If you were listening to Numan in '80/'81, there is every reason to suspect that this album was also in your record collection. It was big in my world that's for sure. In the years that followed I must admit that I went on to rate John Foxx's version of the band as it was more aligned to the punk thing that I was retrospectively soaking up. Nevertheless, 'Vienna' remains a great album, if a little of its time. It is hard to listen to the album without mentally processing those moody monochrome images of trenchcoats in the mist, but putting the pomposity of 'Vienna' to one side, the rest of the album was really very good (it's not that I hate 'Vienna', its just one of those songs that are so ubiquitous that it is near impossible to hold an objective view on it any more). There are far more engaging songs on the album, 'All Stood Still', 'Mr X' and 'New Europeans' being good examples,
The whole album conjours up images for me of the whole 'Blitz' scene and New Romantisism. How else could Midge Ure get away with that look without the existance of that scene!
'On a crowded beach washed by the sun, he puts his headphones on
His modern world revolves around the synthesizer's song
Full of future thoughts and thrills, his senses slip away
He's a European legacy, a culture for today
New Europeans
Young Europeans'
New Musical Express (12th July 1980)
Record Mirror (5th July 1980)
Smash Hits (10th July 1980)
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