The Golden Girls (1985-1992)
The 1980s were big: big hair, big poofy clothes. Bright colors and bold patterns. Mullets, perms, shoulder pads, parachute pants, and leg warmers are some of the looks that featured heavily over the decade. Cabbage Patch Kids, Care Bears, the Rubik’s Cube and so much more also came out of this time.
For movies, this is the decade of the teen movie, with the John Hughes movies Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off all coming out between 1984 and 1986. Other popular movies from the decade include Heathers, E.T., Top Gun, and the start of many franchises, like Ghostbusters, Back to the Future, The Terminator, and Indiana Jones (the first Star Wars came out in 1977, but the remaining two original trilogy movies came out in 1980 and 1983).
In TV, many classic shows began their lives. Cheers started in 1982; The Golden Girls and MacGyver in 1985; Miami Vice and Murder, She Wrote in 1984; Married… With Children and Full House in 1987. The end of the decade started Saved by the Bell, Roseanne, The Simpsons, Seinfeld, Family Matters and Baywatch.
And in music, beyond The Go-Go’s, there was Madonna and Michael Jackson. They dominated the decade and were trendsetters. There was Prince, Elton John, David Bowie, Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Whitney Houston, Cyndi Lauper and so many more solo artists that had long-lasting impacts on pop culture. For bands, there was U2, Wham!, Rush, Bon Jovi, Genesis, Journey and more.
There were boomboxes and the rise of the Walkman, but MTV launched in 1981 and defined the music of the 80s. They popularized music videos and shaped pop culture, dictating the sound and look of the time, as well as the general feeling, as music videos displayed bands and could get across messages better than just songs did; they could have political messages, including fear and anxiety over the ongoing Cold War, which would not come to an end until 1989.
The Go-Go’s
The Go-Go’s formed as a punk band in Los Angeles in 1978. After going through a few changes to their lineup, by late 1980 they settled on Belinda Carlisle (vocals), Charlotte Caffey (lead guitar, keyboard, backing vocals), Jane Wiedlin (guitar, backing vocals), Kathy Valentine (bass), and Gina Schock (drummer). At this point they shifted to a more pop sound.
In 1980, The Go-Go’s toured England and released a demo of “We Got the Beat.” They signed with I.R.S. Records in 1981 and released their first album, Beauty and the Beat, which was number 1 on the Billboard 200. Beauty and the Beat was their best received album, but they also released Vacation (1982) and Talk Show (1984).
The Go-Go’s broke up in 1985 and each pursued solo careers (Belinda Carlisle’s was the most successful, releasing “Mad About You” and “Heaven is a Place On Earth” as singles) but briefly reunited in 1994 to record Return to the Valley of The Go-Go’s, a retrospective album, and tour. They toured again in 1999 and released a new album, God Bless the Go-Go’s in 2001 and continued regular touring for years. They announced a farewell tour in 2016 without Valentine, who had left the band and sued the remaining members in 2013. However, all five reunited to play a show in January 2018 and announce the Broadway dates of Head Over Heels.
Legacy
The Go-Go’s are a history-making band who have a been reaching milestones since 1982. When Beauty and the Beat topped charts in 1982, they became the first all-female band who wrote their own songs and played their own instruments to make it to number 1. They were inducted to the Hollywood Bowl Hall of Fame in 2014 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2021. In 2020, a documentary about them, The Go-Go’s, was released through Showtime. The Go-Go’s are currently touring.
