The 80s-90s Lost Classics Rate - Goodbye Wes! :'-(

[berserkboi]

@Filippa picking a French lady or two out of the songs we are rating? What is this??? Does this mean some upcoming Germans/Austrians/Italians are from @berserkboi?? I guess you will see #soon!

In other news - I am back tomorrow and I have Batman giving a little preview:

That's right! Sprocky takes a reprieve from all the stabbings and at least one person not to have lost a high score for a while is up!

Spoiler

@WowWowWowWow @daninternational @Untouchable Ace @saviodxl @TéléDex @Maki

 

[berserkboi]

Filippa eliminated a French woman yesterday, is another going today to synchronise with Berserkboi's return?






















































Are there many of them left, or are we down to just Stephanie at this point? Let's find out!

























































Look at that! We are actually losing men!! Are they French?


































































#25

Modern Talking - You’re My Heart, You’re My Soul
Picked By: Berserkboi
Credentials: (1984) #1 Austria, #1 Belgium, #1 Germany (6 weeks), #1 Switzerland, #3 France, Certified GOLD in France & Germany, 715000 Units SOLD in France, 250000 Units SOLD in Germany, WORLDWIDE Sales of 8000000 Units
(1998) #1 Hungary, #2 Austria, #2 Germany, #3 France, #4 Switzerland, Certified GOLD in France, 475000 Units SOLD, Certified PLATINUM in Germany, 500000 Units SOLD
Average Score: 7.7136
Highest Score: 10 @berserkboi @Untouchable Ace @WowWowWowWow
Lowest Score: 3 @Filippa

That’s right (and utterly unsurprising! Dddd) - the Modern Talker out of your hosts was indeed Berserkboi! You’re My Heart, You’re My Soul was even on my PJ Retro Potentials List many moons ago, as I was utterly unaware of its massive success in both incarnations we had the (dis)pleasure of rating.

Randomly, I don’t remember ever knowing the 80s original growing up despite its success in France. It was the ‘98 Version through the previously mentioned German Music Countdown that screened in Mauritius that took me off guard in its Dance Pop greatness. I was entranced right away by this sound that modernised 80s melodies I loved growing up (not realising it was an actual remix of an 80s song - ah, the innocent idiocy of the berserk! Dddd) and I was salivating for more Modern Talking, including LOVING the ‘98 Version of Brother Louie.

I never delved much into their discography outside of that but recently checked out their 1998 Remix Album and enjoyed most of the songs on there. I see they are thought of as Germany's most successful Pop Duo, and have sales of 120 million across all their albums and singles. Now - I am sure there are some Modern Talkers here who can recommend, or even talk about these men (with the iconic bad hairdos) a little better than I can since I did not grow up with their music as an (un)wanted soundtrack to my life. Please enlighten us DominoDancing, Filippa & everyone else this applies to!

@berserkboi is me! As you all know! - 10 - I am MASSIVELY into the Pro-98 Version Faction, sorry my dear co-host! Dddd @TéléDex (9.5) continues to get the FilippaDominoes fuming ddd - Great song. Was this remix necessary though? Here's @DominoDancing throwing shade using the B word, which guarantees Song Contest victories on PopJustice dddd(5) - Listen, Thomas Anders is a perfectly fine singer, and the song is catchy in a basic way, so I cannot really go lower than this. But it still suffers from the same things as all Modern Talking songs: basic songwriting and production, featherbrained lyrics and the involvement of one of Germany's leading misogynists.

@WowWowWowWow (10) is a Berserky again, shhhh - don't tell anyone! And yes, please MilesAngel or any other UK based voter - what happened for this to flop in Great Britain? - Sorry @Filippa but I really love this. Haha... but I suppose it is different for me as I don't think Modern Talking really ever tried to break the USA, so they were not a plague on our radio airwaves for 35 years. Also does anyone know why "Brother Louie" reached #4 in the UK when none of their other songs reached the top 50? @Penguin (8) is giving me German relocated overseas with this knowledge! I stan!! – I enjoy Modern Talking but they have made one song in their entire career and this isn’t my favourite iteration of it.

@saviodxl (8.9) joins the Wowx4 train, albeit with a lower score! - Not the same level of catchiness of Brother Louie, but I don't get why the UK rejected this song while continental Europe embraced it. @Filippa (3), we want you to spill all the tea!!! - It’s better I don’t speak my mind. @Phonetics Girl (6) made me giggle, but this is kinda true if you ever watch any of the "Adult" movies from this country! Dddd - they sound so dead behind the eyes. truly the German Papa D.

@Ezz (9) would like to speak to the Manager!! - The UK clearly had no taste with this only getting to 56! @daninternational (7) assumes personal connection would lead to a higher score, when it is clearly the opposite from the German faction ddd - It's a very typical example of the period and genre. Lacks something special without a personal connection for me. @MilesAngel (9) made a discovery - we love the Lost Classics Rate providing with those!! - Both versions of this are great and would get the same score, but they show the difference between the 80's and 90's. I never knew this act produced 'Brother Louie' until this rate. @jtm (9.5) is on the Hate/Love Train! - I hate them both and neither the 98 video nor remix have any right to be that much of a serve.





Brother Louie 98 for Ace - very Love's Gonna Get You with a rap verse!


​

 

[Deleted member 26234]

 

[DominoDancing]

Finally, indeed. And I'd be more than open to hearing a full commentary by @Filippa.
Really, Dieter Bohlen is insufferable and regressive in his worldview, and a one-trick pony in terms of his songwriting (well, perhaps two tricks: the 80s Modern Talking stuff that all sounded the same, and the 2000s German Idol balladry that all sounded the same). And if you want a great example of how shameless he is as a songcopierwriter, have a listen to this POS he released in 1994, five months after Pet Shop Boys got a huge #1 in Germany with Go West:

 

[Untouchable Ace]

It was obvious from the start that it was the next option for my 11.
But the first thing I knew about Modern Talking was the forum's disdain for them. Probably when they were compared to Man Meadow.

They're intense, but undeniably make good pop.

 

[WowWowWowWow]

I enjoyed when @Filippa once called Modern Talking "the evil incarnate of all songs"

 

[soratami]

Well there goes my last negative score in the rate

 

[Deleted member 26234]

I enjoyed when @Filippa once called Modern Talking "the evil incarnate of all songs"

Did I? I can't remember. But it's good!

Well just a little anecdote:
One of Dieter Bohlen's partners wrote her autography. No-one would have cared if she hadn't described an accident while they had sex. Apparently Dieter sustained a penile fracture. And I'm sure this isn't pleasant and very hurtful, but according to her three fire engines and two ambulances arrived because of her panicking ...

That's not why I can't stand him but fire engines?

 

[berserkboi]

Finally, indeed. And I'd be more than open to hearing a full commentary by @Filippa.
Really, Dieter Bohlen is insufferable and regressive in his worldview, and a one-trick pony in terms of his songwriting (well, perhaps two tricks: the 80s Modern Talking stuff that all sounded the same, and the 2000s German Idol balladry that all sounded the same). And if you want a great example of how shameless he is as a songcopierwriter, have a listen to this POS he released in 1994, five months after Pet Shop Boys got a huge #1 in Germany with Go West:

You really should send this to PJRetro and have an ironic win! Ddddd

 

[WowWowWowWow]

Did I? I can't remember. But it's good!

Well just a little anecdote:
One of Dieter Bohlen's partners wrote her autography. No-one would have cared if she hadn't described an accident while they had sex. Apparently Dieter sustained a penile fracture. And I'm sure this isn't pleasant and very hurtful, but according to her three fire engines and two ambulances arrived because of her panicking ...

That's not why I can't stand him but fire engines?

We need The Real Housewives Of Modern Talking. Thomas and the Nora necklace would be at least a 3-episode arc.

 

[DominoDancing]

You really should send this to PJRetro and have an ironic win! Ddddd

I don't think I would be able to handle it psychologically if this ended up my highest PJRetro scorer, so not a chance I am willing to take!

 

[soratami]

@berserkboi trying every day to get people to enter this rate's artists on PJRetro is a bit of a scream dd

 

[Phonetics Girl]

Check this out: Modern Talking is so big in Poland that our main woman in rock called her comeback sell-out dance pop album Modern Rocking. And that was in 2009.

 

[Deleted member 26234]

Enough of Modern Talking, let's talk about someone who prefers modern love to talking ...






































@Phonetics Girl it seems that the song was most successful in Poland.
Do you know who I am talking about?
Well it's a man and he is a superstar.












































#24


David Bowie / Pat Metheny Group - This Is Not America

Picked By: @Filippa
Credentials #1 in Poland and the Netherlands, #2 in Belgium and Sweden, #3 in Norway, #5 in Austria and Germany, #6 in Germany, #14 in the U.K.
Average Score: 7.8932
Highest Score: 10 @Remorque, @Untouchable Ace, @DominoDancing, @If You Go,
Lowest Score: 5 @jtm

I don’t need to introduce David Bowie who was one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century. R.I.P.

Pat Metheny Group is an American jazz band with Pat Metheny as bandleader, guitarist and composer.

Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays (pianist and composer of Pat Metheny Group) composed the soundtrack to the John Schlesinger movie The Falcon and the Snowman. It includes the collaboration with David Bowie This Is Not America. David Bowie wrote the lyrics.

Here’s quite an impressing review of the song by Chris O’Leary (bowiesongs).

The piece is a closed circuit: it’s built primarily on a repeating four-chord sequence (originally Gm-Dm/F-Ebmaj7-Dm/F, or I-IV-VImaj7-IV) with a constant rhythmic pulse courtesy of Metheny’s drummer Paul Wertico. Synthesizer motifs appear throughout: a rise-and-fall fanfare, a somber French horn-sounding counter-melody that begins in the second verse. Metheny said at the time that he intended the track to be mainstream: “It was the first time the group really committed itself to doing a real pop record,” he told Billboard.

Metheny and his keyboardist Lyle Mays had written a piece called “Chris” for the Falcon soundtrack, a tone poem for Hutton’s character. This served as the basic track for which Bowie wrote a lyric,** set to the perspective of the disillusioned Boyce. Bowie’s lyric has its faults: the apparent need to include the film title at some point leads to the leaden doom-laden lines about the falcon spiraling and the snowman melting, while the homophone rhymes of “piece” and “peace,” and, more thuddingly, the near-homophone “America” and “a miracle” (done already by Culture Club) are a bit creaky.

Still his vocal is one of his finest of the era: the way Bowie quietly twists and reshapes his phrasing of “America” in its various repeats; the descending phrases to match lyrical depictions of decay (blossoms failing to bloom, falcons tumbling); his fine, eerie singing on the bridge—the octave leap on “was a TIME,” the run of high Gs and As on “blew so pure.” (There’s a touch of Donald Fagen on “faintest idea“). Bowie deftly handles the jarring key change after the first bridge (to G-sharp minor), a move that puts an edge into the song but also seems like the composers forcing the drama a bit. The problem is that once the key change happens, the song doesn’t go anywhere new, settling into a repeat of the first verse and the entire bridge, plus a minute’s worth of outro. When he performed it live years later, Bowie wisely moved the change to the song’s climax.

The hook—the repeated refrain “this is not America”—is all the drama the song needed, as Bowie begins by softly reinforcing the declarations of his backing singers and eventually makes “this is not America” a mournful, wounding statement in its closing repetitions. There’s a world, an empty generation, within the words, their open accusation. Packaged in a quiet, near-Muzak setting, “This Is Not America” briefly hung in the air in the mid-Eighties, a hummable curse for an unsubtle time, offering no solutions, only one concrete statement: that we live in a fiction.

So, what is this song about?

At first, the song title is a quote from the movie. One of the main characters, a Russian spy and drug dealer, is arrested by the Mexican police. He protests, saying "I have my rights, I am an American”, but only got the unimpressed answer "This is not America.”

But to me it’s more about a disillusion, maybe the American Dream going bad whenever one of the ideals democracy, rights, liberty, opportunity or equality is disrespected. Or more generally growing up with / believing in some values and later in life realising that suddenly they are treated with contempt.


What did PopJustice think?

@berserkboi (9.3) Compelling, as ever Mr. Bowie!

@Ezz (5.5) I'm probably in a small minority who doesn't get the appeal of David Bowie - sorry!

@Filippa (8) One of my favourite songs of David Bowie!

@daninternational (8.5) Bowie has always felt a little out of reach for me, until I went to a spontaneous outdoor Bowie hour in Sydney the day he died. It's a good song, which has not dated anywhere near as much as other stuff on this list

@pop3blow2 (9) This is a good one. The kind of song that may get randomly played on a department store satellite radio channel here in the U.S. … oh, the beautiful irony.

@DominoDancing (10) What a mood! Bowie manages to take Metheny's already gorgeous instrumental and turn it, via the magic of his voice and performance, into a classic Bowie track, and one of the high points of his 80s output.

@WowWowWowWow (8) Oh this is the guy who made a song that sampled Samantha Mumba right??

@MilesAngel (6) Confession: I've never been a Bowie fan. I appreciate what this song is doing but it just seems to pass on by, only the piano really grabs me.

@jtm (5) Dddd I now have so many questions about the film from the music video

As the rate is a selection of 80s and 90s songs, here are my favourite songs by David Bowie from this period:

This Is Not America


Ashes To Ashes

Yeah Major Tom!

Under Pressure (Queen & David Bowie)


Modern Love


Blue Jean


And don't miss Let's Dance and Absolute Beginners.

 

[P Grandson]

Blue Jean

Richard Fairbrass on the bass!

 

[MilesAngel]

6 I can definitely see why this would appeal but it's not for me. As I mentioned I've never been a huge Bowie fan although he does have some songs I like. My brother however is a huge fan.

 

[DominoDancing]

Richard Fairbrass on the bass!

What the...that IS Richard Fairbrass! How did I never realize that???

Spoiler

Let's be real, it's because he has hair in this video. But still...

 

[Penguin]

Sorry work has been/still is havoc, I'm just taking the time to catch up now!!!

I fairly sure I gave every song for the past few eliminations at least a 6, so I like them all - and lost a 10.

@Penguin (8) is giving me German relocated overseas with this knowledge! I stan!! – I enjoy Modern Talking but they have made one song in their entire career and this isn’t my favourite iteration of it.

Ooh nope I've been to Germany like once in my life (for half a day), but I like making this impression!

Finally, indeed. And I'd be more than open to hearing a full commentary by @Filippa.
Really, Dieter Bohlen is insufferable and regressive in his worldview, and a one-trick pony in terms of his songwriting (well, perhaps two tricks: the 80s Modern Talking stuff that all sounded the same, and the 2000s German Idol balladry that all sounded the same). And if you want a great example of how shameless he is as a songcopierwriter, have a listen to this POS he released in 1994, five months after Pet Shop Boys got a huge #1 in Germany with Go West:

Honestly this is hilarious.

 

[TrendyMüller]

This Is Not America is AMAZING! It totally stood out among all the synth-pop that was around at the time (although the era of exploration and experimentalism lay mostly dormant by 1985). The gliding, majestic, glittering soundscape was such a breath of fresh air at a time when most of our early synth-heroes had short-circuited or had succumbed to sticky, corporate pomp (j´accuse: Eurythmics and Tears For Fears).

I can´t recommend the whole soundtrack album highly enough! It plays like an extended suite of the main theme, with the melodic elements shifting in and out of focus. Next to the Blade Runner Soundtrack it´s my favourite of the genre.

 

[Phonetics Girl]

1 in Poland

I had a look and this was its position on the Radio 3 countdown which was fan voted. Trust they'd sent smooth jazz to #1! Fun fact: the LP3 charts lasted since the early 80s until 2020 when the government tried to censor the #1 song, which was critical of the ruling party leader, by maintaining it had won the vote due to bots. In short, this lead to the whole thing blowing up nationally, Radio 3 losing its target audience and 90% of DJs and journalists either leaving or getting sacked by the powers that be. So, the original line-up set up their own spin-off of Radio 3 by way of crowdfunding and they're doing quite well for themselves. Pat Metheny and Bowie are still like crack to them. My mum even sends postcards with her votes for the weekly countdown, exactly the way things were done back when This Is Not America was topping the charts! See? This post was not off-topic at all!