What Music DEFINES The Eighties?


Kumaki

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What one band/singer for you totally defines the Eighties?

For me, I don't give a shit what anyone says, Huey Lewis is the shit!  The Eighties are not the Eighties without Heuy Lewis.
 
Depeche Mode, New Order etc.


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For me?  It would be have to be Van Halen.  Started off the decade red-hot and petered-out towards the end of the decade as "VanHagar"...but they were my favorite band (of the 80's for sure).  I listened to them more than any other band of that era.  My musical interests were more big-haired Heavy Metal bands though, so your mileage may vary.   :p  

...and YES, I get that they didn't have the quintessential "Eighties Sound" to them - whatever that was.  My younger brother would probably suggest The Cure or something like that (gag).
 
I find that this kind of answers depend a lot on where you lived. There's very little true international band that was famous all around the world in the 80s in the same way. 

In Japan one start to find commonalities where you go in the 60s with the Beatles, but after that... 

Otherwise for me the 80s is Queen. They were also very strong in the late 70s, but their popularity skyrocketed in the 80s and they had these huge concerts in stadiums that noone else did before them. 

Add David Bowie, Michael Jackson... and probably a couple I am missing. 
 
Duran Duran, Flock of Seagulls, Berlin, Devo, Alphaville, Thomas Dolby were pretty 80s - New Wave
 
I'm a bit weird so my picks aren't going to apply to many other people, but:


Enya


Laurie Anderson


Paul Simon


Johnny Clegg


Then, because I was a kid during the eighties -


Theme music for: Labyrinth (David Howie), Never Ending Story, Airwolf, McGuiver, MLP, Rainbow Brite, Alvin and the Chipmunks. :)


Then 80's music I grew to appreciate *after* the 80's:


Depache Mode


Pet Shop Boys


Men Down Under


... and many more, but I can't recall the artists off the top of my head, and I don't listen to 80's 'emo' music anymore... The 'new romantics' movement of the 80's glorified co-dependancy and 'need' ... So even though I can still enjoy the tunes... The lyrics are just so grossly delusional I find them irritating to listen to.


P.s. I don't listen to any other 'co-dependant' music either... So i'm not just singling out the 80's.
 
I'm a bit weird so my picks aren't going to apply to many other people, but:


Enya


Laurie Anderson


Paul Simon


Johnny Clegg
Nothing very definitive 80s about them.
Depache Mode


Pet Shop Boys


Men Down Under
You probably mean
Depeche Mode


Men at Work (Land down under)


Of these two Men at Work were more firmly rooted in 80s style.


Some more really 80s bands


Foreigner, Asia, Air Supply :)
 
As has been said before - It all depends on where you lived. And also what you mean by "Defines". In my mind, Huey Lewis, Def Leppard, Scorpions and a lot of similar bands indeed defines eighties music - in a bad way. Overblown, overproduced, and most of all boring samey-same. That, of course, being the american version of it - If you look to the UK music scene at the same time, there is a parallell in the oh-so-horrible Stock-Aitken-Waterman stuff, UB40, Level 42 and most of the stuff you'd find on any "Eighties collection". It defines the bad parts of eighties music.

Then again, at the same time we had the beginnings of synthpop stuff - Depeche, Bronskij Beat, OMD. Kraftwerk, the grandfathers of it all. The bits of postpunk and new romantics that were actually good - Early Ultravox, Gang of Four, and so on. The weirdos - Kate Bush (She really is, y'know), XTC - and the beginnings of industrial coming up from the underground, with Neubauten, Blue for Two...uh. My memory is failing me. I also have a kind of guilty pleasure thing with stuff like Sisters of Mercy and The Mission :) And, of course, Dexys. Loads and loads of good stuff. 

Most of this I wasn't aware of at the time. I was a bit late to the whole "listening to music" thing (I caught up later). But even so, in retrospect, it is a regional thing. Many of these things that people from the US cite - Asia, Foreigner, Huey Lewis, ... just draws blanks for me and most of the people I know. Not as in bad or good, more like so bland it is unrememberable :) If I were to pick stuff that in retrospect somehow would represent important eighties US music, then it would most definitely lean towards Afrika Bambaataa or Run DMC kinds of things.

And, well, of course: The eighties were the decade of the superstars in a way that probably never will come again - Michael Jackson, Prince, Madonna, Queen, U2...All of them sort of gathered momentum enough to just continue for a decade or two more, but they're insintrically eighties. Not even US eighties - Global eighties.

Hm. I could write far too much on this subject.
 
Depends on your musical taste and location/culture. Some bands I didn't see above. 

The Cult, Simple Minds, Eurythmics

Slayer - Iron Maiden - Motorhead 

Supertramp 

Dead Kennedys / The Ramones 
 
Landscape, Gary Numan, Human League, Frankie Goes To Hollywood (and Trevor Horn produced music in general), OMD, Howard Jones, Billy Idol, It's Immaterial, A-Ha, Tears For Fears, Stephen Tin Tin Duffy (list goes on, and on, and..)

and sometimes stuff like this would stick in your mind:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/iNAuGs-JM98?feature=oembed
 
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Its pretty hard to specify one particular thing that really defined the 80s because it was all so very new and very diverse. I guess you could say that synthesised music was a very big thing to distinguish the 80s from the 70s but even that is not necessarily accurate as a lot of synthetic music had been being made since the 70s and earlier (like the Doctor Who theme!).

If I were to try and specify something that really defined the 80s though, and in a way that was truly special and without seeming somehow a parody of something else I would probably say something like 1999 by Prince or maybe something by Michael Jackson would be pretty defining. But it is hard since everything either diversified or changed. Someone like Elton John was completely different in the 80s to the 70s. Rock music changed, metal got heavier and glammer. Pop music became more post modern and you saw punk bands getting darker and more experimental. Really, the 80s just blew the creative doors wide open so maybe the defining feature was the shattering of barriers and proliferation of creativity.
 
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