The 1980s was a very transformative era for popular music, witnessing the rise of many new technological effects and an evolving relationship between the artist and their audience. Among the most significant changes in the '80s was the introduction of drum machines and synthesisers. These new technologies changed the entire texture of pop music at the time. Embracing these new instruments were popular artists Madonna and Michael Jackson, creating music with a slicker and more polished sound. Michael Jackson's album, 'Thriller' created a seamless blend of pop, funk, soul and rock music using synthesisers. Similarly, Madonna's 'Material girl' showed how the use of electronic instruments enhanced the songs melody and rhythm and later dominated clubs and radios.

Additionally to electronic music, the '80s witnessed a fusion of pop with rock, funk and R&B. These elements were prominent in the work of artists such as Michael Jackson and Prince, in particular funk fusion. Prince's use of unconventional song structure and synthesised sounds made him one of the most innovative artists of the decade. Similarly, the fusion of funk and soul with pop in songs like 'Bad' and 'Thriller' helped him reach his place as 'King of Pop' and also helped to shape the sound of 80s music as a whole. At the same time, rock music was also continuing to go through its own transformation and gave rise to stadium rock and bands such as Journey and Bon Jovi gained popularity. Many stadium rock songs used guitar riffs and emotive lyrics to create 'sing-along' choruses and the mix of pop and rock would go on to develop 'arena rock' in the future.

On top of this, the evolution of power ballads brought emotionally charged songs which went on to dominate the charts. Power ballads was a genre of music which used a fusion of pop music with the emotional intensity of rock music. Embracing the style, artists such as Celine Dion and Whitney Houston quickly rose to the top of the charts with their emotional and soaring vocal performances.

1980s Rock and Roll compositional techniques

1980s Rock and Roll production techniques

Vocal processing

In the 1980s, vocal processing continued to evolve and more effects such as pitch shifting and harmonizing emerged. Pitch shifting was almost like an early form of autotune and allowed for artists to alter vocals to give them a much more robotic texture, or even to create artificial harmonies. These effects paired very well with styles like synth-pop and new wave as they enhanced their robotic and electronic sounds even further and bands like Eurythmics even experimented with slight detuning in their harmonies to create a more futuristic sound.

Use of click tracks

Click tracks became an essential tool in the 80s, whether that be in studio recording or live performances. The 1980s was definitely a decade of electronic and mechanical sounding music, and the increase in use of drum machines and sequencers required the need for even righter synchronization. More importantly, click tracks were essential when layering multitrack recordings as it allowed for each individual part to be perfectly synced with the others.

Notable Producers/musicians

Technology used in the 1980s Rock and Roll recordings

Digital audio workstations

In the 1980s, digital audio workstations, also known as DAWs for short, were very new and had very limited functions compared to modern DAWs. At the time, they were very expensive. More well known systems like Synclavier and Fairlight could cost up to $100,000 and even then, hard drives were small and also quite expensive, which limited recording time. In addition to this, many computers of the time had slow processors, which further restricted the recordings in their editing complexity. Despite these limitations, the 1980s served as a first stepping stone towards the better modern DAWs that we know today. Even by the early 1990s, computers became much more powerful and with them, DAWs also received significant upgrades.