100 Best Albums of the Eighties by Rolling Stone (1989)

I think this is a pretty poor chart. It ignores some of the best artists and albums from the eighties.

From Igtonumama 12/27/2022 15:08

Excellent selection of albums. Will give the ones I haven't listened to, a hearing too!

Embarrassing bad that they would leave out Talk Talk ...Color of Spring and The Smith's Queen is Dead. 2 of the best albums all time

Top 4 is ok despite the Clash being a blatant 70s album.

The lack of Stone Roses, Doolittle, Disintegration and anything from New Order is bizarre.

From sssvnnn 04/26/2019 23:21

That s a poor chart that ignores most of the typical 80`s acts.
It´s a chart like: What did my 60`s ad 70`s heroes do in the 80´s.

From DeusExMackia 11/12/2018 16:56

It's not that it doesn't respect some of the best records of the decade, it's that it seemingly ignores the outstanding innovation made by a whole host of records from across the world in one of the most diverse times for music, popular and underground. Too predictable for its own good.

Reading through the comments, there are several considerations here:

1. 'Double Fantasy' was released on November 17, 1980, so it is an 80s album.
2. London Calling was released on December, 14, 1979. So, it depends on how technical you want to get.
3. To their detriment, Rolling Stone couldn't give a shit about strength of composition or musicianship when ranking these albums. They've always catered to culture and relevance. So if you're interested in a musical list, then go elsewhere.
4. The exclusion of many well-deserving pop and metal albums on this list is a sham.
5. In the original 1989 article, RS had the audacity to state that there were no real musical revolutions in the 80s. I guess they had no clue about musical revolutions started by Eddie Van Halen, The Clash, or Run DMC. Like every decade in popular music, the 80s was a musical capsule filled with plenty of revolutions.
6. The fact that the original RS article was written in 1989 would lead me to believe that, if given another shot at it, RS would make quite a few changes. As was mentioned earlier, the attempt to bridge 60's hippie and psychadelic rock with 80's pop/new wave/ metal, is blatant.

Given their track record, I approached this Rolling Stone chart with great trepidation. To my relief, it's not 1/2 bad. rather predictable (as you'd expect) but a lot of essential choices here (& some awful picks).

Just made a chart with my top 40 Albums, but it lacks 80’s albums. I’m definarely going to give lots of these a listen!

Not awful, but could be much, much better. For starters, it is ridiculous that London Calling is included, being that it was released in 1979. Doesn't really matter when it was released in the States. Second of all, some of the great alt rock classics of the decade (The Queen Is Dead, Doolittle, Document, Daydream Nation etc) should be close to the top just based solely on how much they would influence the next decade of rockers. Also, what in the world is Double Fantasy doing on this list???