How The 80s Invented Today

You may have met him, worked with him or seen him on a Zoom, but I bet you didn’t know our Head of Culture, Justin Quirk, recently became a published author. “Nothin’ But A Good Time” is a cultural investigation into the spectacular rise and fall of glam metal in the 80s. We’ve had early access and have enjoyed connecting the dots between those hairspray days and what that culture can teach us now. Dust down your denim jacket, spandex trousers and read on…

The 80s brought with it the birth of MTV and introduced a new way for audiences to experience music. With the video format’s huge popularity, bands quickly realised their music videos during this period were just as – if not more – important as the music itself. Fast forward to today and social media has become the new way to express that style. Moving beyond eccentric music videos, the fast-paced expansion of technology and rise of social media has meant both bands and brands alike have had to keep up with the changing trends and popular formats to retain their audiences.

While Instagram has fuelled the desire for visuals on social media over the last decade, what started as an image-based platform now offers both short form and long form video content. And with TikTok emerging to be a huge contender in the visuals game, the ever evolving offerings and innovations of social media means in the never ending competition for a share of your audiences’ screen time, visuals continue to be incredibly important.

Glam metal carefully constructed an image of being an outsider – it shunned daytime radio and mainstream press coverage and monopolised on its underground credentials. It cultivated grass roots audiences right across America and opened up new territories in places bands hadn’t much bothered with previously. These bands realised that a perception of independence and a cultivation of that connection to your core fan base gave you both scale and longevity, more than a one-off hit single would – this same thinking is what sets brands apart today.

Embracing the allure of the underground, from Louis Vuitton’s recent partnership with London based skateboarder Lucien Clarke to Rapha’s controversial collaboration with cult streetwear brand Palace, brands who think outside the box have much to gain. Exposure to new and diverse consumer groups, a repositioning of your offering and cultlike brand loyalty await the brave who are willing to explore territories unknown.

The glam metal of the 80s isn’t going to be revived any time soon, but its spirit lives on in a certain kind of EDM (Electronic Dance Music). The kind of frenetic, pumping soundtrack of Tomorrowland ticks a lot of the same boxes – a soundtrack loved by vast audiences of provincial young people, loathed by supposed ‘tastemakers’ but a strangely perfect soundtrack for an era of attention-deficiency and information overload.

The lesson now, as then, is the same – the cultural moments you might dismiss because they’re not obviously cool or intelligent can reveal a huge amount about a time and place, if you just know how to decode them in a way which is right for your audience.

Everything is cyclical, what goes around comes around, and as a brand it’s important to tap into the culture your audience comes from as well as the one they currently live in. Thinking about how the past has shaped today can set you ahead of the curve and cut through the noise.

To read more from Justin you can buy his book – Nothin’ But a Good Time: The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Glam Metal (Unbound).