Midge Ure Revives Visage and Ultravox in New York City with His Band in a Box, Blancmange Close First U.S. Tour in Nearly 40 Years

Less than a week after playing the Cruel World Festival in Pasadena, California, Midge Ure made his way to the East Coast and played a more intimate room at Sony Hall in New York City on May 22. The second-to-last stop on the North American leg of Ure’s Band in a Box tour highlights his extensive songbook with Ultravox, along with Visage and his solo career.

Before Ure and longtime keyboardist and Band in a Bix partner Charlie Round-Turner performed, synth-pop duo Blancmange, who also played Cruel World on May 17, played their last in a four-date run of shows in the U.S., in New York. The small tour marked Blancmange’s first tour in America in nearly 40 years.

Originally formed in 1979 by Neil Arthur and Stephen Luscombe, the duo released three albums, including their breakout Mange Tout in 1984. After breaking up in 1986, the two reformed in 2006 and released their fourth album together, Blanc Burn, in 2011 before Luscombe parted ways that year due to health reasons. Arthur continued on solo and as Blancmange, releasing Private View in 2022.

Everything is Connected – The Best of Blancmange 1979-2024 was released in 2024, celebrating the 40th anniversary of Blancmange, and Arthur hit on the band’s four decades within the 12-song set.

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Backed by Tara Busch on synth for the five-date run, including a charity concert in Mississauga, on May 24, Blancmange delivered a set of something old and new, opening on 2024 single “Again, I Wait for the World” before going back to the 1982 debut Happy Families with “Feel Me.” Later on, “Waves,” “I’ve Seen the World,” and “Living on the Ceiling,” which went to No. 7 in the UK, were also pulled from the album, along with more from Mange Tout—”Game Above My Head” and “Don’t Tell Me.”

Blancmange’s 1986 release Believe You Me was skipped in favor of Private View with “Some Times These,” and even “Last Night (I Dreamy I Had a Job),” from 2016 release Commuter 23—and teasing Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love” at its end—along with “What’s the Time? from Unfurnihsed Room (2017).

After playing their first shows in decades, with stops with Ure at Cruel World, San Francisco, and Denver, before New York, Arthur reminded the crowd that Blancmange hadn’t played in the U.S. in 39 years. Arthur, who released his solo debut, Suitcase, in 1994 and Analogue Synth Stories in 2016, joked about returning to the States throughout the years, as himself.

“I came back as Neil Arthur,” he said. “I came back as myself. It’s difficult. I’ve gotta say, I prefer being this.”

Carrying each piece attentively and effortlessly, Arthur and Busch closed the night with three of Blancmange’s Top 10 UK hits, “Living on the Ceiling,” “Blind Vision,” and “Don’t Tell Me.”

[RELATED: American Songwriter Interview with Midge Ure — 2024]

Within 15 minutes, Ure opened the night with his 1988 solo hit “Dear God” and “Call of the Wild.”

“This is something I wrote and I produced a gazillion years ago, but I didn’t sing it, so I’m going to sing it for you tonight and hopefully you’ll sing it back to me,” said Ure before moving into the lone “Visage” song of the night, the band’s 1980 debut “Fade to Grey.”

The majority of the Band in a Box set centered around Ultravox classics “Vienna,” “Dancing with Tears in My Eyes,” and “Lament,” and more from the band’s catalog. “We’re going deep deep into the past on this one, into Ultravox territory,” Ure said to the audience before playing “I Remember (Death in the Afternoon)” from the band’s 1981 album Rage in Eden.

Ultravox fits the more compact nature of Ure’s Band in the Box with Turner, manning programmed drums, samples, and loops, and Ure switching between synth to electric guitar. And it’s the closest fans will get to seeing Ultravox live since there’s little chance, Ure has said, of a reunion with keyboardist Billy Currie and drummer Warren Cann, following the death of Ultravox bassist Criss Cross in March 2024.

Ure never reunited with Visage after recording two albums with them, Visage (1980) and The Anvil (1982). Visasage vocalist Steve Strange also died in 2015 at age 55.

“It’s the closest that people are going to get to hear what Ultravox would have sounded like in the day, or if Visage should ever perform live,” Ure told American Songwriter of the tour in 2024.

“I’m kicking myself that I didn’t do it earlier, that I didn’t do it years ago,” added Ure. “There was some reticence. I thought people would see it as some glorified karaoke because it’s only two of us on stage, but honestly, these days, people don’t care. They don’t care that there’s no drummer, no bass player when they hear something that they thought they would never hear live.”

This year is one of milestone anniversaries for Ure, marking the 40th anniversary of Ure’s solo debut, The Gift, and four decades since he co-founded Live Aid with Bob Geldof. The Band in a Box Tour will continue to the UK and the rest of Europe, with dates in Australia and New Zealand, through January 2026.

“I’m loving my New York choir,” said Ure. “I’m going to completely blow the whole evening by playing this song, but this is a very poignant, slow song. I went to Scotland to write some songs for Ultravox back in the day, and I came back incredibly Scottish,” joked Ure before going into “Lament,” the title track of the band’s 1984 album.

Towards the end of the night, The Gift resurfaced again with “If I Was” before Ure ended without an encore, on the Lament single “One Small Day.”

Setlist: Midge Ure and Blancmange at Sony Hall, May 22, 2025

Blancmange

1. Again, I Wait for the World
2. Feel Me
3. Reduced Voltage
4. Game Above My Head
5. Last Night (I Dreamt I Had a Job)
6. Waves
7. Some Times These
8. I’ve Seen the Word
9. What’s the Time?
10. Living on the Ceiling
11. Blind Vision
12. Don’t Tell Me

Midge Ure

1. Dear God
2. Call of the Wild
3. I Remember (Death in the Afternoon)
4. Fade to Grey
5. We Stand Alone
6. Dancing With Tears in My Eyes
7. Vienna
8. Reap the Wild Wind
9. Lament
10. All Stood Still
11. Hymn
12. If I Was
13. One Small Day

Photos by Tina Benitez-Eves