#211 Nominations for the Best Album of 1989 are Now Open!
Hey folks!
It’s time! Nominations are now open for the upcoming Best Album of 1989 tournament! Go here and fill out a form.
You should read the directions provided, but here’s a quick rundown:
To use the form, you’ll have to sign in to Google, like with the voting. If you won’t/can’t, let me know at kentmbeeson@hey.com and like the Beatles we’ll work it out.
Until the nomination period ends, you can go back and edit it at any time. So feel free to load up your faves now, listen to some new stuff (like what we got below) and then update it if you find something that really floats your boat.
Try to hit return after entering each album into the form — it makes for a nice clean list to export later. Thanks!
Are you concerned about what qualifies? Don’t be. Just nominate it. Nominate anything, I don’t care. Nominate Taylor Swift’s 1989 if you want. If it doesn’t end up making the cut on nomination votes, it didn’t matter anyway. It’ll all come out in the wash.
Nomination period is two weeks — April 7 2025 to April 21 2025.
Now, just because the nomination period has begun, doesn’t mean you (and I) can’t keep listening to 1989 albums for stuff to nominate. Towards that, here are more lists for you to check out. First, here’s the final part of The One True Poster’s survey of 1989 metal/hard rock/prog/associated genres, titled On the Track of Unknown Metal Part V: The Prehistory of Limp Bizkit. Terrific reading, and, if you (like me) have been waiting for OTP to tackle the various flavors of industrial, here it is. It also includes a Spotify highlights playlist. (Go here to see Parts I-IV.)
![A picture of hair metal pioneer Blackie Lawless of W.A.S.P. He has long black hair with streaks of grey. He’s shirtless, and wearing black leather pants and some kind of codpiece. He points to the codpiece and appears to be screaming, wide-eyed. He wears spiked armbands. The One True Poster comments, "[has intrusive thoughts of cereal box labeled Oops! All Hair Metal on which Black Lawless is popping out of the bowl]"](https://assets.buttondown.email/images/e8b1fe3b-1f01-4a1b-8f55-ca40e1aaf58c.jpg?w=960&fit=max)
If the hard stuff isn’t to your liking, then Brian Darr (@hellonfriscobay.bksy.social) has got the soft stuff for you, the best technopop of 1989, reprinted here with permission. There’s 11 albums here, and I’m gonna make an effort to hear everything here that I hadn’t already. I hope you do the same!
Beyond Technique: the best technopop of 1989 by @hellonfriscobay.bsky.social
At the dawn of the 1980s synthesizers and samplers were cutting-edge, but by the end of the decade they were ubiquitous, having conquered or at least infiltrated the playlists of almost every radio station, and become common in film scores, advertising, and made available to the general public through increasingly inexpensive consumer products. Many rock acts were brewing a backlash against what many saw as the “soullessness” of electronic music, but most critics agreed there were still innovative things being done in the realms of hip-hop, industrial & certain subgenres of dance music.
But what of the less critically-accepted “technopop” a.k.a. “synth-pop” acts that carried the flags of the early new wave pioneers like Depeche Mode and the Human League (both of whom would release albums in 1990)? The only one I’ve seen much discussion of in the lead-up to our 1989 nomination period has been New Order, whose fifth album Technique dropped in January 1989 and was instantly acclaimed as among their best. It’s sure to be part of the bracket, but will anything else? I propose five albums that make a claim to being as worthy, and a few runners-up worth consideration as well:
Xymox, Twist of Shadows. Approved of by synth-pop fans and goths alike, the third album from the band formerly known as Clan of Xymox was their first form Polygram after departing 4AD Records. Several songs charted, including “Obsession”, “Blind Hearts” and the Anka Wolbert-fronted “Imagination”. With Ronny Moorings’ brooding baritone dominant on most tracks, I imagine this album fitting most snugly in the Best Album bracket crowd’s wheelhouse of all the selections here.
Bel Canto, Birds of Passage is probably my personal favorite of all of these; it’s the second LP by a trio from the Northern Norwegian city Tromsø, that became a duo after the album failed to connect and its lead programmer Geir Jenssen split off to record under the name Biosphere. I’ve never heard their music “in the wild” but I came across the chilly title track on a promo videocassette compilation and was sucked in instantly- turns out the rest of this world-music-inflected album is just as hypnotic and compelling, with vocalist Anneli Drecker staking out territory not far from (and I know this is high praise) Liz Fraser.
Hubert Kah, Sound of My Heart. 1989 was a big year for the country that arguably invented techno (-pop or otherwise) but more due to geopolitics, not because of any new Kraftwerk release. The fifth album from the band named after its high-voiced frontman Hubert Kemmler is arguably their strongest, with lyrics that rise to Germany’s moment, and a sound lushly produced by MC Curly a year before he debuted his project Enigma, to which this high-bpm selection of tunes bears little resemblance.
Thompson Twins, Big Trash. It isn’t as well-known as the mid-eighties chart-toppers made with Joe Leeway as a full-fledged member, but the seventh (and penultimate) album from everyone’s favorite Tintin-inspired band is a heap of overproduced fun, with a huge Warner Brothers budget behind it, providing excuses for a charmingly phoned-in guest slot from Debbie Harry on “Queen of the U.S.A.” and two tracks produced by Steve Lillywhite; the rest were co-produced by remaining band members Tom Bailey and Alannah Currie. If the album’s apt title intrigues, you might just love this.
Liza Minnelli, Results. Like they would the following year with Dusty Springfield’s Reputation, the Pet Shop Boys brushed up an “old-fashioned” diva’s sound by producing an epic synths-and-strings concoction that provides the ideal scaffolding for her timeless voice. (Orchestral duties taken by Anne Dudley of the Art of Noise, who also released an interesting 1989 album.) Maybe the fact that a member of Hollywood royalty could release one of the best technopop albums of the year was a sign the once-punk-affiliated genre’s days were numbered, but good music is good music.
A few more to consider if you listen to those five and want more:
Camouflage, Methods of Silence is probably the second-best German entry in the genre from the year. Very meat-and-potatoes synth-pop but for fans that’s perfect.
Grace Jones, Bulletproof Heart is only on YouTube and apparently not one of her own favorite albums, but it’s not bad at all.
Howard Jones, Cross That Line’s opening track “The Prisoner” is one of the best singles of the year and the sunny “Everlasting Love” isn’t far behind. The rest of the album has its moments.
Shakespear’s Sister, Sacred Heart was the brainchild of ex-Bananarama co-founder Siobhan Fahey. More overt gospel & roots-rock influence on this album than the rest of this list, but the lead single “Break My Heart” isn’t its only slice of pure technopop.
Underworld, Change the Weather is the last Underworld album before emerging after a five-year hiatus with their EDM masterpiece dubnobasswithmyheadman and actually a pretty good synth-pop album.
Sharpe & Numan, Automatic is not available in its entirety anywhere I can find on the open web at this time, but the tracks I’ve heard are up to Gary Numan’s usual standards.