top 50 forgotten/"lost" US hits of the late '80s

I know and love a lot of these songs. Voted Change of Heart. Baby Love is gr8; C'est La Vie is gr8 as well.

Spies Like Us, Who's Johnny*, and of course Batdance were from movies, which explains a bit about why they appeared and then mostly vanished: they made little sense once the

Who's That Girl, Neutron Dance, Shake Your Love, and Causing a Commotion were all very big and am surprised that they've faded from pop fans' memories.

* = Short Circuit, in case you don't know

I just listened to a re-recorded version of "We'll Be Together" from some best-of and it was super terrible, so I went back to the ...Nothing Like The Sun version and it's very similar but the slight differences are enough for me to be like "yes, this is a jam".

Basically, the backing vocal arrangement makes this entire song for me.

Spies Like Us, Who's Johnny*, and of course Batdance were from movies, which explains a bit about why they appeared and then mostly vanished: they made little sense once the

Who's That Girl, Neutron Dance, Shake Your Love, and Causing a Commotion were all very big and am surprised that they've faded from pop fans' memories.

You do remember that "Who's That Girl", "Neutron Dance", and "Causing a Commotion" were ALSO soundtrack songs, right?

I feel like this belongs in this thread (I bought the 12" when it came out lol):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_A8Xe9M0NY

xp LOL (I think "Neutron Dance" had even been released a few years earlier, but only became huge after appearing on the "BHC" soundtrack?)

T/S: Steve Winwood, "Don't You Know What The Night Can Do?" vs. Genesis "Tonight, Tonight, Tonight" vs. Eric Clapton's 1987 version of "After Midnight."

Only the third was created specifically for a beer commercial but in my memory these three songs share a beer-commercial vibe.

I saw that Michelob commercial as a kid and immediately thought drinking beer would be that amazing.

It's not

I think you mean "drinking Michelob would be that amazing."

True. When i drink St Bernardus ABT 12 i leave the planet

Only the third was created specifically for a beer commercial but in my memory these three songs share a beer-commercial vibe.

The other two songs were also used in Michelob ads, though.

Hah, I knew it.

And DJP, thanks for the expansion on the movie songs - I should have recalled the filmic origins of at least "Who's That Girl" but it evaded my mind.

Though there is still, I think, a useful distinction between "created for a movie" vs. "used in a movie."

"Who's Johnny" will always be remembered by its middle-school parody version: "'Who farted?' she said / Then turned, and walked away..."

Though there is still, I think, a useful distinction between "created for a movie" vs. "used in a movie."

Sure, but the only songs in your list that weren't created specifically for a movie were "Neutron Dance" and "Shake Your Love", and "Neutron Dance" didn't become a hit until it was included on a movie soundtrack, so I'm not sure it's as big a distinction as one might think it should be.

I greatly prefer the ‘87 beer commercial version of “After Midnight” to the original.

Which I only ever knew about because of its inclusion on the Crossroads box set. I didn’t watch no damn TV in 1987!

Yeah the remake of After Midnight is a pretty solid rock track

Sure, but the only songs in your list that weren't created specifically for a movie were "Neutron Dance"

Some interesting trivia that I absolutely have known for a long time, and did not only learn about via Wikipedia earlier:

According to Allee Willis, "Neutron Dance" was written in hopes of being placed on the soundtrack of the film Streets of Fire: "We were told that there was a scene on a bus that was leaving town after there had been this nuclear holocaust, and that a '50s doo-wop black group was going to be at the back of the bus that the lead couple was escaping on ...

ahahahahahahahaha classic

I also prefer the bullshit beer commercial version of After Midnight, though it's extremely tacky that Eric Clapton of all people, with his infamous struggles with substance abuse, should do a beer commercial at all. The Genesis beer commercial, on the other hand, Tonight Tonight Tonight is a song literally about addiction, which makes its usage in a beer ad almost as wrong-headed as Reagan and Born in the USA.

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

Those results are just burnin'!

Lol, I'm glad I could help take the Bangles to #2.

heh, those results scan like someone just shuffled the song order

listened to the top 5 and didn't recognize anything. the el debarge song sounds like "stand" by REM

It's remarkable to me that someone wouldn't know "Neutron Dance," but then, I'm not going to assume that "Beverly Hills Cop" has filtered down through the generations and/or across borders.

xp oh this is that song from Short Circuit! I was not an especially idiotic child, just normal idiotic, but I always thought Johnny 5 was singing "who is Downey"

xp Do you think I could credibly pull off the "banana in the tailpipe" routine on a Zoomer?

xp The music video features El DeBarge singing in a courtroom, where a judge is presiding over the trial of Johnny 5 (the robotic protagonist of Short Circuit). A representative of NOVA, the government defense contractor that created Johnny, sits at the prosecutor's table as El DeBarge sings his testimony from the witness stand. Stephanie Speck (Ally Sheedy) and a cardboard cutout of Newton Graham Crosby, Ph.D. (Steve Guttenberg) are also in attendance as adversarial witnesses for the prosecution, implying that El Debarge is playing the co-lead role of Ben Jabituya, played by Fisher Stevens in the film. The prosecutor's sole question during these examinations is the titular line of the song "Who's Johnny?" She plays a VHS tape, labeled "Short Circuit," containing various clips from the movie. Meanwhile, Number 5 wreaks havoc in the courtroom (only his robotic hand is visible to the viewer) with various hijinks, including giving the prosecuting attorney a pair of funny nose glasses, turning up the ceiling fan to create a windstorm of papers, swapping the judge's gavel for an exploding one and calling the fire department, resulting in the judge being sprayed with water. Stephanie and El DeBarge sneak out of the courtroom at the end, covering the camera with a slate on their way out. The prosecutor, still wearing the trick glasses, pops up to deliver the last "Who's Johnny?"

The top two finishers are worthy. "Batdance"--eh, I don't really get it. It mostly reminds me of those obnoxious remixes that played over the end credits of a lot of films from that era, where dialogue from the film is mixed into the film's novelty-ish theme song (we could do a whole thread of these). The rest of the Batman album is solid, though, and occasionally even better than that; "Electric Chair" would likely make my list of top ten Prince tracks.

I don't even like "Neutron Dance" much.

more votes than i would have expected for "c'est la vie"!

heh, those results scan like someone just shuffled the song order

such is the genius of this poll