Matt Cullen

The landmark 1986 debut that made the Beastie Boys the first rap act to top the Billboard 200 receives its 40th anniversary this month.

Forty years after its release, the second and final Frankie Goes To Hollywood album still divides opinion and remains the record that effectively ended the band.

Huey Lewis And The News reached the commercial peak of their 1980s run with Fore!, the 1986 album that produced five Top 10 Billboard Hot 100 singles, including the No. 1 hits “Stuck With You” and “Jacob's Ladder”.

Collective Soul draw on The Cars and 1980s new wave for Touch And Go, with Eye On You providing the clearest expression of the album's retro influence.

Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds' third album, Kicking Against The Pricks, turns 40 this month, marking four decades since the band used an album of cover versions to broaden its musical vocabulary.

Forty years after its release, Wham!'s The Final remains the definitive document of one of pop's most successful and short-lived partnerships, capturing the rise and conclusion of George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley's chart-dominating duo.

Forty years after Run-D.M.C. released Raising Hell, the landmark album remains one of the defining moments in hip-hop history, helping push rap from an emerging movement into the centre of popular culture.