{"id":767363,"date":"2026-07-17T01:20:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T01:20:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/767363\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T01:20:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T01:20:17","slug":"3-songs-that-prove-1984-was-the-defining-year-for-80s-pop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/767363\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Songs That Prove 1984 Was the Defining Year for 80s Pop"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 80s redefined pop music as we know it. Here are a few songs that prove 1984 was a game-changing year for pop music, but especially 80s music.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s Love Got To Do With It?\u201d by Tina Turner<\/p>\n

\t\t\tPlay video<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\"Play\"\/<\/p>\n

This one was released as a single for Tina Turner<\/a>\u2018s iconic comeback album,\u00a0Private Dancer. \u201cWhat\u2019s Love Got To Do With It?\u201d also made Turner the oldest woman to top Billboard\u2018s biggest chart. However, regarding the song\u2019s theme, the singer doesn\u2019t necessarily agree.<\/p>\n

\t\t\tVideos by American Songwriter\t\t<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my case, love has a lot to do with it, I\u2019m sorry,\u201d Turner once shared, laughing in an interview with CBS<\/a>.\u00a0\u201cBut, I mean\u00a0with\u00a0the world today, I mean, everything is very fast\u00a0and\u00a0women have changed.\u00a0And men have changed as well. So I think the song sort of really\u00a0fit\u00a0a lot of liberated girls. They\u2019re feeling like \u2018Yeah, that\u2019s right, Tina! What does love have to do with it anyway?\u2019\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Doves Cry\u201d by Prince<\/p>\n

\t\t\tPlay video<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\"Play\"\/<\/p>\n

Created for a specific scene in Prince\u2019s film Purple Rain, \u201cWhen Doves Cry\u201d was all about quality over quantity musically. In this song, Prince opted not to use bass, which turned out to be one of his best decisions. This changed the game for pop music from that point on.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just sounding too conventional, like every other song with drums and bass and keyboards,\u201d Prince told Bass Player Magazine<\/a> of \u201cWhen Doves Cry.\u201d <\/p>\n

When one of his background singers, Jill Jones, asked him what was wrong, he decided to remove the bass from the track.<\/p>\n

He continued, \u201cSo I said, \u2018If I could have it my way, it would sound like this,\u2019 and I pulled the bass out of the mix. She said, \u2018Why don\u2019t you have it your way?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLike A Virgin\u201d by Madonna<\/p>\n

\t\t\tPlay video<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\"Play\"\/<\/p>\n

Released ahead of her iconic album of the same name, \u201cLike A Virgin\u201d ended up becoming one of Madonna\u2019s quintessential tracks. This one was written by Tom Kelly and Billy Steinberg, the latter of which swears that the word \u201cvirgin\u201d wasn\u2019t just put in the song to turn heads.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wasn\u2019t just trying to get that racy word\u00a0virgin\u00a0in a lyric,\u201d Steinberg\u00a0explained to Fred Bronson<\/a>. \u201c\u2026I\u2019ve been battered romantically and emotionally like many people\u2014 but I\u2019m starting a new relationship and it just feels so good, it\u2019s healing all the wounds and making me feel like I\u2019ve never done this before.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photo by: Richard E. Aaron\/Redferns<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 80s redefined pop music as we know it. Here are a few songs that prove 1984 was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":767364,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[20278,88,216,17172],"class_list":["post-767363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-1980s","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-pop-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=767363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767363\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/767364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=767363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=767363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=767363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}