1984 was a lot of things for music. “The ’80s” as we remember them were in full swing by mid-decade. MTV arguably had its greatest influence and effect on the pop charts. And many of the ...

Last week, I ranked the 1974 crop and today we’re looking at 1984, my favorite year that we’ll tackle. The ranking involves 20 songs, and 18 of them are great and about 15 of them are still in ...

In a peak moment of pop monoculture, synthesizers pumped up songs and MTV forever changed how artists were seen. Here’s how — ...

This week, we’re running a few articles that look back at the music of 1984, beginning with a sharp, well-reported piece by Ben Sisario about the way a number of ’70s rockers (ZZ Top ...

Guilty-pleasure songs come with the baggage of profound embarrassment ... “Hold Me Now” by Thompson Twins from Into the Gap Hits in 1984 were buoyed by earnestness. Thompson Twins’ defining ...