[chachaheels]

Mouni, you've just made me think all over again about how many things I do so easily on a daily basis took me so much more time and effort (or they were completely impossible) in the 80's...particularly where computers and the internet are concerned. Then again, I can't imagine many of the things we enjoyed in the 80's would have had much of a chance to make such an impact on the world if all of us were as attached to the computer as we are now. Amazing.


Sassygirl, the Police used to come to Toronto or the area somewhere near Toronto on these big festivals called "Police Picnics". They lasted for hours and hours, and featured dozens of acts. I remember watching James Brown perform during one of these--almost 100 degree fahrenheit weather, blazing, full sun, and there were James and all his men basically performing at hyperspeed, all in orange and pink polyester. Surreal. By the time the Police actually took the stage, I'd been in the sun for a full 15 hours. It was still exciting to see all those acts and go home toasty red and exhausted. I was completely in awe of and in lust for Stewart Copeland and his lacey, airy, powerful cymbal work...so Sting was lovely, but not my favourite.

I love summer concerts!! I just remembered.

[mouni4]

Hi Chachaheels and Sassygrrl; interesting to read this thing on Moon Unit Zappa
and yay: I know Dweezil only from one solo on "Them or Us" but it was quite an amazing one.
For the book - I can easily imagine that it's quite funny 'cause I know many cool quotes from FZ.

One thing that for me is also very interesting is that every decade seems to me totally unique - there are so many films from the 80's that so fully express something typical for this time and can't be reproduced in a similar way - like "Back to the Future".
Looking back is fun, but on the other hand posting on a forum would have been impossible for me in the 80's - and I don't want to miss it now.
Busties rock!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[sassygrrl]

I always loved the Zappas. Dweezil especially.

Yes, I read that article in Bitch about Jem. Thanks for the cartoon link. I think watching Robot Chicken is like stepping into an 80's time warp. There was even a skit about Cabbage Patch Kids vs Chucky. Funny, I was at a conference in Helen GA for my last job, and had to pass Babyland General. I remember going there once or twice as a kid, and going with a bratty girl who insisted my parents buy her a doll....

God, would have killed to see Police when they were still around. I have seen Sting twice. That was rad. And still haven't gotten around to see The Cure, Morrisey, or REM yet.... I'll try to take some pictures. His new album is beyond amazing.

Yes, I remember those sweaters...ha!

What about the cool ass toy? I'm thinking everything is coming back. I saw Care Bears in Target the other day, and My Little Pony as well.

[chachaheels]

She's 40. She's apparently been doing quite a lot of different things--acting, writing novels (!), even on shows like Curb Your Enthusiasm. I know her brother Dweezil has been playing music for years, and her other brother Ahmed married Selma Blair a few years ago.

I liked listening to some Zappa (Sheik Yerbooty's "Dancin' Fool") when I was younger (there were older friends of mine who listened to his stuff, cause they were more familiar with his earlier music with the Mothers of Invention) but I thought his autobiography was profound, and hilarious. If you ever get a chance to read it, you should--Zappa was an adventurous musician and artist, he loved to laugh at things and at himself and he was very outspoken. A far cry from so many of the manufactured "celebrity" musicians we're surrounded by so often lately.

[mouni4]

Funny, I wouldn't have expected to read the name Zappa on this forum ( I don't know how old this child of Zappa is) but maybe she/he joins the Zappa plays Zappa Tour - I guess this is the name -
that has recently toured Europe with many bandmenbers of Zappa and also Dweezil. For me the 80's were a lot of Zappa and lots of other groups, one time I visited a really all out great "Defunkt" Concert - their Bass player
is Kim Clarke and she has been the most impressive bass player that I've ever seen performing. I didn't know her name and when I googled I also found this:
www.bassgirls.com
The 80's were also a lot of other stuff, and one certainly was

it's like a jungle sometimes ..... ( yay the beginnings of rap and graffiti really rocked)


but many things I only got to know later on ( for example films).
Still an interesting time ....

[chachaheels]

I wonder what Moon Unit Zappa is doing now.

[pepper]

i have a pair of panties with all these valley girl saying on them, totally, gag me with a spoon, gnarly, ha ha ha!

[chachaheels]

No, they did not mean that always. You were not clueless, freckle. People just got "creative" about their meaning, to reflect, say, their own generation's ideas.

If they'd have been around when I was watching the trend go around for the first time, and they had a meaning, I'd have made all my bracelets signify "bite my ass", I'm so skeeved by what the bracelets mean now. I can't imagine anything worse that the utter cluelessness and lack of ability and skill of the pubescent. Can you? Talk about a lousy sexual experience.

Does anyone remember Dolman sleeved sweaters? And the fact that all coats had to be redesigned so that you could wear them over those sweaters?

These were the concerts I HAD!!! to get tickets for during the 80's:
U2; The Police; Big Country; The Cure; The Psychedelic Furs; David Bowie; Simple Minds; King Sunny Ade; The Cult; UB40, REM...

[freckleface2727]

sassy-
I am Beyond Jealous that you get to see Tom Petty next month !!!
do take lots & lots of pictures to share here please?
my sister has seen him at least 3 x's, but in my feeble life I've only just seen rod stewart and the Stones (ageless) last year. I so <3 Tom Petty though. she grew up strong and she grew up right, with them Indiana boys on them Indiana nights.


Bitch mag has a long article on Jem in this month's issue.
how they were both cutting-edge for the almost sole-female-utopia they created, w/ any neccesary men playing weak and stupid and minor parts, but then blew it by hawking so many products and really pushing the IMAGE of the ideal or something like that.

interesting.. the first 2 or 3 pages... what I can say, sometimes I have a short attention span


true blue.
maud how I HATE that song!!
theatre class, jr yr, 1988, our class dance for Talent Show.
the only redeeming factor from it was my friend Bill, a total anarchist, had dyed his tall mohawk blue for it, which certainly livened a gay number up!
that he was already pushing 6 feet w/out the hair was even better. there he was, stomping in his Docs as he's dancing around doing these side to side skip-jump-skip-slide moves. with That hair. ( & of course, his beat up leather jacket of course.)
I wish so much I knew what had happened to him, bc he was by far the coolest guy there, and possibly one of the coolest I've ever known period.

coneheads. we come from france, we wear no pants.
maybe that's why I married the mr? bc I sensed that someday he'd get weird on me and start saying random things like that when I least expect it?

breakdancing. parachut pants.
and those skinny multicolored bracelets, which now mean dirty dirty things!
each color is a sexual activity "available" to whomever comes by & flicks it on the wrist.
y'all probly knew that though, but I just learned about it a year or 2 ago & was Horrified!!!
or- gasp- did they ALWAYS mean that I was just clueless?? (bc I used to wear them)

[bunnyb]

80's cartoons (look down left-hand side for listings).
Takes me back... I loved Thundercats, Care Bears, My Little Pony, Rainbow Brite, He-man and Shera, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, EWOKS, Teddy Ruxpin, Gummy Bears, The Racoons, Cities of Gold...

[sybarite]

Red Emma, I remember buying True Blue; I played that to death. And I completely forgot that people used to say 'tubular'! (That is, I used to say it... shudders)

Snafooey, that Tom Petty video creeped me out too, especially the part when (I think) the camera started swinging around the alice-cake and the mad hatter was laughing wildly. Eesh. I can't believe I remember this.

Oddly, I didn't watch much TV as a kid, it didn't interest me so I don't get half the references. These days however it's a different story...

[pepper]

"...but not too old to watch Thundercats. As long as my little brother was in the room as a cover."
hee hee, me too!!

punky boobster!

i got the thriller album, vinyl mind you, for xmas. it folded out three ways to reveal a sultry, reasonably sized-nosed, dark-skinned michael and a teeny baby tiger cub. sex-ay. at least to tweeny me and my ilk anyhow. what the heck did we know eh?

janet rocks the planet rock, wikky wikky wikky wikky wikky.

bow-wow-wow-yippee-yo-yippee-yah
bow-wow-yippe-yo-yippee-yah.

we don't need no water, let the mother fucker burn
burn motherfucker, burn...

if you wanna ride, don't ride the white horse.
if you wanna ride, ride the white pony.
if you want to be rich,
you got to be a bitch.
white highway, tell all your friends they can go my way.

don't push me 'cause i'm close to the edge,
i'm tryin' not to lose my head, uh huh huh huh.

a fly girl is a girl who wants you to see
her name her game and her ability
two gold teeth, cold cash money
the guys are on the track they tend to act funny.

can you tell i grew up close to the motor city?
heh. girl can shake her ass too, ask around.

[sixelacat]

All I remember from USA is Up All Night with Caroline Schlitt. Loved those awful Tromaville horror films!

Spenser for Hire. I loved Hawk more than Robert Urich.

Toni Basil also choreographed those Gap Khaki ads in the late 90's. And she was so into cheerleading she formed a squad with her girlfriends in junior high when her school had no sports teams.

freckle, my friends and I still do the "Land Shark!" bit around here too! I miss SNL when it was funny! "Jane, you ignorant slut!" or "Wookin' Po Nub"....

And MTV when it played music videos. Had a HUGE crush on Downtown Julie Brown....

Too old for Jem, but not too old to watch Thundercats. As long as my little brother was in the room as a cover.

Oh, and can't forget turquoise or yellow mascara! In junior high we used to sit in study hall coloring our bangs with it, and discuss tips for convincing our moms into letting us have Cyndi Lauper haircuts....

[RedEmma718]

Oh, man, I was such a geek in the '80s...my thing was Michael Jackson. Thriller was the first pop tape I ever had. Later on, I bought Madonna's True Blue with my own money. Tubular!

I was also obsessed with Cabbage Patch Kids. I thought I'd never get one, and I ended up with like eleven of them!

My best friend and I were crazy about "Punky Brewster." We were determined to invite Soleil Moon Frye to visit us and make her our best friend. How that would have worked out, I have no idea. Like SMF was going to come to our little town in PA and hang out. Bag your face, I'm sure.

What else...well, I wasn't allowed to watch much TV. I guess my biggest thrill was being able to sneak a few minutes of "Cheers" before my dad finally made me go to bed. It always bugged me that Diane left Frasier for Sam. Even when I was eight, I had a thing for pretentious intellectuals.

pepper, I had a babysitter who wore pinstriped jeans and had feathered hair. Ohhhh, she was such a badass. She scared the hell out of me! (Hey, whaddya want? I was a cello playing, four-eyed nerd! :-))

[pepper]

JEM!!! i was too old for it but my little sister (who is now a famous musician, go figure) was WAY into jem and the misfits, truly outrageous!
i'm sending her a care package that includes some paint by numbers canvas boards of jem and her entourage that i'm making. that should make her laugh and keep her busy for an afternoon at least. nothing like homemade ghetto cartoon art to decorate the walls of your all-inclusive 5 star hotel eh? (lucky little brat).

magnum pi.
flock of seagulls. loved them. and that band that sang the eye in the sky song, who were they again? totally nerdy goodness.
my mom has school pics where i have on skinny jeans, dark blue with pinstripes, and not one but Two layers of bunchy legwarmers with turquoise suede dessert boots and so much black eyeliner. the pre-requisite assymetrical hair of course and dangly multi-layered earrings in some ghastly flourescent shade as well. she keeps that one on the piano (maude-darn her!). how utterly humiliating.
gah, i remember dying over simon lebon and thinking to myself oh, if only he could meet me, then he'd Know that i'm the only girl for him!"

bah ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!

[sassygrrl]

Dire Straights rocked, and Mark Knoplor is still incredible in concert. I so remember that Tom Petty video, and it scaring me a bit. I can't wait to see him in concert next month!!

Damn, Toni is over 60!


I so loved Express and the Limited as a kid.

God, I loved old SNL when it used to be good...ha!

I think Moonlighting is finally out on DVD.

80's DVD note as well, I just got Golden Girls season 4 in the mail today. Yay!

Anyone remember Jem? I dug her boyfriend with the purple hair....

[anna k]

Toni had been a part of the late 60's Hollywood rebel crowd with Jack Nicholson and Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda. Checking IMDB, she's 63 now, which makes her about 40 when Mickey came out.

[chachaheels]

Toni Basil was actually a choreographer. She danced professionally, but she was really famous for choreographing other peoples' videos. Something nags at me to suggest she may have choreographed David Bowie's Boys Keep Swinging video, among others, or one of his big tours...but I'm really probably wrong on that. She did, however, make a huge career out of choreographing in movies, other people's concert tours, other people's shows. And she has done some acting in film herself. Oh Mickey was just her go at making a video and a joke about that painful highschool affliction, having a big crush on a boyfriend who's most likely gay.

I loved that, especially, about the 80's. That suddenly there were music videos on TV. I loved watching them, even the ones that were ridiculous (I distinctly remember one that the pre-incarnation of Much Music here in Canada played as a satire of Banarama...the song was called "The Devil Lives in My Husband's Body" and it was sung by 3 girls who harmonized simply but badly, just like Bananarama did...and in their song they complained that "their friends can't come over anymore...")

[freckleface2727]

syb you're so right- it was Toni Basil and not PB! many sorry's!

I liked both,and they were both kick ass women-singers, still a relatively new concept in rock at the time, except, what else besides mickey did TB actually do?

I will admit this here and Only here, I was a humongous fan of Knight Ridder, and david hasselhoff, which my family made fun of and called hesaho.

and so before you ask, I Have watched America's Got Talent, but really, not bc of him!

mr F:
I don't remember Night Flight but I do remember Friday Night Video's, which was the highlight of my early pre-adolenscent week. followed of course, by SNL, and the never to have been so good again, cast from 2nd City on the show. John Beulushi, Dan Akroyd, RosananRoasanaDana Tana - Gilda Radner, Gene Wilder... man those cats could crack my ass up! <knock knock>' who's there? ' " uh, Mailman." ' at my bathroom door?' <knock knock> 'who's there?' "uh, Meter man." <knock knock> ' who's there?'
-finally opens door- " Land Shark!!!!!!"
the mr & I actually do this to each other when we're being goofy here at home.

[pepper]

oh, i almost gave my friend's 5 yr old son a mullet the other day with the clippers out on our deck. it was to be his back to school do before he got shipped back to mama in cali, ha ha. we decided not at the last minute though, too bad woulda been so cute.