3 Songs From the 80s That Will Make You Feel Like You’re in a John Hughes Movie

Everyone’s living in their own coming-of-age film if you think about it. Here are some 80s songs that will help you create the soundtrack to your own.

Videos by American Songwriter

“Waiting For A Star To Fall” by Boy Meets Girl

If you’re wanting a song that sounds like teen yearning and whimsy rolled all into one, look no further than “Waiting For A Star To Fall” by Boy Meets Girl. The married songwriting couple, who penned hits like “How Will I Know” by Whitney Houston, touched on the inspiration behind the track a few years back.

“We were a married couple, but I had a past like anybody does,” songwriter Shannon Rubicam shared with The Guardian. “I wrote the song about an unattainable person – that moment everyone has in their teens or early 20s where they have a longing for someone they can’t reach.”

“Invisible Touch” by Genesis

In 1986, Genesis got their first and only No. 1 hit with “Invisible Touch”. The song sings of falling for someone and being entranced in a teenage-crush sort of way.

Well I’ve been waiting, waiting here so long
But thinking nothing, nothing could go wrong, ooh now I know
She has a built in ability
To take everything she sees
And now it seems I’m falling, falling for her.

“The best songs tend to get written quickly,” Mike Rutherford said in 2016.“That’s how it was with ‘Invisible Touch’. We’d rock up, have a cup of tea, [and] see what happened. On day one, we had no songs, no ideas, and a blank bit of paper. Phil was always keen to fill that bit of paper. He was very organized, and we let him. It’s a wonderful song: upbeat, fun to play, always a strong moment in any gig.”

“Heaven Is A Place On Earth” by Belinda Carlisle

This 80s classic has the same sort of epicness as “Don’t You Forget About Me” exudes. Written by Ellen Shipley and Rick Nowels, “Heaven Is A Place On Earth” asks what it actually means to have heaven on earth.

“I was in a gas station in Brooklyn where I was living at the time when that song was written.” Shipley explained to SongFacts, “I was going back and forth to work with my Los Angeles partner, Rick Nowels, but this was the first thing we actually did together. I was standing in a gas station and I was in line and suddenly I just felt like I had to turn around to the greeting cards. And one of the cards, the first one I saw, said, ‘Heaven On Earth’.”

From there, with the help of Nowels, the songwriter came up with the title idea.

Photo by: Christie Goodwin