“Apollo 9” by Adam Ant

Adam Ant fired off "Apollo 9" as a single in September 1984, the opening move in his new "rockers in space" guise, and it was a UK hit, peaking at number 13. His third solo album, Vive le Rock, followed a year later, built on that same look and attitude and carrying the song in two different versions.

Ant wrote it with guitarist Marco Pirroni, and he sings and plays piano on it, with Chris Constantinou on bass and vocals and Bogdan Wiczling on drums and percussion. Tony Visconti, the producer behind records by Ant's heroes Marc Bolan and David Bowie, produced and engineered. He remembered Ant as a creative whirlwind who knew exactly what he wanted, though on Vive le Rock they didn't see eye to eye over the mixes: Ant liked everything trebly, and Visconti, by his own admission, leans to the bass.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz.