Pop Songs From the 1980s That Still Sound Ahead of Their Time

Sounds from the 1980s appear in mod­ern pop songs all the time. Every­one from Lady Gaga to Tay­lor Swift has made hits with the vin­tage synths and drum machines that defined the neon decade. Chas­ing some­thing retro isn’t unique to cur­rent trends. But it’s eas­i­er to mine old songs for inspi­ra­tion when the ones you’re ref­er­enc­ing were so far ahead of their time, as you’ll hear on the tracks below

Beat It” by Michael Jack­son

There are end­less rea­sons why “Beat It” remains time­less. Quin­cy Jones’s pro­duc­tion. Michael Jackson’s song­writ­ing and vocal deliv­ery. And how the two mixed new tech­nol­o­gy with live ses­sion musi­cians. The hyp­not­ic groove com­bines drum­mer Jeff Porcaro’s hard rock rhythm, inter­twined with a rigid drum machine. Near­ly every sec­ond of the track is per­fect, and it builds to an elas­tic, shred­ding gui­tar solo by Eddie Van Halen. Van Halen’s play­ing alone was so ahead of its time that it still sounds fresh today.

“When Doves Cry” by Prince

Jack­son cre­at­ed some­thing eter­nal with one of history’s great­est pro­duc­ers and a team of high-pro­file vir­tu­osos. But Prince was all that inside a sin­gle human. “When Doves Cry” was rad­i­cal in its min­i­mal­ism. On the bare-bones track, Prince used a drum machine, two synths, a gui­tar, and his own voice to con­struct one of the decade’s most icon­ic hits. A bass-less pop song you can dance to isn’t easy to exe­cute. But this was Prince at the height of his pow­ers

Papa Don’t Preach” by Madon­na

Madonna’s career has been a mas­ter­class in fus­ing cul­tures and gen­res. “Papa Don’t Preach” is a post-dis­co dance tune with clas­si­cal orches­tral riffs. Think Vival­di meets the deep­est grooves by Prince or Michael Jack­son. The mix on “Papa Don’t Preach” still sounds pow­er­ful when put against cur­rent pro­duc­tions. And Madon­na con­tin­u­al­ly chal­lenged what was accept­able in pop music. Here, she sings about a preg­nant teen who tells her father she’s keep­ing the baby. Back then, there was no short­age of groups get­ting bent out of shape over Madonna’s art.  

Every­body Wants To Rule The World” by Tears For Fears

Many ground­break­ing tracks expand the son­ic pos­si­bil­i­ties of record­ing tech­nol­o­gy. In the 1980s, elec­tron­ic instru­ments gave pop music a mod­ern sound. The sam­ples sound­ed clean­er and more pow­er­ful than acoustic drums. And the key­boards cre­at­ed dreamy tex­tures, giv­ing a kind of bliss to synth-pop. “Every­body Wants To Rule The World” and its glossy treat­ment encap­su­late the 80s musi­cal spir­it in its catchy sophis­ti­ca­tion. Mean­while, the shuf­fling beat con­trasts with the song’s anx­i­ety as the mas­sive cho­rus made an anthem out of the con­se­quences of raw ambi­tion.