1. Heartbeat City - The Cars 2. All Roads Lead To Rome - The Stranglers 3. I Die: You Die - Gary Numan 4. Auto Music (Razormaid! Mix) - Our Daughter's Wedding 5. To Cut A Long Story Short (12" Version) - Spandau Ballet 6. Fun City (12" Mix) - Soft Cell 7. 8:15 To Nowhere - Vicious Pink 8. Telecommunication - A Flock Of Seagulls 9. New Life (Remix) - Depeche Mode 10. Devil Inside (12" Remix) - INXS 11. Still Angry - Book Of Love 12. Today (Extended Version) - Talk Talk 13. A Forest (Tree Mix) - The Cure 14. The Metro (Extended Version) - Berlin 15. Take On Me (Tony Mansfield 12" Version) - A-ha Notes and other random things: So, hello again! Nice to make your acquaintance. Good to finally carve out an evening to record another podcast. I swear, these days I blink and three or four months go by. I suppose, relatively speaking, the same could be said for this episode as it is officially the shortest podcast in CRC history, clocking in at just under one hour. "So, Mr. DJ Tintin," I'm sure you're saying to yourself, "for all my patience waiting for you to give me some new tunes you reward me with LESS music???" It seems that way. You still get the requisite 15 songs, but many of these were single or album versions as opposed to remixes. That's the only defense I have. BUT, look at this artist and track list! Those of you looking for some stuff you haven't heard before may have just hit the mother lode. The Stranglers? Our Daughter's Wedding? Not exactly household names. "Fun City", "Heartbeat City", "Still Angry"? Not exactly the songs anyone would recall off the top of their heads by Soft Cell, The Cars or Book Of Love, respectively. But enough justification. On to the bands ... So, why were the 80s so great? A loaded question to be sure. But ask yourself how many bands in recent memory could have a member, who owned a hair salon, rent out a space above said hair salon, form a band, get discovered by Bill Nelson of Be Bop Deluxe fame, decide upon wearing women's clothes for a video shot in three days on a shoestring budget and become superstars thanks in some part to a fledgling music network called MTV and a now-famous hairstyle? Such was the fate of A Flock of Seagulls, a band that certainly helped alter my musical trajectory and, with the song I Ran (So Far Away), created one of the most iconic and lasting songs of the decade. THAT is the greatness of the 80s - the fact that music was not yet paint-by-number. There was room for experimentation. Sure, you had to be marketable, but the definition of marketable was fluid. And the rules were fluid. As long as someone in the know heard something they liked or saw a creative spark it was sometimes enough for a label to take a chance on you. Spoken like someone who thinks the music they grew up with is the best, I know. But I ask again: could that backstory exist today? Perhaps, but I just don't see it. As for the song in this podcast, "Telecommunication", it is sort of a cult hit at this point and probably an accidental one at that. "(It's Not Me) Talking" was the first single release by AFOS in 1981, but it was the futuristic lyrics and "wall of sound" energy, later praised by uber-producer Phil Spector, that propelled "Telecommunication" into the clubs and into hearts of new wavers. The tune still sounds cool and futuristic even today and reminds me of a moment in time when musical possibilities were still limitless. "No sequencers were used" reads the liner notes of Our Daughters Wedding's first EP, "Digital Cowboy". Layne Rico (electronic percussion / synth), Keith Silva (vocals / synth) and Scott Simon (synth / saxophone) wanted everyone to know that their electronic wizardry and sleight of hand was due entirely to coordination and skill and not programming and triggers like many of their contemporaries such as Depeche Mode and OMD, two groups to which ODW was often compared after their switch over from punk rock and guitars to new wave an(continued)