Now this is how it started: THE ILX 1980s ALBUM POLL RESULTS!!

3 first place votes!

GTF tbh

I definitely would not have expected that.

so we don't all have to go into the show all message minefield:

100. Robyn Hitchcock - I Often Dream of Trains [1984] (75 points, 5 votes)
98. (tie) Scraping Foetus off the Wheel - Hole [1984] (76 points, 5 votes)
98. (tie) Spacemen 3 - The Perfect Prescription [1987] (76 points, 5 votes)
97. Big Black - Atomizer [1986] (77 points, 8 votes)
96. Associates - Sulk [1982] (79 points, 6 votes)
95. Jane's Addiction - Nothing's Shocking [1988] (79 points, 7 votes)
94. Def Leppard - Pyromania [1983] (80 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
93. Thomas Dolby - The Golden Age of Wireless [1982] (80 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
92. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - Dazzle Ships [1983] (80 points, 9 votes)
91. Run-D.M.C. - Raising Hell [1986] (80 points, 10 votes)
90. Meat Puppets - Meat Puppets II [1984] (81 points, 9 votes)
89. Prince and the Revolution - Parade [1986] (83 points, 10 votes)
88. Bruce Springsteen - Tunnel of Love [1987] (86 points, 7 votes)
87. Pet Shop Boys - Actually [1987] (86 points, 8 votes)
86. Pet Shop Boys - Please [1986] (87 points, 8 votes)
84. (tie) Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine [1989] (87 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
84. (tie) Talking Heads - Speaking in Tongues [1983] (87 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
83. David Bowie - Scary Monsters [1980] (89 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
82. Scraping Foetus off the Wheel - Nail [1985] (91 points, 5 votes, 1 first place vote)
81. The Beat (aka The English Beat) - I Just Can't Stop It [1980] (91 points, 13 votes)
80. Various - The Indestructible Beat of Soweto [1985] (93 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
79. The The - Soul Mining [1983] (93 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
78. The Pogues - Rum, Sodomy & the Lash [1985] (93 points, 16 votes)
77. Meat Puppets - Up on the Sun [1985] (94 points, 8 votes)
76. U2 - The Joshua Tree [1987] (95 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
75. Cyndi Lauper - She's So Unusual [1983] (95 points, 9 votes)
74. Galaxie 500 - On Fire [1989] (96 points, 10 votes)
73. X - Wild Gift [1981] (97 points, 9 votes)
72. The Chills - Kaleidoscope World [1986] (98 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
71. Roxy Music - Avalon [1982] (99 points, 10 votes)
70. Laurie Anderson - Big Science [1982] (99 points, 11 votes)
69. Scritti Politti - Cupid & Psyche 85 [1985] (100 points, 7 votes)
68. New Order - Power, Corruption & Lies [1983] (100 points, 16 votes)
67. Violent Femmes - Violent Femmes [1983] (101 points, 12 votes)
66. Prefab Sprout - Steve McQueen [1985] (104 points, 10 votes, 1 first place vote)
65. Donald Fagen - The Nightfly [1982] (105 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
63. (tie) Tom Waits - Rain Dogs [1985] (106 points, 12 votes)
63. (tie) Cocteau Twins - Treasure [1984] (106 points, 12 votes)
62. Grace Jones - Nightclubbing [1981] (106 points, 12 votes, 1 first place vote)
61. Arthur Russell - World of Echo [1986] (108 points, 11 votes, 1 first place vote)
60. Eric B. & Rakim - Paid In Full [1987] (111 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
59. Mekons - Fear and Whiskey [1985] (111 points, 8 votes, 2 first place votes)
58. The Cure - Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me [1987] (112 points, 7 votes, 2 first place votes)
57. Arvo Pärt - Tabula Rasa [1984] (112 points, 9 votes, 1 first place vote)
56. R.E.M. - Lifes Rich Pageant [1986] (112 points, 12 votes)
55. Dinosaur Jr. - You're Living All Over Me [1987] (115 points, 13 votes)
54. Bruce Springsteen - Born in the U.S.A. [1984] (118 points, 14 votes)
53. Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska [1982] (120 points, 14 votes)
52. Brian Eno / David Byrne - My Life in the Bush of Ghosts [1981] (120 points, 17 votes)
51. Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man [1988] (121 points, 11 votes)
50. The Feelies - Crazy Rhythms [1980] (123 points, 13 votes)
49. The Go-Betweens - 16 Lovers Lane [1988] (125 points, 9 votes, 1 first place vote)
48. XTC - Skylarking [1986] (127 points, 16 votes)
47. Steely Dan - Gaucho [1980] (128 points, 9 votes)
46. R.E.M. - Reckoning [1984] (131 points, 14 votes)
45. Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band - Doc at the Radar Station [1980] (133 points, 11 votes)
44. The Fall - This Nation's Saving Grace [1985] (136 points, 13 votes)
43. Sonic Youth - EVOL [1986] (143 points, 12 votes, 1 first place vote)
42. Hüsker Dü - New Day Rising [1985] (146 points, 14 votes)
41. The Cure - Pornography [1982] (148 points, 9 votes)
40. Dexy’s Midnight Runners - Searching for the Young Soul Rebels [1980] (148 points, 11 votes, 1 first place vote)
39. Manuel Göttsching - E2-E4 [1984] (154 points, 12 votes, 2 first place votes)
38. New Order - Substance [1987] (156 points, 16 votes)
37. De La Soul - 3 Feet High and Rising [1989] (164 points, 23 votes)
36. The Fall - Hex Enduction Hour [1982] (166 points, 14 votes, 1 first place vote)
35. ABC - The Lexicon of Love [1982] (173 points, 11 votes, 1 first place vote)
34. The Smiths - Hatful of Hollow [1984] (173 points, 16 votes)
33. The Smiths - Louder Than Bombs [1987] (174 points, 20 votes)
32. Prince - 1999 [1982] (191 points, 17 votes, 1 first place vote)
31. Sonic Youth - Sister [1987] (199 points, 21 votes, 1 first place vote)
30. Hüsker Dü - Zen Arcade [1984] (200 points, 13 votes)
29. Young Marble Giants - Colossal Youth [1980] (200 points, 17 votes, 1 first place vote)
28. The Stone Roses - The Stone Roses [1989] (201 points, 15 votes, 2 first place votes)
27. Guns N' Roses - Appetite for Destruction [1987] (201 points, 18 votes)
26. Prince - Dirty Mind [1980] (210 points, 14 votes, 1 first place vote)

the 20s have been teh worst so far (except prince.)

no wai! i'm happy to see young marble giants, gnr, prince and the clash. neither abstruse nor slavishly canonical - just some stuff that people like to listen to. which is as it should be.

I definitely would not have expected that.

― _Rudipherous_, Monday, November 30, 2009 1:01 AM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark

satisfying nonetheless.

hate the tendency to view the clash in oppositional terms, as though you gotta either LOVE the experimental dub twaddle and turn yr nose against the lumpen punk, or vice versa. they did equally fine work on both sides of that line, wherever you draw it.

i personally have a lot more use for sandinista than for london calling, but i'm not gonna argue that LC is less successful or important. it's probably more influential and artistically coherent, and it's almost as brave. i just happen to like it less.

24. The Cure - Disintegration [1989] (218 points, 19 votes, 1 first place vote)

http://img.imeem.com/ai/ERMCGYTJ3W5QWHVR7SXSFOLNEHGDJWFV.jpg

I remember when I first heard this album, it was like nothing I'd ever heard before. Very dark, very pretty. My favorite Cure album, definitely in my top 5 all-time.

"Pictures of You" is the weak link and it's still great.

― Curt1s Stephens, 28. lokakuuta 2007 22:04

You know, I had a horrible experience where I played Disintegration (admittedly) on a crappy boombox when we were drywalling and repainting our living room, and a friend came by to lend a hand and part way through "Plainsong" she actually turned it off and said "now can we play something we can actually listen to?" I was gobsmacked and weirdly saddened by this episode.... so much so that this is the first time I've mentioned it to anyone and it must have happened, oh, three years ago or so!

(Needless to say, at the time, I said "no, you can't do that, you really fucking can't" and hit play again.)

― Lostandfound, 29. lokakuuta 2007 8:33

This album alone really shaped my whole musical (and to a very large extent non-musical) world when it came out and I was 13. A friend had lent me a huge batch of tapes he got from Columbia House and after checking out the Midnight Oils, the Simple Minds and the Eurythmics, I finally put on that one tape. I knew straight from the opening synths of Plainsong that things would never really be the same for me. Utterly awesome.

― baaderonixx, 29. lokakuuta 2007 16:56

yeah, this is the best thing they put out alright

the captivating and altogether enchanting mystique pervading this record lends tracks like 'last dance' and 'prayers for rain' a true dreamlike and ethereal quality. each track is approached with more lyrical sincerity and subtlety than smith had been able to muster before or since. fantastically engaging moody pieces and unforgettable singles. perfect mix and wash of instruments.

and i should mention that the last two minutes or so of the title track is pure bliss

― Charlie Howard, 30. lokakuuta 2007 18:35

Thought that was top 5 for sure.

Yes, thought that would place much higher!

really should get around to listening to a cure record that isn't 3 imaginary boys/boys don't cry. one of these days...

Same here. All my illusions about the top 25 are now being shattered.

xp

This is one of those albums that, no matter what format I have it on now, will always be mentally split in half for me because I listened to it on cassette about a zillion times. I'm usually either in the mood for Side 1 or Side 2, but almost never listening to the whole thing in one sitting. Either grouping of songs puts me in a different mood.

And late to the party but I'm suprised at the complete "buh?" UK response to the first Femmes album. I thought it was one of those embedded 80s canon albums - it certainly has been in Australia for decades. Even little kids recognise the opening riff of "Blister".

I know it, because my Dad (who was into a lot of 'alt-country' stuff) bought it when I was about 10, but that was very unusual in Britain. I think mainstream recognition of Violent Femmes was almost zero in the 80s in Britain. When I went travelling around Australia (in 1997) I kept hearing 'Blister in the Sun' being played, and I couldn't understand why something so obscure (and old) was so massive.

I'm wondering about Rock 'n' Roll - The Mekons. It seems unlikely it will place high enough to get mentioned now, but I thought it would have been higher than Fear & Whiskey.

Fear & Whiskey seems to be the de facto Mekons album when it comes to consensus lists. Fewer people like Rock 'n' Roll, but are more passionate about it. More people like Fear & Whiskey, but not as passionately, and thus it ends up somewhere in the middle. I guess if more than 14 or 15 people voted Rock 'n' Roll really high on their ballots it could still appear here, but I don't see it happening.

maybe because it's all over grosse point blank? i think violent femmes have been enduringly pretty popular in the uk in a cult-y as opposed to music press sense. looking at the list now that it's starting to turn predictable, the real anomalies are 2 x appearances by both foetus and meat puppets.

Thirlwell love on ILM is strong, so the Foetus double shot isn't surprising. Didn't ever realize people cared that much about Meat Puppets, though. (I like 'em fine, but they probably wouldn't even crack my personal '80s list even if I expanded it to 200.)

I'm surprised The Cure are placing at all. I suspect I may be using ILM in a different way to everyone else.

Does a day ever go by where there's not some new or revived Cure thread on the front page?

I'm surprised The Cure are placing at all.

― Ismael Klata, Monday, November 30, 2009 2:14 AM (29 seconds ago) Bookmark

that's way more surprising than the cure's landing a few records on the list.

me, i was wtf surprised by the associates' sulk and manuel gottsching's e2-e4 (neither of which meant a thing to me), and pleasantly surprised by the relatively high placement of arvo part's tabula rasa. everything else seems pretty reasonable, if not exactly predictable.

Cure, fantastic singles band, albums a bit meh. (Ducks brickbats from ILX Cure massive)

xpost I expected Sulk to be top 50, but they're like the Violent Femmes in that they meant nowt, apart from the usual Anglophiles, in America.

One name that hasn't come up so far on predictions (on this thread anyway) for the top of the list (not the very top, certainly) is Siouxsie & the Banshees. Hard to see how they wouldn't make it, but maybe vote-splitting would cause that (especially since there's a lot of overlap between the Cure contingent and the Siouxsie contingent).

i've always thought of sulk as a pretty big ilm record. yeh the cure are behemoths, i don't think their presence here is at all surprising, disintegration is a big 'un for their fans though so maybe thats the last for fat bob? i'm wondering how more arena-y staples like jamc & the bunnymen are going to do now, i assumed they'd have a couple each but now....

I'd make the argument for Siouxsie that Dods did for The Cure. Great singles band, and I probably should've voted for Once Upon a Time, but I probably wouldn't toss a vote in the direction of any of their albums proper (okay, maybe Peepshow, but even there the first half totally dominates the second half).

The Cure were consistent hitmakers, and got to be fairly regularly top ten, until "Friday I'm in Love", and that was the end of it!

Would never have guessed.

23. The Human League - Dare [1981] (219 points, 17 votes, 2 first place votes)

http://991.com/newGallery/Human-League-Dare-230383.jpg

The story behind this album and how the label were just about to write off the League as a failure, given that Marsh and Ware had left Oakey to the contract on his own is far more fascinating than even the going to the bar to find the two female singers story. Basically, Oakey being super-crazy and persistent, and Martin Rushent being a producer god allowed Dare to be what it is.

― System Jr. (Mackro Mackro), 22. helmikuuta 2009 6:21

it's always been 'things that dreams are made of' for me. Those sawing noises in the middle eight that power up into the reedy mock-tudor squall of the chorus! that alien elegance-inelegance, the huge distance between his voice and the synths, the storybook hopefulness of the lyrics. A bunch of remixes of it were released in 2007 and none of them could satisfy, i think because they all somehow smoothed out the edges of the weirdness, made it either screechy or too dreamy.

though the lightness of touch in 'don't you want me' never fails to astonish: i think it wasn't until i heard the 12" dance mix that i even noticed how bright the chorus is.

god i love this album so much.

― c sharp major, 22. helmikuuta 2009 14:35

If Seconds (my vote) wins this, I'll be delighted. But really: it's almost a perfect album, isn't it? Much weirder, way more unsettling and far less obviously of its time than -- I think -- received wisdom has it. I've read countless articles about how it came about, and I'll not deny the genius-level input of Martin Rushent -- but I think the key thing is that the departure of Ian C-M and Martin, and the arrival of Ian B and Jo, got rid of a lot of the self-consciousness and simply gave rise to an eight-legged tune-making machine. I still prefer the MkI League, but Dare is the sound of a slightly unlikely collection of songwriters absolutely nailing the moment; music-box melodies with no musicianship.

given that Marsh and Ware had left Oakey to the contract on his own

Adrian Wright's lack of recognition saddens me enormously!

― Special topics: Disco, The Common Market (grimly fiendish), 22. helmikuuta 2009 20:59

Well, sure, but maybe people are avoiding that one the better to rave about the lesser known equally good ones. The two that really got me back then were 'Sound of the Crowd' and 'The Things That Dreams Are Made Of'. I liked their tough, strident rhythms and highly musical use of sound effects. Phil's voice has always had a slightly cold, brutal quality that went with the music. But fundamentally, yeah, great rhythms and sounds. 'Seconds' - soppy, slightly unchallenging chords, cliched lyrics and perspective (not as weak as Dolores O'Riordan Cranberry's effort on the same subject, good song compared to a lot of synth pop at the same time though, and a big warm production. Hmm yeah, but Do Or Die, a modernist classic of early techno. Melodically so obvious as to be oddly not obvious, especially when carved in the blaknk grey slate sounds of that big System 700 or whatever it was. In 1981 I found that track a bit of a challenge, but nowadays it's just a kickass piece of modernist synthpop. I'm with you Geir! Except I am a little surprised you like it, being as how it's not exactly brimming with melodic invention, relying more on subtle textural, arrangement and rhythmic shifts to hold interest. I mean, basically, it's a groove, once Phil's alarming/alarmed and thrusting vocal section ends. Hilarious lyric - 'Alsatians fall unconscious at the shadow of your call'. How does he come up with this stuff?

― moley, 23. helmikuuta 2009 7:20

Was just listening to this not three hours ago. I figured it was coming, just didn't know how soon.

Apparently this album was called "Dare" in the UK and "Dare!" (with an exclamation mark) in the US. I wonder what's the story behind that?

Oh wow, I'd never noticed.

i always wondered about that too.

booming album.

Reverend, if you're still reading, I'd be interested in seeing how a poll for strictly '80s rap & r&b would turn out if you're up to organzing such an undertaking. Not to marginalize it in any way, but you're always going to get the same few strong contenders from particular genres that show up in a poll like this where the only parameters are release dates and nothing more.

I can sorta see where Rev is coming from: this poll seems to be more dominated by "white" guitar rock than either the 70s or the 90s poll, where other genres than rock had a better representation. I'm not sure what the exact reasons for this are, but to me it seems in the 80s the division between "black" and "white" music was bigger than either in the 70s or the 90s, and this poll might reflect that (especially among voters who were actively listening to popular music in the 80s). It was only towards the end of the decade that this division began to get narrower, with the rising popularity of rap and house/techno.

I was just looking for the 90s poll. How is it titled? I didn't turn up much in the search.

And, of course, the fact that for the better part of the decade rap and dance music were single-oriented rather than album-oriented genres doesn't help them in an album poll.

Anyway, I think part of it is due to the fact rap was a singles-driven genre until at least the middle of the '80s...so we're basically working off of five years here instead of ten. On top of that, a lot of popular-then r&b hasn't really dated as well as material from the '70s has and the sound of r&b in the '90s wasn't significantly different going into the '00s (until recent years) that it hardly seemed dated at all. For whatever reason, '80s r&b seems preserved in some kind of impenetrable amber that is nostalgic for some and cringe-inducing for others.

xp (Tuomas and I on the same path here re: rab being singles-driven.)

rab=rap

I was just looking for the 90s poll. How is it titled?

I think you have to search under "1990s" (or that's how the singles poll was titled anyway).

I was starting to think Dare might be forgotten so really happy to see that so high, it was my number one.

When were the 70s and 90s polls held btw?

ILX 70s album poll - results (nominations in '04, results in '05)

Still haven't located the nineties poll.

because i am bored i just looked them both up

ILX 70s album poll - results
no.1 = there's a riot

THE 1990s POLL RESULTS - THE ALBUMS
no.1 = loveless

So, both those polls were 5-ish years ago. I'd suggest the demographic of ILM has changed in those 5 years too, which wd also account for some of the differences in emphasis between this poll and those.

There's a Riot might win the 70s again, but I doubt Loveless would win the 90s again.

Also, for the record, Tuomas has created the nicest, most organized and well-structured poll out of all of them. Good job!

why so many "white" indie rock in 80s?

http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj242/donaldparsley/80sMilhouse.jpg

he's more yellow i guess

For whatever reason, '80s r&b seems preserved in some kind of impenetrable amber that is nostalgic for some and cringe-inducing for others.

I'm no booster of 80s R&B (and don't know much about it), but to point out the obvious, the same could be said of much of the music in this poll. ABC?

agree. i don't think the emphasis on white music here is an artifact of 80s r&b and rap being a singles game. maybe true of r&b, not of rap. retrospectively, "classic" rap is now seen in album terms in much the same fashion as rock.

tons of worthy rap contenders will go unmentioned in this list due only to the vagaries of ilm's taste. which does seem to skew white & indie (much like mine), not that there's anything wrong with that. metal and mainstream hard rock will get the short end of the stick for similar reasons.

hey, wait. on second thought, let's not have this discussion again...