Sweet Dreams Are Made of EURYTHMICS Album Polls

I really don't know any of their proper albums, but Greatest Hits packs a whallop.

3 Eurythmics Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This) Feb 1983
1 Eurythmics Touch Nov 1983
31 Eurythmics Touch Dance Jun 1984
23 Eurythmics 1984 (For The Love Of Big Brother) (OST) Nov 1984
3 Eurythmics Be Yourself Tonight May 1985
3 Eurythmics Revenge Jul 1986
7 Eurythmics Savage Nov 1987
1 Eurythmics We Too Are One Sep 1989
1 Eurythmics Greatest Hits Mar 1991
22 Eurythmics Eurythmics Live 1983-1989 Nov 1993
4 Eurythmics Peace Oct 1999
21 Eurythmics Greatest Hits (re-issue) Nov 1999
5 Eurythmics Ultimate Collection Nov 2005 Notes

mmmm great poll. will think. and (re)listen. looking forward to that. (it'll be sweet dreams though)

That's for the...

"Oh, they had a reunion, not so long ago, right?"

"Yep, nine years ago!"

Any of them except the last two are contenders. Very consistent albums. I start thinking Savage or Be Yourself Tonight, but then I remember Sweet Dreams and 1984...

Touch I mean, it will be Touch.

Nó fear
Nó hate
Nó pain
No broken hearts

Savage being a concept album might push it over the top for me as contender for best album.

"You Have Placed a Chill In My Heart" may be my favorite single, but the middle of Savage really sags.

Voted for Be Yourself Tonight, which despite an Elvis Costello duet that goes nowhere has terrific album tracks.

I don't know if the links on this page still work, but this blog has a bunch of extended versions and remixes.

Stewart's hair in the Revenge era was something to behold.

"I Love You Like A Ball And Chain" on Be Yourself Tonight
is the bomb

As is "Here Comes That Sinking Feeling".

And "Conditioned Soul."

savage, tho revenge isn't far off. i think i overdosed on those trax a bit as a kid

Revenge, as I suggested above, is heavy on mullet-rock. How do we feel about "Missionary Man" and "Let's Go"?

I think "Missionary Man" is as good as anything they did. It doesn't sound like any other song (any of the other blues-rock songs of the mid/late 80s) and the lyrics are so strange for a pop song. Plus that video.

Otherwise, I haven't heard Revenge (or In The Garden) since I got rid of a bunch of vinyl in '02, but "In This Town" as the other standout. The penultimate track on each of their records is a high point.

"Sweet Dreams". They never did anything better than the title track and "Love Is a Stranger". Wonderful synthpop!

Sweet Dreams, as much for "This City Never Sleeps" as anything else.

Want to register 10 socks just to vote for Savage.

A large part of my Sweet Dreams problem is "Sweet Dreams" itself, which I never want to hear again, ever.

I think they partly lost it midway through the recording of the "Be Yourself Tonight" album. Half of that album is great synthpop, but then it is dragged down by stuff like "Would I Lie To You".

Great band. I reckon Revenge is the best album by miles, it's got their biggest hits on it like Thorn In My Side.

I am somewhat ambivalent towards "Revenge". On one side, the album has way too much guitars and way too much of that typical horrible late 80s sound. On the other hand, some of the songs are obviously among the best they ever wrote. "When Tomorrow Comes" and "Thorn In My Side" are definitely great melodic pop songs. Not so much the repetitive and mantra-like "Missionary Man" though.

I like "Missionary Man" all right but those other two you said are the best Eurythmics songs ever so that's why this album is my favourite. I don't really like the wierd early stuff when they sound like Kraftwerk or something like that.

The drums on Revenge (Clem Burke!) sound awful.

Generally, drums in the late 80s did sound awful. Particularly awful are those late 80s recordings that tried to sound hard and rough and edgy, as a reaction against the softer and warmer synth sounds of the early 80s.
Of course, in the 90s, people learned that, if you want something to sound harsh, better use a guitar, and rather use synths for the kind of soft and warm sounds they were created for.

Do people know that In the Garden was produced by Holger Czukay of Can?

I love that album, but I also really love Sweet Dreams and Touch. They get spotty after that, but still a lot of solid numbers.

She has one of the greatest voices... it's too bad her solo work is so adult contemp.

it was produced by Conny Plank, Holger plays french horn on two tracks, it's the album I voted for

got me searching blogspots hoping someone had transferred their Acid b-side "Let's Just Close Our Eyes". I remember swearing aloud at Amoeba when the reissue left that track off, I care about these things

Sweet Dreams. such a fucked up album

Of course, in the 90s, people learned that, if you want something to sound harsh, better use a guitar, and rather use synths for the kind of soft and warm sounds they were created for.

Oh, Hongropaws.

Sweet Dreams. such a fucked up album

how so?

there's an odd jumble of influences (r&b, Georgio Moroder, prog rock) that are twisted into a very catchy and glossy-sounding pop album with a bunch of pretty dark, depressing, and/or paranoid lyrical themes. Granted much of that formula is par for the course for synthpop, which had a lot of dark and arty undercurrents to it, but Sweet Dreams seems particularly full of dread - Duran Duran and Human League or any other number of synthpop acts had their share of light moments where they got unashamedly romantic/horny/silly, there's none of that on this album.

honestly I kinda miss that dynamic in chart pop, where something sounds deceptively sweet and catchy and then on closer inspection is about something quite dark. That approach seems to be completely gone post-80s.

I own Touch, which has those melancholy moments like "Paint a Rumour" out of step with the likes of "Right By Your Side," etc. Is it much different?

wow this is really hard, but i think that Sweet Dreams is going to just barely edge out 1984 for the number one spot for me, although i worry that 1984 wont get many votes which is too bad because it is completely brilliant.

I prefer them in Greatest Hits form. I never found an album of theirs that was enjoyable the whole way through, and I was surprised that In The Garden didn't do more for me when I tried it. I recall liking Savage quite a bit, though, so I guess I'll vote for that despite not remembering a thing about it.

buy it Bimble, it's really great (and kinda goth, if you squint)

"it was produced by Conny Plank, Holger plays french horn on two tracks"

Thanks for straightening me out Milton.

Yeah Sweet Dreams is really goth and amazing and only interrupted once with spontaneous bursts of gleeful Spanish. I wouldn't say it's darker than the second Human League though.

sweet dreams vs be yourself tonight

but y'know we too are one is underrated and frankly terrific

argh

1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) without a doubt

but y'know we too are one is underrated and frankly terrific

actually, the Conventional Wisdom is correct about this one!

have a hard time seeing how anything other than Sweet Dreams is a contender here

alfred wtf we always agree on everything - this is, like, a disturbance in ilx. srsly the only dud track on we too is "you hurt me"

vis:

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

surprised to see revenge so low

No one's convincingly defended Savage. Someone wanna try?

defend from what, rightfully winning the poll?

these are my guns these are my ferns this is maybe their fourth best record

Finally listening to Savage again now, for the first time since it came out.

As I said elsewhere, I was friends with a guy circa 1987 who was nearly twice my age who was gay and we were into a lot of current, underground British indie import records at the time. It seemed very contrary (dare I say un-hip?) to be listening to a Eurythmics album for us, because surely they were an act that should have been corporate sell-out bores by this time. But nevertheless, it proved to be a really interesting record for some reason. And that's why I chose it for this poll, that it was surprising that a Eurythmics album of all things would be worthwhile to me in any way by 1987 considering what else I was into. I remember walking around my neighborhood with it on my walkman and really grooving on it. It makes me a bit uneasy now to hear it, though. Puts me in some weird teenage place I don't know if I want to be.

I must admit though, that the songs here are pretty unassailable, and there's really not a bad song here, even if the first half of it is the strongest. Synths on "Heaven" are especially delicious. Last song "I Need You" is wow! Now that one's pretty special. Seems to me I used to play that one a couple times in a row.

Yes, I remember there were some truly remarkable videos for this album, but I'm really not ready to experience that again right now.

In summation: This has been a nice trip down memory lane, but like I said, it all makes me slightly uneasy and I'm probably not going to do it again anytime soon. But thanks.

Brand New Day's the last song, you must have missed it in rewinding I Need You over and over.

Nope, I didn't get that one on my iPod at all somehow. Thanks for noting it! I appreciate it.

Yep, heard it now "Brand New Day" - thanks so much for letting me know I missed it or I probably wouldn't have known! I like it a lot. This is a great album. I think I'm gonna try to get comfortable and cozy with this album again very soon.

First record would've been my choice, too.

I'm with Alfred: if I ever hear "Sweet Dreams" again, it will be too soon. Honestly, I prefer her first solo record to anything she ever did with Dave Stewart. Who sucks.

Hehehehehe... 'Jennifer' (from Sweet Dreams) is like the Jesus and Mary Chain song that never was.

Then Play Long reaches the dis/unity that is We Too Are One: http://nobilliards.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/eurythmics-we-too-are-one.html

The UK crit establishment remains at best ambivalent about Eurythmics as authenticity poseurs, if that makes sense. They weren't as successful here, but we accepted them as intermittently strong pop stars. I rank their albums.

Turrican otmfm re "Jennifer", I would love to hear the JAMC cover that.