It came in at #8 and the following week it was on top of the pile, eventually spending three weeks at #1. Heavy rotation on BBC Radio 1 as well as across the ever-growing independent local stations in the UK meant it was a certainty to hit the #1 spot within a very short space of time. So, Message In A Bottle was a single tailor-made for sounding brilliant on the radio. In fact, I shouldn’t restrict the love for ‘Reaper’ to the rockists as I’ve learned from attending dancing events with Glasgow hipsters of all ages that I am very much in a minority with my distaste for the song… You may recall that the Flaming Lips pressed a limited run of their collaborative Record Store Day album Heady Fwends to vinyl that includes samples of the involved artists' actual blood inside of it.

As for Andy Summers on guitar….well he’s not a million miles away from playing the same notes as can be heard on Don’t Fear The Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult which has long been regarded by rockists as a classic. Hell, even the bass playing of Sting is top-class stuff. And the drumming from Stewart Copeland in particular the way he changes tempo all the way through it, is something to behold. It’s got a great tune and a catchy chorus to kill for. I’m not going to sit and here and say that this is a dreadful song. In other words, this is the single that re-invented stadium rock, just as those who had fought in the punk wars had thought they were going to win. rock and in doing so turned the band into a global product for mass consumption. In September 1979 they unleashed a single which somehow straddled new wave and M.O.R. Having become highly popular in the first half of 1979 with an album and singles originally released back in 1978, there was a huge amount of interest in the new material that was going to be released by The Police.

The flaming lips vinyl