To me the 80s were the worst decade in the history of recorded music!
The 80s was just as hit or miss as any other decade, imho. I think the biggest problem with the 80s was the new technology. Initially all the producers and what not went tech crazy they wanted to do all the MIDI sequencing and drum programming they possibly could in order to take full advantage of all these wonderful (then) new techologies. It was sort of their way of padding their resumes (well look what "I" can do with a MIDI sequencer and drum machine!). The listening public inevitably revolted against this trend and thus the music moved away from that over-synthesized/computer happy sound and back to a more organic and less electronic sound.
I think with the advent of ProTools in the last decade (the 'aughts/'00s) there was a bit of a resurgence of this ugly trend but I'm hoping that it has passed or that it's about to pass/has started to wane.
