80–82
May 2005
This is a shameless personal exercise in nostalgia — remembering the way I discovered new wave and punk-rock music in the time from the summer of 1980 (when I first started listening to Top 40 and rock radio) through the summer of 1982 (just before I left home for college.) These are the songs that had the greatest impact on me at the time, not necessarily the ones that I consider the “best” or “most significant”. They are arranged in, roughly, the order in which I first heard them, not the order they were released.
You can read more about the tracks and how I first heard them, here.
Now, I don’t mean to give the impression that this is all I listened to. During these same years, I was discovering the classic rock music of the ’60s and ’70s, especially the “progressive” variety; so bands like Led Zeppelin, Genesis and Pink Floyd were just as important to me. But (in more ways than one) they wouldn’t fit on this disc. Maybe later I’ll make a parallel-universe 80–82 compilation with “When The Levee Breaks”, “The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway”, “Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun” …
This mix is dedicated to the friends who shared this time and this music with me: sister Karen, David Patmore, Summer Robbins, Dennis Wolfers, Patrick Stallard, Paul Spangler, Michèle Graybeal, Pam Berthold, Paul Lanning …