Summer of 1984
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| The cassette tape, the iconic image of Generation-X for some reason. Both of these tapes were recorded off the radio in the Summer of 1984. In the Spring of 1984 the band from Boston named The Cars had a popular album out called "Heartbeat City". One of the songs that was a hit singe was titled "Magic". Looking back on being a 13 year in the Summer of 1984...the word "Magic" bubbles to the surface when I need a word to describe that Summer. I know a lot of people look back on a time in their youth and think it is an iconic time, and it is...but there was something about the Summer of 1984. I was half-way through my Junior High School time and had just really started to discovery my attraction to the opposite sex, I had also discovered that I had a love for the music that was on the radio at that time, not to mention the new to Bellevue, Ohio's cable line up the legendary MTV of yore. Yes, MTV used to actually play music videos. I honestly cannot think of what the 1980's would have been like without MTV... I think I changed more in 1984 than any other time in my life, or maybe at least I consciously started the transformation that is still going on with me to this very day. The core idea of how I wanted to the world to see me was a direct result of what I saw in popular culture at that time. I am having a difficult time finding the words to type out and get across what I want to say. But I get the gist it is coming through the words I can't find. What a brand new teenager sees on MTV, the TV, magazines, etc. really do have an effect on how they want to shape their lives. Sometime in the Spring of 1984 I had my first real crush. And the weird part was it was not with a girl I knew, at that time. Ironically the first time I really saw a girl and thought wow...she caught my attention was on a video on MTV. It was the lead singer of the German pop group Nena. I won't go into detail why she caught my eye, but she did... They had the hit single "99 Luft/Red Balloons". Towards the end of 7th grade I noticed a girl at school who sort of looked like the bird from Nena and there was my first real life teenage crush. There would be many more, but this was the first and became my obsession for the Summer of 1984. I am not going to name any names... And no I never went out with her, or any other of my teenage crushes. My teenage love life would be put on hold till I got to be a Californian in the Summer of 1990. That was another iconic Summer that deserves an episode on Moon in the Sky in the future. Getting into popular music for the first time in my life really opened doors. I had led a sheltered music life up to that point. My parents were of the WWII Generation and were not into modern pop music, so the exposure had to be done on my own. I had a lot to catch up with and boy did I ever. There was a lot of great music on the radio back then. I won't go into a list of what was popular at that time, but the list is long. It seemed to be that music was more diverse back then. A radio station would play a lot of difference genres instead of sticking to one thing. We'd get a new wave song, then a soul song, then a song from the 60's then a couple of "light-rock" songs, then back to a new wave song. It seems that radio station today stick to one type of music. I think we had a great thing going on. When I think back on the Summer of 1984, hanging out at a local pool pop up to mind. It was always hot and we were in the water as much as possible. We usually could get one of our parents to drive us out to a pool called Fennwood. I had become addicted to the high dive. Going up the ladder, jumping off, swimming to the exit ladder and back again, all the time the radio speakers blasted out "Round and Round" by Ratt, "Panama" by Van Halen, "You Might Think" by The Car's. We were skinny in shape teens and nothing stopped us from staying in the water all day long. An addiction I still have to this very day. Try getting me out of my Scuba Gear and out of the water...not going to happen. We also got very deep brown tans back then. Going to see the popular films of the time were also a rite of passage. The film that I loved the best was "Ghostbusters" along with the song from the film, that was an iconic film from the Summer of 1984. "The Karate Kid" was another good one from that Summer. Back to music for the 73rd time , because looking back that was the glue that made this Summer great. Quite a few of us Generation-Xer's will have memories of recording songs from the radio. I started doing this in the Spring of 1984 and stopped on 12 June 1989 on the day I went to Boot Camp. I have hours and hours of music taped off the radio. Yes I still have the tapes and yes they still play just fine. Towards the end of the Summer I bought my first prerecorded tape, it was "Heartbeat City" by The Cars, I still have it. One of my friends would haul his "boom box" stereo all over. Everyday it was a constant search for more D-batteries to keep the music going. The tapes that I recall him having were "Ghostbusters" soundtrack, "Sports" by Huey Lewis and the News, "Chicago 17", "Footloose" soundtrack. Speaking of the movie "Footloose"...I need to confess that I have not seen the full film start to finish yet. I still have a lot of life left in me and will get around to it someday. One song that always pops up when I look back at the Summer of 1984 is the forgotten minor hit by Tony Carey "The First Day of Summer". |
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