1982 was another seminal year on my chart, as it began to be influenced by my changing tastes, my growing interest in many genres…and MTV, which had hit the cable airwaves on August 1 1981, and which would become a HUGE part of my life beginning with our move from Newark to Lancaster Ohio in the summertime, where I would spend the next eleven years of my life, the longest time I had lived in any one town my entire life up to this point. Lancaster was a pretty good place to live – it had in the 1950s been selected as the perfect all-american town. And yes things were changing in the city in the 1980s. But it was pretty easy to get around…back then (not so much now, which I went into last year on my tribute to my late mom over on eCinemaOne). And it was fairly close to bigger cities – Columbus was just an hour away up Route 33 to the northwest, and there were great stores and things to do in Lancaster as well. I had my first REAL job here, working for a local record store chain, and then at a few other jobs too. And my record collection would grow by leaps and bounds over the years thanks to all the stores that had cut-out bins…I’ve talked about this over on PlanetBibliomusica. Musically, my chart remained mixed, with all different styles and flavors, and as always, a lot of songs that weren’t huge nationally were big on my chart. There were more medleys, a number of novelty songs, like “Valley Girl” by Frank and Moon Zappa and “Pac-Man Fever” by Buckner and Garcia, that were huge hits, and of course, the Kids From ‘Fame“, who over the next two years would rack up a string of hits on my chart, like they did around the world…everywhere EXCEPT the States…sigh. The Keane Brothers, now known as simply “Keane” in Japan, where they were hugely successful (but known as “The Keane Brothers Band” here), returned to the chart for one final hurrah – their Japanese hit “Tryin’ To Kill A Saturday Night” featured in the (awful) US movie “Zapped!” hit number one in the fall. Music from the critically reviled musical “The Pirate Movie” brought Kristy McNichol back to the chart several times this year as well, and there were several hits from or inspired by the years’ biggest film “E.T. The Extraterrestial” too. Disco was officially dead, replaced by “dance music” (oh, HONESTLY!), but less and less of it was appearing on my chart. Songs still moved up and down the chart at what would be considered a breakneck pace these days, and MTV’s influence would continue for the next several years…and things looked great musically…until February of the following year, when I (and the rest of the world) would suffer through the hardest and most personally devastating musical loss of my lifetime…
JANUARY 2 1982
JANUARY 9 1982
JANUARY 16 1982
JANUARY 23 1982
JANUARY 30 1982
FEBRUARY 6 1982
FEBRUARY 13 1982
FEBRUARY 20 1982
FEBRUARY 27 1982
MARCH 6 1982
MARCH 13 1982
MARCH 20 1982
MARCH 27 1982
APRIL 3 1982
APRIL 10 1982
APRIL 17 1982
APRIL 24 1982
MAY 1 1982
MAY 8 1982
MAY 15 1982
MAY 22 1982
MAY 29 1982
JUNE 5 1982
JUNE 12 1982
JUNE 19 1982
JUNE 26 1982
JULY 3 1982
JULY 10 1982
JULY 17 1982
JULY 24 1982
JULU 31 1982
AUGUST 7 1982
AUGUST 14 1982
AUGUST 21 1982
AUGUST 28 1982
SEPTEMBER 4 1982
SEPTEMBER 11 1982
SEPTEMBER 18 1982
SEPTEMBER 25 1982
OCTOBER 2 1982
OCTOBER 9 1982
OCTOBER 16 1982
OCTOBER 23 1982
OCTOBER 30 1982
NOVEMBER 6 1982
NOVEMBER 13 1982
NOVEMBER 20 1982
NOVEMBER 27 1982
DECEMBER 4 1982
DECEMBER 11 1982
DECEMBER 18 1982
DECEMBER 25 1982
If you find a broken link (and it might happen) please report it to “webmaster (at) pnrnetworks.com”!