20. “Rain in the Summertime” by the Alarm I tend to heap scorn on the copycat programming choices made by “commercial alternative” radio during my time served there in the mid-nineties, when the surest route to chart success was delivering a passable Eddie Vedder impression. (Why, I did it just the other day!) However, it was hardly a new phenomenon then, nor was it confined to those further up the dial who could seek out ad dollars without restriction. Throughout much of the decade prior, the labels that catered to college radio were always happy to open their checkbooks to … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 20 and 19

22. “We Close Our Eyes” by Oingo Boingo I can’t definitely figure out if “We Close Our Eyes” was officially released as a single by Oingo Boingo in the United States. The song is right in the middle of the band’s 1987 release, Boi-ngo, and I certainly think of it as one of their bigger tracks. Then again, memory about which songs in the nineteen-eighties were or weren’t crossover hits has been colored by years and years of revisionist nostalgic airplay. It seems sure that it was released as a single somewhere, and the programmers at KROQ (undoubtedly abetted by … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 22 and 21

24. “Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before” by the Smiths “Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before,” the fourth and final single from the Smiths’ fourth and final studio album, Strangeways, Here We Come, was the first track from the band that I openly enjoyed, mostly because I was stupid. While I was arduously learning to expand my musical tastes during high school, I naturally and unfortunately took cues from my peers, a group of largely unenlightened souls who will quick to tag the U.K. group built around the creative tension between lead … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 24 and 23

26. “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” by U2 The Joshua Tree, the fifth studio album from U2, was released on March 9, 1987. I think it’s quite far to tag that as the date that everything changed decisively for the Irish quartet. It’s not like they hadn’t enjoyed a taste of success previously, especially back home in the U.K., where they were an established Top 10 act. Even in the presumably tougher-to-crack United States, their previous two studio albums had peaked just outside of the Billboard Top 10, and the single “Pride (In the Name of Love)” … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 26 and 25

28. “Crazy” by Icehouse So let’s dial back to the way perceptions of bands were shaped circa 1987. For those, like me, who were stuck is relatively small suburban areas, well removed from the major culture centers, there weren’t many ways to find out about new music, especially given the ever-increasingly caution of local radio. This led to the disproportionate influence of MTV, which served as a de facto nationwide radio station back when they were more interested in music videos than reality shows. So the first time I heard of Icehouse was when the video for “Crazy” started getting … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 28 and 27

32. “It’s Still Warm” by Dramarama One of the things that has sadly been lost in the corporate consolidation of broadcast radio is the concept of the local hit, those songs and bands that maybe make only the mildest headway nationally but somehow manage to absolute enthrall one city or region. While the New Jersey formed band Dramarama had a couple minor hits on college radio and later commercial alternative radio, it was nothing like the impact they made on KROQ-FM. Their song “Anything, Anything (I’ll Give You),” their second single, had no broader chart impact, but it was one … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 32 and 31

36. “Alone Again Or” by the Damned Given the opportunity, I don’t think I ever would have listed Love, the nineteen-sixties band fronted by Arthur Lee, as an influence on the Damned. But the U.K. punk legends gave exactly that reason when asked why they recorded a cover of Love’s seminal song from Forever Changes, their 1967 masterpiece. The cover version showed up on the band’s 1986 album entitled Anything, which came out well after the point that most were even paying attention to the group, at least stateside (they were still making regular visits to the Top 40 back … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 36 and 35