This year marks the 30th anniversary of "Faith", George Michael's landmark debut album. Come post your memories, vids, pics, etc. about this era and George. No bashing. RIP Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou.

[Edited 1/11/18 14:21pm]

Amazing to remember how BIG George Michael was circa 1988 in North America. He was way BIGGER than he was even in the UK back then.

Faith holds up fairly well, though in retrospect it seems almost like a gay-man-in-early-AIDS-era document -- especially some of the cringeworthy videos! ("I Want Your Sex" is a little embarrassing.)

'Father Figure' is a classic, but the track that impresses me most all these years on is "Hand to Mouth", an apt commentary on Reagan-era social welfare failure in the US. (Joan Baez did a nice version of it.)

(I prefer his second album from 1990, which I think is a little less desperate for attention and has aged better.)

I miss this gent.

AlexdeParis said:

Faith is absolutely flawless (sorry)! There's not a bad track on the album and George's voice and charisma sold them all. While I do think LWP is even better, the combination of artistic and commercial achievement here cannot be overstated.

I completely agree. In fact, I think all of George's albums are perfefct and flawless. Such an amazing talent. He is missed.

mjscarousal said:

I still cannot believe he is gone Such a great voice and talent.

RIP

I have the album. Love it.

Faith was a forward leap with recording technology at the time. It really makes it revolutionary while maintaining just as much interest and clarity as it did thirty years ago.

The 12" of "I Want Your Sex" with all three parts intact as one track is worth everything.

I've always loved George. Faith is in my CD lineup in my car. Another fantastic voice that was lost to us.

great album, from begin'n to end

mjscarousal said:

I still cannot believe he is gone Such a great voice and talent.

Faith is perfection I wish they would offically release the Faith tour on DVD and Blu-ray.......Here is a live performance in Rotterdam 1988

I still can't cope with the fact that he's gone. Faith, LWP and Older are all flawless albums IMO.

Father Figure is probably one of the greatest songs EVER! ...not to mention, Videos!

domainator2010 said:

Father Figure is probably one of the greatest songs EVER! ...not to mention, Videos!

As a sidenote about videos: The original MTV Video Vanguard Award was first awarded to GM, and presented by Madonna, around 1990 or so. It was renamed the MTV George Michael Video Vanguard Award. It was later changed to the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award, which I still hate since I think most GM vids trump that of MJ (not to say MJ doesn't have great stuff).

P!NK is getting the award this year at the MTV VMA.

TrivialPursuit said:

I want your sex was the best single song of the 80's to me; it's the song that Prince forgot to make.

And i loved Wham! before that, and George's solo songs before the Faith album.
So day 1 I bought Faith, and sure it's a collection of great songs, but as a whole i never could get into it THAT much. Monkey, Hard day, those kind of songs were not the typical GM songs i loved so much.
Even Faith the song was a little side-thought compared to the great IWYS.
Father Figure is the other juwel.

"In the past, there were arguments for and against casual sex. Then it was a question of morality. These days, it can be a question of life or death, it's as simple as that. And this song is not about casual sex."

George Michael

Enjoyed this thread, thanks! Hard to believe it's been 30 years, the title track was massive! I remember when I first heard it on the radio, not realizing right away it's the same guy who did Make It Big! I actually liked it much better than the new mj song Bad at the time though it was popular too, and I was only in kindergarten! I'm pretty sure we have home videos floating around with a couple of singles from this album playing in the background

[Edited 8/21/17 23:12pm]

Hard Day is my jam!!!!

Watched a few George videos on YT tonight. Some funny ones too (The first Carpool Karaoke) I miss that guy. Got sad watching 'If I Told You That' w/ Whitney. Terrible losses.

EmmaMcG said:

TrivialPursuit said:

As a sidenote about videos: The original MTV Video Vanguard Award was first awarded to GM, and presented by Madonna, around 1990 or so. It was renamed the MTV George Michael Video Vanguard Award. It was later changed to the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award, which I still hate since I think most GM vids trump that of MJ (not to say MJ doesn't have great stuff).

P!NK is getting the award this year at the MTV VMA.

Regardless of personal preference, you can understand why they'd name it after Michael Jackson instead. Big, fantasticly produced music videos are kind of his thing. ALTHOUGH, "Freeek" is my all time favourite music video. But I agree with domainator2010 that Father Figure, both song and video, are a class above the majority of what you get from other artists.

Hypnotic. That's the word I'd use - Hypnotic. BOTH of 'em.
Heh - it's interesting you like the video - you're in your 20s, so you would probably have been exposed to far "bigger" videos in your time (cuz naturally, things improve over time) - y'know, Big production, lots of special fx, CGI, blah blah, whatever..... and you still like it? ) ....Well....you've got TASTE!

domainator2010 said:

Umm nope - I'm surprised you like a song from before you were born

domainator2010 said:

domainator2010 said:

Umm nope - I'm surprised you like a song from before you were born

What's the big deal, everybody here and out of here loves music that dates back to before they were born.

TrivialPursuit said:

domainator2010 said:

Father Figure is probably one of the greatest songs EVER! ...not to mention, Videos!

As a sidenote about videos: The original MTV Video Vanguard Award was first awarded to GM, and presented by Madonna, around 1990 or so. It was renamed the MTV George Michael Video Vanguard Award. It was later changed to the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award, which I still hate since I think most GM vids trump that of MJ (not to say MJ doesn't have great stuff).

P!NK is getting the award this year at the MTV VMA.

the Video Vanguard award had been around since the first MTV Awards. David Bowie and The Beatles were the first ones to get it.

Madonna got it in '86, MJ got it in 1988 and then George got it in '89