Best Album on My Favourite Albums of......1983!!

I dont think REM had an avowed anti-synth stance

Listening Script of the Bridge and a) goddamn Up the Down Escalator is good and ii) how did Interpol get away with it?

early on Michael Stipe had a synthy side project, Tanzplagen (Wikipedia informs me he played Farfisa organ, but that may have been the closest he could get to a synth in 1980-81)

Hard to argue with Murmur or Speaking in Tongues, but I'm voting Synchro System.

Replacements Hootenanny missing from list.

This may be my favourite year for music in the 80s. From the list I'm going with Before Hollywood, the Go-Betweens most hungry, astringent and poetic album. I never get tired of it.

The most important album of 1983 for me (and befitting my nom de ILX) was Stavros Xarhakos' remarkable original soundtrack for Kosta Ferris's film Rebetiko. He managed to craft deeply soulful music which existed simultaneously in 1933 and 1983, reinvigorating a genre that was trapped in amber by revivalists. When I heard it, and contemporaneous albums by Nikos Papazouglou, Haris Alexiou, Aki Panou and others, I knew it was the music I wanted to play. It changed my life and led me on a fantastic and continuing musical journey.

Sonic Youth – Confusion is Sex
Suicidal Tendencies – s/t
Swans – Filth
Talking Heads – Speaking in Tongues
U2 – War
Violent Femmes – s/t

are my top 6.

Oh hey, i see my favorite Wipers album on the list

The most important album of 1983 for me (and befitting my nom de ILX) was Stavros Xarhakos' remarkable original soundtrack for Kosta Ferris's film Rebetiko.

I remember 1983 well, it would be a final pick from Punch The Clock, Cafe Bleu and Power, Corruption and Lies.

PCL it is.

Much easier than '82, Rain Parade, no hesitation.

By sheer coincidence was listening to the P Funk Allstars album from ‘83 this afternoon...probably not the best album of the year but sounded pretty pretty good...

I tell you what: I'm checking put that 100 Flowers album mentioned upthread rn and it sounds like a total front-to-back classic punk album. Lots of different ideas bumping up against each other

first answer was the correct one.

(i voted high land)

i tried aztec camera again, i like his voice but the music just does zero for me.

Maybe you are more Hollywood than Westwood

I voted Aztec Camera, too.

could vote for any of these, this is absurdly hard:

Aztec Camera – High Land Hard Rain
Echo and The Bunnymen – Porcupine
ESG – Come Away with ESG
King Sunny Ade and His African Beats – Synchro System
Madonna – s/t
Philip Glass - Koyaanisqatsi
R.E.M. – Murmur
The Go-Betweens – Before Hollywood
The The – Soul Mining
Tom Waits – Swordfishtrombones
Violent Femmes – s/t
William Onyeabor – Good Name
ZZ Top – Eliminator

Murmur, Before Hollywood, and Koyaanisqatsi jump out, but Aztec Camera and Madonna are nipping at their heels

ZZ Top, Def Leppard, The Police, Dio, Motley Crue & U2 were my tapes of these back in the day.

maresnest so otm

Tough one. Would have gone for Tears for Fears - The Hurting, were it listed. The Police, U2, Def Leppard were the hard-to-evict residents on my tape deck that year. Picked The The due to falling hard for the "Uncertain Smile" 12".

voted for Power, Corruption and Lies, it is my favorite New Order album and one of my favorite albums ever

Decided to pick Philip Glass to pick to pick decided to pick Philip to pick Philip Glass

Madonna vs Cyndi, just as it was in 1983

Out of Step was such an incredible record

also remember loving the 100 Flowers album and The Rain Parade

Metal Circus meant so much to me, those guitars

Diane

Got to be Eliminator.

A lot of rock ordinaire on that list, it must be said.

Murmur is my real favourite but it will get loads of love fron everyone else so voted for Billy Bragg

Went with Talking Heads
over U2 and Violent Femmes

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Sonic Youth album is all-time amazing as well.

Murmur crushes everything else on here like a grape and yall know it. A disco-rock classic! Dance! Dance, you fuckers!

Torn between High Land Hard Rain and Hearts and Bones

I might be the only vote for the Bad Brains album but I think it really is my favorite here

Cocteau Twins a close second, both records were personally huge for me back then

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

https://img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/tenant/amp/entityid/BBW4IwX.img

ha ha, you were right!

Murmur really is a great album

Wow the Violent Femmes debut got zero points. There's a band that's fallen out of fashion. Along with REM, they would've been the critics fave new US band of '83

Best Album on My Favourite Albums of......1984!!

They meant pretty much jack shit in the UK, though.

(xpost)

"Blister In The Sun" was a 90s indie disco staple

Somehow I feel like we've had this conversation before?

It managed to get snuck into a couple of ads in the '90s, but that was many years later.

"Blister In The Sun" was a 90s indie disco staple

― . (Michael B)

The first time I heard Blister In The Sun was when The Wannadies covered it in the mid 90s. It was definitely played a lot in indie clubs when I started going to them the late 90s.

The first I heard of 'em was also in the late '90s, through a combination of 'Blister in the Sun' being on some advert and the fact that they kept being cited by American music nerds. I mean, I've said this before, but they were definitely an American phenomenon.

I don't particularly want to open this can of worms again but they seem to have been markedly more popular in the US. As for meaning 'jack shit' in the UK, well, that's fair enough if the Go-Betweens, for example, or any number of well-regarded 'indie' bands who never quite broke through to the mainstream are also described as meaning 'jack shit'. I think it's a bit harsh, personally.