Midge Ure, 72, is a Scottish singer-songwriter, best known as the voice of Ultravox’s “Vienna” and co-writing “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” in 1984, as well as a key organiser of Live Aid the following year. Born into a working-class family near Glasgow, he trained as an engineering apprentice, before scoring his number one, “Forever and Ever”, with the band Slik. He lives near Bath with his wife Sheridan, a yoga teacher; they have four daughters, Molly, 39, Kitty, 32, Ruby, 29, and Flossie, 27. His ninth solo album, A “Man Of Two Words”, is out in May, with a tour running until November.
Here he looks back at the moments that shaped him, from growing up in a crowded slum, passing on the Sex Pistols, getting sober, and why Band Aid still gives him a jolt four decades on.
My childhood sounds grotty, but I’ve got nothing but happy memories. Everyone I knew was in the same situation. I was born in a tenement slum on the outskirts of Glasgow– outside toilet, water running under the floorboards, communal areas lit by gas mantle. It was freezing – you could draw on the condensation on the windows – but warm in bed, weighed down by multiple blankets.
I remember open fires and the magical build-up to Christmas. My dad drove a bakery van after being in the war; my mum did a myriad of jobs, including working in a Hoover factory, to make ends meet. I shared the one bedroom with my older brother. My parents slept in a cavity bed with my younger sister – a hole in the wall with a mattress and curtains. The radio was always on, so the flat was filled with music.
Singing didn’t cost anything, so I sang along to whatever I heard on the radio – 1950s bebop, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Scottish accordion music. Eventually, I got a guitar from a dodgy distant relative, and taught myself using Bert Weedon’s Play In a Day book – the same tutorial book Lennon, McCartney, Eric Clapton and Brian May used.
I formed my first group in secondary school. My mate Jim and I would sit in our bedrooms, working out Beatles songs by ear from the record player. Then we found a drummer and would play at Saturday Morning Pictures at the local cinemas – cartoons, a movie, and us singing whatever was in the charts.
My parents wanted my brother and I to have a trade. I left school at 15 for a four-year engineering apprenticeship at the National Engineering Laboratories in East Kilbride, playing in bands at weekends. At 18, I joined a full-time band, Salvation. After seeing Dirty Harry, we all got James Dean quiffs and renamed ourselves as Slik, with me on lead vocals.
We got to number one, but it didn’t make me happy. We came to London to record and were given a cover – “Forever and Ever”. The track was already recorded; all I did was sing. It went to number one in 1976. I was in a successful band, but hadn’t played a note towards its success.
I turned down joining the Sex Pistols in 1975. Two years later, Glenn Matlock – the original Sex Pistols bassist – invited me to join the Rich Kids. I wanted to bring in a synthesiser, which immediately split the band. When I joined Ultravox in 1979, I knew I’d found my home.
I’ve been with my wife for 35 years, and we have four beautiful daughters. I could have easily missed that particular bus, and not had the headaches and heartaches that come with true love.
I don’t feel the desire to go to football matches, or golfing and skiing holidays with the boys. My wife’s a yoga teacher, so very spiritual. We don’t have to interrupt our individual lives to be a couple. Touring means long stretches alone in hotel rooms, but I’m happy in my own company.
I’ll never forget the look in one of my daughter’s eyes when she found me with a bottle. It was devastating. The idea of her dad as a knight in shining armour collapsed. So, I stopped drinking 20 years ago – I’d had more than my fair quota. I remember playing the Whiskey A Go Go in Los Angeles with Ultravox. A waitress came up, wearing a bandolier of shot bottles and glasses, asked: “What do you guys want to drink before the show?” and gave me a rum and Coke. That was the start of my big downfall.
I started doing all the stuff that you vow you’ll never do – never drink on your own, never drink during the day, never drink a whole bottle. You become someone you wouldn’t want to spend five minutes with.
Performing is like running a marathon every night. Singing for an hour and 45 minutes takes its toll. I eat after the show, which isn’t great because I don’t burn it off. I balance that by eating much better at home.
God knows what fragile, broken bits I’ve got inside me. Back in my day, you were told you were thick rather than being diagnosed with ADHD or dyslexia. If I were to sit on a psychiatrist’s couch, it might all come out. Right now, it comes out in the form of songs.
I’m still not sure how we pulled off Band Aid. We had no money, no office, no secretary, no telephone. There was no internet and no mobile phones with instant access to anybody on the planet. I’m still very much involved as one of the trustees who oversees the distribution of the funds. Every day there’s a request for funding.
I’m still proud of “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” – although the song is pretty dodgy. There’s no chorus, the lyrics are a very difficult subject matter, but it does its job. Every time I hear the opening clang of doom coming out a supermarket speaker in October, the hair on my arm still stands up – in a good way.
Midge’s new album ‘A Man Of Two Worlds’ is out now. He’s currently on tour