Visage – Fade To Grey

Blitz kids, French spoken word, European No. 1

On 14 November 1980, Polydor issued Visage’s Fade To Grey on the same day as the band’s self-titled debut album. Steve Strange sang lead. The French spoken lines came from Brigitte Arendt, a Luxembourg student then dating drummer Rusty Egan. The writers credited on the single were Billy Currie, Chris Payne, and Midge Ure. Ure also produced with the band and sang backing vocals beside Egan. John Hudson engineered. The lineup around the sessions also drew on Ultravox and Magazine players such as Currie, Dave Formula, and John McGeoch.

The music began as an instrumental nicknamed Toot City. Currie and Payne worked on the bassline and chords during soundchecks on Gary Numan’s 1979 tour, with drummer Cedric Sharpley involved. Ure heard the piece while on a parallel Thin Lizzy U.S. tour, wrote English lyrics and a top-line melody, and brought it into the Visage track list. Strange took singing lessons with Ure so the vocal would sit in tune on tape. The finished track sets a cool synthesizer pulse under Strange’s restrained delivery and Arendt’s French mid-section. You hear electronic drums, keyed bass figures, Currie’s synth and electric violin colors, and a chorus that repeats the title like a warning rather than a shout.

It was Visage’s first major-label single after an earlier indie release. The song reached No. 8 in the UK, No. 1 in West Germany and Switzerland, and Top 10 across France, Austria, Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Australia, and New Zealand. Kevin Godley and Lol Creme directed the video, one of their early clips; Strange’s friend Julia Fodor mimed the French parts on camera while Arendt’s voice stayed on the record. The look matched the Blitz Club scene Strange helped define: makeup, sharp clothes, and a cold electronic sheen that European radio embraced faster than British rock press expected.