60's Nostalgia in the 80's

It seems that during the 1980's there was a lot of 60's nostalgia going on in the charts. Many of the biggest hits of the 1980's, were covers of many of the 60's biggest hits.

Phil Collins - You Can't Hurry Love (The Supremes)

Phil Collins - Groovy Kind Of Love (The Mind benders)

Kim Wilde - You Keep Me Hanging On (The Supremes)

Billy Idol - Mony Mony (Tommy James & The Shondell)

Tiffany - I Think We're Alone Now (Tommy James & The Shondell)

Any other examples?

 

Bangles - Hazy Shade of Winter

 

Sent the song back into the Top 10 in the UK and Ireland in '86.

 

A group called the Red Rockers had somewhat of a "hit" (at least in my area) with a cover of Barry McGuire's Eve of Destruction. There was a similar cover version "hit" of Spirit in the Sky that also got a lot of airplay, and I think I may have even saw this band performing live on MTV. For the life of me though I can't remember who they are/were. I'm not sure if these covers were chart hits per se but they were briefly more popular than the original versions for some time in the 1980s.

 

Roy Orbison's career revival in 1986-1987, thanks in part to David Lynch using some songs in Blue Velvet.

 

Drive my Car was covered by Breakfast Club.
Don’t look it up, it’s awful.

 

Naked Eyes' cover of Dionne Warwick's “Always Something There to Remind Me.”

 

The Paisley Underground ...........,

 

How about a 2 for 1?
Tainted Love by Gloria Jones and Where Did Our Love Go? by The Supremes covered in one song/medley by Soft Cell

 

The Dukes Of Stratosphere

 

UB40's cover of Neil Diamond’s “Red Red Wine.”

 

"Move Over Darling" - Tracey Ullman

 

I had a lot of that going on for me personally. From about '85 on I listened to Pink Floyd, The Beatles, CSN, Traffic, and Grateful Dead. Good times.

 

"Got My Mind Set On You" - George Harrison

 

Doctor + The Medics covered "Spirit In The Sky". Forgot all about that until now. There was also a cover of "Green Eyed Lady" (Ok, it's the early 70's, so sue me!) by a guy named David Drew that got a fair amount of airplay on MTV around the same time.

 

"There's A Ghost In My House" - The Fall

 

To me the 1980s had an acute hatred for the 60s. The Republicans were in control and boy did the old time Republicans hate the 60s. To me the 1990s was a resergence of 60s-70s music and style and more progressive thinking. I may be wrong but life in my neck of the woods seemed this way. John M.

 

Martha & The Vandellas' “Dancing in the Street” was covered by Van Halen and Bowie/Jagger.

 

"Work Is A Four Letter Word" - The Smiths

 

"Golden Lights" - The Smiths

 

UB40 really put their stamp on that one. Neil Diamond's original sounds pretty tame against the remake.

To the OP's point, the Nuggets CD releases in the mid-late 80s seemed to be riding the wave of 60s nostalgia. Great releases of course!

 

But what UB40 really covered was Tony Tribe's cover (from 1969):

 

Deep Purple - Hush (1988)