A-Ha -- "The Sun Always Shines on TV"

(Debuted November 30, 1985, Peaked #20, 16 Weeks on the Charts)

As much as I feel A-Ha's #1 hit "Take on Me" was played to death both on my radio and on MTV during its chart run, I feel that its followup "The Sun Always Shines on TV" was underrated. Not just the single, but the video as well. Personally, I felt the music was more complex. The synthesizer parts were more layered, and the vocals were more interesting. It definitely deserved a better run, especially on teh heels of such a massive hit.

Interestingly, I remember that I first heard "The Sun Always Shines on TV" during the winter. I lived in nothern New York (which is usually really cold at that time of year), but that particular winter gave us a lot more snow than normal. However, consideing the band's Norwegian roots, the line "the sun always shines on TV" doesn't seem odd if you're snowed in. I definitely remember seeing shows that were set in California and Miami and thinking that -- despite the violent crime in some of those shows -- it was better than where I was because nobody worried about getting two feet of snow out of the driveway.