Lately I've been revisiting the music of my youth, kinda going back over the new releases of back in the day with my old man ears and seeing what I still like. Naturally, there's stuff that I liked then that doesn't hold up (W.A.S.P., Helix), and stuff I didn't get into at the time that I love now (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds being the highlight).

I picked eighth grade as the starting point, with the month I turned 14 in particular. Here are the May-June 1984 releases I've re-added to my collection in this little project of mine.

Great diversity for only being 14.

The only major rap album that came out these months afaik was by The Fat Boys. I might buy that, but it isn't in print and used prices are obnoxious. My country tastes before 1986 leans towards Johnny Cash and the '70s outlaws. Willie Nelson and Hank Jr. had albums around this time but these ones don't hit the spot for my old man ears.

Revisiting old releases with modern ears. At 14 I lived in a small Atlantic Canadian town of under 1000 people. A lot of these albums I didn't hear until college or later.

Oh, I see. Radio must have been your best friend back in that small town.

God, no! They played Funkytown and Electric Avenue every morning! The kids were into gospel, country or hair metal. The saving grace was the pot smoking teens who'd loan you The Sex Pistols or something like that. I swear, it was like an '80s version of the school in Pump Up The Volume.

Poor guy. I grew up in NJ so I was blessed to have all the NYC stations, some of the best of the world and those DJ's were my teachers. Of course every band in the world wanted to play in NYC so again got to see many because of the proximity.

Great thing about music though, always awaiting to be discovered. Been collecting since I was kid buying 45's and still, everyday I learn something new that I want to checkout. How great is that!

Like a buddy of mine used to say, the best song is the next good one I haven't heard yet.

That degree of diversity makes me think of early MTV and how it was, partly out of necessity, so refreshingly genre-agnostic, unlike most radio of the time.

My 80's tastes were eclectic. I was listening to Robert Cray when everyone else was into Van Halen.

I need to go back and listen to some of that stuff - your thread has inspired me, Bolgani.

Added three more to the pile.

I find this really ironic that a guy named Rick is giving this the

Oh, and for the record, you may want to try Prince from that era. Who knows? I can't in good conscience recommend the other 3 pop acts, but he had something of an edge.

The first three Prince albums were amazing, in my opinion. He was unique.

Purple Rain's one of the cds above. Good album.