As always, the fact that rock is getting old -just like those of us who have enjoyed it all our lives- is something inevitable and sometimes even saddening, but at the same time it determines a series of anniversaries that allow us to recover some important works. Forty-two years ago, in 1980, a kind of “bridge course” was established between punk, the subsequent new wave or disco music, and what was to come in that carefree and crazy decade that was inaugurated. It is interesting to review, through these 5 albums, the wide amalgam of styles that were cemented through them.
5. The Game – Queen
After having great successes in the seventies with “We Will Rock You”, “We Are The Champions”, “You’re My Best Friend”, “Bohemian Rhapsody”, etc., the English band Queen found a new path with the album The Game, which was acclaimed by critics and the public that bought in record time, in the United States, 3 million copies in 1980.
4. The River – Bruce Springsteen
It’s really hard to find the words to define an album like this. Like it or not, Springsteen has had a totemic character in the future of rock and this album is possibly the work that best draws him in all his facets, due to the number of songs it contains and their out-of-orbit quality. After two masterpieces like Born To Run and Darkness On The Edge Of Town and spending bittersweet moments in a career that suffered greatly from the inclemencies of the recording world, Bruce and his boys finally had time to think properly about a load of new songs. that the first had prepared.
3. Blizzard Of Ozz – Ozzy Osbourne
Ozzy’s most anticipated album after he was fired from Black Sabbath a year and a half earlier. Previously the work and its future release were already planned but Ozzy left the project to focus again on Sabbath. He would take it back, bring together musicians from the bands Rainbow and Urial Heep and delight the ears of thousands. People wanted to know what was behind Ozzy Osbourne once he announced his solo career and the prince of darkness made his solo career known in the best way. With short riffs and to the beat of bass and guitar, Blizzard of Ozz begins with “I Don’t Know” which is a pseudo-futuristic song where Ozzy seems not to find them when or why of the end of the world that seems to be approaching.
2. Ace Of Spades – Motörhead
Lemmy and his two henchmen, after spawning no less than two smash hits like Overkill and Bomber over the past year, decided to go all out with this definitive treatise on how to turn classic rock and roll into something so fast, dangerous and dirty who laughed at punk right in its face. There was no one like them, capable of drilling ears and brains as if it were a Black & Dekker.
1. Back In Black – AC/DC
1980 was a magical year, the year that opens a decade that changed the world forever. Back in Black is a refined record, very well produced and that sounds like it was made yesterday. Very different from what AC/DC had done so far. Bon Scott was practically a punk singer, a genius in his own way but the band had a more laid-back and disinterested attitude. With the death of the vocalist, AC/DC changed, improved, grew, and still in mourning wrote their greatest work, a true “masterpiece”! Producer Mutt Lange, who had previously produced Highway to Hell, was very important in this maturing of the band’s sound, mainly because of the work he did with the new singer and lyricist Brian Johnson. What pressure for Brian! But he took it literally (pardon the pun). He did a masterful job that showed a new future for the band, new possibilities.