You know you're getting old when...
...you find out that Midge Ure is seventy-five years of age!
Former member of Slik, The Rich Kids and Thin Lizzy, Mr Ure was airlifted into becoming the frontman for Ultravox in 1979 (after their founder and vocalist John Foxx left to go solo) by keyboardist Billy Currie (with whom he had worked as part of Visage with Steve Strange and Rusty Egan). Arriving just at the right time for the rise of the "New Romantics" - a style movement they themselves had partially instigated with Visage - this brand-new incarnation of the band became an instant hit, dominating the charts alongside the likes of Spandau Ballet, Depeche Mode, Soft Cell and Human League.
In 1981 alone, Midge (it's a nickname, from reversing "Jim"; the shortened form of his name) and the boys had a string of reasonably successful chart hits, including Sleepwalk, Passing Strangers, All Stood Still and, of course, this one - notorious as "the nation's favourite Number 1-that-never-was", thanks to the awful novelty song Shaddup You Face by Joe Dolce - it is a classic song that (together with its video, which was largely filmed about as far from its eponymous location as possible, in Covent Garden in the heart of London) just about summed up that brave new musical world...
We walked in the cold air
Freezing breath on a window pane
Lying and waiting
A man in the dark in a picture frame
So mystic and soulful
A voice reaching out in a piercing cry
It stays with you until
The feeling has gone, only you and I
It means nothing to me
This means nothing to me
Ah, Vienna
The music is weaving
Haunting notes, pizzicato strings
The rhythm is calling
Alone in the night as the daylight brings
A cool, empty silence
The warmth of your hand and a cold grey sky
It fades to the distance
The image has gone, only you and I
It means nothing to me
This means nothing to me
Ah, Vienna
This means nothing to me
This means nothing to me
Ah, Vienna
Mystic and soulful, indeed.
Many happy returns, James "Midge" Ure OBE (born 10th October 1953)
Footnote:
Mr Ure shares his landmark birthday with a huge raft of assorted "names", including the centenaries of both Nicholas Parsons and Murray Walker, the 210th anniversary of the birth of Giuseppe Verdi, the 120th of composer and songwriter Vernon Duke, and the birthdays of Winston Churchill, Harold Pinter, Charles Dance, Kirsty MacColl, Helen Hayes, Willard White, Lilly Daché, David Lee Roth, Crystal Waters, Ed Wood, Martin Kemp, Sarah Lancashire, Dan Stevens, Chris Tarrant, Judith Chalmers, Matthew Pinsent, Amanda Burton, Thelonious Monk, Gabriella Cilmi and wrestler Giant Haystacks. Phew.
