102 Greatest 80's Songs

This is my curated collection of the Greatest 80s Songs, with audio clips for each song. I have been building this collection for over 20 years. In this article, I have done my best to avoid the over-played songs that you'll find most "top music of the 80s" lists. This is not an "obscure 80s songs" list either; I hope you'll recognize a good portion of them, and maybe rediscover a few you forgot about. As a bonus, if you have an Amazon Prime Membership, you'll be able to download well over half of these 80s songs for free. (!)

I am a child of the 80s and love all 1980s nostalgia, but as anyone who knows me personally could tell you, I am completely obsessed with 80s music. Something about the combination synthesizers, note swelling, and catchy melodies got me hooked at an early age. This collection includes 102 of the creme de la creme of 80's pop, 80's new wave, 80s dance music, 80s movie soundtrack songs and 80s rock songs. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.

I grew up in a music centric household. My father has strange affinity to speakers and has always played music at the highest possible volume setting. My youth was chock full of Michael Jackson, Prince, U2, Fleetwood Mac, David Bowie, UB40, and a TON of Motown. Still, to this day, my mother refers to R&B music as "Motown" (it's so cute). I guess you could say that this is in my blood.

It wasn't until I was 16, at the dawn of digital downloading, that I developed a real thirst for collecting 80s songs. When I first got my license, I would listen to mostly classic rock stations (I still do) and I would hear songs from time to time that I instantly connected with and vaguely recognized, but was not able to name. I would go home, and do an Internet search* for a few of the lyrics that I understood, to find the song to download.** From time to time, my lyric translation was so far off that I had to find the song via 80s music message boards. Thank you early adopters of Social Internet. You were my heroes.

As I got older, Napster turned into Morpheus, Kazaa, and Limewire (which maybe gave my first college computer a virus? Who knows!). Enter 1 dollar downloads from iTunes. I could buy my 80s songs individually and LEGALLY. Thank you iTunes. You saved my hell-bound soul.

*This was before the heyday of Google. The verb "to Google" hadn't been invented yet!

**This was WAY before the invention of Shazam (possibly the best smart phone app ever).

I did not look at ANY 1980s lists anywhere to create this article. I generally avoid them, and I figure it's been done so much before, why wouldn't I do my own thing? Every song on this list was, in a sense, "collected" by me at some point in my life. These songs all live on my computer in a playlist simply titled "80s".

So here they are...

1 Take On Me - a-ha

2 Nowhere Girl - B Movie

3 No More Words - Berlin

4 The Killing Moon - Echo & The Bunnymen

5 Lips Like Sugar - Echo & The Bunnymen

6 A Little Respect - Erasure

7 Always - Erasure

8 Oh L'Amour - Erasure

9 Great Southern Land - Icehouse

10 Love Will Tear Us Apart - Joy Division

11 Dead Souls - Joy Division

12 True Faith - New Order

13 Bizarre Love Triangle - New Order

14 Just Another Day - Oingo Boingo

15 Major Tom (Voellig Losgeloest) - Peter Schilling

16 Kiss Them for Me (Single) - Siouxsie & The Banshees

17 Cities in Dust - Siouxsie & The Banshees

18 Tainted Love / Where Did Our Love Go - Soft Cell

19 Voices Carry - 'Til Tuesday

20 Road to Nowhere - Talking Heads

21 Psycho Killer - Talking Heads

22 Head Over Heels - Tears for Fears

23 Everybody Wants to Rule the World - Tears for Fears

24 Mad World - Tears for Fears

25 Break It Down Again - Tears for Fears

26 Town Called Malice - The Jam

27 Only You - Yaz

Depeche Mode was the first 80s band that I fell head over heels for. I really do believe they embody the quintessential "80s sound," even into the early 90s, so please excuse me if some of the following songs bleed over the decade line:

28 Never Let Me Down Again - Depeche Mode

29 Personal Jesus - Depeche Mode

30 Strangelove - Depeche Mode

31 Enjoy the Silence - Depeche Mode

32 Policy of Truth - Depeche Mode

33 World In My Eyes - Depeche Mode

34 Stripped - Depeche Mode

I Decided that The Cure needed its own category on my greatest 80s songs list. If you aren't familiar with The Cure, but enjoy 80s music, you're in for a treat:

35 Close to Me - The Cure

36 Just Like Heaven - The Cure

37 Lovesong - The Cure

38 A Forest - The Cure

39 Lullaby - The Cure

40 In Between Days - The Cure

41 The Figurehead - The Cure

42 Six Different Ways - The Cure

So these may not all be in the dance genre - some are definitely new wave or synth pop. I can tell you one thing: they are definitely all songs that you can dance to. HARD. DANCE LIKE IT'S YOUR JOB:

43 Obsession - Animotion

44 Come on Eileen - Dexy's Midnight Runners

45 Electric Avenue - Eddy Grant

46 Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) - Eurythmics

47 Good Thing - Fine Young Cannibals

48 Cars - Gary Numan

49 Disappear - INXS

50 Escapade - Janet Jackson

51 Dead Man's Party - Oingo Boingo

52 Raspberry Beret - Prince & The Revolution

53 U Got the Look - Prince

54 I Can't Wait - Nu Shooz

55 Wanna Be Startin' Somethin' - Michael Jackson

56 Situation - Yaz

57 Don't Go - Yaz

"You Can Call Me Al" by Paul Simon is one of the first music videos I can remember seeing as a child.

For those times when you want to dance, just not very fast. Grab a partner and hold them awkwardly at arms length, or fly solo, interpretive dance style. Just go with it.

58 Forever Young - Alphaville

59 All Through the Night - Cyndi Lauper

60 Drive - The Cars

61 Everywhere - Fleetwood Mac

62 One More Try - George Michael

63 Never Tear Us Apart - INXS

64 Human Nature - Michael Jackson

65 Man In the Mirror - Michael Jackson

66 I'll Stand By You - Pretenders

67 When Doves Cry - Prince

68 Caribbean Queen - Billy Ocean

69 I Can Dream About You - Dan Hartman

70 She Drives Me Crazy - Fine Young Cannibals

71 Things Can Only Get Better - Howard Jones

72 Smooth Criminal - Michael Jackson

73 The Boy In the Bubble - Paul Simon

74 Sledgehammer - Peter Gabriel

75 Big Time - Peter Gabriel

76 Somebody's Watching Me - Rockwell

77 Infatuation - Rod Stewart

78 Africa - Toto

Okay, I couldn't choose one... and they're both Michael Jackson. I couldn't help myself. Each of these albums is solid from start to finish. He is the King of Pop for a reason.

Genesis's "Land of Confusion" is everything I love from the 80s rolled into one music video. The wonky puppets are awesomely terrifying.

Why yes, yes it is...

79 The Goonies 'R' Good Enough - Cyndi Lauper - "The Goonies"

80 Cry Little Sister - G Tom Mac - "The Lost Boys"

81 Weird Science - Oingo Boingo - "Weird Science"

82 In Your Eyes - Peter Gabriel - "Say Anything"

83 Send Me an Angel - Real Life - "Teen Wolf"

84 Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now - Starship - "Mannequin"

85 Burning Down the House - Talking Heads - "Revenge of the Nerds'

86 A Million Miles Away - The Plimsouls - "Valley Girl"

87 Pretty In Pink - The Psychedelic Furs - "Pretty in Pink"

88 If You Were Here - Thompson Twins - "16 Candles"

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun has some ridiculous 80s music in at, as well as young Sarah Jessica Parker and Helen Hunt. The song in the beginning of this clip is called "Dancing in Heaven" by Q-Feel. It is one of my favorites, but sadly I couldn't find the original version on iTunes. It lives in the movie though!

You'll notice that my 80s rock song list is void of a lot of the huge rock bands of the era. I did this on purpose for one very simple reason: I HATE 80s Butt Rock. I really really hate it. I do have one Scorpions song on here - I promise you I am not the devil:

89 The Boys of Summer - Don Henley

90 Veronica - Elvis Costello

91 Man on the Corner - Genesis

92 Do You Wanna Touch Me - Joan Jett

93 Beds Are Burning - Midnight Oil

94 Sister Christian - Night Ranger

95 Dumb Things - Paul Kelly

96 Back On the Chain Gang - Pretenders

97 Radio Free Europe - R.E.M.

98 Addicted to Love - Robert Palmer

99 Still Loving You - Scorpions

100 Moving In Stereo - The Cars

101 Don't Stand So Close to Me - The Police

102 Walking On the Moon - The Police

"Young Einstein" is a ridiculous 80s movie about a young Albert Einstein and how he invented The Theory of Relativity, beer, and Rock and Roll. Einstein, played by Yahoo Serious, also falls in love with Marie Curie and is Australian (somehow). The soundtrack is awesome and I've included a few songs in this article ("This Southern Man" in the New Wave section, and "Dumb Things" in the Rock section, directly above this blurb).

This is the best scene in the whole movie: