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  2. Number I own = zilch.

    However, the picture of the Pixies guy I am 99% sure is taken outside Tottenham Court Road tube station, where in 1987 I used to get “Record Collector,” probably from that very newspaper seller, and across the road from the old Virgin Megastore, where I’d buy 60s reissues on See For Miles and Bam Caruso and charge them up as “coffee,” “taxi” or “washing-up powder” back at the office.

    • Number I own = 6
      Fleetwood Mac (note wrong lineup is used for the illustration), Eurythmics, U2, Bruce, REM, and the Trio album.

      I would add Robbie Robertson’s first album as a personal favourite from that year.

      I was working in that part of London in the 80s and have pangs of nostagia for the enormous record emporia that existed – including that Virgin Megastore which seemed to be forever expanding at the time. We probably rubbed shoulders at the 60s section….

  3. Probably being a miserable old git, but the release of albums used to be such an exciting event in the 80s/90s. You were nearly always hearing at least 90% of the music for the first time. You had to make an actual journey somewhere to get it. They’d usually been a bit of press, maybe one or two interviews on the radio and the adverts – that was it.
    In contrast, say, The National’s new album – heard four tracks already (will probably be five or six by the time it’s released), saw the artwork months ago etc. And it will just appear on my phone…

  5. 1987 was the point at which music got interesting again after the fallow years of the mid-Eighties. For me, it was time to sober up and start behaving like a responsible adult.

      • “Sgt. Pepper’s” almost certainly had the biggest promotion in Oxford Street, a huge picture of the inner-sleeve photograph all over HMV.

        A decent retrospective magazine (Mojo) was, incredible as it seemed even at the time, a full six years off. Your only bolt holes were “Record Collector” and The Beatles and Elvis monthlies.

        Dark days, Wacko Jacko et al were almost impossible to avoid.
        Now, the no. 1 single is familiar only to the artist and his/her immediate family.

        • Q started in 1986. Macca on the cover. I remember buying issue one from a platform kiosk at Preston railway station. It included a small booklet of reviews of the ‘best’ music available on CD, which gave the whole thing a bit of a retrospective feel. I was still just getting into music so I embraced it all as essential background reading, but I know there are some who took Q’s preoccupation with the past as a warning sign.

  7. It’s not what I would call a good/interesting list despite owning 7 of them. I reckon I probably purchased at least new, 35 LPs/CDs in that year, all of them more deserving to be on that list than those listed. That’s my opinion obviously, others will differ as is their right.

    Regarding listening to albums before they are released, or viewing the artwork, I manage to avoid doing so until the CD or LP is in my hands. Listening for the first time at home to a new album is still an experience I love.

  8. I didn’t buy many records in those days despite following new music. Of the records I bought that year I never really came to love Erik B and Rakim’s Paid In Full (I much preferred Coldcut’s more instrumental 7 Seconds of Madness remix single), Public Enemy’s Yo! Bum Rush the Show or The Smiths’ Strangeways. Girlfriend in a Coma is the only proper Smiths track on the album. The rest is mostly rather straightforward indie rock to my ears.

    I warmed more to Echo and the Bunnymen’s eponymous effort, especially the fantastic Lips Like Sugar. Of the featured albums, I did buy Sign of the Times, which is superb too and got played a lot back then but not so much since.

    1987 was great for singles. Coldcut as mentioned but also Pump up the Volume, True Faith, Push It by Salt n Pepa, Birthday by Sugar Cubes, Rent by Pet Shop Boys, Come into my Life by Joyce Sims, among others. People always go on about albums but in many ways singles are more interesting.

  10. No mention of Introducing The Hardline According To Terence Trent D’arby, a rather big omission I feel. And as for leaving out the Housies’ second – well!

    Other notables (for me) not mentioned are Madge’s You Can Dance, George Harrison’s Cloud Nine, Aztec Camera’s Love, The Communards’ Red, It’s Better To Travel by Swing Out Sister, and the ‘Nana’s Wow!

    The less said about Five Star’s Between The Lines the better.

    • Terry was the sound of the hot summer nights; then it was Darklands and George Best (which was a bugger to get where I lived – instant on-yer-phone music rules!) as Winter descended, but the record that overshadowed everything else in ’87 was New Order’s Substance. Until the moment its release was announced, we never imagined this lot – with their parade of 12 inches with inscrutable covers – would just scoop them all up on a chartbusting compilation. And still there wasn’t room for Touched By The Hand Of God…

  11. David Sylvian gets a mention! That never happens anywhere! (Except here, natch.) And, whatsmore, the person what mentions him recommends Blemish and Manafon! Lordy! What a jolly good article, even though I can’t be arsed to read the rest.

  12. Don’t forget that David Bowie released his classic, Never Let Me Down.

    I also liked The World Wrestling Foundation’s Piledriver, The Return Of Bruno by Bruce Willis (it was his debut) and The Hooters, similarly inaccurately titled, One Way Home.

    Album of the year had to be Faith by George Michael. However, the release that changed my life was Duke Ellington The Blanton Webster Years.

  13. I have always considered 1987 to be something of a nadir.
    Maybe it’s because I was 17, grumpy and moody, and wanted more (more of what, I don’t know).

    Then again, a quick look at the database reveals:
    The Cult – Electric
    Marillion – Clutching At Straws
    Ramones – Halfway To Sanity
    Sisters Of Mercy – Floodland
    Jesus & Mary Chain – Darklands

    (plus the mentioned The Smiths – Strangeways Here We Come and Guns n Roses – Appetite For Dustuction (which I didn’t actually buy until sometime in the 90s))

    all still getting regular-ish plays 30 years later (did I just write that?)
    Hell, even Jethro Tull’s Crest Of A Knave is pulled from the shelf once in a while

    And then … I look at some of the other 1987 date stamped albums and singles. “Of their time” is perhaps the right phrase.

    My count: 17

    The one that’s missing? T’Pau – Bridge Of Spies
    (perhaps not?)

  14. God I can actually picture some of those records on the shelves at Our Price in Reading.. of those listed Tunnel of Love and Savage were rarely far from the turntable, fighting for their place on it with the majestic Poetic Champions Compose by Van the Man.

    As Mini says, Terence Trent Darby was ubiquitous that year, as was The Christians debut album, and we played both of them to death.

  15. Missing from the list… Zodiac Mindwarp. If you were reading the music press at the time you’d have thought he was going to be the new Marc Bolan. In the event he wasn’t even the new Joe Dolce.

    • Not a funny place, just different.

      I was in my very late 20s, and couldn’t find much interesting in British music. I remember –

      Lyle Lovett self titled album. I had to send to London for it.
      Exit 0 by Steve Earle
      Hillbilly Deluxe by Dwight Yoakham
      The latest Tom Waits available though can’t remember which one.

  18. The 1980s were the decade of children, so my album of 1987 was probably All Aboard.

    The only one on that list I actually bought was Tunnel of Love. Other albums I bought included Exit 0 (Steve Earle), King’s Record Shop (Roseanne Cash), Frank’s Wild Years, and of course this:

    • Tunnel Of Love was the only one I bought, too. What else? Not much, I expect. The dB’s Sound Of Music, Santana’s Freedom/Blues For Salvador, Van’s Poetic Champeens, Psonic Psunspot … I can’t even remember where I was in 1987, so I had to be there.

        • It was, for me, a pretty barren time. Springsteen seemed to have shot his bolt – I was one of the few who thought Tunnel Of Love wasn’t that great (still don’t). The Dead released In The Dark (I now remember) but Little Feat, Steely Dan, and the Left Coast bands I loved were part of a wave that had already crested. Even for the profligate Zappa 87 was a ho-hum year.

          • I doggedly kept buying BS’s albums through the 80s and 90s, but in truth none of them between Nebraska and the Ghost of Tom Joad really hit home, although they all had their moments. Those two albums summed up what I wanted him to move on to after the glories of the 70s.

            Just discovered that Ian Maclagen played piano on Human Touch. Who knew? Maybe everybody but me.

  20. I thought I would have loads, actually only having the Deacon Blue, nearly all of theirs you would ever need. Lots I would still not cross the street for, or would cross over to avoid. And lots of so so albums by acts past their better, Mac, Eurythmiccs etc etc. Mind you, at 30 I was mainlining Folk Roots rather than Q.

  21. I didn’t think I’d bought any current music in 1987, but maybe I did after all.
    That would have been the point at which I abandoned suffering lo-fi music from cassettes on a boombox and got myself a CD player, a mediocre amp and some not-very-good speakers.
    I don’t think I was buying all that many CDs, what with the price they were back then.
    Some of the earliest Zappa CD remixes/reissues on Rykodisc probably and I might have bought Midnight Oil’s “Diesel And Dust” and Man Jumping’s “World Service” that year, or possibly the next.

    Dukes Of Stratosphear’s “Chips from The Chocolate Fireball”, The KLF’s “1987: What The Fuck Is Going On?”, John Hiatt’s “Bring The Family”, Cabaret Voltaire’s “Code”, Klaus Schulze’s “En=Trance”, Chris & Cosey’s “Exotika”, “Take Five” & “Obsession” EPs, Jennifer Warnes’ “Famous Blue Raincoat”, Tom Waits’ “Frank’s Wild Years”, Ry Cooder’s “Get Rhythm”, Dwight Yoakam’s “Hillbilly Deluxe”, Gil Evans & Steve Lacy’s “Paris Blues”, Miles Davis & Marcus Miller’s “Siesta” soundtrack, Prince’s “Sign O The Times”, Penguin Café Orchestra’s “Signs Of Life” and Dolly, Linda & Emmylou’s “Trio” have all been acquired since.

    • I’ve always been impressed with the breadth of your taste. You are willing to give everything a go and have an uncanny ability to pick out the best.

      That KLF album will be worth something. Wasn’t it withdrawn for copyright infringement?

      • My taste was not all that broad back then, believe me.

        I have just mp3s of 1987:WTF?, alas. Until about ’94 they were not on my radar.
        Proper copies are even rarer than hens teeth. If the legend I heard is true, every single copy was either destroyed or handed over to ABBA’s legal representatives, except possibly one. Or something.
        About a sackful of hens teeth for a copy if that’s correct.
        Some of it is quite amazing, the rest is pretty dire really. They later released a guide to which samples were required and full instructions for remaking it yourself.

        • the current KLF:1987 story is that they went to Sweden to give the albums to ABBA but failed so burnt some and gave the rest to a sex worker.

          Regardless of the music, you have to say the KLF give great music business anecdote.

  22. The big ones for me, not mentioned above (or I don’t think so, at least)

    Danny Wilson – Meet Danny Wilson
    Triffids – Calenture
    Sinead O’Connor – The Lion & the Cobra
    Happy Mondays – Squirrel & G-Man etc

    I still listen to the first two (or three). Calenture was Peak Triffids in my book.

    I was working school holidays testing CD players, with a choice of three CDs – one of sound effects, one Tchaikovsky, or The Joshua Tree. I now twitch involuntarily if I hear U2.

    • 1987 officially marks the point when Whitesnake became “a bit rubbish”, and Hysteria marks the point Def Leppard became American.

      Both sold by the bucket-load though.
      1987s biggest sales occurred when they re-issued it with the re-recording of Here I Go Again tacked on

      • Funnily enough I picked a copy of Hysteria today in lovely nick for just two pounds. (Plus an equally lovely Planet Waves for the same price.)

        Pouring on of sugar will commence at approximately 7pm.

        • I’m pretty sure that Joe Elliott would have listened to Bob Dylan over the years. But I wonder if His Bobness has ever spun a Leppard record. Worth thinking about.

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