through rock at the time.  Still sounds pretty good.  Lots of interesting chords and changes.

Stumblin' In - Chris Norman and Suzi Quatro

[link] I had a thing for this 1979 song, which was played incessantly on the radio. It was kind of one of those annoying songs that grew on you. It holds up now only has a historical piece, really. Music was different then.

Imagination Movers - Magic

This is a really great song from Imagination Movers, which we watch in the morning while Ru-Jun wakes up.  Really good show with lots of good songs.  These guys are good.

Doc McStuffins - Halloween song

This is a really great song. Doc Mcstuffins is one of Ru-Jun's favorite shows.

Deeper and Deepr - The Fixx

[link] The Fixx in their highest period of popularity and guitar synthy wonderfulness. The 80s equivalent of art pop. Really liked this then and still pretty good now.

Organimodality II

Daily life is like moving through a two dimensional space filled with force vectors, like wind gusts, of various directions. Some days it may seem that all of the vectors oppose you. But really they are all in different directions and cancel out, providing no net opposition or assistance to your journey through them.

Standing in the Doorway - A Flock of Seagulls

[link] One of their more obscure tunes.  But I really like it.  It has an edge that their better known songs don't.  The instrumental part at the beginning is a really nice contrast. This band is more complex than the pop cliche that they became lets on.

Into the Fire - Sarah McLachlan

[link] I still remember exactly where I was when I heard this amazing song for the first time. I was at an impressionable age, in an impressionable time, and this song melted all over and through me.

Mirror Man - Talk Talk

[link] One of their very early songs and one of my favorites.  These guys are pop geniuses and I am one of the army of musicians who counts them as major influences. There are a lot of elements, the melody line and Mark Hollis's delivery, the hooks in both verse and chorus, the keyboard figures driving the whole thing, the entire atmosphere (really effective live), the building of the song.  All really singularly great here.

Tony Adams - Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros

Link below. Really nice song named after a soccer player. Heard it on WFUV the other day, which is a bit like WXYC was back in the day, very eclectic. 

http://youtu.be/EEEWarLHymI

The Magnificent Seven - The Clash

[link] I've always loved this classic of theirs. It's done with a nonchalance that's infectious. Not sure what the heck the song is about, but it's nevertheless attractive and rewards lots of listens.