Two-Hit Wonders: ‘80s Artists Who Snuck Back on the Charts After a Big-Splash Song

Ah, the ‘80s. Those of us who lived through it can regale you with tales of artists and bands coming out of nowhere with massive hits, and then just as quickly disappearing into relative anonymity. Yet there were certain times when these folks had another hit left in them. It’s just that the first song was so monstrous that we tend to forget that second hit.

There aren’t any hard and fast rules for this list about chart position. We’re just—unscientifically—looking at five times when artists sometimes described as one-hit wonders were actually a good bit more than that. 

1. Men Without Hats

This Canadian outfit was largely the brainchild of lead singer Ivan Doroschuk, and they certainly had the idiosyncratic group name that befit an ‘80s one-hit wonder. And with their 1982 single “The Safety Dance,” they also had a hit that seemed unrepeatable, a relentlessly catchy mélange of New Romantic pop and robotic rap that features that immortal cry of freedom: We can dance if we want to!

It was a full five years later, when most pop music fans had likely consigned them to the mists of history, that Men Without Hats managed to reaffirm their capacity for charmingly off-kilter anthems with “Pop Goes the World.” It snuck into the Top 20 on the U.S. charts, which is impressive considering all the time that had passed since “The Safety Dance.” They may not have had hats, but they certainly had hits.

2. Animotion

Animotion’s is one of the stranger tales on this list. The first incarnation of the group scored big with the 1984 single “Obsession.” The song was written and first performed by Michael Des Barres and Holly Knight, but Animotion found hooks galore on their version via beaming synths and a crashing beat. Then there was the strange vocal chemistry between Bill Wadhams and Astrid Plane, the former sounding slightly sinister, the latter cool and unaffected.

You might not remember the band’s second Top 10 hit, the frothy pop ballad “Room to Move,” from 1989. Perhaps that’s because it was pretty much an entirely different band by then, with the he/she lead singer interplay for this track provided by Paul Engemann and Cynthia Rhodes (also an actress most known for her role as Penny in Dirty Dancing). By the way, the current version of Animotion once again features the original duo of Wadhams and Plane.

3. Ready for the World

Two common misconceptions about Ready for the World upon the release of their 1985 No. 1 “Oh Sheila”: That they were British, or that they were Prince in disguise. The British confusion came from singer Melvin Riley Jr.’s occasional dipping into a foreign accent in this song’s spoken-word section (the band was actually from Michigan). And the association with His Purpleness was due to production similarities, most notably the drum machine rim shots utilized.

[RELATED: The 8 Ultimate One-Hit Wonders from the “Decade of the One-Hit Wonders,” the ’80s]

Nonetheless, “Oh Sheila” was as smooth a piece of R&B as the mid-‘80s produced. To their credit, Ready for the World dug deep again in 1986 with “Love You Down,” which had more of a Quiet Storm vibe. That song also hit the Top 10, although it hardly gets the airplay today that “Oh Sheila” still enjoys.

4. John Parr

This is the one time on this list where the somewhat forgotten hit is the one that came first. John Parr was already a music industry veteran when he finally got a solo deal in his thirties. He scored a Top 25 hit with his debut single, “Naughty, Naughty,” which was released in 1984. As the title suggests, it was a rocker with a lascivious bent to it.

Parr scored a gig to write the theme song to the film St. Elmo’s Fire in 1985. He and pop impresario David Foster wrote the music, and Parr, unimpressed by the film’s story about the romantic entanglements of recent college grads, instead based the lyrics on the story of Rick Hansen, a paraplegic who toured the world in a wheelchair to raise awareness for others with similar disabilities. The resulting song, “St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion),” topped the U.S. charts and was nominated for a Grammy.

5. Neneh Cherry

Swedish female singer-rappers just weren’t dominating the U.S. charts in the late ‘80s, believe it or not. That is until Neneh Cherry came along with her dynamic 1988 Top 10 hit “Buffalo Stance.” It’s a wildly inventive hybrid of dance pop and rap, characterized by an amazing chorus hook and Cherry’s defiant patter. Come on, you remember it: Now, don’t you get fresh with me.

But do you remember “Kisses on the Wind?” It was found on the same album as “Buffalo Stance” (Raw Like Sushi) and also made it into the Top 10 in 1989. Although it’s a solid song, the Latin-flavored “Kisses on the Wind” isn’t quite as dynamic as its hit predecessor, which could be why it’s not lodged in the memory banks quite as far as “Buffalo Stance.”

Photo by David Redfern/Redferns