This past season, the Unofficial team realized a noticeable decline in uninhibited ski town partying at damn near every mountain we visited durind the aprés ski hour. For me that included ski areas in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, and Utah.
Only during a spur of the moment trip to Chamonix did I wet my proverbial beak in the wonder that is aprés in the alps. But after talking to some other concerned ski town residents, I decided to do a shallow historical dive into the soundtracks behind ski town parties, “then vs. now.” The findings are shocking and show that we need a musical correction ASAP.
1987
Billboard Top 100 #1 — ‘Walk Like An Egyptian’ The Bangles
Billboard Top 100 #7 — ‘Here I Go Again’ Whitesnake
Billboard Top 100 #12 — ‘Everybody Have Fun Tonight’ Wang Chung
Live Shows: Grateful Dead plays Telluride in Colorado, Park West in Utah.
What I love most about the late 80’s is that ski boot technology really started to come around and the music FOLLOWED. All of a sudden skiers were getting extremo– especially in the alps and listening to everything from The Grateful Dead to Wang Chung.
This was a golden age for aprés in ski towns and if you were there like my dad was at Hunter Mountain, you better believe you were having a good time. And unlike 1989, 1987 is not tainted by Taylor Swift.
2018
Billboard Top 100 #1 : ‘In My Feelings’ Drake
Billboard Top 100 # 4 ‘FeFe’ 6ix9ine Featuring Nicki Minaj & Murda Beatz
Billboard Top 100 #16 ‘Delicate’ Taylor Swift
Live Shows: Michael Franti plays what seems like every ski town in North America. Phish doesn’t really go to the mountains anymore. I guess Portugal the Man at Jackson Hole was pretty cool?
Things are not looking good for music lovers in 2018 and aprés is suffering as a result. We need to get back to the roots of what makes a ski hill party a worthy endeavour– the music. We need songs about good times. We don’t need ‘Feelings’ by Drake or ‘Delicate’ by Taylor Swift.
But I digress… What was your favorite music year or period in terms of skiing?
*The views in this post are of the author’s and not necessarily shared by Unofficial Networks
