Vienna (album)

Vienna
Ultravox studio album
Publication (s)	July 11, 1980
Label (s)	Chrysalis Records
Format (s)	CD, LP
Genre (s)	Rock , new wave , synth-pop
Title (number)	9
running time	43:44
occupation	Vocals / guitar / keyboard: Midge Ure Bass / Keyboard: Chris Cross Drums / Percussion: Warren Cann Keyboard / violin: Billy Currie
production	Ultravox and Conny Plank
Studio (s)	Recording: RAK Records , London Mixing: Conny's Studio , near Cologne
chronology Systems of Romance (1978) Vienna Rage in Eden (1981)
Single releases July 16, 1980 Sleepwalk October 15, 1980 Passing Strangers January 15, 1981 Vienna May 26, 1981 All Stood Still

Vienna (dt. Vienna ) is the fourth album and the first commercially successful music album of Ultravox after the departure of John Foxx with the new front man Ure . The album was released on July 11, 1980 at Chrysalis Records and is assigned to the genre New Wave . It marks the turning point of the first formation of the band around John Foxx from the commercially unsuccessful post-punk to synth-pop .

A double album of the same name was released on September 22, 2008 as a Remastered Definitive Edition . In addition to a remastered version of the original album on the first CD, it contains a second CD with some B-sides of the single releases, live recordings and previously unreleased songs.

History of origin

After John Foxx left the band after the US tour in March 1979 to start a solo career, the three remaining members of the band were facing the end without a record deal. Through his engagements with Gary Numan and Visage , Billy Currie made contact with Midge Ure, who joined Ultravox in April 1979, but due to contractual obligations with EMI, the record company of the Rich Kids , with which Ure was previously, and a USA and Thin Lizzy's Asian tour did not come together with the band until November. With Ure as the new front man, the band made four appearances in Great Britain and three appearances in the USA in November with songs from the albums already published, mostly written by Foxx. Released on Vienna in the summer of 1980 , but could already be heard on this tour at the end of 1979, were the purely acoustic piece Astradyne , New Europeans and Mr. X , a further development of Touch and Go , the Foxx as the frontman of Ultravox was already on the self-financed USA -Tour in early 1979 and published on Metamatic under his own name. In February 1980, the band signed a new recording deal with Chrysalis Records and toured the United States and Canada for two months in February and March 1980 after performing for the label in London's Electric Ballroom . During this tour, the songs Private Lives , Western Promise , Passing Strangers , All Stood Still , Sleepwalk and Vienna , which were later released on the album, were played.

No new songs were composed for the recordings for the album in London's RAK Studios , only songs that had already been tried out live were recorded. The ten-day recordings in the RAK studios were primarily used to determine the sound the band was looking for, in addition to the recording. Not only the actual recording studios were used for the recordings, but the entire studio building. For example, some drum passages were recorded in the entrance hall of the studio because the sound there was more like the result Cann wanted. Cann was only able to record its passages at night because of the street noise. Currie played the passages on the violin in the studio toilet.

The album was mixed and mastered by Conny Plank in his studio in Wolperath near Cologne. As the album title was briefly proposed by Warren Cann Torque Point (dt. Fulcrum ) talking, but was in favor of Vienna rejected the release the band members as the best composition of the album, despite the slow rhythm and a length of about four minutes as a single wanted to. Plank, who had already worked as a sound engineer and producer for several Krautrock bands and Kraftwerk , was also the co-producer of the album, which is otherwise produced by the band itself.

instrumentation

For the first time all band members used electronic instruments for the album. In addition to the ARP Odyssey (distorted by an Electro-Harmonix Electric Mistress) and the ELKA Rhapsody 610 from Currie and the Roland TR-77 from Cann, with which the band already had two years of experience, were also new Used equipment purchased or in the studio for the album: Cross used a Moog Minimoog for some bass lines, Cann a Roland CR-78 rhythm machine , SDS-3 drum pads from Simmons, Claptrap and a Synare III pad. Currie used - especially live - an electronic piano type Yamaha CP-30 and a Yamaha CS-20 and CS-40 string sounds in addition to its by Barcus-Berry -Abnehmer amplified violin from the Vienna tour. Ure took over the cello accompaniment in the title track with a Yamaha SS-30, while Currie played the acoustic violin as a solo after the tempo change. The rhythm section, in particular, is synthesizer-heavy; where Cann remains true to his acoustic Ludwig set with Zildjian cymbals. Cross took over the bass line of the title track as well as Sleepwalk , New Europeans and All Stood Still with the Minimoog. The CR-78 can be heard as a “ticking” in the first chords with Astradyne and as drums with Mr. X. The claptrap is used at New Europeans and the Synare pad delivers the thunderous sound to the rhythm of the title track. In addition to Currie's violin as a string instrument, an electric bass and an electric guitar were also used as classic rock instruments, which distinguishes Ultravox from synth-pop bands such as The Human League or Depeche Mode , which only used synthesizers and sometimes used tape machines for live performances. Ure himself describes the style in his biography as heavy metal with synthesizers, in which electronic and organic sounds are combined.

Track list

1. Astradyne - 7:07
2. New Europeans - 4:00
3. Private Lives - 4:06
4. Passing Strangers - 3:49
5. Sleepwalk - 3:10
6. Mr. X - 6:33
7. Western Promise - 5:44
8. Vienna - 4:52
9. All Stood Still - 4:23

The Remastered Definitive Edition contains on the second CD:

1. Sleepwalk (Early Version) - 3:23
2. Waiting - 3:53
3. Face to Face (Recorded Live at St. Albans, Aug 16, 1980) - 6:04
4. King's Lead Hat (Recorded Live at The Lyceum, Aug 17, 1980) - 4:07
5. Passionate Reply - 4:46
6. Mr X - 5:52
7. All Stood Still (12 "Version) - 5:07
8. All right - 4:56
9. Keep Talking (Cassette Recording During Rehearsals) - 6:23
10. Sleepwalk (Recorded Live in Rehearsals at The Lyceum, Aug 17, 1980) - 3:43
11. All Stood Still (Recorded Live in Rehearsals at The Lyceum, Aug 17, 1980) - 4:35

Publications and chart successes

The album reached number three in the UK, number 22 in Germany and number 164 in the US album charts. What is remarkable is the very long time spent in the UK Top 75, at 72 weeks. The album reached number one in the Netherlands for six weeks and the top 20 in Sweden and Norway. The album received platinum status in the UK for more than 300,000 records sold.

year	title	Chart positions					annotation
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1980	Vienna	22 (19) May 26, 1981	-	-	3 (72) July 19, 1980	164 (9) September 13, 1980	Platinum in UK

A total of four singles were released from the album: Sleepwalk on June 16, 1980 (before the album was released), Passing Strangers on October 15, 1980, the title track Vienna on January 15, 1981 and All Stood Still on May 26, 1981. All four singles were able to place in the British top 40, Vienna was in the top 40 for a total of 14 weeks, of which four weeks in second place and also reached top 20 positions in Germany and Austria. The single New Europeans was released exclusively in Japan.

year	title	Chart positions					annotation
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1980	Sleepwalk / Waiting	-	-	-	29 (11) 07/05/1980	-
1980	Passing Strangers / Face to Face	-	-	-	57 (4) October 18, 1980	-
1981	Vienna / Passionate Reply	14 (20) April 13, 1981	8 (14) April 15, 1981	-	2 (14) January 17, 1981	-	Gold in UK, Single of the Year 1981
1981	All Stood Still / All clear	69 (2) August 10, 1981	-	-	8 (10) 06.06.1981	-	Silver in UK

tour

In addition to ten gigs in Great Britain in August 1980, the band started a tour known as the Vienna Tour with nine gigs in Great Britain and further concerts in early 1981 on mainland Europe, including Vienna. At the time of the European concerts, the single Vienna made it into the British Top-5 for several weeks and made the band known to a wide audience beyond the borders of the United Kingdom. The participation of Ure and Currie at Visage , who celebrated chart successes across Europe almost simultaneously with the single Fade to Gray and reached the top of the charts in Germany and Switzerland , also contributed to the band's popularity .

The setlist of the tour contained with Slow Motion , Hiroshima Mon Amour and Quiet Men only three songs from the time of John Foxx. In addition to all the songs published on the album, Face to Face and Kings Lead Head were also performed regularly . The title Kings Lead Head is an anagram to the Talking Heads and comes from Brian Eno .

The increased use of electronics on the album made modifications to the synthesizers necessary for live concerts. Since there were no MIDI interfaces at that time, all synthesizers had to be operated manually; they couldn't trigger one another . In particular, Cann and Cross, as a rhythm section, had to manually set each synthesizer to the same rhythm, which caused problems , especially when changing tempos like in the title track by Vienna . To solve the problem, they soldered measuring devices with LED displays into the tempo-setting circuits of their synthesizers so that they could read the voltage values ​​even in poor lighting. The devices were synchronized when the voltage values ​​determined during the rehearsals for each song on the respective device were displayed on the CR-78 and Minimoog. At live concerts, the band was often perceived as humorless and serious. Ure once said that “the technology was so sensitive that the band was always close to a nervous breakdown live and therefore seemed so strict on stage”.

“We refused to use backing tapes. We refused to do any of the stuff the other bands were doing. "

“We refused to use tape recorders . We refused to do any of the stuff that other groups did. "

- Ure in an interview for the Pete Mitchell Show on BBC Radio 2 on April 26, 2009

reception

The contemporary British press did not leave the “atmospheric electronics” (source: New Musical Express ) “the slightest doubt about their musical mastery” (source: Sounds ). Allmusic's David Jeffries describes the band as a "melodramatic synthpop chamber orchestra" and rates the album as "a brave move that took time to pay off".

The sales success, especially in Great Britain, proves that the sound of Vienna still hit the nerve of the times a year after the success of Gary Numan with The Pleasure Principle . The synthesis of stage outfits and synthesizer-oriented music by artists such as Visage, Spandau Ballet , Duran Duran , Japan , Depeche Mode, The Human League or Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark became commercially viable in Europe from 1980 to 1982.

Individual evidence

• Christian Graf and Burghard Rausch: Rock Music Lexicon . Europe / Vol. 2, Lake Zombies. Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag , Frankfurt am Main 1996, ISBN 3-596-12388-7 , pp. 751-1515 .

1. ^ Robin Eggar, Midge Ure - If I Was - The Autobiography, pp. 88-89
2. ↑ ^{a b} Certified Awards Search. In: bpi.co.uk. Retrieved September 14, 2014 . 
3. ↑ ^{a b} Ultravox in the German single charts. (No longer available online.) In: Musicline.de. PhonoNet GmbH, archived from the original on November 21, 2004 ; Retrieved August 27, 2009 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ^ ^{A b} Ultravox in the Austrian hit parade. In: austriancharts.at. Hung Medien, accessed August 27, 2009 . 
5. ↑ ^{a b} Ultravox in the Swiss hit parade. In: hitparade.ch. Hung Medien, accessed August 27, 2009 . 
6. ↑ ^{a b} Ultravox in the UK charts. In: officialcharts.com. Retrieved January 22, 2016 . 
7. ↑ ^{a b} Ultravox in the Billboard 200. In: billboard.com. Retrieved October 25, 2009 . 
8. ↑ Warren Cann and Jonas Wårstad: Ultravox The Story: Warren Cann interviewed by Jonas Wårstad. (PDF: 4.4 MB) In: Ultravox official website. 1997, accessed October 8, 2012 . 
9. ↑ Excerpt from the program Science Topics on the subject of Moog Minimoog . (English)
10. ↑ contemporary press quoted from Graf, Rausch , pp. 1375/1376
11. ^ David Jeffries: Vienna at allmusic. In: allmusic.com. Retrieved September 12, 2010 . 

Web links

• Vienna at Allmusic (English)
• Lyrics of Vienna in LyricWiki
• Booklet of the Remastered Definitive Edition by Vienna (PDF file; 16.0 MB)