Pitchfork

The 80s! Sick of them yet? In the early 90s, the measures of people in their 20s against their teenage 80s plasticity resulted in everything sounding like Grand Funk. In the early 00s, everyone realized the 90s were a drag and wondered if there was something to that Thompson Twins thing after all. I anxiously await whatever Jill Sobule/G-Funk hybrids the early 2010's will bring us!

The 12" single was the art form of the 80s. They were the last gasp of the single as a physical, commercial artifact. Disco made the 12", and it brought disco's dub-space and length to everything it touched. Yes, even the Thompson Twins. Sure, it's survived via dance music, but today what comes between those elongated intros and outros is a lot less likely to be a song. (Oh, but what about the cassingle? Well, it destroyed the B-side. The CD single gives us up to six bullshit "remixes". So you were saying?)

Now just look at that cover up there: those stark white letters, that deep salmon background, that gorgeous boombox. It's enough to give the design fetishist in me an erection of the heart. And the idea of a compilation of 80s 12"'s already wins points as they were some of the first records I ever bought. And this comp makes a pretty good case for all the various aspects of the 12" philosophy. The Cure's "A Forest" just goes for sheer treetop scaling length. Scritti Politti's ultra-brite (p)op-art stabs and gimmicky samples are a mini-essay in mid-80s remixing-- as well as on what the 80s did to punk. Grace Jones' "Pull Up To The Bumper" all but invents M.I.A. (yeah, I said it) except scarier and better. The Icicle Works' "Love Is a Wonderful Color" is one of those "wow where was this hiding?" tracks that make you think there's something left to 80s crate-digging. On some level, I should just be able to write "Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go?" and go out for a beer.

12"/80's is one of those collections that-- due to concept, packaging, and a goodly portion of its contents-- I want to grace with a much higher rating. But I can't deny one thing: There's a Simply Red song on this box set. If you meet a beautiful boy with a unibrow, you can shave it, but it's always going to grow back. Likewise, you can skip tracks here, but Mick Hucknall, the unibrow of pop, returns every time you replay it. There is some real wack, horrid shit (Lloyd Cole? The Style Council??) next to the unmitigated triumphs (Yazoo, they can never tarnish you). Plus, it's too white (only one rap song and no Prince), too British (understandable since it's a UK import, but a U.S. version is urgent and key), and too in thrall to the whole "80s = stuff you hear in a dentist's office" idea. Also, despite containing two Trevor Horn productions-- ABC's Fairlight panto-cabaret "Tears Are Not Enough" and Propaganda's Bergman-funk "Dr. Mabuse", there's no Frankie Goes To Hollywood! You wouldn't make a box set called 7"/60's and leave off "I Heard It Through the Grapevine"!