Search - Ultravox :: Systems of Romance

A landmark recording

Steven Guy | Croydon, South Australia | 03/22/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I was captivated by this album in the late 1970s. Some of the songs continue to impress me today. I think that this album represents the most consistent, coherent and succinct musical, emotional, intellectual and stylistic statement on recording of Ultravox under John Foxx. Midge Ure took the band in a quite different direction around two years later.



The things I like most about "Systems of Romance" are the imaginative and expressive lyrics for the songs and the endeavour to present the songs from different and unconventional (for the time) angles. For instance, the acoustic drums were recorded through fuzz boxes in places. The electric violin and guitars were subject to "treatments" through synthesizers, too. What we hear is a "Punk Rock" sound in transition or metamorphosis - "evolving", if you like.



Some have said that the songs on this album represent alienation and the use of synthesizers makes the music cold in some way. I strongly disagree. I feel that "Systems of Romance" presents us with some very personal and, indeed, beautiful poetry from John Foxx. The songs present us with feelings of yearning, desire, regret and, sometimes, wild flights of the imagination. The synthesizers and piano actually warm up the sound and make it much more "cushy", colourful and luxurious than the previous Ultravox albums. "Just for a moment" could be considered the "Genesis point" of the whole concept of "New Romantics", however, that does rather trivialise this beautiful and unconventional song.



The album, "Systems of Romance", ended John Foxx's work with Ultravox, but he continued the ideas, themes and styles of this album on his own solo album, "The Garden", several years later.



John Foxx performed and, perhaps, still performs, some of the songs from Systems of Romance in concert. I have live recordings of some of them and they do suggest how Ultravox may have sounded if John Foxx had stayed with the group. In retrospect, "Vienna" was good, "Rage In Eden" was inspired in places and every subsequent Ultravox album was less and less interesting. A pity, really."

The Apex of New Wave Romanticism

Chromefreak | 11/01/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Systems of Romance is aptly titled: the sleek but creamy veneer of Conny Plank's brilliant production perfectly complements the ethos of John Foxx's alienated technician posturings and Billy Currie's melodramatic but insanely gorgeous synthesizer/violin soundscapes. Fusing lyrical elements from French new wave cinema (particularly Godard and Resnais) with space cadet era Bowie and a music indebted to, though not derived from, Eno, early Roxy Music and Neu, Systems of Romance quite literally introduced a fresh, new approach to music back in 1978. Amazingly, it's dated very little, if at all. The opening track "Slow Motion" is a pulse-pounding number that reminds one of what Kraftwerk might've sounded like had they had a guitarist and a rhythm section. The evocative "I Can't Stay Long" is a showcase for Foxx's icy vocals and is one of the album's best tracks. Of course, there's the classic minimalist synth-pop of "The Quiet Men" and the entrancing "Dislocation." Then there's the hauntingly beautiful "Just for a Moment"--as poignant a post-nuclear holocaust song as you'll ever hear. Quite frankly, there's not a poor track anywhere on Systems of Romance. And for anyone desirous of understanding the origins of much of today's music, they should avail themselves not only of Systems of Romance but some of the other artists mentioned above."