From Kate Bush’s mighty centrepiece Running Up That Hill to Dead Or Alive reaching UK No.1 with their Hi-NRG classic You Spin Me Round (Like A Record), 1985 was a massive year for pop. After the New Wave takeover and the synth-pop revolution, the genres mixed like never before in a year that gave us some of the most exciting and diverse records of the decade.

Inside this special edition of Classic Pop Presents we revisit the year’s finest albums, from Kate Bush’s mighty Hounds Of Love and Tears For Fears’ synth-pop epic Songs From The Big Chair to Talking Heads’ commercial peak with Little Creatures.

From the Classic Pop archive we present interviews with a-ha’s Paul Waaktaar-Savoy, who recalls the making of a-ha’s life-affirming debut, Hunting High And Low; we speak to Peter Hook about New Order’s transformative Low-Life LP; Jim Kerr revisits Simple Minds’ stadium-ready classic, Once Upon A Time; and Claudia Brücken and Trevor Horn tell the story of Propaganda’s cult debut, A Secret Wish. Mike Scott remembers writing and recording The Waterboys’ ‘Big Music’ centrepiece, This Is The Sea; plus we chat with China Crisis about their breakthrough album, Flaunt The Imperfection.

Also inside, we pay tribute to Grace Jones in a year that cemented her status as a global icon, and revisit classic collections from Prince, The Cure, Scritti Politti, The Style Council and Prefab Sprout. Finally, there’s our Top 40 singles, the best of the year’s soundtracks and our rundown of the best of the rest of 1985’s albums.