Was 1984 the best year for soundtracks?
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Soundtracks are an important part of movies (and TV shows). While they're not always needed, one can't deny they're definitely icing on the cake to a movie. Recently I was listening to the top hits of 1984 on Spotify and I noticed a number of songs were from movie soundtracks, while others had some movie or TV show connection, even if that came after their release. So here we're going to take a look at why '84 might have been the best soundtrack year EVER! I know some of you are going to disagree with this, especially Millennials, but calm down. Let me make my case for '84.
Starting off our list is the Purple One, aka Prince and his Purple Rain album, which served as the soundtrack to his film debut of the same name. Purple Rain gave us When Doves Cry, I Would Die 4 and the title track. I'm not sure if people remember the movie as much as the music, but I guess that's the power of Prince.
Then there was Footloose, the movie about a town that bans dancing and rock n roll amongst its youth population, starring Kevin Bacon as the rebel who needs to move his feet. The soundtrack had Deniece Williams' Let's Hear It For The Boys and Kenny Loggins' title track, which has led to many memorable parodies across movies and TV.
1984 also saw the release of the first Ghostbusters movie and with it came the song of the same name by Ray Parker Jr with its infectious hook. There's some controversy surrounding this song, as Parker got sued by the rock band Huey Lewis for allegedly ripping off the melody from their song I Want A New Drug.
The filmmakers had used "I Want a New Drug" as temporary background music in many scenes to which they gave Parker film footage to watch to write and compose a song for them.
The fantasy movie NeverEnding Story, based on the 1979 German novel was released in 1984 and it came with a killer soundtrack tune of the same name sang by British singer Limahl and featured vocals by Beth Anderson.
The first Beverly Hills Cop soundtrack may not be all that famous, but it gave us arguably one of the best theme songs from a movie, the aptly titled Axel F, after the character Eddie Murphy plays. Beverly Hills Cops dropped at the tail-end of 1984 and furthered Murphy’s movie stardom as well as launch a franchise that just had a recent installment.
Songs from 1984 not related to a specific soundtrack, but still movie related.
Rockwell's Somebody's Watching Me which features Michael Jackson on the hook and his brother Jermaine doing additional vocals was released in December 1983 and charted all over the following year and while not a soundtrack record, overtime has been ingrained in pop culture through movies, TV and of course, Halloween. And the record makes a reference to Alfred Hitchcock's famous Psycho movie.
Jump (For My Love) by The Pointer Sisters is definitely one of the grooviest songs you'll ever hear and while it was not made for a soundtrack, it has soundtracked many a scenes, probably the most famous being from the movie, Love Actually.
Even if you don't know who they are, you've surely heard Twisted Sister's We're Not Going To Take It for its frequent use throughout pop culture in films and tv show.
Tina Turner's 1984 single, What's Love Got To Do With It, ended up being the name of her 1993 biopic, which starred Angela Bassett and Laurence Fishburne.