Greatest Billboard Top 40(-ish) Ballad (1988 edition)

Good poll. I'm trying to imagine Stevie B's "Spring Love" as a ballad though.

or "paradise" even

Yeaaaah, I stretched, admittedly.

My finalists:

B. Sure! - 'Nite And Day'
Anita Baker - 'Giving You The Best That I Got'
Belinda Carlisle - 'I Get Weak'
Brenda K. Starr - 'I Still Believe'
Brenda Russel - 'Piano In The Dark'
Cheap Trick - 'The Flame'
Cinderella - 'Don't Know What You Got ('Til It's Gone)'
Def Leppard - 'Love Bites'
George Michael - 'One More Try'
Gloria Estefan - 'Can't Stay Away From You'
Sade - 'Paradise'
Stevie B. - 'Spring Love'
Terence Trent D'Arby - 'Sign Your Name'
The Church - 'Under The Milky Way'

Several of those songs are among my favorites of all time

If not "Father Figure," then this write-in (#41):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxuuFQLBPeU

I voted for The Church even though that track doesn't really fit with the rest of the list. What a miserable time, the mountains of terrible ballads were just the worst.

Brenda Russell's "Piano in the Dark" -- Classic or Dud?

don't sleep on 'wait'

okay it's probably #7 on this list but

oh god I forgot "If It Isn't Love."

"TONIGHT I NEED YOUR SWEET CARRESS! HOLD ME IN THE DARKNESS!!!!!!!!"

I have not heard that song since I was seven years old.

"If It Isn't Love" isn't really a ballad in the sense of something like "Giving You The Best That I Got" or "Father Figure"; imagine someone slow-dancing to it and you'll see what I mean.

same as "The Promise."

I think I tripped myself up by not re-listening to the tracks before I started the poll. I was thinking 'wistful' and 'pleading' and 'melancholy' and forgot that some of them had a beat.

"TONIGHT I NEED YOUR SWEET CARRESS! HOLD ME IN THE DARKNESS!!!!!!!!"

― Mr. Snrub, Wednesday, July 22, 2015 10:20 AM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

When I was a kid, I half=thought the following lines were "Tonight you cause my breastlessness, do you believe my sandwich?"

"always on my mind" reached the U.S. top 5 in 1988 too! i'm leaning towards "two occasions"

I was thinking 'wistful' and 'pleading' and 'melancholy' and forgot that some of them had a beat.

some of which are foolish

Oh, fuck. I forgot 'Fast Car'.

This poll is a shambles.

But '88 is great!

I always think ballads should be love songs in some sense, so I wouldn't worry about "Fast Car"'s omission. Great song, but to me something else.

TTD narrowly over New Edition.

And I will stan for gothy INXS too.

As I continue to dig into 1988, I naturally discover that the best year for ballads also features easily the worst ballad of the '80s (maybe in the history of pop music, even?). I don't know how I never heard this monstrosity before:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-a5HJ3DFEyQ

oh it's been mentioned a lot -- it even came up at EMP Pop Conference last April. Fortunately it wasn't played more than a few weeks in December '87.

Torn between one more try and aaaaayeeyeeyeeyaangel

"Angel"

"The Flame" #2

poison

"Father Figure" over "Love Bites" over "One More Try"

in 88 I might have spoken up for the take on Swayze's hit, "She Passes Wind"

"Cant Stay Away From You" is flawless.

Voting for Al B! because "If It Isn't Love" isn't a ballad.

Oh shit I didn't see "Two Occasions". Reconsidering.

"Cant Stay Away From You" is flawless.

― Master of Treacle, Friday, July 24, 2015 5:41 PM

yeah I said in the '86 poll that this is the only period when Gloria Estefan wrote and sang simple mean-what-they-say ballads, of which this is the best.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I still have no idea of what to vote for. I think I've created the impossible poll.

Father Figure over Sade, Richard Marx, When in Rome, hell I even love the Cinderella

Angel.

"One More Try" over the other 2 GM songs, but I'm surprised that I actually like a lot of these. I was never a big fan of ballads as a kid.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

i'm just going to note before anyone has that ILX WHYYYY poll freakout that while under the milky way tied for first, it did it with six votes. so you're yelling at six people. considering the great silent indie majority usually in these polls, 6 is actually kinda small.

I'm more WHYYYY about 'Father Figure' tying for first when it's clearly the lesser of the three George Michael songs on offer here.

WHYYYY did two ppl vote for 'angel'???

way too many songs up there that aren't remotely ballads. would've voted 'nite and day' over 'under the milky way' and 'love bites' among the ballads, 'if it isn't love' over 'paradise' among the non-ballads. 'one more try' for george michael ballad but that might just be cuz i still hear 'father figure' but never really hear 'one more try' anymore.

i can't remember if i ended up voting for "angel", "one more try" or if i forgot to vote

Without your love a dog without a bone

it wouldn't have won my vote but bon jovi's 'i'll be there for you' would've been a contender

otm, i love that the climax immediately follows a reveal that the song is a belated birthday card

I DIDN'T MEAN TO MISS YR BIRTHDAY BABY
YOU KNOW I WISH I'D SEEN YOU BLOW THOSE CANDLES
OUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU-OUUUUUUUUUT

precisely my fave moment

I voted for "Nite and Day" with 'One More Try' and Anita Baker close seconds.

Oh, didn't see this poll, would have voted for 'Father Figure'.

i swear to go i think i might hear stevie b's 'one more try' more than george michael's nowadays

i wonder if stevi b's pizza is stevi b's pizza instead of stevie b's pizza because of 'one more try' stevie b

I broke down and voted 'Kissing a Fool'. Anita and Al B. were very, very close to getting the nod. Sad to see that Taylor was locked out. 'I'll Always Love You' is up there with 'Love Will Lead You Back' in her amazing ballads canon.

balls, I think you mean Timmy T. Dope ballad.

I was about to stay

*say even

FUCK how did i confuse timmy t's 'one more try' w/ stevie b's 'because i love you'?????? WHYYYYY???

http://media.giphy.com/media/3GhNj6yQzOCs0/giphy.gif

wondering if there's a timy t's pizza now

it's awesome how Timmy got a freestyle ballad #1 in spring '91 with a drum machine and synth sound that were outdated when Expose scored their first top forty.

was trying to remember which one was 'the postman song'. the answer is stevie b.

the Milton of Miami, the Robert Smith of freestyle, quivering with unrequited feelings and the weight of makeup and Pizza Hut runs.

Freestyle ballads would be a pretty sweet poll unto itself.

ooh!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ug53v_7HJqk

Sa-Fire gave me a special feeling in my twelve-year-old heart.

whenever i think of how cool john leland era spin magazine was i think they put sa-fire, nick cave, and binky the rabbit on the cover

Sure, The Church songs is one of the better songs here, but I thought it would have plenty of votes, and I would rather vote for something different.
so it came down to INXS, Aerosmith, Belinda, & George Michael for me. I keep thinking I'll vote for a Belinda song in one of these, but this one is just second-rate 80s Heart (and I would have voted What About Love in a flash), so maybe Heaven Is A Place On Earth shows up one day. Never Tear Us Apart is not as great as I remembered, a great guitar hook, and bedroom Michael Hutchence, but I need more drama in my ballads. If push came to shove, I could have gone Father Figure based on that super noirish verse, but that chorus is horrifying.

On the other hand, Aerosmith lays it all on the line in Angel, spending a ton of money and time on this, and even bringing 80s Michael Clayton-song fixer Desmond Child. The post-rehab version of the band needed a hit, and bad ('C'mon Joe if you just let us use the harmonizer on the intro, we'll let you play the solo clean'). Steven Tyler's country record is a bit of a joke, but it's not too hard to picture this song making a few minor Music Row tweaks and topping that chart too. Hell I can play it on an acoustic right now and it sounds great.

Unrelated: A friend dragged me to see them in 1998, and given that the Afghan Whigs were opening, I went expecting to hear one of my favorite bands and then maybe get to hear Draw The Line. And as you might expect, the Whigs were just a train wreck, Greg's schtick not playing at all in arena, the band pretty much mailing it in on an uneven album anyway. Plus Greg must have been about 225 pounds at this point, he looked like shit. I kind of picture Tyler backstage chuckling. In any rate, Aerosmith comes out and just plays an insane set that blew me away. life's funny that way sometimes.

'I Get Weak' is 'second-rate 80s Heart', gtfo. I got weak when Belinda told me how weak she got when she looked in my eyes! In a way that pre-adolescent me only otherwise experienced regarding the excessive number of walls that had been built between me and Cathy Dennis.

If "Too Many Walls" shows in one of these polls, I don't know what I'll do.

sorry old lunch. Belinda's solo career is further testament to the fact that Jane Wiedlin was the Gene Clark of the 80s.

Tracy Chapman - 'Baby, Can I Hold You'

Where is it, goddammit.

Mods, delete poll so I can start over plz.

I'm so sorry, everyone.

thought this would be a blog link-related bump lol

"father figure" and "one more try" are so terrific ugh. it's not a classic by any means, but i strangely enjoy bardeux's "when we kiss" too. i'm pretty sure that song is almost entirely forgotten now.

Not by me, friend. Not by me.