4 Glittery Pop Songs From 1985 You Probably Forgot You Loved

Here are some 1985 pop songs that need no explanation. They’re fun and danceable, and man, do they shine. These are the kind of tracks that make us fall in love with pop music all over again.

“Into The Groove” by Madonna

This, in my opinion, is one of Madonna‘s more underrated tracks. Madonna was inspired to write “Into The Groove” by an experience she had on the dance floor. She was attracted to a Puerto Rican man she found there. Even though she’d already released hits like “Material Girl” and “Like A Virgin”, “Into The Groove” would end up being Madonna’s first No. 1 hit in the UK.

“Cloudbusting” by Kate Bush

If you’re only slightly familiar with Kate Bush, it probably has a little something to do with the singer’s “Running Up That Hill (Make A Deal With God)” song. Her catalog, however, is full of underrated tracks. The inspiration for this song was Wilhelm Reich, an Austrian psychiatrist who invented the “cloudbuster.” The purpose of the device was to produce rain by manipulating “orgone energy.” In “Cloudbusting”, Bush sings from the perspective of Reich’s son, Peter Reich. He wrote the 1973 Book Of Dreams about his dad.

“How Will I Know” by Whitney Houston

In “How Will I Know”, Houston asks the question that keeps all of us up at night. If it’s true love, how do you determine that? This song was written by husband-and-wife duo George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam, who intended to write a song for Janet Jackson. Apparently, it wasn’t a good fit for Jackson at the time, so it went to Houston.

“Sussudio” by Phil Collins

Phil Collins released No Jacket Required in February of 1985, and with it came several memorable tracks like “One More Night”, “Don’t Lose My Number”, and of course, “Sussudio”. Collins came up with the name “Sussudio” while crafting the song, so it wasn’t necessarily inspired by anyone. He told VH1 Storytellers: “…I went back and tried to find another word that scanned as well as ‘sussudio,’ and I couldn’t find one, so I went back to ‘sussudio’…”

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