Welcome to our first Very Selective Retrospective. We'll be doing these every so often, but this first one is all about the entertainment released in 1988.
There's an absolutely overwhelming amount of iconic music that was released throughout the year, ranging from glam metal and mainstream pop to fast emerging alternative rock and hip hop acts.
We're really just barely scraping the surface, but here's a relatively short list - some songs you're sure to remember, some you might still be trying to forget, and some are still begging for another listen 36 years later...
Poison - Nothin' But A Good Time
INXS - New Sensation
Tracy Chapman - Fast Car
Taylor Dayne - Tell It To My Heart
White Lion - Wait
U2 - Desire
Sonic Youth - Teen Age Riot
Boogie Down Productions - My Philosophy
The Beach Boys - Kokomo
Dead Milkmen - Punk Rock Girl
Bon Jovi - Bad Medicine
The Cure - Pictures Of You
N.W.A. - Straight Outta Compton
Patrick Swayze - She's Like The Wind
R.E.M. - Orange Crush
Def Leppard - Pour Some Sugar On Me
LL Cool J - Going Back To Cali
Edie Brickell & The New Bohemians - What I Am
Terence Trent D'Arby - Wishing Well
George Michael - Faith
Pixies - Gigantic
George Harrison - Got My Mind Set On You
Public Enemy - Don't Believe The Hype
Rick Astley - Never Gonna Give You Up
Jane's Addiction - Mountain Song
Guns n Roses - Sweet Child o' Mine
And that's just the music. Here's some of the standout movies that were released in 1988...
Beetlejuice
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Big
Coming To America
Die Hard
Willow
Scrooged
Young Guns
The Land Before Time
Crocodile Dundee 2
Child's Play
Rain Man
Three Men and a Baby
License To Drive
The Serpent And The Rainbow
Stand and Deliver
They Live
Bloodsport
A Nightmare On Elm Street 4
Mac and Me
I'm Gonna Git You Sucka
A Fish Called Wanda
Cocktail
It was a really big year for NES, too...
Your video game collection was kinda weak if you didn't have at least 3-5 of these games released in 1988 (in North America, anyway.)
Super Mario Bros 2
Contra
Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link
Mega Man
Double Dragon
Rampage
Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest
Blaster Master
Life Force
Blades of Steel
Adventure Island
Bubble Bobble
It also happened to be the first year for Nintendo Power Magazine!
But wait...there's more!
There's so much from this year that we haven't even touched on...from the California Raisins' prime time tv special, Meet The Raisins, to the launch of Nike's 'Just do it' slogan. We saw the debut of Roseanne, The Wonder Years, China Beach, Murphy Brown, Kids In The Hall, and Just The Ten Of Us, but television didn't stop there. We also got some classic tv moments from Geraldo, in the form of a disturbing interview with Charles Manson, and an all out, nose-breaking brawl from his decision to host a racist group.
1988 gave us Microsoft Office, the Energizer bunny, Lunchables, Yo! MTV Raps, Shark Week, Vernon Reid's absolutely bonkers guitar solo on Living Colour's "Cult Of Personality," and supergroup, The Traveling Wilburys...just to name a few cultural staples.
We could go on and on, but we did call this a Very Selective Retrospective.