History

Many thanks to Oliver over in Germany for helping this page to become the definitive source of information about Visage - especially the discography. If you have any information relating to Visage or Steve Strange please write to me. Please feel free to comment - I make these pages to hear from people with similar tastes in music.

Much of the material has been supplied by This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. who would love to receive mail from other Visage fans around the world.

More recently Steve Strange (via Steph Lynch) has made the Image section possible, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. in Brazil has kept the images coming.

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Thanks to Rhiannon.
1/4/98

Thanks to David
3/2/98

What happened to the original three tracks recorded by him, Steve & Midge?

They were Eve Of Destruction, In the year 2525 and can't remember the other. It might have been the Dancer but it might have been Tar rather than Eve of Destruction. Loads were recorded.

In an interview Steve said that some tracks were discarded for use on Beat Boy as they had become dated. What were these tracks and are tapes available?

Can't remember and no!

Wrote to NME to see if they knew about Steve Strange, got this reply (31/7/96):

"Afraid we have no idea what La Strange is up to professionally but when last spotted by NME he was drunk backstage at the Sex Pistols Finsbury Park concert in June this year. He was sporting a tragic beard and hanging out with Tony James, ex-Sigue Sigue Sputnik etc. NME hasn't written anything about SS for a very long time."

has a great net site which everyone should know about!

History

Live

Steve Strange

Trivia

The Moores Murderer's

Who are Visage?

Fade to Grey

History

Out of the ashes of the London punk scene of 1978 rose a new style of club. It started in Meard Street, Soho, on a Tuesday night at a club called Billy's. DJ Rusty Egan and Steve Strange provided the setting for a mixture of art students, hairdressers and fashion designers to become precursors for the New Romantic movement which defined the next style in music - a cross between the emerging New Wave (Ultravox, Gary Numan, etc.) and an escape from the reactionary image of punk. Three factors contributed to the success of the club: the music was sophisticated and danceable (Roxy Music, Kraftwerk, Human League and David Bowie), there was no violence, and the participants ultra-chic appearance. Billy's became too small and Tuesday nights moved across town to Great Queen Street, Covent Garden, in 1979, Blitz became the new location for these early rave parties and the yardstick by which all other clubs have been measured. Club for Heroes became the place to be seen in 1981. When everyone else started to do it, the duo raised close to a million pounds and transformed an old cinema (The Music Machine) into the first "full-time" club location called Camden Palace in April 1982, "Slum it in Style" on Tuesdays was the place to be. Where did Steve Strange fit into this picture? Starting out as a shop assistant at PX, he became the doorman (notorious at Blitz for letting in David Bowie but not Mick Jagger) in the early days and hosted Club for Heroes and Camden Palace. He also designed Visage and described the music as Futuristic.

Live

1. On the Channel 4 music show 'The Tube' in 1982. The line up was Steve, Rusty, Billy Currie, Dave Formula and Steve Barnacle. The played Pleasure Boys and The Anvil.

2. At the Monteray Festival in 1984. The line up was as per Beat Boy. Play list unknown.

Visage did a session for Radio 1's David Jensen show in 1984 which was played during an interview with Steve and Rusty. The line up was Steve, Rusty, Steve Barnacle, Andy Barnett and Mulligan (from Fashion) on keyboards. The tracks recorded were Questions, Only The Good Die Young, Can You Hear Me and The Promise.

Steve Strange

Born in Wales, educated at Oakdale Comprehensive School and expelled for dying his hair orange. He was invited to London by Billy Idol. Missed out on becoming a member of Gen X after hesitating on the move. Instead he did artwork for the bands posters, advertisements and album covers. After a short lived existence in a band called the Moores Murderer's and a band called the Photons, he met up with Rusty Egan of the Rich Kids - the rest is History. On March 5th 1986, at the London Hippodrome, Steve Stange unveils his new band, Strange Cruise, which features former Photo's singer Wendy Wu on vocals. The single "Rebel Blue Rocker" was released on 24th February. He resurfaced in 1989 organising club nights around Scotland and giving interviews about how he conquered his heroin addiction.

Steve Strange - 1982

Name: Steve Harrington
Height: 5'11"
Weight: 10.5 St.
Sign: Gemini
Birth date: 28/5/59
Birthplace: Wales
Ambition: To actually find a script that I would like to do
Turn-offs: Bad breath, chipped nail varnish
Favourite food: Italian
Preferred performers: Shirley Bassey, Frank Sinatra
All time favourite song: Mother and Child Reunion
Best films: The Damned, Death in Venice
Favourite reading matter: Last Exit to Brooklyn
Favourite outfit: P.X., Melisa Caplan, Anthony Price
Perfect evening: Afternoon tea at the sterling club
Desert island companion: K.W.
Best and worst characteristics: Rude when drunk, I get taken in too easily
Secret: Not telling you

Steve Strange - 1981

Steve Strange - 1982

Steve Strange - 1983

Top 5 Best Dressed Men

1. Edward Fox - Actor
He was superb in Edward and Mrs Simpson and the costumes he wore were just tremendous. Fox has a perfect face, too. A man with a really great sense of style.

2. Quentin Crisp - Gay Author
I like him for his eccentricity. He had an awful lot og guts to walk around in the streets the way he did in those days.

3. David Bowie - Singer
I love the way he never stays in the same guise for too long. People say I copy him, and that's the only sense in which I do. I do admire people who always move on and change.

4.
I would like to include Bryan Ferry, but he's stayed the same for too long. So Adam Ant is number 4. He puts his clothes together very well in a clever and inventive way. He looks great.

5. Me, of course.

Trivia

David Bowie attended one of Steve and Rusty's "Bowie Night's" at Billy's which was the inspiration for his single 'Boy's Keep Swinging'. It also led to Bowie inviting Steve to appear on his 'Ashes to Ashes' video, you can see him in front of the bulldozer.

Steve appeared on two TDK tape adverts in Japan. The music used was Night Train and Whispers which were both subsequently released as singles.

The Moors Murderer's

Steve Brady (Steve Strange) approached Christine Hindley (Chrissie Hynde) at the Vortex club with the proposal that she help him get a record contract by pretending (no pun intended) to be the guitarist in this fictitious band. He performed three songs for her acapella, the subject was criminals, one about Myra Hidley, one about Capone and the third about the Kray brothers. Chrissie was strongly against the whole concept but got mixed up in the media circus that followed. It even went as far as the press saying there was a single out on the Popcorn label, the songs were supposed to be "Free Myra Hindley" and "The 10 Commandments". Some of the lyrics were:

Who are Visage?

On Visage

• Steve Strange: vocals
• Rusty Egan: drums, electronic percussion, saxaphone, backing vocals
• Midge Ure: guitar, keyboards, bass guitar, backing vocals
• Billy Currie: electric violin, keyboards
• John McGeough: guitar
• Dave Formula: keyboards
• Barry Adamson: bass

On The Anvil

• Steve Strange: vocals
• Rusty Egan: drums, electronic percussion, saxaphone, backing vocals
• Midge Ure: guitar, keyboards, bass guitar, backing vocals
• Billy Currie: electric violin, keyboards
• Barry playing all the bass guitars
• Dave Formula: keyboards
• Barry Adamson: bass
• Gary Barnacle: saxaphone
• Perry & Lorraine: backing vocals

On Beat Boy

• Steve: vocals, keyboards
• Rusty: percussion, keyboards, backing vocals
• Steve Barnacle: bass
• Andy Barnett: guitar
• Gary Barnacle: saxaphone
• Marsha Raven/etc.: backing vocals

"When we started Billy's the only music there was the Human League, the Normal, Bowie and Roxy. The Rich Kids were about to split up and had some studio time they knew they weren't going to use, so we decided to record some music we could play at Billy's - that's how Visage started." "The meaning of Visage, apart from being French for face, is that the Vis is for the visual side of the band, the Visa...well, although we canít tour at the moment, as itís impossible to get everyone together, we will do, and like (Spandau) Ballet we wonít do run of the mill stuff, it'll be select gigs - that Visa is going to take us throughout, even if it's only me and Rusty itís going to take us to America or wherever, and the Age is the new age in dance music. That's how I see it."

Speak Japanese? Then check out this page, even has some words to Fade to Grey.

The true French words in Fade to Grey thanks to Stéphane Delhautal

Midge Ure, Billy Currie (Ultravox) and Chris Payne (Gary Numan band) are credited with writing the song. Gary Numan shed some light on the matter for the Numan Digest.

"As far as I'm concerned Chris and Billy were the driving force behind writing 'Fade To Grey'. They used to work on it during the sound checks on my '79 tour. Cedric (Sharpley - Gary Numan band) was also heavily involved. In those days it was called 'Toot City'."

Versions

• Fade To Grey (Original 7")
• Fade To Grey (Live At Rehearsals 27/9/85) b-side of the Midge Ure 12" That Certain Smile
• Fade To Grey (Dance Mix)
• Fade To Grey (Bassheads 7" Edit)
• Fade To Grey (7" Remix)
• Fade To Grey (Bassheads Dub)
• Fade To Grey (Bassheads Trance)
• Fade To Grey (Subliminal Mix)
• Fade To Grey (Wild Cat Mix)

Covers

• Datura - 1994
• Fierce Ruling Diva - ?
• Sector Wave - 1992
• Mark 'oh - 1997
• Monumentum - ?
• Trance to the Sun - 1998 (from New Wave goes to Hell)
• Nerve Factor - ?

Samples

• U96 - I Wanna Be a Kennedy

Other Covers

• Psyche - The Damned Don't Cry