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Midge Ure OBE (born James Ure, 10 October 1953, Cambuslang,
Lanarkshire, Scotland) is a rock and roll guitarist, singer, keyboard player, and
songwriter. He had particular success in the 1970s and 1980s. His stage name,
Midge, is a phonetic reversal of his real name, Jim.
 Career
Ure began his career with Slik. Before Slik became famous they were known as
Salvation and were the house band playing mostly covers in Glasgow disco Clouds
(above Green’s Playhouse), where all major bands played when they came to the city.
Midge played guitar. He turned down an offer to be the lead singer of the Sex
Pistols. He would go on to play in The Rich Kids (with then-former Sex Pistol Glen
Matlock) and temporarily for Thin Lizzy before replacing John Foxx as singer of
electronic New Wave band Ultravox in 1979. Shortly afterwards, they had a huge UK
hit with "Vienna", and became one of Britain's top bands for several years. Also
later that year, Ure also formed the band Visage with Steve Strange and fellow
former Rich Kid Rusty Egan. The following year, Ure and Thin Lizzy leader Phil
Lynott co-wrote Lynott's biggest solo hit, "Yellow Pearl". A re-recording of the
song done in 1981 was used as the theme for Top of the Pops.
Midge also worked as a producer for other artists. Steve Harley and New Wave group,
STRASSE.
In 1984, Ure co-wrote with Bob Geldof and produced the Band Aid hit, "Do They Know
It's Christmas?". He and Geldof jointly set up the Band Aid Trust and he remains
active as a Band Aid Trustee to this day. He was also the co-organiser of Live Aid.
The following year Ure scored his one and only solo UK number one single with "If I
Was". This was followed by the album The Gift. Ultravox as a band did not last more
than a year or so after Live Aid.
After members of Ultravox went their separate ways, Ure pursued a solo career which
included the international hit, 'Breathe,' also used in a Swatch TV ad
campaign.
Ure recently organized Live 8 concerts with Bob Geldof with the aim of pressing G8
leaders into taking action to end world poverty. In 2005 he was made an Officer of
the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to music and charity.
Ure received three honorary degrees in recent years. He was made an Honorary Doctor
of Arts in 2005 by the University of Abertay Dundee for his artistic and charity
work over the past 30 years. He was made a Doctor of Music by University of
Edinburgh in 2006. In 2007 Ure received his third honorary doctorate from the
University of Paisley for his contribution to Scottish culture and charity
work.
He is an Ambassador for Save the Children and in recent years has gone back to
Ethiopia and visited Sierra Leone in that capacity.
Ure continues to perform his own songs, along with popular Ultravox songs, in
concerts both solo, acoustic and with a band. In 2007 the single "Personal Heaven",
credited to Midge Ure & X-perience was released in Germany.
Personal
life
Ure resides in the village of Box near the city of Bath.
Ure has been married twice: to actress and writer Annabel Giles (with whom he has
one daughter, Molly) and to Sheridan Forbes (with whom he has three daughters,
Kitty, Ruby and Flossie).
His daughter Molly has followed her father into the music industry, as the
guitarist and vocalist of pop punk band The Faders, who split in July 2006. She is
now pursuing a solo career.
Ure's two main passions are music and cooking. He was able to indulge the second of
these in the 2007 Celebrity Masterchef series, easily winning his heat and
progressing to the final on 15 June, alongside Nadia Sawalha and Craig Revel
Horwood. Although all three competitors greatly impressed the judges, the trophy
was won by Sawalha.
Ure made a speech and gave prizes at Prior Park College's annual speech day, on 7
July 2007.
Source : Some of the information on
this page came from a Wikipedia article and is licensed under the GNU
Documentation License. ©2008 www.geneticmatrix.com.
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Midge
Ure - Manifestor - Biography
