There were so many great guilty pleasure tracks of the 80’s on here, it just is a compilation for guilt.

So many great songs here were compiled from Phil Collins on his own with his 1985 #1 song, One More Night, and his career with Genesis with their only #1 song, Invisible Touch. There are other great 80’s tracks, including Pat Benetar on her smash, Love Is A Battlefield, Los Lobos with the only Spanish song to hit #1, La Bamba, and other guilty pleasures. Although this is just like every 80’s collection with guilty pleasures like Love Shack from The B-52’s, Queen’s Another One Bites The Dust, Tommy Tutone’s phone number ballad 867-5309 / Jenny, Missing You by John Waite, and the only Grateful Dead Top 10 hit, Touch Of Grey. All in all, just so much here, but more to be longed for.

Billboard #1s: The '80s

Disc: 1
1. Another One Bites the Dust – Queen
2. Owner of a Lonely Heart – Yes
3. Mony Mony [Live] – Billy Idol
4. Invisible Touch – Genesis
5. Way It Is – Bruce Hornsby, Bruce Hornsby
6. Twilight Zone – Golden Earring
7. Waiting for a Girl Like You – Foreigner
8. Bamba – Los Lobos
9. Just Another Night – Mick Jagger
10. Life of Illusion – Joe Walsh
11. Everybody Wants You – Billy Squier
12. Sleeping Bag – ZZ Top
13. Missing You – John Waite
14. Sea of Love – The Honeydrippers
15. One More Night – Phil Collins

Disc: 2
1. Love Shack – The B-52’s
2. Orange Crush – R.E.M.
3. Need You Tonight – INXS
4. Touch of Grey – Grateful Dead
5. Hold Me – Fleetwood Mac
6. Fascination Street – The Cure
7. Amanda – Boston
8. Living Years – Mike + the Mechanics
9. New World Man – Rush
10. She’s a Beauty – The Tubes
11. Voice – The Moody Blues
12. 867-5309/Jenny – Tommy Tutone
13. Love Is a Battlefield – Pat Benatar
14. Abracadabra – Steve Miller, Steve Miller Band
15. Downtown Train – Rod Stewart

Since both of my kids were born in the 1980s this is a very popular era of music in our house. These are the songs my kids grew up with.

The heavy presence of disco is to be expected since this dance style still rules the charts in 1979. I Will Survive and Y.M.C.A. became ageless club anthems, Ring My Bell is famous for its atmospheric syndrum effects and Heart Of Glass crossed the boundaries between new wave and disco in a big way.

I bought Billboard Top Hits: 1979 just for that one song you cannot find anywhere else. Randy VanWarmer, Just When I Needed You Most. You cannot find this one anywhere, unless you have it on an old record.

Escape (The Pina Colada Song) was a novelty hit and it still irritates me, but Just When I Needed You Most, Sad Eyes and Fire are great emotional ballads that have stood the test of time very well. The Devil Went Down To Georgia is still an amusing country song with some superb instrumental breaks. Nine great songs out of ten tracks make this one of the better Billboard compilations, reflecting all of the relevant styles that made 1979 such a great year for music.

Billboard Top Hits 1979

This 10 track retrospective is a good example of the diversity that topped the charts in ‘79. From Disco Classics (I Will Survive, Ring My Bell), to the camp from the openly gay Village People (Y.M.C.A.), to country (The Devil Went Down to Georgia), to a reworked track from Bruce Springsteen via the Pointer Sisters (Fire).

You have here a taste of what went on back in ‘79.

The dramatic ballad, another 70’s staple is also featured here with Sad Eyes, and Just When I Needed You Most, and another 70’s icon the “songs that defy description” is featured here with Escape (The Pina Colada Song).

Joe Whitburn's Billboard Top Pop Singles 1955-2006

This is the definitive book for the Billboard Hot 100 chart from 1955 thru 2006. Every charted song, every charted artist. The bible of the radio industry.

This book is perfect for the person who wants to know when a song charted in the top 100, how high it went, how long it was on the charts. It also has basic information about the major artists. It is perfect for the professional mobile DJ’s.

This is excellent for the serious collector or for anyone interested in facts about music and artists.

Every library should have this book as a resource reference as well as the complete set of Joel Whitburn’s books from Billboard.

It annotates the most popular songs in the United States from 1955-2006. It dispenses with fan propaganda and sticks with the pure facts.

Billboard’s Hottest Hot 100 Hits is essential for music trivia and popular culture fanatics. The most interesting part is reading the Top 100 hits of each year, year by year. It is a fascinating study in shifting trends in public taste, and you literally “see and hear” the changes in U.S. history, reflected through its music, over the coarse of five decades.

From the Elvis Presley, Perry Como and Doris Day era of the 1950’s, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones in the 1960’s, Donna Summer, Abba and Bee Gees in the 1970’s, Madonna in the 1980’s and Snoop Dogg, Eminem and Mariah Carey, this book is fun and fascinating from start to finish.

Billboard Top Hits: 1978 Track Listings

1. We Are the Champions – Mercury, Freddie
2. Hot Child in the City – Gilder, Nick
3. It’s a Heartache – Scott, Ronnie
4. Take a Chance on Me – Andersson, Benny
5. Baby Come Back – Beckett, Peter
6. Reminiscing – Goble, Graham
7. Lay Down Sally – Clapton, Eric
8. If I Can’t Have You – Gibb, Barry
9. Kiss You All Over – Chapman, Mike [Prod
10. I Go Crazy - Davis, Pau

How old was I in 1978 - just eleven! Trans Ams and The Fonz were the coolest, Grease was in the movie theatre and by that Summer, popular music had started to split away from disco domination. In the next year, some would go towards Van Halen and others would move towards Devo. Billboard has put together a diverse compilation of hits that will surely sit in your CD changer for weeks as you re-live 1978.

The 8th Edition, written by Joel Whitburn, is another “must have” for anyone serious about music chart performance. Joel’s reputation for compiling and publishing chart data in an interesting and useful format is well recognized, and this edition covers the entire time span of 1955-2003.

Whitburn’s books can get so much use as valuable reference tools, that it’s easy to wear out the binders. Can’t wait for the 9th edition!