For the month of October, I’m selecting a song each day from the decade that has the most meaning to me: the 80s. It was the decade that I grew up in. The period of time where I discovered my love for music — and explored many different genres. For the next 31 days, I’ll highlight a handful of songs that I truly loved and that were representative of the decade. #31DaysOf80sSongs
I’m not sure how this song was off my radar growing up. As many music fans know, Queen was the king of the Live Aid concert at Wembley Stadium. Now, they didn’t play “I Want to Break Free”. “Radio Ga Ga” and “Hammer to Fall” got the new song honors at that show. And “I Want to Break Free” also didn’t chart exceptionally high. But the song just flat out kicks ass. It’s truly one of my favorites from the band.
“I Want to Break Free” is a song that seems to have endured well over the years. And it has made a comeback in all kinds of places — from bars to tv commercials. I remember some friends of mine who studied abroad in Barcelona in the late 90s were raving about this “new” Queen track that they played incessantly at the bars. The song was actually “I Want to Break Free”, which seemed to have a resurgence that allowed many of us naive rockers to finally get introduced to the song more than a decade after its release. The instrumentation hasn’t aged exceptionally well, but the melody has. I think, at the end of the day, upbeat, hopeful songs will always have a place in people’s hearts. It’s what music was designed to do.
“God knows I've fallen in love.”