There’s a lot of music to love, and just as much to hate, from the 80’s. I love most of the 80’s top-40 pop, but I hate the synthesizer sound. I love most of the glam-rock power ballads, but never really got into the quirky, moody “alternative” stuff. I love 80’s R&B and hip-hop, but hate the 80’s version of hardcore punk. I love the 80’s country pop that extended the careers of Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers, but I’m less a fan of the 80’s country pop that brought us Travis Tritt and Clint Black.
My pick for today, which was also an alternative pick for yesterday, is REO Speedwagon‘s 1994 hit “Can’t Fight This Feeling.” It’s a perfect representative of the sort of overwrought, overly emotive, but truly epic ballads that sprouted up and took over in the 80’s like kudzu in the Southeast. It is also a song that, when it comes on the radio, inspires me to perform an epically dramatic pantomime of its forlorn tale. Especially the “crawling on the floor” and “crashing through your door” parts. I mean, you should really see my rendition.
Here it is:
It is only occurring to me now that “Can’t Fight This Feeling” more or less tells the same story as my pick for Day 5 of this Challenge, ABBA’s “Waterloo.” They’re both songs about being so besotted, so enraptured, so overcome by love that you just wave the white flag. That’s one of those good bad feelings, like laughing so hard that it hurts.