Music: The Eighties are back!

I must admit, I hate the eighties. If there is anything that will remind me of the 80s, it would be big hair, and shoulder pads. Music-wise, they meant lots of synthesizers, dirty guitar rifts and more shoulder pads. Listen to all the volumes of Chorus Girl, and you'd get what I mean - one volume in and you'd surely feel yourself grow a mullet.

The good news? They're all back, and fortunately, in a more polished way. I sure hope I'm not confusing this with emo, but emo probably would consistent of clean-cut kids trying to scream their way out of puberty. Back on topic, I've been listening to The Myriad, Hard-Fi, The Bravery, and more notably The Killers. They have that distinct 80s feel - complete with bored vocals. It's called neo-rock, a fusion of new rave and rock, and perhaps The Matrix. Major plug: The Killers' Hot Fuss is a great buy, no ballads here, just pure rhythmic pleasure and catchy anti-pop melodies.

If you're looking for a more popular repertoire, there is the soundtrack to Sky High. Led by Bowling for Soup's version of I Melt With You (Jason Mraz did a reggae version of this for 50 First Dates, which didn't do anything good for the song). Or how about a revival of Everybody Wants To Rule The World? It's a jumble of 80s pop revisited for the post Y2K crowd. Major Plug again: Nice movie, watch it with you high school/college friends, and end up talking about the freaks from your batch. Hehehe.

There is one downside - someone did a remake of Spandau Ballet's True. Ooh, big mistake. True is the consummate Eighties song, everytime someone asks me my favorite song from the 80s, this is always the immediate answer. (The consummate 90s song would probably be Wonderwall by Oasis). Anyway, not that the remake was bad, but the original was simply a classic.

Comparing revivals with the originals where they were originally released is not a good sign, but not as bad as wearing shoulder pads, I guess.