The Fave Songs by Year Challenge: 1986

A fantasy mixtape I wish I’d made back then

AI-generated image created by the author with Microsoft Copilot

It’s funny how the passage of time and our memories of different times in our lives work. There are some years in my very distant past, like when I was in high school, that I can remember almost perfectly. However, there are other years in which almost everything is now a blank to me.

I would think that’s probably very common for a lot of people as we get older. We get jobs, homes, etc., that we end up having for many years. It’s not that those times are necessarily bad, boring, or even forgettable in any way. However, looking back at them years later, one year may look almost completely interchangeable with multiple other years.

For example, I’m right now imagining my life when I was 27, 28, and 29. Each year I had the same job, same friends, etc., and each of the years was very similar to the others. I was very happy then, but now it’s not easy for me to instantly differentiate between those years.

However, if I give it a little more thought, I can easily find a wonderful thing that made each of those years (and just about every other year of my life) wonderful and unique:

The music that was released during those years!

I’ve been addicted to music since I was 10 years old in 1976. In each of the years since then, there have been A LOT of songs and albums released that I fell in love with — music that will always hold a special place in my music-loving heart and soul.

So, let’s go way back in time and take a look at some of the music I love from one of those years: 1986.

Other than some nice memories I have of being in college then and also of a fun part-time job I had at a local smoke shop, 1986 is kind of a blur to me now— except for a lot of the great music that came out that year!

Back then, as a lot of people around my age did, I frequently made mixtapes of songs I loved. I’d either record them off the radio or from vinyl albums and singles onto cassette tapes. I’m sure I made several mixtapes in 1986, but they’re all long gone now. I, unfortunately, can’t use any of them as exact references for what I’m writing here.

However, if I had created a mixtape at the very end of 1986 and included some of my favorite songs of the year on it, it would have looked something like this:

Side A

Manic Monday — The Bangles

[embed]Written by Prince (as Christopher)

Even though they’d had a couple of moderate hits from their first album, All Over The Place, this song from their second album, Different Light, was the song that catapulted The Bangles into superstardom.

Over forty (!) years later, it still gets played regularly on radio stations on Mondays. When it does, I never turn it off.

Digging Your Scene — The Blow Monkeys

[embed]Written by Dr. Robert

I know nothing else by The Blow Monkeys, but I’ve always loved this song.

Nasty — Janet Jackson

[embed]Written by James Harris III, Terry Lewis, and Janet Jackson

A huge hit on the radio, MTV, and just about everywhere else. It was one of several hit singles from her great breakthrough album Control.

I Engineer — Animotion

[embed]Written by Mike Chapman, Bernie Taupin, and Holly Knight

This song seemed to be more popular on MTV than it was on radio stations. Unfortunately, it disappeared from both pretty quickly. I’ve never understood how it wasn’t a much bigger hit than it was. I’ve always loved it.

Walk This Way — Run-DMC featuring Aerosmith

[embed]Written by Steven Tyler and Joe Perry

Not only did this fun collaboration bring a new level of fame to Run-DMC, but it also helped revive the popularity of Aerosmith, who had been going through a bit of a slump in sales and popularity before it was released. It sort of ‘jump-started’ what would become several years of big hit records for the band.

I especially love the entertaining and often very funny music video for the song.

Secret Separation — The Fixx

[embed]Written by Dan K. Brown, Cy Curnin, Rupert Greenall, Jeannette Obstoj, Jamie West-Oram, and Adam Woods

I was already a big fan of The Fixx before this one was released. I loved (and still love) their earlier hits “Stand Or Fall,” “Saved By Zero,” “Deeper And Deeper,” but “Secret Separation” quickly became my favorite by them.

NOTE: If you’ve never seen the music video for the song, I encourage you to watch it. It’s a little (okay, more than a little) bizarre, but it’s very entertaining.

American Storm — Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band

[embed]Written by Bob Seger

This is probably one of the less-popular songs I’m sharing here, even though it was a hit in multiple countries when it was new. It reached #13 on the Billboard Hot 100 Chart, but it seems to be mostly forgotten now. I don’t think I’ve heard it played even once on the radio since the 80s.

Maybe I’m wrong, but maybe it has something to do with the subject matter of the song: cocaine abuse. After all, that certainly isn’t the most ‘radio-friendly’ topic.

While I’m very anti-cocaine, that’s not why I dig the song as much as I do. I love “American Storm” simply because it’s a great rockin’ and rollin’ song! Seger’s vocals and the music in it are fantastic. I’d rank it in my personal Top 3 favorites from Seger and his band.

Side B

Calling America — Electric Light Orchestra

[embed]Written by Jeff Lynne

This was E.L.O.’s last Top 40 hit (at least so far) in the United States. It’s from their great (and I think underrated) album Balance of Power. It’s always been one of my favorites by them.

That Was Then, This Is Now — The Monkees

[embed]Written by Vance Brescia

I instantly became a huge fan of The Monkees in the mid-70s, after discovering their music while watching reruns of their old TV series from the 60s. At that point, though, The Monkees had been broken up for several years. Naturally, I thought I’d never be able to hear new music from them or see them live.

Therefore, I was beyond thrilled when they reunited in 1986 and had a huge hit with “That Was Then, This Is Now.” The song’s success led to future recordings and several concert tours for The Monkees. Lucky for me, I saw them several times in concert over the ensuing 30 years. Each time was fantastic!

Press — Paul McCartney

[embed]Written by Paul McCartney

This is another song that seems to be mostly forgotten about now, but it’s always been one of my favorites by Paul — in no small part because of the very entertaining music video for it. I remember recording it off of MTV onto a videotape and playing it over and over and over again back then.

That tape is long gone, of course, but I still watch the fun video on a very regular basis.

To Be A Lover — Billy Idol

[embed]Written by William Bell and Booker T. Jones

I didn’t know it until many years later, but this song was originally recorded as a soul ballad entitled “I Forgot To Be Your Lover” in 1968 by one of its co-writers, singer William Bell. At that point, it hit #45 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Billy’s much more rocking retitled version of the song, nearly 20 years later, made it to #6 on that same Billboard chart. I’m a big fan of Billy and this has always been one of my favorites by him.

Dreamtime — Daryl Hall

[embed]Written by Daryl Hall and John Beeby

Daryl’s first and most successful song as a solo artist (at least so far). I think it’s one of his best songs ever — including his songs with John Oates.

Talk Dirty To Me — Poison

[embed]Written by Bret Michaels, Rikki Rockett, Bobby Dall, and C.C. DeVille

Will I ever be able to meet someone named “C.C.” and not ask them to “pick up that guitar and talk to me?”

Why, no. No, I won’t.

P.S. — In case you don’t know “Talk Dirty To Me,” the above was a reference to a fun line in the song from singer Bret Michaels to lead guitarist C.C. Deville.

Also, if you don’t know the song, do yourself a favor right now and listen to it. Turn up your volume first, though!

California Dreamin’ — The Beach Boys

[embed]Written by John Phillips and Michelle Phillips

“California Dreamin’” was a huge hit by The Mamas & the Papas when they released it in 1965.

The Beach Boys’ remake of it was quite popular, especially on MTV, where the music video of the song went into heavy rotation for quite a while.

It’s a great video. One of the things I love about it is that it featured cameo appearances by the song’s songwriters, John and Michelle Phillips of The Mamas & the Papas. It also featured a cameo by fellow 60s’ music star Roger McGuinn of The Byrds, who performed a great guitar solo on the new track.

Some may view this as ‘sacrilegious,’ but I actually prefer The Beach Boys’ version of “California Dreamin’” over the original. Their vocals on it are great.

AI-generated image created by the author with Microsoft Copilot

There were many other songs from 1986 that I could have also easily included here, but I could fit only so many songs onto my fantasy 60-minute cassette tape.

Hmmm….maybe I’ll have to consider doing a Volume 2 tape also!

NOTE: This post is my reply to a music challenge I recently created: The Fave Songs by Year Challenge. If you’d like to learn more about the challenge, please click below to see my initial post about it:

[embed]The Fave Songs by Year Challenge P.S. — Welcome to the new publication PubBeat!medium.com

Also, if you’d like to do the challenge yourself and share it here in PubBeat, please click here to learn how to be added as a writer to the publication.

Thank you for reading. Have a great day!

Image by kalhh from Pixabay