Paul McCartney - here there and everywhere, 1984

"On the back of the LP cover, a remark alerts the listener: This record is longer than usual but due to the available playing time on a vinyl disc, some editing of the soundtrack has been necessary to retain full volume and dynamic range. Even longer versions exist on cassette and compact disc."

The Go-Betweens - draining the pool for you, 1984

"The album was named after an annual fair in Spring Hill, Queensland, suburb of Brisbane Grammar School, Robert Forster's high school. Some of the band had also lived there in the early eighties. Grant McLennan said of the title, "It was generally not that we were home sick, I think we just wanted to have, after Before Hollywood, which was so obviously an American kind of thing, a regional home-town thing." In another interview McLennan stated "we all lived there and the main reason was that in September, October of every year in Brisbane, there is, in Spring Hill, a fair, and as the album came out around then we thought it would be nice to have a parochial mention in a title because we hadn't done that for a long time."

Bruce Springsteen - i'm goin down, 1984

"A rock song, "I'm Goin' Down" is described by Uncut contributor John Lewis as having a country music influence, and "sound[ing] in places like Johnny Cash". For other critics, the song contains rockabilly elements."

The Go-Betweens - part company, 1984

"Forster later indicated in an interview that McLennan had told him that "Just a King in Mirrors" was about Nick Cave, whom he was close to at the time. Desperately broke at the time, Forster said, "A moment of brightness for me was writing the music for "Part Company", the strummed folkie chords setting up the possibility of telling a story, not a fragment."

The Go-Betweens - bachelor kisses, 1984

"Despite the efforts of producer John Brand to shine it up, Bachelor Kisses is perhaps still too skeletal to have been a genuine commercial hit in 1984 (maybe a couple of years earlier it might have been a contender), but it remains one of the great treasures of the Go-Betweens’ catalogue." 

See also https://sintrabloguecintia.blogspot.com/2024/05/the-radio-dept-bachelor-kisses-cover.html. This is a fabulous cover version of this song by The Radio Dept. A dreamy and lo-fi cover, aligning with The Radio Dept.'s style.

The Style Council - long hot summer live, 1984

"The Style Council is rock’s most underrated band of all-time. Many of you will be scratching your heads at that statement. How in the heck can a man who grew up in Central Indiana, spent four short years in Southwestern Ohio, then moved back to his hometown, the one in which our said hero claimed to which he would never return, to raise his family, ever hear of the UK-centric and generally altogether European artist The Style Council?"

Bruce Springsteen - bobby jean, 1984

"Bobby Jean" was one of the last songs from the album to be recorded, and was considered a musical breakthrough for Springsteen during the recording, with its more accented rhythm and near dance groove."

U2 - a sort of homecoming, 1984

"Like much of the album, the song replaces the hard-hitting martial drum sound of War with a subtler polyrhythmic shuffle, and the guitar is no longer as prominent in the mix."

The Housemartins - time spent thinking, 1984

"The Housemartins originated as a Kingston upon Hull busking duo composed of singer Paul David “P.d.” Heaton and guitarist Stan Cullimore. Heaton (b. May 9, 1962; Bromborough, Merseyside) spent his childhood in Sheffield and his adolescence in Chipstead, Surrey, where he played in his first band, Tools Down, with his brother and local youth. He lived for a year in Leeds and busked around Europe before 1983, when he settled in Hull, where he met Cullimore (b. April 6, 1962; Stapleford, Cambridgeshire), who attended grammar school in Birmingham and enrolled (in 1980) as a mathematics major at the University Hull. They cut a demo tape with the rhythm section of local goth rockers Les Zeiga Fleurs. Heaton and Cullimore pressed 100 copies of Themes for the Well-dressed Man, a demo cassette with nine songs"

Marillion - fugazi, 1984

"Fugazi is the second studio album by the British neo-prog band Marillion, released in 1984. Produced by Nick Tauber, it was recorded between November 1983 and February 1984 at various studios and was the first to feature drummer Ian Mosley, following the dismissal of the band's original drummer Mick Pointer. The album is titled after a military slang term well known at the time of release. According to AllMusic, the album "streamlined the intricacies of the group's prog rock leanings in favour of a more straight-ahead hard rock identity". Built upon the success of its predecessor, Script for a Jester's Tear, Fugazi reached the UK top five[4] and was certified Gold."

Bruce Springsteen - downbound train, 1984

"Downbound Train" is a song that appears on the 1984 Bruce Springsteen album Born in the U.S.A. The song is a lament to a lost spouse, and takes on a melancholy tone. Author Christopher Sandford described the song as beginning "like a Keith Richards' riff" that ultimately moves to "one of those great country busted-heart lines, 'Now I work down at the car wash/where all it ever does is rain.'" The song was recorded on May 6, 1982 at the Power Station at the end of the "Electric Nebraska" sessions. Like several other Born in the U.S.A. songs, including "Working on the Highway" and the title track, a solo acoustic version of "Downbound Train" was originally recorded on the demo that eventually became the Nebraska album. "Downbound Train" is one of the few tracks that was successfully recorded at the "Electric Nebraska" sessions. Though it was not one of the seven singles released from the album, the song nevertheless gained some album-oriented rock radio airplay and was featured fairly regularly on the Born in the U.S.A. Tour. It has been performed sporadically in tours since. Overall, the song has been played in concert about 130 times through 2008."

Soft Cell - soul inside, 1984

"I had the huge pleasure of seeing 1980s icons Soft Cell at Hampton Court Palace this week. And what a joy it was. Marc Almond in magnificent voice exuding energy and charisma in abundance, Dave Ball (performing in a wheelchair following his fractured vertebrae last year) in every sense the straight man. From classics like Torch, Bedsitter, Say Hello Wave Goodbye and of course Tainted Love to newer material like Nostalgia Machine and rousing encore Purple Zone, the band soon had its somewhat ageing fan base on their feet and singing along. I thought they were the best band around in the 1980s – and hindsight hasn’t changed my mind. They are retrospectively so underrated it’s a crime."

Bruce Springsteen - dancing in the dark, 1984

"Springsteen wrote "Dancing In the Dark" overnight, after Jon Landau convinced him that the album needed a single. According to journalist Dave Marsh in the book Glory Days, Springsteen was not impressed with Landau's approach. "Look", he snarled, "I've written seventy songs. You want another one, you write it." Despite this reaction, Springsteen sat in his hotel room and wrote the song in a single night. It sums up his state of mind, his feeling of isolation after the success of his album The River, and his frustrations of trying to write a hit single. Six takes of "Dancing in the Dark" were recorded on February 14, 1984, at The Hit Factory, and after 58 mixes, work was completed on March 8, 1984. The 12-inch single was released May 9, 1984, and was the highest-selling 12-inch single in the US that year."

Keats - hollywood heart, 1984

"Keats were a short-lived British rock band, which produced one eponymous album in 1984. It was an Alan Parsons Project offshoot. Its members were Colin Blunstone (vocals), Ian Bairnson (guitars), Pete Bardens (keyboards), David Paton (bass and backing vocals) and Stuart Elliott (drums and percussion)."

The Waterboys - church not made with hands, 1984

"From the outset there would be something spiritual about all things Waterboys without a doubt influenced by their main man Mike Scott’s mother, an English teacher, reading him CS Lewis’s Narnia Chronicles when he was a child."

The Alan Parsons Project - don't answer me, 1984

"Instead of the art rock and progressive rock sounds for which Alan Parsons was well-known, Parsons crafted "Don't Answer Me" in the style of Phil Spector and his Wall of Sound technique. Eric Woolfson, the co-writer, handled lead vocals on the single, with Mel Collins providing a saxophone solo with a "soothing yet destitute wail".

Etienne Daho - week-end à rome, 1984

"The only song on my playlist not by a female artist was by colossal French superstar Étienne Daho and it is called Week-end à Rome, and if you haven’t heard it before you might want to sit down round about now."

Bruce Springsteen - no surrender, 1984

"No Surrender" is a song from Bruce Springsteen's album Born in the U.S.A.. It was only included on the album at the insistence of Steven Van Zandt, but has since become a concert staple for Springsteen. Though it was not one of the seven top ten hits of the album, "No Surrender" nevertheless charted on the Mainstream Rock chart, peaking at No. 29. It returned to prominence during the 2004 United States presidential election when John Kerry, the Democratic candidate and a fan of Springsteen, used the song as the main theme song for his campaign."

The Style Council - council meetin, 1984

"The Style Council was formed in early 1983 and their first single was Speak Like a Child peaked at Number 4 in March 1983. I kept a diary of the events of The Style Council developing from January 1984 to this gig in October 1984... I suspect I then got bored and stopped!"

The Style Council - the paris match, 1984

"Acting as a second part of a mini-suite beginning with the "Blue Café" instrumental, "Paris Match" continues the Bacharach/David, early-'60s-inspired mood. The melody is a delicious combination of pop and jazz, with a stately elegance that is unlike anything Paul Weller had ever written to date. A true torch ballad, the lyrics are a lonely, cinematic reflection of a lost lover in the wee hours of a London morning. The lead vocal is sung by Tracy Thorn, who delivers the emotion with a breathy grace."