I have heard of a grand total of zero songs on Billboard's current Hot 100

I love that song. I listen to a lot of top hits music because of the 9 and 5 year old but it's not like I have to force myself. I think from working in clubs I have an affinity/tolerance for dance music that I am not sure most Dads in their forties do.

In the case of Despacito I like that it has Spanish in it as do my kids as both go to Spanish bilingual schools and want to hear Spanish songs. I am also a big mark for the Reggaeton beat that kicks in. I listen to Reggaeton on Spotify in the house quiet a bit.

Part of the reason for the pop songs is that I don't have the time or know where to start looking for some new Rock music.

 

I don't have anything against dance music in a vacuum, and some if it is pretty catchy and fun. But I resent it for killing rock with kids.

 

He also married "Felicia" ... boy had A+ range.

 

Technically from 1986 and not 1985, but still an awesome moment in television history:

 

I'd imagine more here have heard some of these songs than they think.

The disconnect is that the songs in general aren't memorable enough to trigger any sort of memory or recall of artist/song title/tune.

 

For the record, mainstream country makes the Top 40 look like Neil fucking Young by comparison.

 

I don't know -- it's incredibly easy to avoid Top 40 stuff now. I listen to music all the time but never terrestrial radio.

Like I said, I've heard 7 songs on that list, but six were because I specifically went looking for them on Spotify. The only one I heard by chance was "Human" by Rag n Bone Man, and only because I saw him on Jools Holland.

 

I don't even actively avoid it out of hostility or to prove a point. In the day, the stuff I listened to, on my stations, also happened to chart. I never stopped seeking it out. It just so happens that it's no longer widely popular.

Some day Whitman Jr. and Mrs. Whitman Jr. are going to be bumping to Flo Rida's spiritual heirs, oblivious that it is out of fashion.

 

No, that was a few months ago. This one has a chorus about "champagne on ice" and "that's what I like, that's what I like."

There are a couple of individuals on the top 100 that I like. Sheeran, and I believe Harry Styles is better as a solo act than I expected. (He was in One Direction.) As for bands, I've thought the Chainsmokers were pretty talented when I've heard them on award shows.

I liked seeing Childish Gambino in the top 20, not because that's my type of music, but mainly because Donald Glover is such a damn talented, multi-faceted guy.

 

Also there weren't nearly as many mediums tugging on your attention back in 1985. Pandora and Spoitify make it easy to listen music nonstop and NEVER encounter top 100 stuff. Back then you only had your turntable or cassettes. And most cars weren't automatically equipped with tape decks. If you listened to the radio in the car, the range of offerings wasn't tremendous

 

It's not a bad thought, but I had a cassette deck in my car in the mid-'70s, and while I listened to a lot of full albums, I still knew pretty much every song in the top 40. So it's more than that. It's hard to put into words. I know that even though I might like, say, Sheeran, I'm a lot less likely to listen to his full album and know all the secondary cuts that might show up on the charts in a few months.

And I think it was Dick who mentioned that there are so many collaborations now that solo artists and established bands don't dominate the charts like they once did.