Making The Grade (1984) Dorian Walker, Judd Nelson, Jonna Lee, Gordon Jump

Orion the Hunter was a 1980s rock combo and offshoot of the popular band Boston. It featured former Boston members Barry Goudreau on guitars and Brad Delp on backing vocals, as well as future Boston lead vocalist Fran Cosmo. The band was originally known as simply "Orion", but the name was changed to "Orion the Hunter" in deference to pressure from Orion Pictures. The group's self-titled album in 1984 on Portrait/CBS Records, which yielded a hit single "So You Ran," featured the sky-high vocals which prompted Cosmo's entrance to Boston in the early 1990s. Orion the Hunter charted at #57 on Billboard's Top 200 Albums chart after its debut on May 9, 1984. "So You Ran" made the Top Ten on rock radio and was a mid-chart hit on mainstream pop radio. Orion the Hunter featured Bruce Smith on bass and ex-Heart drummer Michael DeRosier. The album also included Brad Delp, former lead singer of Boston, who co-wrote four songs and sang background vocals on numerous tracks. Delp's vocals are especially noticeable on the ballad "Joanne" which he co-wrote with lead singer Fran Cosmo.

The Works is the eleventh studio album by the British rock band Queen, released on 27 February 1984 by EMI Records in the United Kingdom and by Capitol Records in the United States. After the synth-heavy Hot Space (1982), the album saw the re-emergence of Brian May and Roger Taylor's rock sound, while still incorporating the early 80s retro futuristic electronic music (Freddie Mercury) and New York funk scenes (John Deacon). Recorded at the Record Plant Studios in Los Angeles, California and Musicland Studios in Munich, Germany from August 1983 to January 1984, the album's title comes from a comment Taylor made as recording began – "Let's give them the works!"

The music marks a distinct departure from the busy bebop style Gillespie is more closely associated with, as he turns his attention to laid-back music with a funk/smooth jazz feel.

Don't Break the Oath is the second studio album by Danish heavy metal band Mercyful Fate, released in 1984. The style Mercyful Fate employed on Don't Break the Oath resembled a mixture of heavy metal with progressive elements, lyrically preoccupied with Satan and the occult and distinguished by King Diamond's theatrical falsetto vocals. Although very influential to future black metal bands due to its lyrical content, the music itself is more reminiscent of traditional heavy metal. The album was remastered and subsequently re-issued on Roadrunner Records in 1997. This reissue came with the bonus track "Death Kiss (Demo)", which would eventually evolve into the album's lead-off track, "A Dangerous Meeting". Metal Rules named this the greatest extreme metal album of all time.

Defenders of the Faith is the ninth studio album by English heavy metal band Judas Priest, released on 4 January 1984 by Columbia Records. The album was certified platinum by the RIAA, and spawned the singles "Freewheel Burning", "Some Heads Are Gonna Roll", and "Love Bites". The 30th-anniversary release of the album (released in March 2015) came with a double CD of a live show recorded on 5 May 1984 at the Long Beach Arena in Long Beach, California on their Defenders of the Faith Tour and was originally recorded for a radio broadcast.

For this session, recorded only six weeks after Afrika on Steeplechase, South African bassist Johnny Dyani continued the use of a six-or seven-member ensemble and inched closer to the sort of music Abdullah Ibrahim, one of his mentors, was creating at around the same time with his band Ekaya. The edgy roughness and avant-garde affinity shown in his earlier ensembles with John Tchicai and Dudu Pukwana have been replaced by a slightly smoother (though, certainly, still rambunctious) sound and more song-oriented pieces. The band's a strong one, however, the compositions are engaging and the soloing imaginative. A couple of the pieces, including "Song for the Workers," still have the aching, bitter quality of his best work…

Former Clearlight's leader Cyrille Verdeaux comes back, after a too long absence. Dedicated to the planet's survival, "Messenger Of The Son" (1984) displays some lyrical and romantic streamings down of keyboards. His sense of melody reminds the best passages of "Visions". "Rhapsodies Pour La Planète Bleue", from which four titles are included on this welcome Musea reissue, have originally been recorded during the year 1986.

The Surf Raiders were among the few bands who were considered the originators of the surf music revival. The members were Robert Dalley, lead guitar, Neal Kuzee, guitars, Loyd Davis, bass, Linda Dalley, keyboards and Dave Rodriguez, drums. Eventually Neal retired and was replaced by Tom Moncrief. This was the core of the group until 1989, when the group disbanded.