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Now That's What I Call [chat]!

BogartBogart Streetwise HerculesRegistered User, Moderator mod
edited August 2018 in Debate and/or Discourse
Soon to release its 100th collection, Now That's What I Call Music is a touchstone for people of a certain age. Several certain ages, actually. Take a bunch of stuff that charted over the last six months, whack it on a double album, get it out quickly and boom just the cover can call forth a multitude of teenage nostalgia many moons later. Where else can you find Run DMC sharing space with Steve Winwood?

I had two of these, 8 and 15, and boy howdy did they get played a lot. 8 was on a double cassette package, an antique I expect to be worth thousands in fifty years time. Sure, they were repackaging hits in a cynical, cash-grabbing way but for a snapshot of a period in time they are remarkably effective. Check these track listings, groovesters. Look at the subtle mix of absolute dross, forgettable mediocrity and a few stone cold classics that blend to form an indelible picture of a spotty but incredibly handsome youth in his bedroom, endlessly playing these songs and being introduced to Soul II Soul and Neneh Cherry while hurriedly fast forwarding through Jive Bunny And The Master Mixers and Boris Gardiner.

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Now That’s What I Call Music! 8, released 24th November 1986 (bolded for excellence)

Notorious - Duran Duran
Suburbia - Pet Shop Boys
Walk This Way - Run DMC
Don't Leave Me This Way - The Communards
Breakout - Swing Out Sister
Higher Love - Steve Winwood
(Forever) Live And Die - Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark
In Too Deep - Genesis
Word Up - Cameo
I'm Not Perfect (But I'm Perfect For You) - Grace Jones
Showing Out (Get Fresh At The Weekend) - Mel & Kim
We Don't Have To Take Our Clothes Off - Jermaine Stewart
Step Right Up - Jaki Graham
What Have You Done For Me Lately - Janet Jackson
Human - The Human League
I Wanna Wake Up With You - Boris Gardiner
Don't Give Up - Peter Gabriel & Kate Bush
Think For A Minute - The Housemartins
(Waiting For The) Ghost Train - Madness
In The Army Now - Status Quo
Stuck With You - Huey Lewis & The News
One Great Thing - Big Country
Greetings To The New Brunette - Billy Bragg
(I Just) Died In Your Arms - Cutting Crew
You Keep Me Hanging On - Kim Wilde
Calling All The Heroes - It Bites
Waterloo - Doctor & The Medics
French Kissin' In The USA - Deborah Harry
I Didn't Mean To Turn You On - Robert Palmer
The Wizard - Paul Hardcastle
(They Long To Be) Close To You - Gwen Guthrie
Every Loser Wins - Nick Berry

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Now That’s What I Call Music! 15, released 14th August 1989 (bolded for excellence)

I Want It All - Queen
Kick It In - Simple Minds
Good Thing - Fine Young Cannibals
Americanos - Holly Johnson
Baby I Don't Care - Transvision Vamp
Mystify - INXS
The Look - Roxette
Rooms On Fire - Stevie Nicks
My Brave Face - Paul McCartney
Ferry Cross The Mersey - Gerry Marsden & Paul McCartney & Holly Johnson
Song For Whoever - The Beautiful South
Days - Kirsty MacColl
The Second Summer Of Love - Danny Wilson
Cry - The Waterfront
Violently (7" Version) - Hue And Cry
The Best Of Me - Cliff Richard
Back To Life (However Do You Want Me) - Soul II Soul Featuring Caron Wheeler
Manchild - Neneh Cherry
Every Little Step - Bobby Brown
Do You Love What You Feel (Duane Bradley Remix) - Inner City
It's Time To Get Funky - D-Mob & LRS
Joy And Pain - Donna Allen
Licence To Kill - Gladys Knight
Miss You Like Crazy - Natalie Cole
It's Alright - Pet Shop Boys
Swing The Mood (Medley) - Jive Bunny & The Music Mixers
You On My Mind - Swing Out Sister
Cruel Summer '89 - Bananarama
Say No Go - De La Soul
Blame It On The Bassline - Norman Cook & MC Wildski
Just Keep Rockin' - Double Trouble & The Rebel MC
Lullaby - The Cure

Young folk today will roll their eyes at grandad and his albums of music curated by a human being rather than an unfeeling algorithm but I tells you this was the style at the time. I could still sing along to 80% of the songs on these albums, I think, even the terrible ones and the mediocre ones. An appalling use of brain cells or a direct and febrile connection to a couple of years in the eighties? I DON'T KNOW.

Why yes, I will abuse my position to make a [chat] thread about whatever I like even if it's a fleeting bit of nostalgia that sailed into my head because of a podcast and I've long since tossed the actual albums in the bin or lost them or had them chewed up by a tape player because that's what happens to all cassettes eventually.

Bogart on
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