Vienna (Ultravox Song)
"Vienna" is a song by the British New Wave band Ultravox. It was the third single and the title track from the band's fourth album.
The single was released on Chrysalis Records on 15 January 1981, and is notable for spending 4 consecutive weeks at #2 in the UK singles chart without ever getting to #1. "Vienna" was kept off the UK #1 slot by John Lennon's "Woman" for a week, and then by Joe Dolce's novelty hit, "Shaddap You Face", for a further 3 weeks, although "Vienna" did sell more copies than either of these records and ranked as the 5th best selling UK single for 1981.
It also won "Single of the Year" at the 1981 Brit Awards. To date, it remains Ultravox's signature song, being their most commercially successful release and is often played live by Midge Ure in solo performances.
Ure said of the track: "We wanted to take the song and make it incredibly pompous in the middle, leaving it very sparse before and after, but finishing with a typically over-the top classical ending."
Read more about Vienna (Ultravox Song): Background, Music Video, B-sides, Reissue, Track Listings, Chart Performance, Vienna 92, Cover Versions, Media References
Famous quotes containing the word vienna:
“All the terrors of the French Republic, which held Austria in awe, were unable to command her diplomacy. But Napoleon sent to Vienna M. de Narbonne, one of the old noblesse, with the morals, manners, and name of that interest, saying, that it was indispensable to send to the old aristocracy of Europe men of the same connection, which, in fact, constitutes a sort of free- masonry. M. de Narbonne, in less than a fortnight, penetrated all the secrets of the imperial cabinet.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)