Fade to Grey

"Fade to Grey" was released on November 14, 1980 on Polydor as the second single from Visage, with "The Steps" on the B-side; Wow Vinyl dates it December 1980. The album version is 4:02 and the single edit 3:50. It began as an instrumental called "Toot City", written by Chris Payne and Billy Currie during soundchecks on Gary Numan's 1979 tour; Payne told the Electricity Club that they recorded it at Genetic Studios with Numan's drummer Cedric Sharpley, and that he played the hypnotic synth bassline and haunting string tones on a Polymoog. Ure reworked it, suggested the melody and wrote the lyrics, and Midge Ure and Visage produced. The French spoken vocal is by Brigitte Arendt, per Wikipedia. Strange wrote in Blitzed! that crediting only Ure, Currie and Payne was not fair.

It reached number one in West Germany and Switzerland, three in Austria and France, six in Italy and Australia and eight in the UK, with the UK peak on February 7, 1981; it went gold in France and Germany and silver in the UK. The Bassheads remix reached 39 in 1993. The video, directed by Godley and Creme, was the band's first; Julia Fodor, known as Princess Julia, appears with Strange and mimes the French lyrics. In 2014 they played it in Prague with an orchestra, which led to the orchestral re-recording. Covers and re-recordings include Datura (1994), Mark 'Oh (1996) and Atrocity (2008). Bono's U2 account says Adam Clayton working out its bassline led to "New Year's Day". Strange performed it in the Blitz scene of Ashes to Ashes in 2008.