“Working with Fire and Steel” by China Crisis

"Working with Fire and Steel" is the title track of China Crisis's second album, Working with Fire and Steel – Possible Pop Songs Volume Two, and it followed "Tragedy and Mystery" out as a single in 1983, catching the English synth-pop outfit at its most ornate. Gary Daly wrote the words and sings them, sharing the music credit with Eddie Lundon, and Mike Howlett produced, with Alan Douglas and Gil Norton engineering.

It reached 48 in the UK and 47 in Australia, and it climbed to 27 on Billboard's American dance club chart. Not everyone was sold: Spin granted it was pop through and through, but found its meaning fussy and buried in metaphor, and the mix so stuffed with sounds and instruments that a casual listener half-watching MTV or flipping the car radio couldn't untangle it.

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