Year Released: 1987

Notable Songs: “I Ain’t No Joke”, “Eric B is President”, “Move The Crowd”, “I Know You Got Soul”, “Paid In Full”

Album MVP: “I Ain’t No Joke”

Why I Loved It:  To be honest I’m confident when I go back someday and evaluate the job I did with this countdown, this will be a selection I woefully undersold.  This is one of the greatest rap albums I’ve ever heard in my life and if you’re not convinced I truly feel that way, let me indulge with you a quick story. I vividly remember buying this cassette from Record Theater in Main Street in Buffalo, New York when I was 16 years old. For the next few weeks I played the shit out of it and at some point, quite possibly because I wore it out the film on the tape broke. The very next day I walked my ass all the way back to Record Theater and spent $9.99 or whatever it was on the same cassette again. I don’t think I’ve ever bought the same album twice before or since. I couldn’t go without having it and legitimately knew every lyric to each track on it.  Til this day I think Rakim is the best rapper who has ever lived. Nobody could touch him when it came to spitting lyrics with the flow he demonstrated.

With a superbly inimitable sound and a brilliant rapper, “Paid in Full” really bangs home how vital this album was with stretching the limits of hip hop on pretty much every track, especially one of my all-time favorite rap tunes “I Ain’t No Joke.” 

Damn, this should’ve been much higher.  I’m sorry, hip hop fans.

Commercial Success: By typical pop music commercial standards this wasn’t an incredible successful album but rap music in general during the 80’s didn’t have the mainstream appeal it does now, so selling a million copies, as this album did meant more back in the day.  “Paid in Full” reached as high as No. 58 on the Billboard Top 200 and eight on the Black Albums chart on the strength of five singles, with three of them landing on the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs charts. “I Aint No Joke” reached No. 38,   “I Know You Got Soul” stalled at No. 64 and “Paid in Full” maxed out at No. 65.

Fun Facts: Courtesy of Encyclopedia.com: “It was disc jockey Eric Barrier (Eric B.) of radio station WBLS (NY) who first recognized Rakim’s talent while seeking an MC to complement his experiments with sampling in 1985. Barrier took Rakim as a protégé, and the two performed as a duo, with Barrier topping the marquee. Originally billed as Eric featuring Rakim, they recorded a single track, “Eric B. Is President,” as a demo in 1986. Zakia Records, an independent Harlem-based label, released this demo track as a two-sided single, paired with “My Melody,” that same year. In the lyrics of this early song, which became a summertime street hit, Rakim glorified the influence and power of professional MCs such as himself.

In an unfortunate footnote to its fame, Paid in Full generated a web of copyright infringement lawsuits from James Brown and Bobby Byrd, with each claiming damages resulting from the use of the recordings Barrier had sampled in the popular remixes contained on the album. Indeed, much of Barrier’s reputation and popularity rested on his talent for the remix, and some critics contended that the Eric B. & Rakim mixes were superior overall to the recordings they were taken from, including those by Brown and Byrd. Legal disputes and controversy notwithstanding, Paid in Full was certified a platinum million-seller on July 11, 1995.”

You’d be hard pressed to find a handful of things more 80s symbolic than Jon Cusak, a boom box and this jewel of a song by former Genesis front man Peter Gabriel.

Of course, I’m referring to the movie “Say Anything” in which a devastated Cusak (Lloyd Dobler) stands on the front lawn serenading his ex-squeeze Diane Court, holding a boombox over his head blasting this song. It’s indisputably one of the more iconic movie moments of the decade.

Because of that scene it’s easy to forget that Gabriel’s song was already a hit years before.  “In Your Eyes” was released in 1986, although it’s more connected with casual fans to the 1989 movie.

That sort of bothers me, as this is a pleasing record on its own.  Although Gabriel had other singles that reached higher on the charts: Sledgehammer, Shock the Monkey and Big Time— In Your Eyes was far and away my favorite.

Chart Success: Peaked at 26 on the Billboard Top 100 charts in late 1986. It reemerged 42^nd on the charts three years later thanks to the movie. It ended up spending a total of 28 weeks on the charts. It didn’t finish on the Billboard Top 100 Songs of 1986 because the Billboard Top 100 Songs of 1986 are stupid.

Great Lyrics:  So many great lyrics to choose from in this song. To me it’s great from the first lyric.

Love I get so lost, sometimes
Days pass and this emptiness fills my heart
When I want to run away
I drive off in my car
But whichever way I go
I come back to the place you are

Fun Fact: While to my knowledge it’s never been confirmed, it’s been widely reported that Rosanna Arquette is the inspiration for the song.  Gabriel lived with her for several years.  Additionally, Arquette was the inspiration for the Toto hit “Rosanna”.

Year Released: 1986

Notable Songs: “Live to Tell”, “Papa Don’t Preach”, “True Blue”, “Open Your Heart”, “La Isla Bonita”

Album MVP: “Papa Don’t Preach”

Why I Loved It: When I first started putting together this countdown I was pretty confident “Like a Virgin” would be my highest ranking Madonna album.  Turns out I was wrong.  Don’t get me wrong, I love me some Like a Virgin (No. 22 on this countdown) but I simply thought True Blue was just a little better. I’m not really sure why True Blue is my most preferred Madonna studio album because generally speaking, I love concept albums where it feels the songs are connected together.  True Blue isn’t that—at all.  It’s a collection of singles with seemingly none  having similar meaning.  But man, what an incredible collection of tunes this is. Simply put, this is the prototype of what 80’s pop music was supposed to sound like. “Papa Don’t Preach” is all about a teenager getting pregnant and choosing to keep the baby as opposed to abortion.  In today’s realm that sounds like everyday music but back then it was highly controversial.  Then again, that’s to be expected with an artist like Madonna. Honestly and selfishly I didn’t love the song for its deep meaning but simply because I loved her voice on the record.  Ditto for “La Isla Bonita”; one of the more underrated funky jams to get down to in the 80s.  She had three number-ones and five top five songs on this album. That’s ridiculous.

If you’ve ever wondered why Madonna has had such a long and illustrious career, give this entire album a listen and most your questions will probably be answered.  True Blue is awesome.

Commercial Success:  The expectations were sky high following her successful Like a Virgin album two years before, and True Blue shattered them.  Madonna’s third studio album was one of more the more commercially successful albums ever, literally.  True Blue rose to number-one on the Billboard Top 200 and remained there for five consecutive weeks before the Top Gun soundtrack finally pushed it off.  It was the best-selling album in the world in 1986 and wound out being the biggest-selling album of the entire decade by a female artist.
“Live to Tell” was Madonna’s second career ballad (“Crazy For You” the first) and her third career single to reach number-one on the Billboard Hot 100.  “Papa Don’t Preach” soon after became her fourth, topping the Billboard Hot 100 for two weeks. “Open Your Heart” made it a trio of Billboard Hot 100 chart toppers on the album. The title-track “True Blue” reached three on the Billboard Hot 100 while “La Isla Bonita” peaked at five, giving her a staggering five singles with the top five of the charts.   In total this album sold 25 million copies. If fact, this album made Madonna so huge that she was honored with the Video Vanguard Award at the 1986 MTV Video Music Awards despite being a mere four years into her commercial music career.

Fun Facts: Madonna’s “True Blue” is the eighth-biggest selling album by a female solo artist of all-time.  Here, in order are the albums above it: Shania Twain’s “Come on Over”, Alanis Morissette’s “Jagged Little Pill”, Celine Dion’s “Falling Into You”, Adele’s “21”, Celine Dion’s “Let’s Talk About Love”, Madonna’s “Immaculate Collection”, Mariah Carey’s “Music Box” and Norah Jones’ “Come Away With Me.”  Rounding out the top 10 are Carole King’s “Tapestry” and  Brittany Spears’ “Baby One More Time.”