The top 5 best 80s cheese pop vocal performances

(#4 will ELIMINATE YOUR HEAD!)

I have given this matter incredibly ponderous thought, and will shortly list the five greatest 80s cheese pop vocal performances, in order, starting with the best because I bet you didn't expect that. Should you disagree with these objective truths, I reserve my right to balk, scoff and/or whinny like an English governess.

Before I get to the list, however, there are certain diversity issues that must be dealt with earnestly and openly. You will find out that the best vocal performance was done by a woman, which is hardly surprising since that is the case in pop music for probably every decade (xref: Adele, "Someone Like You"; Rihanna, "Desperado").  That said, the other four are white cishet men.  I know.  There's something inherently cheesy about us, maybe, or perhaps this exercise is faux-objective and I often look to men for guidance with the difficulties of life.  Please know that many outstanding 80s vocal performances had to be excluded on the grounds that they were not really pop (Joan Jett, "Bad Reputation), or that they were actually good songs (Prince, "Kiss", Traci Chapman, "Fast Car").  If anyone is at fault here, I suggest it is you.

Here is the list, from greatest to still-great-but-not-as-good-as-the-greatest:

1.  Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart".  Friends, this is as good as it gets.  It starts slow, melancholic, reflective.  Soon, however, we can hear that something is catching in her throat, and that thing is "utter insanity".  She becomes more and more distraught as the song progresses, until the listener is willing to do something--anything--even make soup--to assuage her pain.  Alas, she is inconsolable.  This song, as I once said to Prole Hole , is an insane roller coaster ride of emotion, and that roller coaster is being driven by an insane monkey who has you by the balls and is whispering gentle encouragements with every painful squeeze.  By the end of this 17-minute long song, she is completely burned out, a charred husk of a woman smoking on a recording studio floor whose like will not be seen again.  I have every reason to believe she died immediately after recording this.

2.  "Don't Stop Believing" by Journey.  Steve Perry is the yang to Tyler's yin, insofar as 1980s singing gods go.  He takes us on a tour of everyday America, showing us the cycle that goes on and on and on and egg.  This gently raspy man is hiding angel wings under his jean jacket that strain the fabric with each miraculous high note.  It's all in the throat/head notes here.  I suspect Steve Perry is Italian.  Here, he burns brighter here than a million candles arranged in the shape of a heart that's about to explode.

3.  "Keep On Lovin' You" by REO Speedwagon.  O my goodness.  This, my friends, is a naked man.  When he draws out the "un" sound in "hissin'" shortly before the first chorus, it is the most openly vulnerable sound you will ever hear, including any conversations you may have with Invisible Goat .  He isn't trying to puff himself up; he's saying, "here I am.  This is my boney chest.  I am turning into water.  Take what I have, even if it isn't very good."  But it IS good!  It's nasal and thin and that's exactly why it works.  The man needs nurturing and a hot bath, and he isn't ashamed to admit it.

4.  "Dream On" by Nazareth.  Do you know what I'm going to tell you?  This man's voice is both broken AND unbreakable!  "Wait, how is that possible," you ask--well, shut up!  Dan's voice has stood the test of time better than his lungs, but here he is in his prime.  You can hear how he has run himself ragged for this woman, and she laughs at him, but MY GOD he's devoted to her.  Listen.  She's fooling herself, and HE'S fooling HIMself if he thinks he's managed to distance himself from her.  Why, this man is ready to lurk naked in her garage if need be.  And unlike the similarly brilliant and powerful vocal in his cover of "This Flight Tonight", this song doesn't sound like it was recorded in a sewer using bean cans and lengths of string for a mic.  You can hear all the natural undertones and overtones that his larynx produces, and you can crawl right inside that throat until you either feel better or are ready to perish.

5.  "Boys of Summer" by Don Henley.  Oh man I hate the Eagles and their sweet Laurel Canyon sound as much as anyone, but this song fully justifies Don Henley's stay of execution.  Listen to the quiet burr in that voice as it sets the scene for you:  nobody is on the road, nobody is on the beach.  Don is going to take us on a tour of Southern California, where people wear things called Wayfarers.  He seems distanced--aloof even--until you get to that chorus and POW!  He's completely invested in the absent woman!  Listen to him hallucinating his way around Venice Beach; that woman is everywhere and he's howling at his own inability to turn back the clock, his voice soaring like some kind of...falcon I guess.  They fly pretty high.

p.s. I am not a psycho