Ultravox
No
other band in the select coterie of the New
Romantics expanded beyond its initial frontiers as radically
as the London-based Ultravox, whose early work bore all the
hallmarks of the scene thanks to the synth experimentalist and
frontman John Foxx (real name Dennis Leigh).
Formed way back in 1974, Ultravox originally consisted of Foxx
plus bassist Chris Cross, keyboard player and violinist Billy
Currie, guitarist Steve Shears and Canadian drummer Warren Cann.
Foxx moved to London from Chorley, Lancashire, to study
illustration at the Royal College of Art in 1973 and decided to
form a band after a seminar discussion on Design For The Real
World, which stressed the importance of involvement above
theory.
He spent his student grant on a small PA system and the group
began rehearsing in the college canteen.
Their Bowie and Roxy
Music-influenced sound led to a deal with Island Records at
the height of punk, and a major coup was scored when Brian Eno
agreed to produce their eponymous debut album (which failed to
chart).
When James "Midge" Ure replaced Foxx as singer in
1979 (following a six week tour of the US), the group had recently
been dropped from Island after three unsuccessful albums (Ultravox!,
Ha! Ha! Ha! and Systems Of Romance).

Ure's CV - listing a Number One hit with Slik
in 1977 and a tour with Thin Lizzy as
a stand-in guitarist - demonstrated the kind of professional nous
that might resurrect Ultravox's career.
So it proved when the portentous Vienna reached Number
Two in January 1981, famously denied the top spot by Joe Dolce's Shaddap
Your Face.
The
hits kept coming both for Ultravox (notably the electro-pop
melodrama Dancing With Tears In My Eyes) and for Ure the
solo artist, who finally bagged a Number One with If I Was
in 1985. Two months later, Live Aid
climaxed with Midge and Saint Bob's Do They Know It's
Christmas?
In October 1986 Ultravox released their final album, U-Vox.
The album was a Top 10 hit in the UK but didn't make a dent in the
US charts.
When the downturn came it came quickly and Ultravox finally
split in 1987 when Ure decided to turn his full attention to his
solo career.
The others renamed the band U-Vox for a while, before
vanishing, more or less completely.
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