My Top 1000 Songs #567: Reap The Wild Wind

[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.]

Another one of those new wave-era synthpop hits I absolutely adore, even if I don't spend a lot of time listening to the band's broader catalog. (See also, e.g., INXS, "Don't Change"; Icicle Works, "Whisper To A Scream"). By the time of their sixth album, 1982's Quartet, their earlier, edgier work with original frontman John Foxx were well behind them, with vocalist Midge Ure taking the band in a more pop direction. And while many choose the lush "Vienna" as the peak of this run, I'm a sucker for the galloping clip of "Reap The Wild Wind," lush and grandiose and maybe even a little cheesy, but tethered to a bouncy, hum-along hook. Killer bass sound to boot. Definitely captures a moment in time for me.

At Live Aid (indebted to Ure's original crafting of the "Do They Know It's Christmas" charity single), 1985: