The 1980 Smash Hit Was Named One Of The Best In History
- 29.08.2026, 19:13
The composition was inspired by Paul McCartney's music.
The song “Ride Like the Wind” by American musician Christopher Cross, which became one of the most recognizable hits of the early 1980s, has gained renewed recognition more than four decades after its release. The song made Amazon Music’s list of the 50 greatest soft rock songs of all time, according to Parade.
However, few people know that the idea for the future hit came from the music of Paul McCartney. Even before his solo success, Cross and his band performed the song “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five” by Wings—released in 1973 on the album *Band on the Run*—at their concerts. During these performances, the musicians often turned the song into a lengthy improvisation. It was then that Cross came up with a vocal motif without words—that very memorable rhythmic phrase that later became the foundation of “Ride Like the Wind.”
Cross later recounted that this particular musical fragment came to him first, and he then wrote the melody and verses around it. According to the musician, he never told McCartney about this connection and joked that, had McCartney learned the story, he would surely have demanded a share of the royalties.
“Ride Like the Wind” was released in 1980 and became a breakthrough hit for Cross. The song combined the artist’s soft vocals with an energetic rhythm, and the backing vocals by Michael McDonald of The Doobie Brothers added extra expressiveness. As a result, the song had a richer and more dynamic sound than many other soft rock hits of that era.
Cross wrote the lyrics from the perspective of a criminal racing toward the Mexican border, trying to escape his pursuers. The musician himself recalled that he wrote the lyrics during a trip from Houston to Austin. It was this very circumstance, he said, that helped convey the sense of movement and tension that became one of the song’s defining features.
“Ride Like the Wind” quickly climbed the U.S. charts and reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100, second only to Blondie’s “Call Me.” The song appeared on Cross’s self-titled debut album, which also introduced listeners to the future classic “Sailing.”
The album’s success was so massive that at the 1981 Grammy Awards, Christopher Cross won several major awards at once—for Album of the Year, Record of the Year, and Song of the Year—and was also named Best New Artist. At the same time, the musician himself admitted that he had never expected such success for his debut album.
More than 40 years later, “Ride Like the Wind” remains one of Cross’s most famous songs. And its story has gained additional interest thanks to an unexpected musical connection to Paul McCartney: one of the biggest hits of 1980 actually grew out of a live improvisation on a Wings song.