Top 50 of the '80s--21-30

21. "Need Your Loving Tonight"—Queen (The Game)
22. "Tired of Toein’ the Line"—Rocky Burnette (The Son of Rock and Roll)
23. "Turn and Walk Away"—The Babys (On the Edge)
24. "Fantasy"—Aldo Nova (Aldo Nova)
25. "While You See a Chance"—Steve Winwood (Arc of a Diver)
26. "Heat of the Moment"—Asia (Asia)
27. "You Shook Me All Night Long"—AC/DC (Back in Black)
28. "Burnin’ for You"—Blue Oyster Cult (Fire of Unknown Origin)
29. "Edge of a Broken Heart"—Vixen (Vixen)
30. "No One Like You"—Scorpions (Blackout)

Top 50 of the '80s--31-35

31. "Little Red Corvette"—Prince (1999)
32. "Nicole"—Point Blank (American Exce$$)
33. "You Better You Bet"—The Who (Face Dances)
34. "The Kid Is Hot Tonite"—Loverboy (Loverboy)
35. "American Storm"—Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band (Like a Rock)

Top 50 of the '80s--36-40

36. "Magic"—The Cars (Heartbeat City)
37. "Back on the Chain Gang"—Pretenders (Learning to Crawl)
38. "Some Like It Hot"—Power Station (The Power Station)
39. "I Got You"—Split Enz (True Colours)
40. "Head Over Heels"—The Go-Go's (Talk Show)

Top 50 of the '80s--41 to 45

As promised--or threatened--here is the next installment:

41. "Hearts on Fire"—Randy Meisner (One More Song)
42. "I Missed Again"—Phil Collins (Face Value)
43. "Teacher Teacher"—Rockpile (Seconds of Pleasure)
44. "Wasted on the Way"—Crosby, Stills & Nash (Daylight Again)
45. "Always Something There to Remind Me"—Naked Eyes (Naked Eyes)

TBC.....

Top 50 of the '80s--46-50

Recently some college friends of mine and I swapped a series of e-mails listing our Top 50 songs of the 1980s (the era in which we were in college). I thought I would post my list--in increments--as the mood strikes me.

50. "Emotional Rescue"--The Rolling Stones (Emotional Rescue)
49. "Hold On"--Santana (Shango)
48. "I Love a Rainy Night"--Eddie Rabbitt (Horizon)
47. "Misunderstanding"--Genesis (Duke)
46. "Givin' It Up for Your Love"--Delbert McClinton (The Jealous Kind)

More to come.

Whatever Happened to the Original Version?

Haven't blogged in awhile, for a couple of reasons. 1. Been under the weather. 2. Nothing has pissed me off lately, politically speaking. 3. Been busy. What I have been doing this evening, however, is listening to, repeatedly, something that a friend of mine found somewhere out there on the internet: the orginal version of "Fool (If You Think It's Over)" by Chris Rea. I've read that Rea wasn't happy with the original version of this and other songs on his debut album, Whatever Happened to Benny Santini?, and he subsequently re-recorded this song on his first greatest hits album, giving it a much blusier feel. But to people like me, who did much of their growing up in the 1970s and hearing this song on stations like WLS-AM in Chicago, this is the ultimate version, and finding it is like discovering Eldorado. I did find on YouTube a video clip of Rea doing this version from what looks like a late '70s British TV show, but they don't have the full version. Think I'll listen to it a couple of more times this evening.

Wally Phillips, 1926-2008

Just got around to reading Saturday's paper and, while I normally skip over the obituary pages, something in that day's paper caught my eye. Longtime Chicago radio host Wally Phillips died last Thursday after suffering from Alzheimer's. For those of you who never heard of Wally Phillips, he was the king of morning radio in Chicago from 1966 through 1986. When I was a kid, I spent many nights at my grandparents' house in Valpo, and every following morning I would hear Phillip's rich voice coming through their radios on WGN. Phillips was perhaps the most dominant local radio personality in US history; at his peak, he had local listenership of 1.5 million--that was half the population of Chicago! His mix of drop-ins, humor, and local news (plus an occasional song or two) made me want to get into radio when I was a kid. He will be missed.