Get the mix here, and/or continue reading… (174MB)

In music, and pop culture in general, decades don’t really mean what we think they mean. For example, most of what we call 60s music lasted well into the 70s. Punk rock, generally thought of as 70s music, didn’t really start until 1976 and died out quickly, by ’78 (take THAT!). Disco started a bit earlier than that and died out a few years into the 80s.

What we think of as 80s music, oddly enough, started along side punk and disco, the same two genres that much other 80s music was derived from.

That’s how trends in music work. Some things will start on their own and then sometimes, those very same things are influenced by whatever else is going on.

Anyway, my point with all of this is that 80s music started in the 70s. And while the title: The Bastard Love Child of Punk & Disco, is true enough, it’s not nearly the whole story.

As you’ll see over the next year and six volumes of proof, 80s music is very much 70s music. Artists like Simple Minds, Midnight Oil, Devo, Elvis Costello, Talking Heads, XTC, The Police, Thompson Twins, Human League and many others not only got their start in the 70s, but by the end of ’79 had released their first single (and in many cases, several albums).

This six volume mix consists totally of first singles (and their b-sides) of bands that had their biggest success in the 80s. All of these songs were released in the 70s. This first volume is 25 of those singles. The next volume will be the 25 b-sides to those singles. And that’s how it will work.

Every other month for the year 2010, I’ll put up one of these mixes. In between those will be other mixes.

As for Bastard Love Child, Vol 1, we’ll start with Talking Heads, go through Devo, Thompson Twins and The Police, winding up with Blondie and The Pretenders. Most will recognize some of the bands by name, but the early sound of some of this music will be basically unheard of.

The Police, for example, sound like a speedy post-punk band, Gary Nueman (Tubeway Army) is heavy on the guitars and missing the synth, a style that was more than reversed a few years later. XTC wasn’t yet the esoteric chamber music they later became, but a fuzz box punk act.

That’s just how it went. As time went by, the bands changed – people changed. But for the next year, you’ll hear these bands, commonly thought of as “80s music” in the early years of their development – the 1970s.

Here are some samples…

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Tubeway Army – That’s Too Bad

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XTC – Science Friction

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Thompson Twins – Squares and Triangles

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The Police – Fall Out

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The Pretenders – Stop Your Sobbing

Get it here! (174 MB)

I’m using a file hosting service called Megaupload. If you have any problems with it, just let me know. It’s easy! Just click the link, put in the little “captcha code,” hit enter and then choose “regular download,” ignore the ads (sorry) and download it to your desktop.

It’s a zip file, so everyone in the universe should be able to open it.

Check out my other mixes here.