Bands that perfectly represent decades

the explosion of genres in the 70s and 80s seem to defy this approach imo. there just weren't omnivorous/omnipresent figures like the Beatles for those decades

I can't really think of one for the 80s cuz imo they would have to straddle both new wave synthpop and rap in some way (to say nothing of what was going on w guitar rock at the time such as the Smiths), and I can't think of a single act that did that

― Οὖτις, viernes 22 de agosto de 2014 20:54 (30 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five?

Two records only, both in the 80's. Sampled New Wave and rapped on top of it.

that's true but seems kinda wrong to call a band that was over by 1983 one that typified the decade

Well they got back together in 1988 and then disbanded again.

The Eagles formed in 1971 and broke up after releasing an album in 1979, and were arguably the biggest band of the '70s, doesn't make them any less associate with that decade just because they started touring again in the '90s.

this.

when you think of the 70s it has to be a band of 'rock' excess in all its clichéd form.

and the eagles truly rep that groove.

Zep more representative stylistically and sonically imo, AND they were huge AND they were rock n roll excess in its most cliched form, they practically wrote the book

Zep also got the polyglot nature of the 70s music scene better - they could draw on folk, metal, funk, disco, reggae, even punk to some extent

wasn't all they were drawing on

thought about zep, but they released debut in 69, and final album in 82 ..

Spazz, your points re Pumpkins as the quintessential 90s act are all great and otm. Square as I am, I felt like pointing out that the band, strictly speaking, is non-eligible. You still make a hell of an argument.

80s - Thompson Twins

I can't really think of one for the 80s cuz imo they would have to straddle both new wave synthpop and rap in some way (to say nothing of what was going on w guitar rock at the time such as the Smiths), and I can't think of a single act that did that

C'mon man, I already named them upthread!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsyHQgiem8c

but they released debut in 69, and final album in 82

Actually Zep I and Zep II both came out in 69, but Coda from 1982 consisted of previously recorded material from before Bonham died.

lcd soundsystem for the 2000s: nostalgic and anxious about being nostalgic.

I can't really think of one for the 80s cuz imo they would have to straddle both new wave synthpop and rap in some way (to say nothing of what was going on w guitar rock at the time such as the Smiths), and I can't think of a single act that did that

― Οὖτις, viernes 22 de agosto de 2014 20:54 (30 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Mantronix?

80s: Zapp, Culture Club, Big Black

lcd soundsystem for the 2000s: nostalgic and anxious about being nostalgic.

― Treeship

That's not what the 00's is about! It's more about dancing and being self-concious.

White Stripes would have been perfect for 2000s, had their debut not come out in 1999.

Got one for 2000s:
Jet

As it currently stands:
The Fiery Furnaces

Lil Wayne maybe. He was the first artist I noticed who catapulted himself to top tier status using the internet. Also his mixtapes from the mid aughts have a kind of exhausting, gratuitous quality that I associate with American culture during Bush's second term.

rip lil wayne 2000-2009 such a talented 9 year old whyyyyyyyyyyyyy

00s: 2 Many DJs, Glass Candy, Fischerspooner (not sure if these two are still active, they seem like a good fit anyway)

re-posting from some other thread I probably shouldn't have revived:

I was thinking of this yesterday, although not so much in terms of favorite as much as in terms of artists' whose work during a given decade best approaches encapsulating that decade. Prompted by listening to a bunch of Prince stuff, of course. His run of 80s albums contains so much - both in terms of musical styles and genres covered or touched upon as much as the overall subject matter and aesthetics - and his output reflect the times so well. It has the panicky hedonism, the apocalyptic eschatology (both religious and sexual), the 60s/baby boomer hangover, the sense that computers/tech are the future, flirtations with Reaganism. And musically so much of the decade's trends are present, regardless of whether or not he was setting or following them: post-disco R&B, new wave, 60s throwback jangle pop, Bob Seger-style guitar anthems, rap. If you go through these records they give you a better picture of what 80s pop culture was about, from the dawn of the decade to the end, than almost any other artist I can think of.

Then working back I was figuring Zep for the 70s and (duh) the Beatles for the 60s, although going the other direction I have a harder time - feel like from the 90s on either the number of artist's who sustained a career height through the entire decade become rarer (and they were pretty rare to begin with), or the pop landscape fractured too much for anyone to really cover it all.

I mean you could even (to some extent) extrapolate 80s hair metal from Prince - the androgyny + guitar pyrotechnics and stupid come-ons

although Prince was active outside the 80s so I guess he doesn't quite meet the thread premise re: activity

also I can't accept the Pumpkins for the 90s because the 90s were VERY much about rap imo and Corgan is like the whitest of lily-white non-rap dudes possible

feel like to represent the 80s you'd have to have "light and jaunty" sounding records early on but "heavy and bloated" records by the decade's end.

maybe that's rock-centric, idk

Prince def meets that criteria!

For the 90's, I'd say Pavement might be the best example for it.

60s: The Beatles
70s: Led Zeppelin
80s: Prince
90s: Nirvana
00s: Animal Collective

i don't think prince is a band?

ok, Madonna then

tell that to the Time

xp

Madonna is the only real contender for the 80s imo. I have zero interest in her catalog but her transformative zeitgeistiness is undeniable.

Teena Maria

you can't pick an artist you have 0 interest in! you can't subtract yourself from the question

why not? I haven't ever really enjoyed listening to Madonna but I am familiar enough with her work (still have copies of the first three albums, for some reason) and a clear enough memory of her impact over the course of the decade to understand how well she embodied the decade. I guess she's a bit musically less adventurous than other contenders like Prince or Zep or the Beatles - and that's to her detriment - but she was pretty on top of mainstream pop trends, and she still covers a lot of ground.

I guess she has no real connection to any of the rock of the decade, that's a hindrance.

they might be referring to prince and the revolution, but i don't know. i wouldn't choose prince to rperesent the 80s

feel like prince representing the 80s would be saying the 80s was a sex addict's dream sound. the guy made some cool stuff, but his mind didn't coincide with most 80s music? 60s or 70s would be more of a sexual liberty thing

porn first became widely available in the 80s thx to VHS so no

choosing a single band/musician/artist to represent decades is a fool's game

as if porn was the peak of 80s pop culture

I just meant that in comparison with the 60s/70s the 80s had its own kind of "sexual liberation"

if you have an issue with the basic premise that's all well and good (albeit a different complaint)

porn first became widely available in the 80s thx to VHS so no

― Οὖτις

lol maybe where you're from x-post

exactly. you can't win. it's useless

to my mind there was a very deep strain of puritanism vs. sexual hedonism that ran all through the 80s - AIDS crisis, Ed Meese's anti-porn crusade, John Holmes and the Wonderland murders, the Dorothy Stratten murder, the PMRC, the teen-sex comedy genre, I could go on and on

xp

and Prince (and Madonna!) were right in the middle of that stuff, sometimes literally

was grunge the first pop phenomenon that was sex-negative

probably. it was unusual on a lot of levels.

if prince and madonna were the sexual hedonism half, who was the puritanism half? or are they puritan in some way i'm missing