# Why are 80s music videos so bad?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-80s-music-videos-so-bad/740928>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [December 20, 2015, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-80s-music-videos-so-bad/740928 "2015-12-20T16:27:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![salinqmind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)\
**Post date:** [December 22, 2015, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-80s-music-videos-so-bad/740928/41 "2015-12-22T22:40:46Z")

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> [@monstro](#):
>
> Dancing was what made 1980s videos awesome. Who can ever forget Pat Benetar’s “Love is Battlefield”, Stevie Knick’s “Stand Back”, or The Pointer Sister’s “She Works Hard for Her Money”.

Pat Benetar said about “Love is a Battlefield” she could not dance at all, and “they stood me up and moved my legs around by hand so it LOOKED like I was dancing”. 😃 I want to take a look at that video for these edgy early special effects!

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**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\
**Post date:** [December 22, 2015, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-80s-music-videos-so-bad/740928/42 "2015-12-22T23:18:09Z")

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> [@salinqmind](#):
>
> Pat Benetar said about “Love is a Battlefield” she could not dance at all, and “they stood me up and moved my legs around by hand so it LOOKED like I was dancing”. 😃 I want to take a look at that video for these edgy early special effects!

I think she did good with what her mama gave her. My favorite part is at [4:25](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGVZOLV9SPo) when she’s all badass with the bosom-shaking.

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**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\
**Post date:** [December 23, 2015, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-80s-music-videos-so-bad/740928/43 "2015-12-23T06:40:31Z")

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I had always read that the '80s was when record labels were willing to spend big bucks on videos, and then they later decided (even when they were still going strong with album sales in the '90s) that they didn’t need to mount expensive productions to promote musicians, and just throwing together something fairly barebones was fine.

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