Vienna is the first of our series of Ultravox re-issues.

When John Foxx left the band in 1979 after their final San Francisco show, to embark on a solo career, it seemed to signal the end for Ultravox. But whilst collaborating on the Blitz Club guru Steve Strange’s Visage project , Billy Currie asked Midge Ure to join the band. Midge had been in Slik and Glen Matlocks The Rich Kids with a couple of successful singles to his name.

For the recording of the subsequent Vienna album, the band again used Systems Of Romance producer Conny Plank. The German who produced Bowies German trilogy of albums Low, Heroes and Lodger, plus Kraftwerk the pioneers of the sythn sound, brought the sound to life and the resulting title track, inspired by Carol Reeds 1949 film The Third Man gave the band their biggest single success to date. The single got massive airplay on BBC Radio and shot up the charts getting to No2 and gaining the infamous award of ‘The Best Record Ever Not To Be No1’.

Although synth based, which holds the album together, diversity does abound. The opening instrumental ‘ Astradyne’, a major risk for a mainstream act, is a complex affair, sweeping along with majestic synth arrangements throughout and Curries superb violin well to the fore. The choppy ‘New Europeans’ is followed by ‘Private Lives’ which ushers in Curries classical piano background, then the first two singles to be taking from the album ‘Passing Strangers’ and ‘Sleepwalk’.

Side 2 though is where the album really takes off. Written as a sequence (this was for vinyl remember) it resumes with the more simple, harsh ‘Mr X’ which saw drummer Warren Cann take a rare lead vocal, its leads into ‘Western Promise’ a frantic rollercoaster of a ride which decends to a single beat that ushers in ‘Vienna’. ‘All Stood Still’ then brings the album it to a close.