So it’s Monday again, and it’s time to travel back in time.Based on our previous responses to Flashback Monday, I know many of our dear readers weren’t actually around in the summer of 1985. So bear with me, laugh at the pop culture and then go on about your evening.
The summer of 1985, I was almost twelve and going into the seventh grade. I was looking forward to my second year of resident Girl Scout camp, and the freedom I felt I had there. I remember the radio blasting in the camp boathouse, where the lifeguards hung out between lessons. The radio was always on in the kitchen too, unless we were actually eating a meal.
That entire summer (and the summer before), I was rocking out to Corey Heart’s “Sunglasses at Night”. If you look at Billboard’s Summer of Music page, you’re likely to see the soundtrack you associate with swimming pools, camp, and little league games. In my head, there are always songs to go with outside summertime memories.
So”¦ what do you remember about 1985, if applicable? If not, what’s the first year you remember having a summer soundtrack? (Feel free to hijack this open thread and turn it into whatever you need.)
10 replies on “Flashback Monday OT: 1985”
I was 6, so I don’t remember too much. But I think I might have had the Like A Virgin album by then… Either way, the next few summers were all about Madonna for me, then Michael Jackson and Kylie competed for my attention.
I wasn’t born yet in 1985.. I’ll be outside this thread.
I was 13, and I went to computer camp. I had a TI-99 at home, which put me in the lowest caste of wannabe junior programmers, with the TRS-80 kids, well below the Apple II, Commodore 64 and IBM kids.
That was the year I learned what a blow job was. Not by giving one, mind you, but from the discussions of the teenaged computer geeks at my camp. When I went home, I asked my mom about them, and she grew at least 20 gray hairs right in front of my eyes.
I also had my first crush, a Commodore boy named Mike, who was from Kentucky and wore a leather jacket. I thought he was rad.
When not at camp, I remember lots of bright colored clothes, banana clips and plastic jewelry.
1985 was the perfect year. My dad was in the Navy and had been gone for most of 1984. He came home on December 23, 1984. I went Xmas shopping with him the next day. He bought me lunch at IHOP and he swore that the next year, 1985, would be good. We wouldn’t move. He’d be home the whole time. And he was. He was there. We didn’t have to move. In 1985, I had my first best friend; I had my first best friend because, for the first time, we didn’t have to move away. That summer, I watched Live Aid on TV and saw the band that would become my favorite band ever for the first time, Queen. My mom made me a flouncy, purple lace skirt to wear to the first day of school =.
I think the summer of ’85 was the year I woke up and watched The Monkees every morning, so my summer soundtrack had a lot of Last Train to Clarksville.
Ah, 1985. I was a fetus in its third trimester that summer! As for summer soundtracks, the first year I remember very well that year music-wise is 1992. My brother had several tapes, and we’d tape stuff off the radio. I also distinctly remember watching the Guns n’ Roses video for “November Rain,” and constantly listening to Madonna’s song from A League of Their Own. Being from the south, I also remember suffering through Achy Breaky Heart at nearly every summer social function in our neighborhood, back when our neighbors did that.
Oh and damn did I love the song “Waterfalls.” And as someone downthread mentioned, I played the shit out of Celine Dion’s Falling Into You album. I was also in chorus and fell in love with Broadway in the mid-90s so I was a huge fan of her for her belting of big notes. I also would do that along with Celine, and I got Mariah Carey’s Fantasy as a present that year too.
My favorite year on that list was probably 1997. Music was my refuge from the horrors of middle school bullying, and I have 9 out of 10 of those songs still in my iTunes today.
Also as an added note, I just wanted to brag how very proud I am of myself today. My mom was fretting that there was nothing to eat, but we had a whole harvest of tomatoes from our container garden sitting around and we had pasta. I made homemade pasta sauce with fresh tomatoes, which I’ve never done before. I usually use canned tomatoes which taste fine. I also used fresh basil from our garden, and I have to say it was the most summer-fied tasting tomato sauce I’ve ever had and both my parents loved it. I felt more accomplished having made the sauce than actually eating it. It was so delicious!
now I’ll have to check out the list from 1997.
And your dinner? Sounds amazing. Send some leftovers my way, pretty please?? Tomatoes and basil is one of my favorite combos!
If only this was next week, because on July 4 1985, I took my first steps. As my dad tells it, I was hanging out in my room sitting in my itty bitty yellow director’s chair, holding up books like I was reading to my rows of stuffed animals. My dad came to get me and said, “Annie! Time for Independence lobsters!” I got out of my chair, threw my hands up and walked my happy butt into the living room. There are a couple of blurry photos showing me mid-stride, hands up.
I don’t remember what we were listening too, though. Probably Bob Sieger or Aerosmith? My first summer soundtrack was probably Mariah Carey’s “Fantasy” album, played on my very own CD player, in 1995. I was walking a lot more frequently then, not even for special occasions.
I love it! It’s so great when milestones coincide with holidays. My son started walking over Labor Day weekend. Easy peasy to remember.
!995, you would have been about 11 or so…yup, just the right age for a summer soundtrack! (that year, mine was Hootie and the Blowfish, Cracked RearView)
My birthday is next week (I decided to stop being lazy two days before my first birthday), so I was 9/10 in 1995. My parents got me a CD player and I immediately bought Fantasy on a trip to Phoenix (we’re from a small town). I think the next one was Celine Dion… whichever album had “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now,” which I performed a dramatic interpretive dance to for my parent’s amusement. I don’t think I was ready for Hootie yet, but I rocked Celine for quite some time!
And yay for Holiday Milestones!