Interview with Mide Ure

in the UK's only acoustic guitar magazine: Acoustic

Ure Still Here?

Joel McIver meets everyman guitarist, Band Aid co-writer and now
autobiographer Midge Ure.

"I play small theatres by myself with an acoustic guitar, which means that you have to be convinced that you have something worthwhile singing."

Few musicians of our time have made their mark on as many scenes as Jim 'Midge' Ure, the softly-spoken Glaswegian who has travelled the road of rock as a member of The Rich Kids, Visage, Slik, Thin Lizzy, Ultravox and his own band, all the while sporting the sharpest sideburns known to mankind.
After career milestones such as inspiring the term 'punk' (legendary 70s journalist Caroline Coon first used it after a Midge Ure interview back in those heady days) and pioneering synth-rock with classic Ultravox hits such as 'Vienna', Midge (his first name in reverse) has now penned his memoirs, entitled If I Was.
Bravely detailing his upbringing in the grimmest Glasgow slum, his travails in the music industry, losing all his money when the Monserrat volcano went pop and his alcoholism, Ure's book pulls no punches and reveals his true character -a true gentleman of British music and oh yes, quite an accomplished guitar player...

What's your current guitar setup, Midge?

I play a Takamine and a thin-bodied Crafter electro-acoustic, a micro-thin hollow-bodied thing that you can unscrew the neck off, so it can go in your case. The Takamine sounds great - it looks like something Emmylou Harris would play! I play it through a Trace Elliot 100-watt acoustic amp, which you can't get any more. I don't put the guitar through the wedgies, I just like the voice coming through them, so I use the Trace amp on stage. Electric-wise, I use a matt-black Gordon Smith SG-2, with a single pickup, they make one specially for me. I've ordered one for my daughter, who has just been signed to Polydor. I use a Vox Valvetronics amp too, which has the amp-morphing thing - valve front end and amp modelling so you can dial in whatever sounds you want.
I've also got a 4x12" angled Trace Elliot cab with a Trace 100-watt head, and that has the fattest, crunchiest sound you ever heard. The first time I played it, it had the biggest guitar sound ever and people went, what the hell is that? Even my Vox can't do that when it's fully cranked. I suppose I could emulate it with a pedal but I'm sick of those!

What was your first guitar?

I had a 70s Stratocaster which had been painted badly, there were gobs of paint dripping down it. So I stripped it back to the wood and made it better, and it played OK. It must have been a 50s Strat, because it was old even back in the 70s. I traded it as a straight swap for a Gibson 330, which was what I really wanted - but I put masking tape over the F-holes to avoid feedback. I don't really get feedback with my acoustic guitars when I'm playing live nowadays - I put on an earpiece for the vocals, but because there's no guitar coming through the wedgies there's no problem with feedback.

Famously, Bob Geldof first played you Band Aid's'Do They Know It's Christmas?' on an acoustic guitar with only three strings on it.
That's right! That song was so difficult to compose, because it was done to a brief, for a reason, which meant I had to put a different head on. It's a cheesy song, yes it is! But it's become something else - it's like The Beatles: you forget how cheesy they were at the time. What's been your favourite guitar? I'm a big Gibson SG fan, I've had a variety of SG Standards. My favourite was one with a big chrome tailpiece and the old Gibson wang-bar which nobody ever used because it was so badly designed. But it was beautiful. All my guitars got stolen years ago, though, so I use Gordon Smiths these days - because they're just as good as Gibsons but much more easily replaceable.

Have you got a big guitar collection?

I've got loads of guitars, because they give you all the guitars you need when you become successful.

Are you more of an acoustic player nowadays, after years of electric guitar abuse?
Yes. I'm more acoustic now because in the UK that's simply what is required. The infrastructure of clubs for electric bands to play in isn't really there any more - it's all bar bands and covers bands. So I play small theatres by myself with an acoustic guitar, which means that you have to be convinced that you have something worthwhile singing. I'm a singer-songwriter now rather than a rock star, which is a good thing to be, if you stick around long enough on the British music scene people start to accept you!

Source: Acoustic, UK's only acoustic guitar magazine, February / March 2005.