6 posts tagged “80s”

A friend just informed me that Chicago will be host to JemCon in September! Alright, who wants to go with me? It gives me an excuse to visit Chicago which I always enjoy, plus I can buy weird memorabilia and maybe get that Misfits shirt I've been wanting. Seriously, how can you pass up something where one of the panel discussions is:

 Pizazz: Evil Wench? Or just misunderstood? Why the Misfits appeal is stronger than ever...

Really though, why did cartoons lie to me? Because doing a record label has been nothing like what Jem & the Holograms taught me it would be like. I thought our bands would have overly complicated rivalries with bombs being planted on stage; we'd have a house where we took care of runaway youths; we'd be hanging out with royalty all the time on yachts; I'd have a jealous boyfriend with purple hair and somewhere there would be a chick named Video....who made videos...and had a cousin named Clash...who made clashing noises a lot.

Speaking of big hair, I went to Heavy Metal Karaoke where the club owner actually plays with a live band while people do their thing. Did I mention it was Billy Morris from Warrant!? Oh yeah! Other than some girl killing the vibe by doing a Four Non Blondes song (is that even metal?) it was more fun than any live show I've been to in a long while! Between that, and accidentally seeing Valiant Thorr live, I'm starting to wonder what I've been missing with the whole metal thing. Hubby and I have noticed that the older we get, the more we wanna Rawk! Anyways, I was especially happy that a girl sang Iron Maiden "Run to the Hills" which was one of my favorite songs when I was about 5 years old. I think I always liked Iron Maiden as a tyke because the album art was so amazing to me

Did Iron Maiden albums inspire me to be a painter as a child? Ah, who knows.

I got on another kick recently where I rented a bunch of movies from the era where HBO just ran the same 8 bad teen films over and over again. You know, Alien from L.A., Lucas, Teen Witch, Solarbabies and so forth? Not to mention they ran the two Unico movies constantly for a while too.

Well one of those movies was The Wraith, starring Charlie Sheen. I forgot how short it is, almost like a made for TV movie but still kind of funny and good. So I make my husband watch it and he LOVES it. Like a child he keeps asking me technical and theoretical questions, trying to figure out if these people are supposed to be in high school and gets bent out of shape about certain plot holes. Mostly we are disturbed by the hair-do Nick Cassavettes is sporting.

The next day after watching it he did really good in a competitive road race. He thinks The Wraith possessed him and that helped him win. So we watched it again. The movie is only and hour and 20 minutes long, so no big deal. I just thought it was really funny.

Here's the trailor...

After reading my Joan Crawford book, a friend pointed out this video to me. Oh the 80s: big hair, big belts, shoulder pads, pounds of rouge, and home made smoothies. You know for a "big TV star" her closet kind of looked like crap even with all her lucite drawers. Or maybe it is just her clothes looked silly both on and hanging up. And Brenda, a gold lame dress like that never looks good....ever.

I don't for how long now, but Fat Boys fever has gripped our pad! It all started with a friend who made an insane multi-disc compilation of hip hop/rap from 1979 to 1992 and The Fat Boys stuck out if anything for the beatboxing and other odd noises. Quote the hubby, "Screw playing guitar like Kevin Sheilds, I wanna learn to beatbox like The Fat Boys! Now that's talent!" and so the mental illness began. We even rented the movie Disorderlies which is so bad yet you can't help but admire it somehow. I remember it was one of the heavy rotation daytime HBO movies when I was a kid; usually it was flip-flopped for days with Teen Witch, and Solar Babies at times.

Since then I've had "Baby You're A Rich Man" stuck in my head. It won't go away anytime soon. Around the time (1987) this movie came out I seem to remember it was also when The Fat Boys teamed up with Chubby Checker and The Beach Boys. They were probably told by their management that this was a great idea. I found some video clips, it is almost like watching their careers lose cred and go down the tubes with each video. "All You Can Eat" borders on genius, and the rest...oh just watch and see:

Here are 3 that were rerun non-stop for a VERY long time to the point where I just loved these movies. Seriously, I could watch them again and again.

Kathy Ireland is nerdy, then she falls down a big ass hole into the earth's core and discovers Atlantis is really a big ole crashed spaceship. She meets a cute dude down there, goes on some adventures, and comes back to the surface all hot looking and stuff. Because all you had to do for a makeover in the 80s was get a perm and lose the glasses, dig?

A magic glowing orb falls to earth and gets found by a bunch of orphans who go on a big adventure. Its the future by the way, and although there's been a drought and an evil corporation/government/whatever controls all the water, there's still hockey teams. Okay not a hockey team, a hybrid of hockey, rollerblading and basketball. Look for almost the entire cast of The Lost Boys. There's more to it obviously, you can read about it here

All I have to say is that I Wanna Be the Most Popular Girl...you will have that stuck in your head, along with the awesome white boy band rap song "Top That". Nerdy girl finds out she's a reincarnated witch, and thus casts spells to get back at mean people and then make herself popular. Not only does it star Robyn Lively, but Zelda Rubenstein (you know, creepy psychic from the Poltergeist movies?). I love how this was the era where every stud in the high school was named Brad. Is it just me, or does that pop star Shana (a poor woman's Madonna character) look like Elvira?

For some reason, this Killing Joke video

about a minute into it started to looke like this video

The flowing flags and banners and two of the guys having the same bleached hair. Plus, you know spinning n' stuff. I dunno, thought it was funny.