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Billy Joel stormed the charts in 1983 with his classic song Uptown Girl, reaching number three in the US and claiming the top spot in the UK for five weeks, knocking Culture Club’s Karam Chameleon off. The song was incredibly popular due to it’s catchy tune and simple to learn lyrics, and is the song most people will think of first when asked to name a Billy Joel song.
The song itself tells the story of a regular bloke (referred to as a downtown man in the song) who is smitten with a class socialite woman (the uptown girl of the title). The lyrics describe how this man thinks he would treat this woman were he ever to get the chance, claiming that whilst he may not be able to “buy her pearls” he would treat her well and provide the best life he could for her.
The song was written by Joel with supermodel Christie Brinkley in mind. She was his girlfriend (and later wife) and so the song is somewhat autobiographical in nature, as Joel often wondered how he could have been so lucky to end up with Brinkley as a partner. Unfortunately they divorced in 1994.
If you wanted to know anything about pop music during the 1980’s then the best place to start was with Smash Hits! magazine. For most of the 1980’s and early 1990’s it was the first choice magazine for many teenagers, at it’s peak selling half a million copies every bi-weekly issue. A record breaking issue in 1989, featuring Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan, sold more than a million copies!
June 1987, and the UK goes barmy for Star Trekkin’, a single celebrating all that was great (and stereotypical) about the classic Star Trek series - i.e. the series with Captain Kirk and Spock. No Trek cliche was left unused, except perhaps the one about Kirk always kissing the pretty female guest character. The song knocked Whitney Houston’s I Wanna Dance With Somebody off the top of the charts (thank God) although it was only at number one for two weeks (also thank God!).
Today we are more likely listen to our favourite band via a digital medium, such as compact disc or MP3 files, but in the 1980’s vinyl records still ruled the roost. Cassette Tapes may have been another popular and more portable media format (thanks to the invention of the 
Love him or hate him, there’s no denying that Michael Jackson is one of the worlds most successful music stars, and his sixth solo album, Thriller, has a lot to do with that. Thriller was released in 1982 and to this day is the album that has sold the most copies worldwide, clocking in at 104 million copies!
Junior Senior are a Dutch band formed in 1998 comprising of Jesper Mortensen and Jeppe Laursen, who were both previously members of the band Ludo-X. So what are they doing being featured in a sight about the 1980’s, I hear you cry? Well, the reason is for the amazing pixellated video that accompanies one of their best known songs, Move Your Feet.
It may be looked back on with distaste now, but at the time Joe Dolce’s hit Shaddup You Face stormed the charts around the world. The song was first released in Australia in 1980, where it went to number one and was the most successful Australian produced single in Australian music history for 26 years, selling over 350,000 copies. Total sales worldwide of the song including the 35 different foreign language versions (including the aboriginal dialect Indjubundji) are set at 4 million copies!
Duran Duran were one of the biggest bands of the 1980’s, but have never disbanded and are still recording today. The band had a string of hits including Girls on Film, Rio, Hungry Like The Wolf and the James Bond theme A View To A Kill, and were initially part of the New Romantic scene, dressing flamboyantly and with crazy big hair styles. They also have the honour of being named Princess Diana’s favourite band!