The crowd thought we were on to something new. And Conny Plank, our producer, replied: “Well, sing that then.”Įven though there was no middle section at that point, we performed it at the Electric Ballroom in Camden. Midge felt a little uncomfortable, because he’d only just joined and thought we were being arty-farty. That was why I did a violin solo that was overly vibrato and romantic. He’d tried too hard to be successful and deliberately overdid it. We’d been listening to music by this old German composer called Max Reger. Midge stood at the mic and came up with the lyrics almost straightaway: “Walked in the cold air, freezing breath on the window pane …” We were denied the No 1 spot by the novelty hit Shaddup You Face Billy Currie We were extremely arrogant back then and probably too prog-rocky. I said to the guys I was keen to do something that sounded like the late-19th-century romantics, like Grieg and Elgar. Ultravox had just hooked up with Midge Ure, who’d replaced John Foxx, and I wanted to use my classical training. Everyone wanted us to write a track called Berlin or Paris. Then, the moment it became huge, the pressure on us to surpass it with a follow-up was incredible. It was too slow, too long and there was a violin solo – the antithesis of a commercial single. It was about £300, which was a substantial amount of money for someone who normally only bought stuff from Save the Children. The only thing that cost money was the Burberry raincoat, because I’d always wanted one. Everything I wore in the video was from thrift shops. Then you go back to your cold, grey, miserable life in Chiswick. In such a crumbling environment, you could easily fall in love. Why Vienna? There was a decaying elegance about it. You’ve gone to this beautiful place, met someone and vowed it is going to continue – and, of course, it doesn’t. Vienna was a love song to an imaginary girl. Everything I wore in the video was from thrift shops Midge UreĪ lot of what Ultravox did back in the day was soundbites. I remember going into the studio with just a line in my head: “The feeling is gone, this means nothing to me – oh Vienna!” That was all I had. The cinematic aspect was high on our agenda: every track was for a movie that didn’t exist. The song had the feel of a haunting mid-European classic, thanks to our keyboard player Billy Currie’s classical training.
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