To wish I had been old enough to enjoy the 80s?

[CJ2010]

Just listening to some brilliant 80s songs on my iPod and was just thinking that I would have loved to have been in my teens/ twenties to have been able to enjoy the music, fashion, movies etc. I think the music especially, was brilliant, such a great mix of everything to suit all tastes. I was born in the eighties, so I can sort of remember the 90s, which were also fab, but the last decade I think, has been crap, music wise. AIBU?

Oh the 80s, great time to be a teenager! Rob Lowe and the Brat Pack, especially St Elmo's Fire, Demi Moore was soooo cool
I was channel hopping the other day and came across Working Girl - Melanie Griffiths and her mates' hairdo's and shoulder pads - how come no-one told us at the time how ridiculous we looked??!!

Yes Brightspark - missed Billy Bragg, but enjoyed James and The Man from Del Monte at the Town & Country Club.

Also went to Nelson Mandela concert in '88, and spent late 80's hanging around dive-y indie clubs in New Cross and Peckham, or Alice in Wonderland (psychedelic club) off High Street Kensington. And of course - Kensington Market for clothes.

Best clubbing outfit was my mum's 60's flowered shift dress over thick tights with multi-strapped pointy boots, topped off with (my prized possession) a biker jacket from Red or Dead.

I still have the jacket. Probably a good thing I no longer have the dress, as I suspect I wouldn't even get it over one thigh nowadays.

Sigh.

I love this thread. I was at uni in early eighties and working in London for the rest of the decade. Had so much fun - London was exciting. Sharing a flat in Shepherds Bush and then London Bridge - no-one I knew lived with their parents.

Yes to pixie boots and "bodies", (with the poppers underneath), and electric blue, and shocking pink and jeans with ankle zips, (I wore mine with pink shoes and a high pony tail and I danced all night!) and everything matching - but never a perm.

Saw Adam and the Ants in Paris and Dire Straits in Wembley. Saw The Jam and the Clash and OMD and so many more... Still love the music.

I was born in 1978 so my memories of the '80s is playing with an old pram, on my skates, riding my bike, playing Kerbie, climbing trees, my dad on the picket line during the '84 miners' strike, going to the soup kitchens, crap free school dinners and playing crap cheesy music on an old cassette player - stuff like Brotherhood of Man, Lena Zavaroni and that weird old song 'Where's Your Mamma Gone?' - I don't really remember anything of the decent 80s music that I grew to know and like as I got older.

I have happy childhood memories but I know times were hard for many, not least my parents.

I had my teens during the 90s which I thought were bloody brilliant - great music anyway, but there are aspects of the 70s that appeal to me (punk rock) but my husband who is 15 years older than me tells me that was also a shit time.

*my memories ARE...

I was born in 1969 so the '80s were my teenage years.

I remember Twilight Teaser lipstick and was also a (huge) Paul Young fan.

Went to my first stadium concert - Simple Minds. Left school and got my first job (still work for the same company now!)

I remember having a knitted woollen black dress with buttons down the back. Which I used to wear with neon pink tights, neon pink shoes, neon pink beads, neon pink ear-rings...you get the gist!

New romantics - Duran Duran, Spandeau ballet etc
Culture club
U2
Michael Jackson
Tears for fear
Haircut 100
Phil Collins
Queen

Band aid/live aid

Ra ra skirts, fluorescent clothing,

Royal wedding, sloanes

Another one who was a child in the 80s (born in 77) so I remember the decade very fondly because it was my childhood. Hearing 80s music infuses me with nostalgia for that time. I remember me and my sister being dressed identically in black ski-pants with t-shirts with a palm tree on them and baggy bright yellow shirts. That awful 'Hold a chicken in the air' song (hated it as a child!); the Challenger 85 disaster. Phoning the operator from the phone box and saying 'Can you get off the line please, there's a train coming' (hilarious when you're 10).

LookAtAllTheseFucksIGive if you come back to the thread was the scary children's TV series Children of the Dog Star

It still haunts me!

Spandau Ballet. OMG.

I was a teenager in the 80s and it was awful. The 70s and the 90s were good, but the 80s was the worst decade ever. I don't like anything that reminds me of this time, music, fashion, politics - all just crap.

I can't even bear to read this thread, in fact I'm not sure why I'm even writing, except to say YADBU.

May of 1986 was our big school trip. A week in Switzerland.
I remember one of the boys sneaking in to a teachers room late one night blowing a gazoo in her ear and then running away. i opened the door of our dorm to find 3 lads running past me with the teacher trying to chase them half asleep. So funny.
I remember being on the chairlift with a very dear schoolfriend (who is sadly no longer with us. We had to go on the lifts in pairs cos they were 2 seaters. My friend and i didnt realise that we were suppossed to be wearing these hesian sack things so we were on the chairlift freezing our boobies off listening to the strains of the Chicken Song by Spitting Image coming over the mountains where the other kids were singing it.

Thinking about this a bit more seriously, I agree with whoever it was upthread who said that a lot depends on where you were during the 80's, as well as what age you were.

I started secondary school in 1978, and I remember being really excited the following year with Margaret Thatcher becoming Prime Minister. At that stage the politics pretty much passed me by, but a woman leading government seemed to promise a lot.

Became more aware of/interested in politics over the following years, and remember some very earnest discussions about CND/Greenham, the Falklands, Miners strike etc. I also remember when my school year were of age to vote we were all hugely excited about, and supportive of, the SDP.

I'd also just started getting interested in the Green Party, Greenpeace and Amnesty.

So to me it was an exciting time - some big issues to get stuck into that seemed to be full of hope. But I was in the south-east, later London so a very different 'slant' to many other parts of the country.

And back to trivia - I misremembered dates previously. Indie clubs would have been mid-ish 80's. Late 80's was college as a mature (snort) student, and Grunge. Customised denim shorts & baseball boots with thick tights and some kind of heavily patterned rugby shirt style baggy top. Clubbing in a leather hat, desperately trying to avoid bloody aciiiiiiid house :)

White 'blouson' leather jacket & white stilettos..... and 'branded' every thing else! The 'casual' look for me!

Born in '66 so the 80's was my era.

Lee Cooper or Falmer jeans (I was stick thin size 8- not now )

Copying David Sylvian (Japan) make-up. He wore far more than me.
My mate at school wanted to be a farrier and tried to do metalwork. The teacher refused to let her

southeastastra
I had that yellow lipstick too!!!!(was it called Herbert Lemons, Sherbet Lemon or something like that??)AND I wore it!! I actually didn't find it that lurid, tbh.I loved Miss Selfridge lipsticks, I always bought the one which was kind of nude/beige, can't remember its name though it's on the tip of my tongue!

They were expensive for young teeenagers like myself, and looking back, they were quite dry, although I always used lipsalve/vaseline first. I met a girl when I started college who wore the same one, but it looked awful on her, all dry and flaky and she would just keep applying more on top!

I also used to buy the box of "Kissues", do your remember them? I felt v posh with them on my bedroom shelf!

I still have a bottle of "Soft Talk" perfume, it seemed like a really grown-up, "real" perfume. One whiff and it takes me right back. Miss Selfridge was always my first port of call for clothes, make-up etc, though it wasn't cheap, by any means. The 80's were quite difficult I think for teenagers as there wasn't anywhere like Primark, New look etc. I had to save hard to buy something there, though I do think it was good quality.

YOHOAHOy, aah the Town and Country Club, great place... Bloody awful to get back to south London though... Memories a bit hazy just stripy t shirts 501s and DMs

I was a teenager in the 80s and I loved it!

I had a pair of green stilettos, my mate had yelolow ones. We thought we were the bees knees wearing them with pencil skirts, baggy blouses and thick matching belts.
I also had big button earings and matching beads.
Hair was big and took ages to perfect. I used hair gel plus around a full can of Insett haispray whenever I went out.
Make up took forever too.
Bright green mascara,green eyeliner, loads of eyeshadow, the brighter the better, lip gloss and lashings of blusher.

squeakytoy
I had a "summer 83 tape and July 83 was such a pivotal time for me!!! Anytime I hear a song from that time, OMG, it transports me right back!
War Baby was Tom Robinson, I still have the 7", and I really really loved the Style Council, Long hot Summer, that just summed up that summer cos it was long, and it was hot.

I was 14, coming up for 15, and very slim and dare I say, I was attractive. Not wildly so, but definitely passable haha! (I could cry when I see photos of myself back then, and compare myself now. Still, it's nice to look back and think I was ok.)

I started going out with a 19year old that month (all very innocent, absolutely no malarky whatsoever.) and became quite a celebrity because he was much older, had a big car and was reaaly really good-looking etc.

So hearing those songs takes me right back. I actually met him again when I was starting college and we ended up getting married!! We were together for years. Sadly, it ended, just like that long hot summer.

BUT, i have been very lucky and remarried, got 2 beautiful DS now. I must admit though, I do get a pang if I hear a summer 83 song, a pang for that young girl who was so excited and in love.

Oh, and I would come home after a date and watch Flamingo Road, with Mark Harmon. My friend and I loved that.
wonders if I could go up the loft looking for that tape now

I was a young teen in the mid-80's. I adored early Madonna and did the whole lace gloves/ropes of fake pearls/crop tops and tutu thing. There was an air of excitement and optimism about the music and fashions; Live Aid, Twilight Teaser lipstick, blue eyeliner and backcombing. My sis and I worshipped Fame - I was a ballet student with my head in the clouds of 'making it' as a dancer, so Fame was right up my street. Anyone else loved Doris/Leroy/Coco/Bruno back in the day?

I was too young to know the more serious stuff going on during those years, and despite a very traumatic time when my wonderful dad died; I still look back on the 1980's as brilliant, brilliant years.

DH is a few years older and thinks the 80's were absolute shite.

blue mascara (looks flipping good with brown eyes. I still wear navy mascara cos I'm trendy )
pink boxy jacket and ballet pump canvas shoes with little ribbon ties
Razzle Dazzle (cheapie jewllery)
becoming a vegetarian -for life not just because it was in or because I was in love with Morrisey
BWC cosmetics
Body Shop

Simon Bates , Gary Davies (ooh) ,Steve Wright
I met DH in 1985 -sigh, those were the days, we were young...

Habitat
Accesorising our kitchen in our rented studant flat with red (washing up bowl, jars, bowls, scale, mugs)

Ialways wear a vivid blue mascara, YSL False Lash Effect, it's very expensive but by God, it's blooming great stuff! makes my eyes look really green and lengthens them in seconds. Also leaves your lashes soft and flexible, not hard and brittle.
(I sometimes buy the purple one, it's fab as well.)

I remember buying the 17 blue mascara when it came out, then the No.7 navy one when I was a bit older and had more money.

My friend and I spend hours in Razzle Dazzle on a Saturday and had loads of button earrings and beads to match every outfit. We vowed not to spend more than 99p on earrings! I actually still have those button earrings somwhere.

I wanted a "coca-cola" kitchen, didn't know habitat existed! MY friend had her room all red and white and i was so jealous, mine was bland, boring and beige.

I used to have Radio 1 on in every room in the house and my friend and I would be glued to my transistor radio on Tuesday lunchtimes in schoolto hear the new charts. Sometimes the bell would be going and we'd still be waiting to hear what was no.1, it really was exciting. As someone else said, the charts really did mean something then.

Michael Jackson... billie jean, thriller OMG he was HOT! I sank into depression because i soooo wanted to be with him, i confided in my best friend that i wanted to drop out of school, to find MJ, because SURELY, if he met me, he will know his life is complete.

Said friend booked an appointment with school counsellor for me, who managed to convince me to 'stay on' as i only had a few yrs left.........AAAAAH!

listening to Madness on the radio just now, playing "you're an embarrassment" or whatever its called - brilliant!

does anyone remember school discos when you sat in a line on the floor and did a sort of dance there? what was it called? "oops upside your head"?? also the group with the guy with the big tongue, buster bloodvessell, what did they sing again?

YANBU I loved the 80s and this thread has got me coming over all nostalgic! I was born in 66 so teenage years in early 80s and then I moved to London for university. Remember the pure adrenalin (all that screaming!) going to see Duran Duran, Wham, Tears for Fears, A-Ha (ok so I wasn't very cool!) in concert - not at the O2 like nowadays when all you can see are little pin men, but at the Leicester de Montfort hall, right up at the front!

Also the fashion - black teamed with electric blue or red, and that outfit someone mentioned brought it right back - black sweater dressed with red beads, tights and belt! Huge backcombed hair and loads of panstick, topped off with a trilby hat. Gorgeous!

Born 1970 - so yes the 80s were AMAZING!
Make sure you expose your children to as much 80s music as possible - it is SUPREME!!!

What I would give to listen to replays of the radio 1 Roadshows, and wooooo Gary Davies on your radioooooooo!