“Slave to Love” by Bryan Ferry

"Slave to Love" kicked off Bryan Ferry's sixth solo album, Boys and Girls, as its first single in 1985, and it's the sound of a crooner who has perfected the art of the slow, sultry ache. Ferry wrote it alone and produced it with Rhett Davies, with Bob Clearmountain mixing, and the band is a who's who: Neil Hubbard, Keith Scott and Pink Floyd's David Gilmour on guitar, Guy Fletcher of Dire Straits adding keyboards, Omar Hakim drumming and Tony Levin playing bass.

It's all velvet textures and shimmering guitar, a sophisti-pop swoon built for late nights. It spent nine weeks on the UK chart, peaking at 10, and Ferry sang it at Live Aid at Wembley Stadium that July. Film soundtracks loved it too: 9½ Weeks in 1986 and Polanski's Bitter Moon in 1992.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.