CHART BEATS: A JOURNEY
THROUGH POP

Recap of the Australian top 50 for the week ending February 13, 1983, including new entries from Dire Straits, Peter Gabriel and more.

Recap of the Australian top 50 for the week ending February 6, 1983, including new entries from Marvin Gaye, Boys Town Gang, Paul Carrack...

Recap of the Australian top 50 for the week ending January 30, 1983, including new entries from Dennis Waterman, Grace Jones and Diana Ross.

Recap of the Australian top 50 for the week ending January 23, 1983, including new entries from Wham!, Toto, Fat Larry's Band, Devo & more

Recap of the Australian top 50 for the week ending January 16, 1983, including new entries from Laura Branigan, Lionel Richie, Mi-Sex & more

It's funny what it takes for a song to be banned — and how that's changed over the years. Just last week, we saw that the suggestion of...

There comes a point in some bands' careers where they go from being purely popular to absolutely huge. Often, it only takes one song to...

Sometimes it's better not to tempt fate (pun intended) and try to recreate an iconic pop culture moment. But, 1977's Grease had been so...

This week in 1983, a future superstar made her first appearance on the ARIA top 100. The single — her second — didn't progress very far,...

As well as being a great 12 months for music, 1983 was an important year for developments in computers. Apple's Lisa desktop, Microsoft...

Every summer needs a party anthem. A song like "Love Shack" , "Funky Town" and "Ice Ice Baby" that dominates the number 1 spot, and provides the soundtrack to long evenings and beach holidays. This week in 1983, the party anthem for the summer of '83/'84 debuted on the ARIA singles chart. Super-tight pants? Tick. Gaudy shirt? Tick. Grinning back-up dancers? Tick. Lionel Richie's party was good to go  The singer behind the tune had good reason to party. His solo career had g

What a week it's been, right? As luck would have it, today's look back at the ARIA singles chart from 1983 allows us to draw a neat...

Between them, they'd pretty much defined pop music since the '60s, paving the way for countless other acts and recording numerous songs that would go down in history as classics. So, it was a pretty big deal for Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson to collaborate musically. Macca and Jacko teamed up again in 1983 This week in 1983, the second single from the superstar pair was as well received as the first one had been a year earlier. The bonus: this time, the song on which the

Our family didn't own a VCR until around 1986. I can't remember exactly when it was but we got a free copy of The Last Starfighter  on video when we bought it, so whenever that was a new release in Australia.  John Belushi had passed away by the time The Blues Brothers reached the top 10 Back in 1983, home video was really starting to take off in Australia. In fact, a movie that had been in cinemas in 1980 was released on video in 1983 — and, as a result, its soundtrack rose

"Endless Love" . "Up Where We Belong" . "Save Your Love" . The '80s had already provided some monster ballad duets — and two more arrived on the ARIA top 50 this week in 1983. Two singles, four performers, one overdose of romantic sentiment One of the ballads was performed by a pair of country superstars, while the other reunited two soul singers who'd previously collaborated on a live album in 1980. Both singles would be top 10 hits, one going all the way to the very top of

Back in the pre-digital era, you couldn't just buy whatever song you wanted whenever you wanted. And so, for a single that'd already been...

Apart from half-time shows and the odd sportsperson who makes an ill-advised attempt at a recording career, music and sport don't often...

In last week's recap of the ARIA singles chart from 1983, we encountered a bunch of songs I'd never heard before. I can't say the same...

As I write my flashbacks to ARIA charts from years past, I sometimes come across songs I didn't know at the time. Often, it's an obscure...

U2. Bon Jovi. Nirvana. R.E.M. Coldplay. At one time or other, they've all been regarded as the biggest band in the world. Before any of...