Top 50 New Wave Songs

New wave music was around before the early '80s when the genre first started an advancement onto the U.S. charts. Often seen as punk's poppier younger siblings, new wave artists often shared radio airplay and record-store shelves with the more aggressive music.

As you will see in the below list of the Top 50 New Wave Songs, chosen by the UCR staff, many of these tracks would fit comfortably within other playlists from the era, not just punk, but also pop, rock and electronic. Think synth-pop, post-punk and art-rock convening for a dance party for the ages.

The '80s, not so surprisingly, are well-represented in the list. Many of the best new wave songs come from the early part of the decade when several new forces - including the introduction of MTV that led to an ensuing gate crashing at radio - assembled to give exposure to some of the decade's most enduring tracks. All these years later they're still influencing countless genres.

Two years after singer Ian Curtis's death, New Order was still searching for a post- Joy Division identity, but with their fourth single, they finally broke from his shadow. "Temptation" signaled a turn from post-punk synth-pop toward structured new wave, the electronics merging with melody for the first defined time. Their next single, 10 months later, "Blue Monday," heralded one of the decade's most original voices.

When the Police released their final album in 1983, the trio was barely on speaking terms. But the creative tension resulted in their best work, a record that tightened their knotty, twisty interplay with songs that turned down darker alleys. "Every Breath You Take," Synchronicity 's highlight, is told from the point of view of a very disturbed man, refusing to let go even when presented with the facts. Astonishingly, a worldwide No. 1.

"Isolation"'s place on Joy Division's second and last album balances the heaviness that hangs over so much of Closer following singer Ian Curtis' death just two months earlier. Almost minimalist in its approach, the electronic drums and sweeping synth-rock of "Isolation" temporarily lift the album's post-punk cloud. In many ways, the song prefigures the less shadowy new wave the band would soon undertake as New Order.

Scottish quartet Big Country went big on their 1983 debut, The Crossing, applying widescreen scope to the album's 10 songs. For the opening track and lead single (and sort of namesake track), "In a Big Country," guitarists Stuart Adamson and Bruce Watson fed their instruments through effect pedals, giving them a sound that recalled triumphant bagpipes. The result was a Top 20 single worldwide.

The years leading to the Pretenders ' third album found the band facing a series of new challenges, including the deaths of two founding members. Meanwhile, leader Chrissie Hynde had a daughter as she entered her 30s. All of this comes crashing and colliding in "Middle of the Road," a state-of-the-artist report from the front lines two months before the release of the equally reflective Learning to Crawl . A fierce, personal anthem.

The Knack 's arrival to new wave was by accident. The Los Angeles quartet modeled itself after the Beatles - from dress to album cover art - and played a mix of garage-inspired power pop that had more in common with the era's '60s-derived pop-rock than the skinny-tie brigade. But the jerky rhythms and frontman Doug Fieger's clipped vocal performance in "My Sharona" - a No. 1 hit - edged the song into new wave.

The most straightforward cut on the final album by the Clash 's classic lineup, "Should I Stay or Should I Go" skirts the political themes of Combat Rock 's other songs, including fellow singles "Rock the Casbah" and "Straight to Hell." But its passionate delivery - Mick Jones takes the lead - and power-chord riffing have made it a favorite. Jones was gone when a revamped Clash returned with Cut the Crap three years later.

Devo was as unconventional and media-baiting as they came in the late '70s and early '80s, subscribing to an evolution-in-reverse belief system and making music that reflected their views. But they somehow still had a Top 15 hit in 1980 with "Whip It," a winking slice of metronomic new wave that played up their quirkiness and yet couldn't quite prepare new listeners for what they had in store. Its video was an early MTV hit.

Blondie was entering the height of its popularity when Debbie Harry and the group were recruited to perform the theme song for the 1980 movie American Gigolo. Working with Italian disco maven Giorgio Moroder, who wrote the music, Blondie played up their dance-club credentials. "Call Me" shot to No. 1 and stayed there for six consecutive weeks. Interestingly, Stevie Nicks was asked before Blondie but turned it down.

Sting penned "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" before the Police formed, but their familiar elements are already there. Spliced with the group's mix of reggae and new wave, the song became their highest-charting in the U.S. at the time, sending its parent album, Ghost in the Machine , the Police's fourth, to a then-high No. 2. Two years later the band topped itself commercially and creatively as it skidded toward an end.

Stimulated by a stay in New York City, Joe Jcakson 's sophisti-pop album Night and Day recalled Cole Porter and other Great American Songbook writers more than it did the British punk and new wave artists Jackson came up with. "Steppin' Out" embodies this spirit more than any other song on his fifth LP, with piano and drums (live and electronic) as its most prominent instruments. It's Jackson's only U.S. Top 10 single.

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With a hit No. 1 single that fused new wave, disco and pop, Blondie returned to similar territory for the follow-up LP in the wake of "Heart of Glass"' success. Eat to the Beat 's most obvious disciple, "Atomic," also throws in some new influences, particularly a spaghetti western guitar that runs throughout the song. Debbie Harry has admitted the lyrics were stitched together and have little meaning. No matter, this is pristine pop.

"I wanna bite the hand that feeds me," Elvis Costello declared in 1978, a year after making the Top 20 in the U.K. with a run of singles and a debut album. "Radio, Radio" - a stand-alone single at home, added to the second LP in the States - stalled outside of the Top 30, presumably due to its lack of BBC support. In the U.S., a surprise Saturday Night Live song switch facilitated Costello's 11-year ban from the show .

Peter Gabriel was still musically evolving when his fifth solo LP, So , made him one of the planet's biggest stars in 1986. Since his departure from Genesis in the mid-'70s, Gabriel shifted from progressive rock to world beat to new wave to pop by the middle part of the '80s. "Sledgehammer" finds him in less-serious tones, as he brags about his, um, manhood over super-elastic synths. A groundbreaking video helped.

Australians INXS had been on the verge of a big break since the early part of the '80s. 1985's Listen Like Thieves was a door opener, but Kick, which arrived two years later, was the record that elevated their status to the A-list. "Need You Tonight" helped get them there, thanks to a trance-dance groove and hypnotic vocal by Michael Hutchence . Gliding on a basic funk riff, the song wasted little time climbing to No. 1.

Aimee Mann would go on to an acclaimed career as a singer-songwriter of personal and sophisticated work in the '90s; a decade earlier she was leading the Boston-based new wave band 'Til Tuesday, whose only Top 10 song came with their debut single. "Voices Carry" hints at what is to come, though, as Mann scolds a partner in chilling terms. The song's brittle synths complement her cold-as-ice tone.

A sloganeering chorus - "This ain't no party, this ain't no disco, this ain't no following around" - and a mainstream-swinging performance marks one of Talking Heads ' earliest attempts at branching out from the New York City art scene they originated from. David Byrne said he wrote "Life During Wartime" as an apocalyptic vision partly inspired by his Manhattan neighborhood. A warning sign of their new wave-funk hybrid a year later.

When the Cure 's sixth album, The Head on the Door, was released in 1985, they were coming off one of their darkest and most despairing periods. Still tethered to the sulky art-pop of its predecessors, the record nonetheless shuffled enough styles that songs such as the relatively buoyantly poppy "In Between Days" had a spot. Jaunty guitars and an exuberantly charged melody make it one of the band's all-time best.

Like many outside artists of the era, the B-52's didn't sound like anyone else and inspired others to follow their lead. Five friends from Athens, Georgia, with limited musical background and experience, the band quickly found a following with college audiences and New York's punk scene for both its look and music. "Rock Lobster" is the one that started it, an infectious dance song caught between the garage and new wave.

In his 2015 autobiography, Elvis Costello claimed he wrote "Alison" for a woman working the checkout lane at a supermarket. It remains one of his most gorgeous ballads and a gem among the gritty backdrop of his debut LP . The Attractions weren't formed yet, so the backing duties here fall to the American group Clover, which would become Huey Lewis and the News . Their elegant performance matches Costello's.

As the first video aired on MTV in August 1981, the Buggles' "Video Killed the Radio Star" became the face of new wave music moving into the decade. Released in 1979, the song grazed the U.S. Top 40 but was No. 1 across Europe. By the time the cable network arrived, Buggles members Trevor Horn and Geoff Downes had been recruited to fill vacant spots in prog-rock giants Yes ' lineup; Downes then moved on to Asia .

David Byrne's twitchy, nervy persona was introduced in "Psycho Killer," originally found on Talking Heads' 1977 debut album but written and played onstage years earlier. Timeliness with New York City's Son of Sam killings, which ended just months before the release of Talking Heads: 77 , helped stir talk and controversy, but the song has endured decades later as a high-water mark of the city's mid-'70s punk scene.

A U.K. No. 1 and the Pretenders' breakthrough single in the States, "Brass in Pocket" was the band's attempt at a Motown-like song that Chrissie Hynde said they didn't get quite right. But its mix of '60s pop, '70s rock and spiky new wave anticipated the '80s musical stew propagated by MTV, where the song's playful video was one of the earliest aired on the network. It still sounds like the doorway to a bold new era.

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The Clash didn't intend for their breakthrough U.S. hit to be included on their third album. Tacked on to London Calling at the last minute (it doesn't even appear in the record's track listing), "Train in Vain (Stand by Me)" became an unexpected Top 25 hit, introducing the group to mainstream audiences. Backed by a chugging, soulful new-wave rhythm, the Mick Jones-sung track turned the punk band into temporary pop stars.

Billy Idol debuted in the U.K. punk scene as a member of Generation X, but it wasn't until his solo career turned toward new wave that more people started paying attention. A debut EP featured the remixed band cut "Dancing With Myself" and a cover of Tommy James and the Shondells' "Mony Mony," but his new image was developed on a self-titled 1982 album, which included the guitar-powered, goth-inspired "White Wedding."

Both forward-thinking (a message to gay people to be themselves) and looking back (produced by Todd Rundgren and with backing vocals by the Turtles ' Flo & Eddie), "Love My Way" became the Psychedelic Furs' biggest hit in the U.K. at the time and their first charting single in the U.S. Loads of MTV support certainly helped. Placement in later movies The Wedding Singer and Call Me by Your Name has kept a high profile.

David Bowie wasn't exactly in commercial decline when he teamed up with Chic mastermind Nile Rodgers in 1983 for his 15th album. But the predecessor to Let's Dance , Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) , was three years old (an eternity in the early '80s) and often too thorny for radio play. But with Let's Dance's title track, Bowie upped the charm, mashing pop, disco, funk and new wave into a soulful brew.

Like many of the Police's songs, the one that introduced the band to most of the world carries a dark message. Told from the point of view of a man who falls for a prostitute, "Roxanne" gets more despairing as it progresses, heightened by a Sting vocal that is somewhere between desperate and troubling. It took some time for "Roxanne" to burrow itself into the public consciousness, finally becoming a hit a year after release.

New wave had a habit of sprouting new bands that would soon fade back into obscurity after a popular song ran its course. While England's Modern English never replicated the success of "I Melt With You" - their sixth single and not even their highest charting single at home - they've continued to release records, even rerecording "I Melt With You" in 1990. But most people would be hard-pressed to name another one.

A sidetrack from the world music and expanded lineup of Talking Heads' 1980 album Remain in Light , Tom Tom Club spotlighted the band's married rhythm section - bassist Tina Weymouth and drummer Chris Frantz - along with guitarist Adrian Belew and Jamaican studio pros. Inspired by Zapp's classic funk track "More Bounce to the Ounce," future hip-hop fave "Genius of Love" glides along slippery new wave synths.

The title track from Talk Talk's second album has boasted subsequent lives since its release in 1984, first a year later when it was rereleased to little notice in the band's native U.K. and then in 1990 after it was pulled as a single from a group compilation album and then became their biggest hit. A 2003 cover by No Doubt gave the song more exposure, but the original's soaring chorus remains the absolute version.

Few bands from the British post-punk scene of the late '70s evolved at the pace and scope of XTC . By the time they arrived at their fifth album in 1982, the double LP English Settlement, their new wave-spiked pop had adapted more pastoral shades with acoustic instruments and intricate production. "Senses Working Overtime" features one of the group's best hooks, played for maximum soft-hard effect in the chorus.

The Psychedelic Furs' self-titled 1980 debut did little to distinguish itself from the post-punk rattle coming out of the British underground at the time. But 1981's follow-up, Talk Talk Talk, brightened the corners and emphasized the muscle behind the group's stony wall of sound. "Pretty in Pink" is the standout, given more spotlight a few years later when its title was borrowed for a Brat Pack film where the Furs reworked their song.

When "Hungry Like the Wolf" was released as a single in June 1982, it went nowhere on the U.S. charts. Then MTV put its scenic promotional video into heavy rotation and everything changed; nine months later the song peaked at No. 3, and Duran Duran was suddenly one of the biggest groups in the world. They soon had bigger songs, in the States and at home in the U.K., but they've never been better than they are here.

A decade after Gloria Jones' "Tainted Love" was first released in 1964, the song was given a second life thanks to the Northern soul explosion in the U.K. Synth-pop duo Soft Cell were among the fans of the resurrected soul classic and gave the song an electronic-heavy new wave update in 1981, taking their redo to No. 1 in their homeland and Top 10 in the States. An extended version paired it with "Where Did Our Love Go."

Nick Lowe was a 10-year veteran of the British music scene when he reluctantly stepped into the role of a new-wave godfather. Production on records by Elvis Costello and Pretenders, plus a key spot in the Stiff Records roster, helped make him one of the era's most in-demand artists. His second solo album, Labour of Lust, is a new wave tentpole; hit single "Cruel to Be Kind" is its hook-centered classic.

Norwegian synth-pop trio A-ha probably wouldn't earn a footnote if its hit song "Take on Me" wasn't supported by a groundbreaking video in 1985. But that award-winning clip for the song gave the springy new wave pop hit an extra colorful palette to work with, springboarding the group to No. 1 worldwide. Follow-up singles struggled in the U.S., but A-ha's success in other areas continued well into the 2000s.

David Bowie had just released a challenging but rewarding trilogy of experimental electronic albums with Brian Eno when he entered the '80s with a streamlined version of the same aesthetic. Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) often played like a look back at Bowie's '70s, from direct references to songs to musical cues from the past. "Fashion," a dance-funk-new wave cross, is part "Golden Years," part Berlin Trilogy.

Nobody knew what to call the Cars when their debut album came out in 1978. Were they classic rock? Power pop? New wave? Yes to all, and that widespread checking off of genres helped make them one of the period's most popular acts. "Just What I Needed" pairs new-wave minimalism (in the verses) with a fidgeting synthesizer that sounds like a UFO coming in for a landing. A reliable template for the next few years.

Remain in Light was just the start of Talking Heads' departure from the barbed punk of earlier records; by 1983's Speaking in Tongues , the band had expanded to more than a dozen musicians, including P-Funk keyboardist Bernie Worrell. "Burning Down the House" is mostly the core quartet with additional synths and percussion, launched from a freewheeling jam session influenced by the Parliament-Funkadelic mothership.

Few images from new wave's most prominent years are as telling and representative as Mike Score's hair. The towering coiffure worn by A Flock of Seagulls' frontman supplied many listeners with a (mostly) superficial impression of the synth-heavy music growing in the mainstream, abetted by the underlying UFO theme of their hit "I Ran (So Far Away)." After a 1984 single, the band disappeared from the U.S. charts.

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The Glasgow-bred Simple Minds were barely a presence in the U.S., even with some MTV support, in the first half of the '80s. Then they were tapped to record a song for John Hughes' teen drama The Breakfast Club and everything changed. Despite their initial reservations - unlike the band's earlier work, "Don't You (Forget About Me)" was penned by outside songwriters - Simple Minds finally made it to No. 1 in America.

The mainstream's perception of new wave music in the late '70s can pretty much be summed up in the four minutes of Gary Numan 's "Cars," from the synth-generated hook that greets listeners from the onset to Numan's near-robotic vocals intoning about the cozy isolation and security of his ride. Numan purposely aimed for a commercial hit with "Cars" and succeeded: The song was No. 1 in the U.K. and a U.S. Top 10.

The English Beat (just the Beat at home in the U.K., thank you) had perfected a blend of ska and new wave on two albums before their third and last, Special Beat Service, came out in 1982 and added more pop to the mix. At first, bassist David Steele turned down "Save It for Later" as being too conventional; then the Dave Wakeling-penned, pre-Beat song became one of the group's biggest and best-known cuts.

Blondie never fit squarely into the punk rock scene they were often lumped in with during the mid-'70s. Combining girl-group pop, spiky new wave and, yes, a punk spirit, the group added disco to its arsenal for 1978's Parallel Lines , which included the No. 1 "Heart of Glass," a perfect storm of image and new genres in a pivotal year for popular music. The song - first tested in other forms - kicked off a run of hit singles for the band.

Almost better known for a groundbreaking video than as an anchor to Talking Heads' best LP, "Once in a Lifetime" boils down the group's melting pot of influences. A gurgling synth underlines the song as David Byrne rattles off existential crises until he reaches something close to a breaking point: "How did I get here?" It's a crucial moment in new wave's evolution: sound uniting with vision in a vivid display of persistent anxiety.

Generally considered the purest distillation of the Cure's many lives, Disintegration marked commercial and critical peaks. Robert Smith never hid his intentions with "Lovesong" - it's right there in the title. The old-fashioned love song was a hit with a new audience, especially in the U.S., where it became the Cure's highest-charting hit (it made it to No. 2). So tailored for the mainstream, even Adele had a hit with it.

The duo of Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal lodged themselves as the thinking man's new wave artists with their 1983 debut. But Tears for Fears ' 1985 follow-up Songs From the Big Chair - a concept album about psychotherapy and childhood trauma - is where they earned the title. The deceptively pop-minded "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" was a surprise No. 1, detailing man's downfall over a Beatles-worthy melody.

MTV's influence in the early '80s can't be downplayed. So many artists benefited from the fledgling music-video network's heavy airplay of their videos; new wave, more than any other genre, was supported the most. Duran Duran was barely making a blip Stateside before MTV started playing the travelogue-inspired clips from their second album, Rio. The tropically themed title track raised their profile significantly.

From the start, the Cure never fit into the designated slots they were supposed to fit into. The goth label that's followed them for decades is but a small section of the music they make; it's hard to find even a glimmer of that perceived gloom in early singles "Let's Go to Bed" and "The Lovecats." And the hopelessness of admitted downer LPs Faith and Pornography overlie the edges of psychedelia as much as they do shades of goth. The love songs Robert Smith has written for his wife over the years sparkle in their rapturous settings, few as exuberantly blissful as "Just Like Heaven," the centerpiece of their 1987 double album Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me. Smith once noted the song is about "kissing and fainting to the floor" - proof that this great band has defied popular opinion for years.