1981 NME singles poll (closes 8 May)

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Loads of great stuff to choose from here... (and 'Sound of the Valleys')

Poll Results

Option	Votes
Genius of love - Tom Tom Club	8
Computer love - Kraftwerk	8
Ceremony - New Order	8
O Superman - Laurie Anderson	8
Tainted love - Soft cell	6
Ghost town - The specials	4
Pull up to the bumper - Grace Jones	4
Me no pop I - Coati Mundi	4
Adventures on the wheel of steel - Grandmaster flash	4
Papa's got a brand new pigbag - Pigbag	3
Love action - Human league	3
Der Mussolini - DAF	3
Pretty in pink - Psychedelic furs	2
Chariots of fire - Vangelis	2
Can you feel it - The Jacksons	2
Burn rubber on me - The gap band	2
Mama used to say - Junior Giscombe	2
Wordy Rappinghood - Tom tom club	2
Walking on thin ice - Yoko Ono	1
Flowers of romance - P.I.L.	1
Out come the freaks - Was(not was)	1
Kitchen Person - The Associates	1
Just can't get enough - Depeche mode	1
Pocket calculator - Kraftwerk	1
Let's groove - Earth wind and fire	1
Fascist groove thang - Heaven 17	1
The ‘Sweetest Girl’ - Scritti politti	1
Intuition - Linx	1
To drunk to fuck - The dead Kennedys	1
Being with you - Smokey Robinson	1
Chant No.1 (We don’t need this pressure on) - Spandau Ballet	0
The longest day - Sound of the valleys	0
The art of parties - Japan	0
W.O.R.K. - Bow wow wow	0
Beggarman- Pablo Gad	0
Launderette - Vivien Goldman	0
Another one bites the dust - General saint and Clint Eastwood	0
The razor's edge - Defunkt	0
Four Movements - Thomas Leer	0
Going back to my roots - Odyssey	0
Rapture - Blondie	0
Plan B - Dexys Midnight runners	0
Happy birthday - Stevie Wonder	0
Rapp Payback - James Brown	0
Tears are not enough - ABC	0
Good year for the roses - Elvis Costello	0
Shoot the pump - J. Walter Negro & the loose joints	0
Doors of your heart - The beat	0
Favourite shirts - Haircut 100	0
Show me - Dexys midnight runners	0

― braveclub, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:03 (eighteen years ago)

There's so much missing, but I guess that should make it easier to vote.

― Rockist Scientist, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:04 (eighteen years ago)

PULL UP TO THE BUMPER BAYBEHHH

― lex pretend, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:14 (eighteen years ago)

if that sodding 'ghost town' song wins another ilx poll i will be mildly annoyed! i deliberately sought it out after the other big poll it won expecting it to be really special and it was...so mediocre and meh.

― lex pretend, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:15 (eighteen years ago)

pigbag came close but perfecto allstarz version is better

― lex pretend, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:16 (eighteen years ago)

Oh christ. How to choose btwn "Genius of Love" and "Art of Parties".

― Trayce, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:25 (eighteen years ago)

"whatcha gonna do when you get out of jail?/i'm gonna have some fun!"

― braveclub, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:25 (eighteen years ago)

"O Superman" which is the second greatest single ever made. The greatest single ever made was also released in 1981 but is absent from this list.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:52 (eighteen years ago)

How did "Chariots Of Fire" get in there!!?

― Groke, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:55 (eighteen years ago)

Perhaps it was higher up the list of whoever voted for Sound Of The Valleys.

Wild guess - Paul Du Noyer.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:56 (eighteen years ago)

Marcello, do you mean "Ghosts"?

― Matt #2, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:58 (eighteen years ago)

Nope...came out in '82.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 4 May 2007 14:59 (eighteen years ago)

Marcello, do you mean "Chalk Dust (The Umpire Strikes Back)"?

― Groke, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:02 (eighteen years ago)

I voted 'O Superman', but 'Ghost Town, 'Der Mussolini' and 'Pocket Calculator' all came pretty close.

What is the greatest single ever made, Marcello?

― emil.y, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:03 (eighteen years ago)

Sadly, top impersonator Roger Kitter a.k.a. The Brat's great comedic deconstruction of the renegade Wimbledon champion was also not released until 1982, when it jostled for chart space with other immortal classics such as "Arthur Daley ('E's Alright)" and Wonderdog.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:06 (eighteen years ago)

No Quarterflash, Romeo Void, or "Talk of the Town"?

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:14 (eighteen years ago)

Quite right too.

― Billy Dods, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:15 (eighteen years ago)

No Stevie NIcks ("Edge of Seventeen") or Kim Carnes ("Bette Davis Eyes") either.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:18 (eighteen years ago)

Tough call between Smokey & Psychedelic Furs. Cause it was his last great hit, I'll go with Smokey.

― kornrulez6969, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:26 (eighteen years ago)

not a single but the greatest track of all time (this week), Automata's 'Pimania', is from '82. GIVE EET A TRY MON.

― blueski, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:29 (eighteen years ago)

"Adventures on the wheel of steel" for me.

― JN$OT, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:30 (eighteen years ago)

I don't know these:

Burn rubber on me - The gap band
The razor's edge - Defunkt
Four Movements - Thomas Leer
Der Mussolini - DAF
Shoot the pump - J. Walter Negro & the loose joints
Doors of your heart - The beat
Another one bites the dust - General saint and Clint Eastwood
Launderette - Vivien Goldman
W.O.R.K. - Bow wow wow
Beggarman- Pablo Gad
The longest day - Sound of the valleys

― blueski, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:33 (eighteen years ago)

well, that was easy.

― Saxby D. Elder, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:35 (eighteen years ago)

No 'Stand and Deliver' on the list?

I went for O Superman too btw

― onimo, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:35 (eighteen years ago)

and I'm listening to it now :)

― onimo, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:36 (eighteen years ago)

"Genius of Love", with "Tainted Love" and "Ghost Town" as runners up.

― o. nate, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:53 (eighteen years ago)

Amazing!

I'm going with Me No Pop I, although just about anything on that list is welcome on my turntable.

― dan selzer, Friday, 4 May 2007 16:03 (eighteen years ago)

i went Me No Pop I too - because it's BHW Friday.

― blueski, Friday, 4 May 2007 18:35 (eighteen years ago)

"Wheels of Steel" easy. (Though it doesn't contain "That's the Joint," my favorite single ever.)

― Matos W.K., Friday, 4 May 2007 19:11 (eighteen years ago)

"Der Mussolini".
Came close: "Ghost Town", "Show Me" and "Pigbag".

― zeus, Friday, 4 May 2007 19:26 (eighteen years ago)

Lots missing, but "Ghost Town" was the best single of that year anyway.

― Geir Hongro, Friday, 4 May 2007 20:18 (eighteen years ago)

Can't choose between Ghost Town and Tainted Love.

― Nasty, Brutish & Short, Friday, 4 May 2007 20:34 (eighteen years ago)

The woodwork squeaks and out come the freaks....

Actually I went for Me No Pop I since I spent almost all of 81-83 listening the Mutant Disco album I had to pick a Ze.

I read those Ian Penman notes on the back so often I eventually sickened myself on them, which is strange since looking at them now I would have prefered to have noticed they are piffle on first reading.

But as a single - as a Dancefloor single - (81 being my going out to clubs heyday) it was Me No Pop I that, on first hearing, seemed like a diamond bullet blasted into my forehead.

― Sandy Blair, Friday, 4 May 2007 21:18 (eighteen years ago)

I thought Vince Aletti wrote the notes on the back, or was that Seize the Beat?

― dan selzer, Friday, 4 May 2007 21:43 (eighteen years ago)

from that list I voted for "Computer Love" despite the recent raping by Coldplay :(

― stephen, Friday, 4 May 2007 21:58 (eighteen years ago)

What a year for singles. . .

― Soundslike, Saturday, 5 May 2007 00:23 (eighteen years ago)

Can't decide between "Ceremony," my favorite Earth, Wind,and Fire single, "Walking on Thin Ice," and "The `Sweetest Girl'."

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Saturday, 5 May 2007 00:37 (eighteen years ago)

Dan - maybe there were different UK and US versions - the notes I'm talking about are a curious mixture of The Face's loathsome Hard Times manifesto (bright young things playing with ironic detachment with poverty themes ) and 70s French po-mo.

It starts 'this is recession ragtime'

― Sandy Blair, Saturday, 5 May 2007 13:51 (eighteen years ago)

I gotta rep for the "Let's Groove" - it's the best single Earth, Wind & Fire ever released, and probably the last great moment of disco.

― Tuomas, Saturday, 5 May 2007 14:00 (eighteen years ago)

I went with "Mama Used To Say" (though did Junior ever actually use his last name on a record?), but I LOVE lots of the other ones (and hope I hear J Walter Negro and the Loose Jointz again someday, assuming I ever actually heard it -- I think Christgau compared it to "Double Dutch Bus"!) Hope I hear that proto-dancehall Queen cover up there again someday, too. Very happy to see my favorite Was (Not Was) and Gap Band songs up there as well.(Btw, I would probably have voted for Linx over fellow Brit-soulster Junior if the song up there was "You're Lying," which I thought was the single, rather than "Intuition." Either way, that was a very underrated genre!) (Was "Just An Illusion" by Imagination a year later? I'm too lazy to check.)

ps I never heard these (and never heard OF three of the acts -- Leer, Gad, or Sound of the Valleys) (and am actually not sure whether Odyssey is the same Odyssey who had hit with "Native New Yorker.")

The razor's edge - Defunkt
Four Movements - Thomas Leer
Going back to my roots - Odyssey
Kitchen Person - The Associates
Beggarman- Pablo Gad
The longest day - Sound of the Valleys

Not sure whether I've ever heard those DAF or Japan songs, either, come to think of it, though for all I know they're on my shelf (where I do have LPs by both acts, but heck if I know which ones offhand.)

― xhuxk, Saturday, 5 May 2007 14:04 (eighteen years ago)

And yeah, Matos is right, "That's the Joint" was actually the best single of the year, if not all of human history, and that's not up there (possibly because it didn't hit England til later, I dunno.)

― xhuxk, Saturday, 5 May 2007 14:06 (eighteen years ago)

PS): "Ghosttown" is also great, contrary to etc etc.

― xhuxk, Saturday, 5 May 2007 14:07 (eighteen years ago)

i think it's the same Odyssey -- "Inside Out" from 1982 was better

Imagination's "Just an Illusion" was 1982 as well

right now I'm torn between "Walkin On Thin Ice" & "Pull Up To The Bumper" this was an amazing year for singles esp post-disco/R&B.

― m coleman, Saturday, 5 May 2007 14:10 (eighteen years ago)

(closes 8 May)

In what time zone?

― onimo, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 00:27 (eighteen years ago)

Wheels of Steel.

― kingkongvsgodzilla, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 00:37 (eighteen years ago)

Realized that I only posted "Wheels of Steel."

To clarify: Wheels of Steel hit my 5 year old brain like a bullet a few years after the fact ( I got it on a 1984 K-Tel comp called "Breakdance" that my parents apparently ordered off the tv.

I never did learn how to do the boogie head, but Adventures on the Wheels of Steel formed the standard against which I have held all other music.

― kingkongvsgodzilla, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 00:49 (eighteen years ago)

ps I never heard these (and never heard OF three of the acts -- Leer, Gad, or Sound of the Valleys) (and am actually not sure whether Odyssey is the same Odyssey who had hit with "Native New Yorker.")

The razor's edge - Defunkt
NYC post-punk/no-wave/post-free jazz funk outfit led by Joseph Bowie on trombone and vocals; the 12-inch of this was a big hit at my student parties at the time. Also features brother Lester on trumpet. "I gave up a lot but I won't give in!" Reminded myself of it the other week and it's still magic; furiously danceable and pithy. EPONYMOUS first album is better than the second one (Thermonuclear Sweat) and it all pretty much sounds of its time but absolutely great.

Four Movements - Thomas Leer
British post-punk electronics bod, much beloved of S Reynolds (one of its tracks turns up on the RIU&SA compilation album); later went in a pop direction - 1982's "All About You" is one of the greatest singles ever (he was the Howard Jones we SHOULD have had), and even later than that he teamed up with Claudia Propaganda to form the scandalously underselling ACT (1987's "Snobbery And Decay," particularly the "That's Entertainment" Mix, is another of the greatest singles ever, ZTT's own Valhalla funeral).

Going back to my roots - Odyssey
Yes, it was the same Odyssey, and it was the old Richie Havens song, and a top five UK pop hit.

Kitchen Person - The Associates
One of the many singles they put out on Beggars Banquet in '81 (later collected on the Fourth Drawer Down album) and my favourite; low-budget Barry Ryan crashes into Joy Division, Steve Reich and Michael Mantler, vies with "Taboos" by the Passage - also from '81 - as the "River Deep Mountain High" of post-punk.

Beggarman- Pablo Gad
Doesn't ring any immediate bells, though if I heard it I'm sure I'd recognise it.

The longest day - Sound of the Valleys
Your guess is as good as mine (Welsh male voice choir and/or brass band?). I am assuming that it's the theme tune from the D-Day film where they clear the beach of everybody at the end just so that Robert Mitchum can do his Robert Mitchum walk.

― Marcello Carlin, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 06:39 (eighteen years ago)

Best NME singles poll ever? I've narrowed it down to 22, and even then I thought I was being ruthless.

Today I'm voting with my heart, not my head. It was "Intuition" at the time, so "Intuition" it is, then.

― mike t-diva, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 09:35 (eighteen years ago)

In what time zone?

I think it closes at 2.03pm GMT!

― braveclub, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 09:37 (eighteen years ago)

I was wrong. Is there a way of checking when it finishes?

― braveclub, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 15:15 (eighteen years ago)

"Walking On Thin Ice" - top of any 80s singles poll for me.

― hobart paving, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 17:22 (eighteen years ago)

Poll closes May 11.

― JN$OT, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 17:38 (eighteen years ago)

I sheepishly admit that I never heard "Pull Up To The Bumper" until last night. I've been missing out. Thank you ILM!

("Walking On Thin Ice" gets the vote tho.)

― Myonga Vön Bontee, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 18:13 (eighteen years ago)

"Burn Rubber" is in fact the greatest single of all time. I don't know what y'all are talking about!

― Morley Timmons, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 08:56 (eighteen years ago)

OK Tom Tom Club got my vote in the end.

― Trayce, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 09:23 (eighteen years ago)

What an incredible list. Although the correct answer is O Superman.

― the next grozart, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:20 (eighteen years ago)

Ceremony for me - just edges out Plan B, Tears Are Not Enough, Ghost Town and Intuition

― Dr.C, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:28 (eighteen years ago)

Wow @ four-way split...

― braveclub, Friday, 11 May 2007 00:47 (eighteen years ago)

So I was the only one to vote for Pocket Calculator.

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy, Friday, 11 May 2007 00:50 (eighteen years ago)

It's Eurovision '69 all over again!

Fair result though.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 11 May 2007 06:33 (eighteen years ago)

Two votes for Vangelis?

― JN$OT, Friday, 11 May 2007 07:39 (eighteen years ago)

Perhaps Jon and Vangelis were lurking.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 11 May 2007 07:44 (eighteen years ago)

We have four winners here.

(And "Oh Superman" is awful)

― Geir Hongro, Friday, 11 May 2007 08:51 (eighteen years ago)

You're mixing up "Oh (sic) Superman" with "Geir Hongro."

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 11 May 2007 10:01 (eighteen years ago)

"O Geir Hongoro.."

― Mark G, Friday, 11 May 2007 10:02 (eighteen years ago)

"They're Norwegian songs. Made in Norway.
Melodic or non-melodic?"

― 696, Friday, 11 May 2007 10:07 (eighteen years ago)

But surely Geir would approve of the colour of her violin?

― Myonga Vön Bontee, Saturday, 12 May 2007 07:02 (eighteen years ago)

seven years pass...

http://www.slicingupeyeballs.com/2015/02/17/vote-best-songs-of-1981/

― Fastnbulbous, Thursday, 19 February 2015 05:53 (ten years ago)

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