Ultravox - Vienna

Mid-price reissue of 1980 album from new wave act featuring Midge Ure. Includes 4 bonus tracks 'Waiting', 'Passionate Reply', 'Herr X' & 'Alles Klar' plus CD-Rom material (Video for the new wave classic 'Vienna', discography & a weblink to the official Ultravox website). 2000 release. Standard jewel case. Album Description

Lorretta said it right

"I've been an Ultravox fan since 1979, and while I liked the incarnation with John Foxx, Midge Ure's amazing voice made the band even better. I've listened to this album over and over. I know every note of it. The track listing on this release is different than what I'm used to. In addition to the four songs added on to the end, it seems that Sleepwalk and Astradyne have switched places in the track order. Maybe this is the track listing from the original UK version and I have the US version? I agree with someone else who said that Astradyne doesn't belong at the begining of the CD. It is, however, one of my favorite songs.
At any rate, you can't go wrong with this CD, especially if you love synth music. However, this is more than synth music...and that's what makes it so special. The instruments used include violin, viola, drums, piano and bass. I've always described Ultravox's music as 'Modern Classical.' The songs flow perfectly from one to the next and listening to this CD is pure bliss" I could not have said it any better Loretta...Great review.
August 22, 2008

When nothing means Everything

About a million years ago when I was young, I remember listening to Ultravox singing "Vienna"; lying there in white cotton sheets, halfway on, halfway off the bed, next to my girlfriend of the moment (really less of a 'girlfriend' than a mistress, I think, since I didn't have---and don't have, even now---'girlfriends' in the normal sense)---just listening.

In repose. Thinking. Thinking, idling, doing nothing. Back in the days when I was so young, so callous, that I didn't really expect to live much beyond 21 anyway, certainly not old enough for Ultravox to be called "classic", certainly not old enough to feel a fleeting, bracing pang of nostalgia.

Anyway, so "Vienna" is playing---off, God, I think a tapedeck. And my girl sorta makes this sighing noise, and says "listen to the singer---he's saying, 'this means nothing to me...it means nothing to me, ah, Vienna."

"And you know", she continued, the rain pattering against the windowpane as the sky grew darker by the second; "you know, just by the longing in his voice, that it doesn't mean nothing. It means everything."

I agreed then. I still do. Ultravox makes conjuring up the most devilish, intuitive, essential emotions with a synth seem so casual as to be evilly simple. That's their charm; was then, still is.

"Vienna" is haunting, mesmerizing stuff, good for smoking your way through rainy weekends, good as a nice little tonic for burning rubber down some rainswept highway.

Good, heady, lonely, wistful stuff. Give it a spin.

JSG August 15, 2007

Dynamic

In a sense this disc is a snapshot of the new wave scene in 1980--an amalgam of styles and audio experiments filtered through a definite pop sensibility. May 12, 2007

Waiting for the Passionate Reply

In early 1979 the personality and creative force behind Ultravox left the group, unfortunately this coincided with the band being dropped by Island records. John Foxx was incredibly deadpan and maudlin, but his visions of a faceless and mechanical world tempered by futurism and the French New Wave combined extremely well with the raw musical experimentation of the group. Depending on your viewpoint the arrival of Midge Ure (a tried and tested pop success with Slik) into the line-up for their fourth studio album "Vienna" was either disastrous or a stroke of genius. With Midge on board the charts would no longer be resistant to the band's alienating form of electronic pessimism. However as the years went on that pessimism became diluted as Ultravox mellowed into a rather safe and chart friendly pop group. Fortunately "Vienna" continues the bands occupying themes and surprisingly they took them even further on their fifth album; 1981's "Rage in Eden". These two albums are clearly the highpoint of the Midge Ure years. Ultravox on "Vienna" continue to depict a disturbing and faceless European culture, one dependent on fashion, art and pretence - this is rather ironic considering how much Ultravox themselves relied on these things. There are one or two moments of arrant self-indulgence, especially with the insipid basement bargain Kraftwerk rip off "Mr X.". But generally speaking the music stands up quite well to modern listening, with the rather dated exception of the otherwise excellent "Sleepwalk." Guitars are used as frequently as electronic instrumentation which challenges the conception that Ultravox were just keyboard wizards. Midge Ure's melodramatic and falsetto vocal delivery oddly fits the material, especially on the title track, which has rightly become the band's trademark song. Ultravox had a much grander, heavier and rock orientated sound than their feeble Casio derived rivals, but lyrically they fail to avoid the decadence, arrogance and self-indulgence which were hallmarks of this musical period.
June 19, 2006

Great transitional album for Ultravox

So this was the transitional album for Ultravox. 1980 & John Foxx had gone on to pursue his solo career giving over the position to Midge Ure (previously of the Rich Kids). Thankfully the new line-up didn't rest on the laurels of the old lead singer & his very personal & esoteric lyrics. When I saw Ultravox in Concert back 1980 they were canny enough to split their set pretty much in 1/2. Half of the old 70's fave's and then introduced the new stuff off this album. Vienna being more symphonic and richer sounding than the simpler robotic synth lines and beats of their previous effort 'Systems of Romance' this album took a huge leap forward for the group. Neither distancing themselves from their original sound, the Violins of Billy Currie were still up front and centre in many of the arrangements and given free reign on tracks like Vienna the highly emotive title track. Elsewhere you have the Instrumental lead in 'Astradyne' which shows how to make the most of a Synthesizer back in the 80's, when knob twiddling was how you played Synths rather than too much key work. However it works very well here while the group intelligently veers back to solid song-structure & the great brave vocals of Midge Ure pushing the songs like 'Passing Stranger's' & 'Sleepwalk' along wonderfully. I say brave because this was an obvious transiton for the group from Underdog Synth Punkers to the New Age scene that was fast hitting the U.K. and they straddled it with confidence and panache. Highly emotional songs like 'Vienna' & 'New Europeans' sharing space with beat driven Electro ditties like 'All Stood Still' & 'Sleepwalk' which I believe was their 1st single off the album. The stark white cover with the group in rather awkward stances I think works quite well & even their Logo changed. Certainly one of the top 10 albums in the U.K. of 1980 it jump-started a highly prolific Ultravox for another good few years but they never again achieved the height of sophistication they achieved here. A must buy for any fan of old-school New Wave. Highly recommended. December 11, 2005

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