Before Midge Ure and Vienna, Ultravox! were an arty and only mildly pretentious electro-pop band who got caught up inadvertently in the punk revolution. Brian Eno produced their debut album and Krautrock titan Conny Plank their third (and last); all are reissued next month. When Ure replaced John Foxx in 1980, a little part of many fans died.
1 Hiroshima Mon Amour This could have been cringe-making; instead, Foxx’s ice-cool narrative and a plaintive sax propel it to greatness.
Advertisement
2 Saturday Night in the City of the Dead A harmonica-driven glam-rock blast that’s a lost Bowie track in all but name.
3 Slow Motion Could Gary Numan’s Cars have existed without this?
4 Rockwrok “F*** like a dog, bark like a shark,” Foxx suggests on this buzz-saw stomp.
5 My Sex To some a foppish folly, to others an austere art-rock masterpiece.
6 Some of Them Want to hear the inspiration for Franz Ferdinand? It’s here.
7 Slip Away Bordering on prog: of course they weren’t punk.
Advertisement
8 The Man Who Dies Every Day Heralding the coming new-romantic explosion. Yes, it was their fault.
9 Maximum Acceleration A superbly ominous, eastern-bloc-drab Plank production.
Advertisement
10 The Wild, the Beautiful and the Damned Four years before Vienna, Billy Currie flexed his fiddle over this.
Download At www.napster.co.uk