‘L’Amour Toujours’ N°85 – Vintage 80s Music Videos

Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Cliff Richard, Nana Mouskouri, Barry Manilow, Jim Diamond, The Icicle Works, The Flying Pickets, Joe Jackson, Marvin Gaye, Howard Jones, Imagination, Yazoo

They are the performers of twelve vintage love songs that were ranked in various charts, this week but in the Eighties 80s.

Here, they are reunited in one glorious playlist. Enjoy!

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Tracklist

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1 . Frankie Goes To Hollywood – The Power Of Love

Released in late 1984, “The Power of Love” by Frankie Goes to Hollywood sits among a trio of heavyweight singles that carved the band’s brief yet striking dominance on UK charts that year.

Partnered with producer Trevor Horn, the track transforms what might have been a simple love ballad into an expansive, almost cinematic listening experience—a hallmark of Horn’s glossy, maximalist approach to production.

The instrumentation leans heavily into grandeur, imbued with strings and a restrained rhythm section, while Holly Johnson’s vocal delivery teeters between angelic reverence and an emotional urgency that borders on operatic.

Its chart-topping success in the UK coincided with a December release, and while it’s not—strictly speaking—a “Christmas song,” its timing and religious undertones cast it as a seasonal staple, an irony not lost on those who revel in festive reinterpretations of pop melancholia.

The accompanying music video boldly adopts a Biblical nativity theme, directed by Gerard de Thame, which raises eyebrows for simultaneously elevating the song’s themes of devotion while wading knee-deep into cliché-laden sentimentality.

Chronicling love as a near-spiritual force, the lyrics toe a delicate line—part raw passion, part celestial sermon—offering interpretations that range from romantic to transcendent.

Internationally, the single punched far beyond its weight class, earning top-five spots in Germany and Ireland, proving that the band’s reach wasn’t confined to British airwaves.

Frankie Goes to Hollywood would never quite recapture the glittering heights of 1984, but “The Power of Love” endures, its staying power exemplified by covers, ads, and even its appearance in cultural curios like “Black Mirror.”

Overproduced for some, a flawless pop anthem for others, its legacy remains a testament to how music, at its best, arrests time—even if just for four-and-a-half shimmering minutes.


Featured on the 1984 album “Welcome To The Pleasuredome“.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Facebook

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2 . Cliff Richard – Please Don’t Fall in Love

Cliff Richard’s “Please Don’t Fall in Love,” released as a standalone single in late 1983, leans heavily into sentimentality with its gentle balladry.

Penned by Michael Allison and Peter Sills, the song bypasses the grandiosity of Richard’s earlier rock ’n’ roll exploits, opting instead for an understated fragility that resonated well with listeners of the time.

Produced by Alan Tarney, a key architect of Richard’s polished ’80s sound, the track thrives on its minimal arrangement, placing Richard’s emotive delivery squarely at the forefront.

Its December ascent to No. 7 on the UK Singles Chart signified a modest triumph for Richard, who was navigating an evolving pop landscape that often discarded the softer complexities for louder hooks or newer trends.

The accompanying music video’s wintry aesthetic plays on the seasonal melancholy of love lost, serving as a fitting extension of the track’s bittersweet tone.

While “Please Don’t Fall in Love” never became part of a studio album, it earned its way onto compilation records like “Private Collection: 1979–1988,” ensuring its place among Richard’s better-remembered contributions of the era.

But beyond the charts, the song operates as a small testament to Richard’s knack for conveying vulnerability without losing artistic polish—a shortcut to sentimentality done just right.


Featured on the 1983 album “Silver”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Official Site

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3 . Nana Mouskouri – Only Love

Released in 1986 as part of its namesake album, “Only Love” by Nana Mouskouri drifts between delicate sentimentality and a near-operatic elegance that feels utterly timeless.

This track, originally the theme for the BBC adaptation of *Mistral’s Daughter,* thrums with a polished theatricality, thanks to Vladimir Cosma’s composition and Norman Gimbel’s lyrics.

Its orchestration leans heavily on lush strings, wrapping Mouskouri’s crystalline voice in layers of dramatic crescendo, as if courting a sweeping cinematic moment that demands both tears and applause.

Multilingual by nature, Mouskouri lets her dexterity shine here—performing versions like “Aber die Liebe bleibt” for German audiences, ensuring the song’s reach spanned continents without losing its emotional pull.

Culturally, it straddles that peculiar line between mass appeal and art-house earnestness, tricky for even veteran performers to master, yet Mouskouri remains wholly at ease, even if at times bordering on overly earnest.

The song’s high chart placements, like its runners-up spot in the UK and a win in Ireland, underline its pervasive hold during the mid-’80s, though some may argue that it’s more *refined nostalgia* than pioneering artistry.

Through live recordings and vintage TV appearances now scattered across digital platforms, it’s clear that Mouskouri’s rendition of “Only Love” aimed to channel universal emotion, leaning into themes of devotion and longing without succumbing to overwrought theatrics—a rarity for ballads of its era.

Still, there’s room to question if its lasting appeal lies as much in its association with prime-time melodrama as in its musical strength; after all, one doesn’t climb charts on impeccable pitch alone.

At heart, “Only Love” reinforces Mouskouri’s ability to infuse even the most straightforward lyrics with a vocal resonance that somehow feels both personal and grandiose—a trick she executes with disarming ease.


Featured on the 1982 album “American TV series Mistral’s Daughter”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Facebook

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4 . Barry Manilow – Read ‘Em and Weep

Barry Manilow’s “Read ‘Em and Weep” stands as an intense meeting point between theatrical excess and straightforward pop sentimentality.

Originally penned by Jim Steinman, it first appeared on Meat Loaf’s 1981 album, but Manilow’s 1983 adaptation gives it a sleeker, more radio-friendly coat of paint.

The production leans on Steinman’s signature dramatics, framing regret and emotional turmoil in unapologetically grandiose style, yet Manilow tempers these elements with his softer delivery.

Released under Arista Records, the song carries themes of longing and introspection, with lyrics heavy on theatrical angst and reflective sorrow—a fitting mix for Steinman’s flair and Manilow’s emotive vocal approach.

Though charting respectably at No. 18 on the Billboard Hot 100 and claiming three weeks atop the Adult Contemporary chart, the song’s real strength lies in its contrast: overblown yet haunting, dynamic yet underpinned by a fragile sense of regret.

The accompanying music video highlights this theatricality further, bordering on melodrama, which feels simultaneously captivating and excess-laden.

Manilow’s version, while stripped of some of the rock edge of Meat Loaf’s original, compensates with its seductive polish, seamlessly blending emotional weight with 1980s adult-pop gloss.

Culturally, the collaboration between Manilow and Steinman is intriguing—a pop star borrowing and adapting the bombast of rock-opera storytelling for a different audience without compromising its grand emotional scale.

Its international chart success, including a No. 1 spot in Canada’s Adult Contemporary rankings, hints at its widespread appeal, a testament to its ability to balance melodrama with a mainstream sensibility.


Featured on the 1981 album “Dead Ringer”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Official Site

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5 . Jim Diamond – I Should Have Known Better

“I Should Have Known Better” captures a moment where pop balladry and emotional vulnerability collide in quintessential ’80s fashion.

Jim Diamond’s voice, raw and piercing, delivers a lament draped in regret and introspection, penned with Graham Lyle’s expertise in crafting melancholic melodies.

Released in 1984, it served as the flagship single for Diamond’s debut solo album, *Double Crossed*, and quickly climbed the UK charts, briefly claiming the No. 1 spot in a competitive music landscape.

The production by Christopher Neil bolstered the song’s fragile, haunting atmosphere, with its brooding piano arrangements and understated instrumentation ensuring the vocals remained front and center.

Diamond’s request for fans to prioritize supporting Band Aid’s charity single over his own record shows his surprising selflessness, a rarity in an industry often defined by ego.

The accompanying music video, with its minimalist yet evocative visuals, added to the song’s understated charm, while frequent airplay amplified its reach across Europe.

Lyrically, themes of heartbreak, accountability, and longing resonate deeply, capturing a universal sentiment that transcends its era.

The track’s enduring appeal lies in its unfiltered emotional delivery, a quality that earned it an Ivor Novello Award and a spot on numerous compilation albums.

Its influence persisted in Diamond’s live TV performances, where the artist’s heartfelt renditions kept the song alive in collective memory long after its charting days.

An introspective anthem of love and remorse, “I Should Have Known Better” is less about innovation and more about timeless, sincere storytelling in musical form.


Featured on the 1985 album “Double Crossed”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Wikipedia

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6 . The Icicle Works – Love is a Wonderful Colour

The Icicle Works’ “Love is a Wonderful Colour” arrives with the shimmering sheen of early ’80s new wave, wrapped in a production style that feels as grandiose as it is unrepentantly earnest.

Released in 1983 under Beggars Banquet Records and produced by Hugh Jones, the track revels in polished synth crescendos, lush orchestration, and Ian McNabb’s unmistakably bold vocal flair.

The lyrics lean into poetic abstraction, dripping with themes of admiration and warmth while remaining just vague enough to feel universal—a hallmark of the era’s more emotionally ambiguous songwriting.

Chart ambitions were clearly part of its DNA, and they paid off, as it managed to peak at No. 15 on the UK Singles Chart in early 1984, making it the band’s biggest commercial success at home.

The song’s accompanying music video, punctuated by its surreal imagery, didn’t exactly redefine visual storytelling but managed enough airtime on MTV to get it lodged in the collective memory of a small but loyal audience.

What lingers most is the track’s commitment to its optimism, served up generously through layers of sound that almost dare you to be cynical about its message.


Featured on the 1984 album “The Icicle Works”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Twitter

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7 . The Flying Pickets – Only You

The Flying Pickets’ “Only You” reimagines a synth-driven Yazoo original as a fully fleshed a cappella arrangement, stripping down the bells and whistles to bare vocals and raw harmony.

Released in 1983 on *Lost Boys,* it’s a peculiar little gem that topped the UK Singles Chart—five weeks of vocal quirks and Christmas-radio immortality.

This isn’t just a song; it’s a curiously layered exercise in simplicity, where theater-kid earnestness meets chart-topping ambition.

The Flying Pickets, born out of a political and performing-arts scene, brought a sense of communal presence that felt oddly refreshing in the synth-pop era they emerged from.

Apart from its harmonic intrigue, it found time to flirt with activism, performed for miners embroiled in the UK strikes of the mid-’80s—an odd but fitting stage for such wistful vocal tenderness.

Love, longing, nostalgia—it’s all there, wrapped in unfussy vocal lines engineered to break a little heart as it plays over coffee-shop speakers decades later.

Its cultural echo remains compact yet resonant; it’s the proof that sometimes “less” really does linger “more.”


Featured on the 1984 album “Lost Boys”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Official Site

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8 . Joe Jackson – Steppin’ Out

“Steppin’ Out” by Joe Jackson emerges as an effortlessly chic piece of 1980s pop, standing tall amidst the synth-driven wave that dominated the decade.

The track, lifted from his 1982 album *Night and Day,* channels the energy of nocturnal escapades in a city that famously never sleeps—New York.

Its foundation lies in a taut blend of Latin jazz influences anchored by the steady pulse of a Roland CR-78 drum machine, which sets the stage for Jackson’s crisp piano hooks and understated yet poignant vocals.

There’s a sophisticated air to the arrangement, evoking a mood of seizing the night without drowning in its chaos—more tailored suits than leather jackets, more cocktails than dive bars.

The lyrics, delivered with Jackson’s measured restraint, hum with an urban optimism that avoids slipping into excess or sentimentality.

The single climbed to #6 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #4 on the UK Singles Chart, a noteworthy feat for a track that eschewed bombast in favor of elegance.

A Grammy nod followed, further solidifying the song’s cultural foothold.

Its accompanying video, directed by Steve Barron, mirrored the song’s themes of quiet liberation, complete with high-rise panoramas and late-night glamour—an aesthetic MTV couldn’t air enough.

More than four decades later, its rhythmic precision and melodic clarity keep it relevant, a rare artifact that has endured without the crutch of nostalgia.

“Steppin’ Out” isn’t just a song about movement; it *moves*—unassuming yet confident, contemporary yet timeless, standing as a testament to Jackson’s alignment of artistry and accessibility at its peak.


Featured on the 1982 album “Night and Day”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Official Site

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9 . Marvin Gaye – Sexual Healing

Marvin Gaye’s “Sexual Healing” is a shimmering blend of funk, sultry lyricism, and electronic sophistication, defiantly resurrecting the artist’s career from the ashes of tumultuous personal setbacks.

Released in 1982, the track marries a drum machine’s propulsive hum with warm reggae undertones, creating a balance between mechanized rhythm and human vulnerability.

The song’s layered production stands as a quiet revolution, a step toward the digital age without abandoning the emotive fire of classic R&B.

Lyrically, it oscillates between longing and self-care, with Gaye’s restrained yet evocative vocal delivery turning simple phrases into sensual anthems.

Commercially, it achieved near-global ubiquity, dominating New Zealand charts while nabbing two Grammy Awards—a nod from an industry that often lagged in acknowledging his innovation.

Yet, its success wasn’t just in the numbers but in its cultural resonance, illustrating Gaye’s uncanny ability to make intimacy a universal language.


Featured on the 1982 album “Midnight Love “.

Lyrics >> More by the same : Official Site

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10 . Howard Jones – What Is Love?

In late 1983, Howard Jones posed an age-old question to the synthpop generation with “What Is Love?”—though his tone suggested he didn’t need an answer anytime soon.

Built on shimmering synthesizers and produced by Jolley & Swain, the track balanced philosophical musings and a hook that lodged itself in your head with calculated precision.

The lyrics weren’t interested in grand declarations; instead, they teetered on the edge of skepticism, mulling over love’s fragility and the weight of expectation.

For a genre often criticized for its emotional detachment, Jones managed to inject an introspective warmth beneath the glossy production.

The song ascended to No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, lingering there for three weeks, yet couldn’t break past No. 33 stateside—though it certainly earned its fair share of MTV airtime.

Its live renditions, broadcast on iconic platforms like “Top of the Pops,” were as calculatedly earnest as the synthesizer riffs themselves.

“What Is Love?” became a cornerstone of his debut album, *Human’s Lib*, which went on to sell in unimaginable quantities—though whether its existential questions were answered by listeners or left as rhetorical, we’ll never know.

If nothing else, the song carved a space for itself in ’80s pop as both a reflective shoulder-shrug and a danceable piece of catharsis.


Featured on the 1984 album “Human’s Lib”.

Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Official Site

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11 . Imagination – Thank You My Love

Released in 1987, “Thank You My Love” represents a less-celebrated but quietly enduring piece of Imagination’s output, lodged comfortably in the shimmering folds of their album “Closer.”

Crafted by Leee John and Tony Swain, the track veers into a smoother, more polished production realm, signaling the group’s effort to mature with mid-’80s trends without losing their funk-laden core.

While the group’s golden age of “Just an Illusion” and “Body Talk” was beginning to dim, this song still holds its own, benefiting from a warmth and sincerity that stamps gratitude onto its velvet grooves.

Its production, spearheaded by Swain, balances clean instrumentation with just enough funk to nod at their roots without feeling overly anchored to the past.

The lyrics tread familiar terrain around love and devotion but avoid syrupy sentimentality, carried by Leee John’s tender, if slightly theatrical, vocal delivery.

Though it didn’t light up the charts like earlier hits, peaking modestly in the UK, it struck a particular chord in mainland Europe, where the group had a devoted following.

The accompanying music video provides a visual extension of their suave aesthetic—silky suits, confident choreography, and just a hint of excess that feels inseparable from their image.

Live renditions from promotional tours further amplified the song’s layered presence, even if it lagged behind others in popular memory.

Today, it resurfaces like a fond memory through compilation albums, radiating a quiet but undeniable charm that resists erasure from 1980s playlists.

“Thank You My Love” doesn’t demand the spotlight but rather pulls you into its orbit with understated magnetism, a reflection of a band refining their identity amid an evolving musical landscape.


Featured on the 1986 album “Trilogy”.

Lyrics >> More by the same : Official Site

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12 . Yazoo – The Other Side of Love

Released on November 15, 1982, “The Other Side of Love” by Yazoo operates as a vivid snapshot of early ’80s synth-pop innovation, with Vince Clarke and Alison Moyet presenting a track that feels both playful and wistful.

As a standalone single, it never found a home on either of their studio albums, yet it managed to carve out its place in the charts, peaking at No. 13 in the UK while making subtle ripples beyond.

The song’s light-hearted veneer masks a richer undercurrent, hinting at themes of fleeting connections and romantic curiosity, buoyed by Moyet’s powerhouse voice that anchors even the most fluttering of melodies.

The B-side, “Ode to Boy,” later saw new life in Moyet’s solo career, underscoring Yazoo’s knack for crafting tracks that transcended their initial moment.

Visually, the music video leans heavily into the surreal aesthetics of its era—full of splashes of color and quirky choices that feel equally nostalgic and strange when revisited today.

Produced by Eric Radcliffe and Clarke under the Mute Records label, the song echoes Yazoo’s earlier hits, “Only You” and “Don’t Go,” while showcasing a more mischievous side to their musical persona.

Though not their most iconic work, it provides an engaging detour in their brief but impactful catalogue, a testament to the duo’s ability to flirt with both sincerity and levity within the tight confines of pop’s most ephemeral medium.


Lyrics >> Review >> More by the same : Official Site

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(*) According to our own statistics, upadted on February 2, 2025

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