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A little excerpt for people who take their music very seriously.


Q: What do you think is THE defining song of the 80's? Not the most popular, but the song that if you were putting a disc of one song in a time capsule for 100 years and they were to open it, what song would scream "This is why the 80s rules." I say it's Blue Monday by New Order, but I'm open to suggestions
--Lance Hughes, Lubbock, TX

SG: That's a great "Driving on a road trip and needing something to argue about for 50 miles" question. In my opinion, a quintessential 80's song should accomplish five things:

A. It should make you think that, except for the rare exceptions -- like the Killers or Franz Ferdinand -- they don't make music like this anymore.

B. It should be happy and moody at the same time, the last song you would ever hear before driving your car off a bridge.

C. It should have a definite beat -- you could dance to it, clean your car to it, drive 110 MPH to it, etc -- and it should definitely sound like something that could have been used in Miami Vice (in an opening montage or a "driving around Miami and checking out hot chicks" scene, not a car chase or a "Tubbs hangs out in a strip joint and pretends he's Jamaican" scene).

D. It should make you question your own sexuality for about 0.87 seconds before you say, "Ah, screw it, it's a good song."

E. It should be dated, cheesy and a little overdramatic ... but not so much that the song isn't still enjoyable even now.

Anyway, these would be my six choices (with apologies to "Relax" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, which wasn't quite morose enough since it was about an orgasm):

1. "The Promise," by When In Rome
2. "Suedehead," by Morrissey
3. "Uncertain Smile" by The The
4. "A Forest" by The Cure
5. "The Killing Moon," by Echo and the Bunnymen
6. "Age of Consent," by New Order

So there you go. And yes, I spent about 90 minutes coming up with that list. And you wonder what I do all day.