Today’s music – early Ultravox! That’s the John Foxx stuff and the band’s name with the ! (an idea nicked from Neu!)
The first self titled Ultravox! album is a bit of a muddle, with half a dozen directions indicated, lots of scratchy new wave style guitars, incongruous violin, some punky stuff, some surprisingly sophisticated songs (like the hugely commercial sound of "Dangerous Rhythm"). It doesn’t really hang together terribly well, but it’s interestingly inventive, and although they were lumped together with the emerging punk movement this debut album proves that Foxx and the boys were on an entirely different course. In many ways it reminds me of the first Japan album, in that it has many punk / new wave elements, (plus some not always successful attempts at spiky white boy funk) but these are surface trappings and there is something entirely different, and impressively original, at its heart. There are synths here, but only to contribute occasional additional ‘weirdness’.
And the first album is produced by Steve Lillywhite and Brian Eno. John Foxx recalls taking a phone call which began "Hallo, this is David Bowie, is Brian Eno there please?" Foxx was speechless. DB was actually inviting the Domed One to Paris to help with the Low sessions…!
Second album Ha Ha Ha starts off very punky and frantic for a few tracks, and it’s all a bit patchy and samey (unlike the debut album), then all of a sudden "Distant Smile" begins with some lovely keyboards and atmospherics. Sadly once the vocals begin it’s as if Ultravox are trying to be the Buzzcocks, and failing rather badly.
Then it all perks up with "The Man Who Dies Every Day", strange, moody and unusual. And despite Foxx’s John Lydon snarl on "While I’m Still Alive" it’s better than much of the early PiL stuff that it sounds like.
But the real killer on this album is the Kraftwerkian drum machine led "Hiroshima, Mon Amour" – it clearly points the way towards both Foxx’s later electronic balladry and Ultravox’s most successful period under Midge Ure. The Andy Mackay-esque saxophone adds a lovely mournful air. And it’s totally out of place on this record! (There is a totally different recording of this track which was used as a b side, and is all guitars and real drums, and would have fitted far better on the album. Interestingly they dropped the more conventional sounding track for the more machine-like version).
1978’s System’s Of Romance takes the band even further from scuzzy guitars and punked up beats. Picking up from "Hiroshima"s lead here we see many more synth dominated tracks, and where the guitar is used it’s often for atmosphere rather than the lead instrument. The opening "Slow Motion" is terrific, and although there are still some of the more frantic New Wave type songs, these are clearly the weaker tracks. The drumming is more machine-like too, the songs pulse and throb rather than rocking out. "Quiet Men" exemplifies this – over a martial drum machine and synth bass Foxx sings in a monotone, and although the guitars are still present the overall impression is that this is a synth band now. The following eerie "Dislocation" takes this further and it is clearly Foxx’s preferred direction as it prefigures tracks like "Burning Car" or "No-One Driving" much more than it does "Sleepwalk" or "Passing Strangers". "Cross Fade" is another pointer to Metamatic. Having said that if you substituted Foxx’s unusual vocals for Midge’s on "When You Walk Through Me" then it wouldn’t be a bad fit on Vienna. Robin Simon’s guitar sound is very close to Midge’s too.
Ultravox split during early 1979 with Foxx going off to record the totally mechanised Metamatic. Billy Currie joined Gary Numan’s band for a while. Numan was a huge Ultravox fan so he was delighted – Currie’s involvement really cements the similarities between Systems Of Romance and Numan’s Replicas and Pleasure Principle. In fact you could mix up many of the songs of these albums and you’d be hard pressed to tell which was which! (Ultravox’s "Maximum Acceleration" is a clear blueprint for Numan tracks like "M.E", especially in the rigid drumming, deep bassy throb and fat minimoog). Numan really copies Foxx’s blanked out whiney vocals too
Currie also worked with Visage during 1979 and it was there that he met ex-Rich Kid (and then a member of Thin Lizzy, weirdly) Midge Ure. Midge connected with Billy straight away – both had strong ideas for atmospheric synth dominated, yet still commercial, music. Midge was introduced to the other members of Ultravox and it was decided to give the band another try. This proved to be a good idea, as the exploratory sessions resulted in an album called Vienna…
The first self titled Ultravox! album is a bit of a muddle, with half a dozen directions indicated, lots of scratchy new wave style guitars, incongruous violin, some punky stuff, some surprisingly sophisticated songs (like the hugely commercial sound of "Dangerous Rhythm"). It doesn’t really hang together terribly well, but it’s interestingly inventive, and although they were lumped together with the emerging punk movement this debut album proves that Foxx and the boys were on an entirely different course. In many ways it reminds me of the first Japan album, in that it has many punk / new wave elements, (plus some not always successful attempts at spiky white boy funk) but these are surface trappings and there is something entirely different, and impressively original, at its heart. There are synths here, but only to contribute occasional additional ‘weirdness’.
And the first album is produced by Steve Lillywhite and Brian Eno. John Foxx recalls taking a phone call which began "Hallo, this is David Bowie, is Brian Eno there please?" Foxx was speechless. DB was actually inviting the Domed One to Paris to help with the Low sessions…!
Second album Ha Ha Ha starts off very punky and frantic for a few tracks, and it’s all a bit patchy and samey (unlike the debut album), then all of a sudden "Distant Smile" begins with some lovely keyboards and atmospherics. Sadly once the vocals begin it’s as if Ultravox are trying to be the Buzzcocks, and failing rather badly.
Then it all perks up with "The Man Who Dies Every Day", strange, moody and unusual. And despite Foxx’s John Lydon snarl on "While I’m Still Alive" it’s better than much of the early PiL stuff that it sounds like.
But the real killer on this album is the Kraftwerkian drum machine led "Hiroshima, Mon Amour" – it clearly points the way towards both Foxx’s later electronic balladry and Ultravox’s most successful period under Midge Ure. The Andy Mackay-esque saxophone adds a lovely mournful air. And it’s totally out of place on this record! (There is a totally different recording of this track which was used as a b side, and is all guitars and real drums, and would have fitted far better on the album. Interestingly they dropped the more conventional sounding track for the more machine-like version).
1978’s System’s Of Romance takes the band even further from scuzzy guitars and punked up beats. Picking up from "Hiroshima"s lead here we see many more synth dominated tracks, and where the guitar is used it’s often for atmosphere rather than the lead instrument. The opening "Slow Motion" is terrific, and although there are still some of the more frantic New Wave type songs, these are clearly the weaker tracks. The drumming is more machine-like too, the songs pulse and throb rather than rocking out. "Quiet Men" exemplifies this – over a martial drum machine and synth bass Foxx sings in a monotone, and although the guitars are still present the overall impression is that this is a synth band now. The following eerie "Dislocation" takes this further and it is clearly Foxx’s preferred direction as it prefigures tracks like "Burning Car" or "No-One Driving" much more than it does "Sleepwalk" or "Passing Strangers". "Cross Fade" is another pointer to Metamatic. Having said that if you substituted Foxx’s unusual vocals for Midge’s on "When You Walk Through Me" then it wouldn’t be a bad fit on Vienna. Robin Simon’s guitar sound is very close to Midge’s too.
Ultravox split during early 1979 with Foxx going off to record the totally mechanised Metamatic. Billy Currie joined Gary Numan’s band for a while. Numan was a huge Ultravox fan so he was delighted – Currie’s involvement really cements the similarities between Systems Of Romance and Numan’s Replicas and Pleasure Principle. In fact you could mix up many of the songs of these albums and you’d be hard pressed to tell which was which! (Ultravox’s "Maximum Acceleration" is a clear blueprint for Numan tracks like "M.E", especially in the rigid drumming, deep bassy throb and fat minimoog). Numan really copies Foxx’s blanked out whiney vocals too
Currie also worked with Visage during 1979 and it was there that he met ex-Rich Kid (and then a member of Thin Lizzy, weirdly) Midge Ure. Midge connected with Billy straight away – both had strong ideas for atmospheric synth dominated, yet still commercial, music. Midge was introduced to the other members of Ultravox and it was decided to give the band another try. This proved to be a good idea, as the exploratory sessions resulted in an album called Vienna…
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