The five hundred twenty-seventh song: The Winner Takes It All - Abba
It feels like there's little to say about Abba songs that hasn't been said already. The Winner Takes It All has multiple layers, something that shows Abba at their best as there's the victory, making it something you can dance too, but with that melancholic angle that's in there, with Agnetha's almost spoken word bridge having most of this element. It's an interesting song with a real life element that's there, even if it doesn't quite reflect reality. It's a sad celebration that feels like it's one of their best in showing what they can do.
The five hundred twenty-eighth song: Rapture - Blondie
Part of the reason this song is its historic significance, the first song featuring rap to reach the number one position in the US charts. It's a weird experience, in part because these days, Debbie Harry's rap would sound more like a parody of the idea while here it's them using a musical style that seems to have been in their world and using a new tool in the arsenal. Even so, it grows the genre in a way by using its own music rather than sampling others, even as rap was, or became, a black culture phenomenon.
The five hundred twenty-ninth song: While You See a Chance - Steve Winwood
It feels like with the eighties coming in and Abba and the like setting a direction for music, that others follow. While You See a Chance moves a rock star to perform something closer to electronic pop and here it feels like part of that shift. The song itself is some nice synth rock, moving towards that more pop sound. The song's quite good for that, but it's also not the most out there or impressive song, instead it's more of an indication of a moment in how music developed.
The five hundred thirtieth song: Heartattack and Vine - Tom Waits
It's clear that blues rock from the 1980s is a different beast from what we've seen earlier in the list, and while Tom Waits' vocals match that of the performers of the sixties, there's something sleazier and darker in there that's everywhere, from presentation to sound, with lyrics about the dark side of life and those who are poor, rather than hardship and more classic stories that feature in other blues songs. The constant threat is there, and it paints a world that'll be a shock to the middle class, feeling exaggerated but still also grounded in reality.
The five hundred thirty-first song: Kings of the Wild Frontier - Adam & The Ants
There is a lot to say about what followed punk as you can say about punk itself. Adam & The Ants come from that world, but clearly build on their own things. They feel extravagant, creating a performance rather than just playing the music, and while the critical and political lyrics are still there, the driving beat that they made their signature goes beyond the punk aggression to feel the base of something that sound more threatening, contrasting more jubilant and louder vocals that build to aggression in a way that moves beyond that of punk - using the punk vocal style to mix with a more intense hard rock style that creates a threat and a performance more than anything else.
The five hundred thirty-second song: Redemption Song - Bob Marley & The Wailers
While this is one of the last Bob Marley songs released during his lifetime, there's also something about this in here that's specifically his. Recorded with just an acoustic guitar, the constant sound of reggae is gone in favour of a sad ballad that uses a style of singing that follows what you get in reggae rather than in country or such. It's a show of artistry, a call for continuing to fight for freedom that comes across far stronger because it's just Marley playing a guitar. It's unexpected, but for me this does feel like it's his best.
The five hundred thirty-third song: Dead Souls - Joy Division
Dead Souls is an interesting pick for the list, a heavy metal B-side with lyrics evoking an emotional darkness that's the band's trademark but eerily prefigure Ian Curtis' passing a few months later. It's dark and haunting for those reasons and difficult to listen to in retrospect. It references regression and past lives, but also through that the spectres of his past that keep calling him back. It's a difficult song to listen to with that retrospect and an unfortunate story that this leads into, but it shows how well music can send these emotions at the same time.