Four overplayed songs from the 1980s that lowered our intelligence

Inevitably, there will be people who disagree with the list (and heck, maybe some of the facts) that follows. Maybe there is such an emotional connection between you and the tracks that you are blinded by what you see as greatness. That's fair. You be you.

For the rest of us, or newbies who have luckily not had to hear these tunes, there will be reasons each of the songs makes the list. True facts, too. Not like half of the lies I tell aren't true kind of thing. (That is a ridiculously good song by Stereophonics, though.)

Maybe you grew up hearing some of these songs in the 1980s. Maybe you have never listened to the lyrics. If you haven't, we apologize for what you are about to read.

Four overplayed songs from the 1980s that are rather dumb

Europe - "The Final Countdown"

The lyrics are so...so bad. Realizing someone somewhere will say, "This is a lazy way of looking at this song! It's actually about..." The question might be, how do you know? The lyrics as heard and read seemed to imply that the singer and a very good friend have traveled the universe around planet Earth and they are sad that the trip is ending.

The issue is that one might imagine themselves feeling some kinship with the "final countdown" of a long-term relationship but the music is so overly produced that having any real connection is nearly impossible. Is the keyboard riff catchy? Sure, in a way that leaves one nauseated hours afterward.

"Oh-oh, we're heading for Venus (Venus)
And still, we stand tall
Cause maybe they've seen us
And welcome us all, yeah
With so many light years to go
And things to be found (To be found)
I'm sure that we'll all miss her so"

I mean...what?

Again, some will love this song. It might even be a gateway song to ludicrous "metal" tracks later in the decade. There was a better path that could have been - and should have been - chosen.

Asia - "Heat of the Moment"

It is not like words did not exist before the 1980s. Musical artists such as Bob Dylan and Tom Waits were penning some fine tunes with intelligent lyrics even in the previous decade (or two). The problem is that the 1980s appeared set on giving us some kind of combination of metal and pop. That would have been fine had there been some oversight as far as the words.

OK...Let's be real. Many times the music was too slick, too. Couple that with words such as "Heat of the Moment"'s, "Do you remember when we used to dance/And incidents arose from circumstance/One thing led to another, we were young/And we would scream together songs unsung" and you have musical atrocities.

How do those two lines fit together in any logical way? Also, what is the one thing that led to another? Screaming along to songs? That makes zero sense and any emotional connection with the words vanishes just like the "incidents that arose from circumstance."

Richard Marx - "Right Here Waiting"

The difference between this song and the Police's "Every Breath You Take" is that Sting knew when he wrote the lyrics that the words would come across as if the narrator was stalking someone. That was kind of the point. Unfortunately, Marx sings as if he is unaware of how creepy he sounds.

Look, as tough as it is - and we have all been there - there might be a person you really like who just doesn't want to be with you. That is their choice. Look at it as if this is an opportunity for you. Someone probably will want to spend a lot of time with you, so - again, as difficult as it is - move on for your sake as well as the sake of the person you might be stalking.

Marx (apparently - sadly - no relation to Karl) sings the following stanza:

"I took for granted, all the times
That I thought would last somehow
I hear the laughter, I taste the tears
But I can't get near you now"

Whose laughter is he hearing? Weird. Worse, whose tears is he tasting? Lastly, if the person he loves knows he is trying to get near them, maybe they should call the police (not the band with Sting, but the real po-po).

Toto - "Africa"

The lyrics to this track have long been bandied about as being non-sensical. Maybe we should go one step beyond here (not the Madness song, though that would be cool). Imagine Toto saying their words to another person and that person saying, "Wait...what?" And then that person realizing the narrator of Toto's song sees themselves as some kind of divine creature.

How else to react to a chorus that ends with "I bless the rains down in Africa/I bless the rains down in Africa (I bless the rain)/I bless the rains down in Africa (I bless the rain)." Great! Bless that rain, whoever you are supposed to be. But what gives you the right to do so?

40 years later, the music to this track is still somehow irritatingly catchy, but that only sucks us into the awfulness of the words. It is like the band got lazy there. Shame on them for setting us up only to fail us with their message.

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