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1001 Songs Challenge #726: Rhythm Nation (1989)
In Rhythm Nation, Jackson juxtaposed beats and rhythms to be found on music channels with unpleasant current affairs headlines.
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1001 Songs Challenge #725: Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns (1989)
Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns is said to be about Andrew Wood’s relationship with his then girlfriend, Xana La Fuente.
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1001 Songs Challenge #724: Headlights on the Parade (1989)
The Blue Nile's Headlights on the Parade is heavily driven by a piano/keyboard that opens proceedings and continues for much of the track.
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1001 Songs Challenge #723: Nothing Has Been Proved (1989)
Nothing Has Been Proved recreates aspects of the Profumo scandal with each verse describing a particular eyebrow raising moment.
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1001 Songs Challenge #722: Back to Life (However Do You Want Me) (1989)
Back to Life… opens with the express wish to leave behind a fantasy realm two lovers inhabit and to return to the reality that is life.
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1001 Songs Challenge #721: The Humpty Dance (1989)
The Humpty Dance is a silly but fun bit of hip hop, detracting from social commentary in favour of a humorous tale of a so-called ugly man’s sexual antics.
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1001 Songs Challenge #720: Nothing Compares 2 U (1989)
Nothing Compares 2 U conveys the painful end of a relationship and how one of the people in this union is struggling to pick up the pieces.
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1001 Songs Challenge #719: Free Fallin’ (1989)
In Free Fallin’ Tom Petty teamed up with Jeff Lynne of Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) to write a track that was a homage to San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles.lin by Tom Petty
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1001 Songs Challenge #718: Lullaby (1989)
One popular interpretation of Lullaby is that it refers to bedtime stories Smith heard as a child of a spiderman that eats children alive.
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1001 Songs Challenge #717: Can’t Be Sure (1989)
The Sundays' Can't Be Sure generalises the concept of desire and the narrator describes it as being a “terrible thing.”
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1001 Songs Challenge #716: Monkey Gone to Heaven (1989)
Pixies' Monkey Gone to Heaven deals with environmental issues and is a testament to the damage mankind has done to the planet.
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1001 Songs Challenge #715: Getting Away With It (1989)
I did read that Getting Away With It is partly a parody of Morrissey from his days in The Smiths and the image he projected to his audience.
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1001 Songs Challenge #714: W.F.L. (Think about the Future) (1989)
W.F.L. is not the most straightforward song to unravel but it does seem to concern a relationship that has changed or broken down.
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1001 Songs Challenge #713: Like a Prayer (1989)
Like a Prayer harks back to Madonna’s own upbringing. She has stated in interviews that being raised as a Catholic led to a lifelong impact.
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1001 Songs Challenge #712: Epic (1989)
Faith No More's Epic describes a narrator who is in the midst of an experience, one that is leaving them feeling very good indeed.
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1001 Songs Challenge #711: Me Myself and I (1989)
In Me Myself & I each of the members of De La Soul take it in turns to express their frustration at being labelled by their contemporaries as hippies.
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1001 Songs Challenge #710: I Am the Resurrection (1989)
I Am the Resurrection seems concerned not with a love of religion but with a breaking of the bond between mankind and faith.
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1001 Songs Challenge #709: Soy gitano (1989)
In the chorus of Soy gitano we hear that he is gatecrashing a wedding and is going to make a spectacle of himself and declare his feelings.
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1001 Songs Challenge #708: Personal Jesus (1989)
Songwriter Martin Gore took inspiration and indeed the song title from Priscilla Presley who once referred to her husband, Elvis Presley, as her own “personal Jesus”.
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1001 Songs Challenge #707: Wicked Game (1989)
Chris Isaak himself said Wicked Game was inspired by a late night call from a girl who wanted to come over and “talk” with him.