Systems of Romance [EXTRA TRACKS] [IMPORT] [ORIGINAL RECORDING REMASTERED]

Ultravox

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 29, 2006)
• Original Release Date: August 29, 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Extra tracks, Import, Original recording remastered
• Label: Ume Imports
• ASIN: B000EU1PWS
• In-Print Editions: Audio CD
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #85,527 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Exclusive Japanese limited edition digitally remastered reissue of their 1978 album, packaged in a miniature LP sleeve. Features two bonus tracks: Cross Fade and Quiet Man (Full Version). This was the final album by the original line-up before Midge Ure took over as vocalist and steered the band to world-wide chart success. Island. 2006. --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Birth of Eighties Music, September 5, 2006

By	Thomas Horan (Chapel Hill, NC) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

On this seminal 1978 record, Ultravox and producer Conny Plank ingeniously cut soaring guitar lines across electronic currents, creating a detached, stylish, expansive sound that just about everyone else would mimic until Nirvana released "Nevermind." "Systems of Romance" is basically the Rosetta Stone of new wave, putting everything Bowie tried to achieve with the Eno trilogy and the subsequent contributions of groups like Wire, Joy Division, and Tubeway Army into perspective. Its songs are strong and stunning enough, both lyrically and musically, to convey originality and wonder even today.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stylish Alienation, Synthesized for Your Enjoyment, February 6, 2007

By	Mark Lipton "lipton53" (United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

It was November of '78, punk was dead as proclaimed by Mr. Lydon, and Joy Division's fame in the US was still several years away. Entering the scene was Ultravox with this, their third album, which received airplay on a recently revived KROQ in Pasadena. As a college sophomore working late nights, I listened to many hours of Chuck Randall ("The Midnight Lobotomist") on KROQ. On one such occasion I happened to hear the track "Quiet Men" from this album, and I was so taken with the sparse sound of synthesizers and soaring guitars that I went out the next day and bought the LP. Listening to the album start to finish was a riveting experience. On this album, the raw rage of punk has been replaced by the cold alienation of synthesizers and detached vocals. Even now, nearly 30 years later, the music has a stark power that serves it well.
From the start of Side 1 (now moot with the CD) "Slow Motion" begins the experience with a detached, spacey chorus. "Someone Else's Clothes" is a paranoiac fantasy sung with borderline hysteria by John Foxx, the creative genius behind Systems of Romance (he left after this album and the subsequent Midge Ure-fronted albums never managed to achieve one tenth of the power of this post-punk masterpiece). It is on Side 2 (tracks 6-10) where this album really works its magic. "Quiet Men" is a hypnotic gem, "Dislocation" puts into words the cold disorientation of alienation, "Maximum Acceleration" is possibly the most "drugged out" song of the era (in the words of one of my friends), "When You Walk Through Me" is the blueprint that Gary Numan would follow a few years later to commercial success and "Just for a Moment" is a plaintive coda, slipping into regret and loss while bringing the album to a close.
The album is a seamless whole with very few weak moments and remains an underappreciated masterpiece from its time. John Foxx likewise is today virtually unknown despite making several quintessential New Wave albums. Along with "Unknown Pleasures" this album brilliantely describes the bleak landscape of alienation in late '70s Great Britain and is a must purchase for anyone who is listening to Interpol, Franz Ferdinand or The Editors today.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Apex of New Wave Romanticism, November 1, 2007

By	Chromefreak - See all my reviews

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.