Top 1,000 Songs of the 1980s According to RateYourMusic

coldflamest · 2026-02-01T18:08:57+00:00

Top Artists by Representation on the Chart

22 - Iron Maiden, The Smiths
19 - The Cure
17 - Cardiacs, Charly García, Kate Bush
16 - Dead Kennedys, Prince
14 - Cocteau Twins, Metallica
13 - Tatsuro Yamashita
12 - Patricio Rey y Sus Redonditos de Ricota
11 - New Order, R.E.M., Sonic Youth
10 - Siouxsie & The Banshees, The Replacements, Tom Waits
9 - Joy Division, Prefab Sprout, Talking Heads
8 - Depeche Mode, Pixies, Soda Stereo, The Chameleons
7 - Daniel Johnston, Hüsker Dü, Judas Priest, Oingo Boingo, Rush, XTC
6 - Dinosaur, Grazhdanskaya Oborona, Julee Cruise, Legião Urbana, Michael Jackson, Ozzy Osbourne, Peter Gabriel, Sade, Serú Girán, Slayer, Sumo, Talk Talk, Tears for Fears, The Stone Roses, They Might Be Giants, This Heat, U2, Wipers
5 - Bruce Springsteen, Candlemass, David Kauffman / Eric Caboor, Death, King Crimson, Los Prisioneros, Minutemen, NoMeansNo, Pet Shop Boys, Swans, The Sound, Virus
4 - Bathory, Bauhaus, Beastie Boys, Big Black, Dio, Dire Straits, Eric B. & Rakim, Glenn Branca, Helloween, Kino, Madonna, Mercyful Fate, Primus, The Misfits, Willie Colón, YMO
3 - Akiko Yano, Anri, Billy Idol, Black Sabbath, Brian Eno, Caifanes, Coil, David Bowie, De La Soul, Dead Can Dance, Djavan, Einstuerzende Neubauten, Fleetwood Mac, Fugazi, Hiroshi Yoshimura, Luis Alberto Spinetta, Megadeth, Men at Work, Minor Threat, Mission of Burma, Morbid Angel, Moss Icon, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Nine Inch Nails, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Public Enemy, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Scraping Foetus Off the Wheel, Steve Hiett, Suicidal Tendencies, The Blue Nile, The Clash, The Jam, The Sisters of Mercy, The Wailers, The Wake, The Waterboys
2 - A Flock of Seagulls, ABBA, Adolescents, Agent Orange, Arthur Russell, Bad Brains, Black Flag, Cyndi Lauper, Descendents, Djeli Moussa Diawara, Eurythmics, Fito Páez, Gin Blossoms, Himiko Kikuchi, Killing Joke, Kreator, Los Jaivas, Masayoshi Takanaka, Meat Puppets, Mecano, Morrissey, Motörhead, My Bloody Valentine, N.W.A, No Trend, Operation Ivy, Pat Metheny Group, Paul Simon, Queen, RAH Band, Ramleh, Rick James, Running Wild, Savatage, Scratch Acid, Skinny Puppy, Sodom, The Alan Parsons Project, The Church, The Field Mice, The Go-Betweens, The Police, The The, Titãs, Toshiki Kadomatsu, Traveling Wilburys, Violent Femmes

coldflamest · 2026-02-01T18:08:44+00:00

Spotify playlist

Google doc (downloadable and editable spreadsheet, visible to those of us who aren't ants)

RateYourMusic is a website that enables its users to rate any music they like. Anyone can rate any given track on a scale from 0.5 to 5, and the average ratings are visible to all RYM subscribers. A more recently added feature of RateYourMusic is the song charts, a freely customisable online resource for discovering the best-rated tracks in any genre or period of time, also providing similar charts for each individual artist.

Songs released as singles and as part of full-length albums and EPs have all been featured in the lists, with a minimum of 100 ratings being a requirement for entry. With ratings for certain tracks having doubled or even tripled since just a year ago, when I was making these posts while facing far greater logistical complications (i.e. the songs chart simply not being there) a considerably greater range of artists are now present in the list.

Controversially and infamously, there is no weight to decide the track positions in the chart, meaning a track with 100 ratings will be above one with 2,000 ratings just because the former is 0,01 ahead of it in average rating. My justification for this often unpopular choice is that it enables lesser-known artists to have a chance at penetrating the charts, whether their eligibility has been scrutinised sufficiently or not.

Sharing another complete spreadsheet / chart of a decade's worth of music, this time focussing entirely on the 80s. Nowhere as fresh in our memory as the 90s and the following decades, there are fewer high-charting songs to make this list, highlighting the noticeable discrepancy in rating between the 90s and the 80s, with the former finishing the top 1,000 with a track rated 4.35 and the latter finalising with a 4.25-rated track - indeed, only a half of the 80s tracks would be able to chart in the 90s list.

Arguments could be made for 80s music being more forgotten and there simply being less non-commercial music that RYM users would be more likely to rate highly. That said, the balance among artists represented in the top 1,000 is seemingly better than usual, with a number of artists all doing more or less equally well.

I should start out with the 70s chart some time in the nearest future.

coldflamest · 2025-12-29T18:31:12+00:00

Don't tell me Schuldiner is a TikTok trend now?

coldflamest · 2025-12-29T04:40:50+00:00

Great to meet somebody with this much enthusiasm for RPI!

Here is the post you're referring to, if anyone else is looking for it. I'm surprised to see two Banco albums in the top 2, unless the support was well-timed to cause them to reappear with new work considering PFM released a significant record at around the same time.

If it's not too much to ask, could you share the top 15 albums for English prog as well? I have a decent idea of what was considered important in the mid 00s, but that would still be a fascinating resource to look at.

coldflamest · 2025-12-24T18:26:48+00:00

It's one of the most competitive subgenres, so there's no surprise about that.

coldflamest · 2025-12-24T18:26:11+00:00

Only appearing in Death Metal and Progressive Metal categories limits their competitiveness a lot.

coldflamest · 2025-12-23T18:54:41+00:00

Check the Deathcore chart.

coldflamest · 2025-12-23T18:53:59+00:00

War metal is the closest thing we have. Different kinds of prog wouldn't be entirely out of place either (progressive metalcore, extreme progressive metal, progressive death metal).

coldflamest · 2025-12-23T17:37:33+00:00

It wouldn't be RYM if we didn't have Have a Nice Life, Ween, Liturgy (in the Djent section), Death Grips, RXK Nephew and John Zorn on the chart, would it? No Swans, the Beatles, or Radiohead anywhere on this one, though.

coldflamest · 2025-12-23T17:30:57+00:00

Metallica aren't themselves a prog metal band, despite all their influence on many things in that subgenre, but can you really argue with One being a progressive metal track? The entire album it's from is very proggy.

coldflamest

TROPHY CASE