If you want to hear Rusty Egan on Visage’s biggest hit, “Fade to Grey,” you need to get the single version. Hear that DUUSSCHHH… extended hit from the Simmons SDS? That’s Egan. The iconic drums, though? Not Egan. They were provided by the late, great Cedric Sharpley from Gary Numan’s touring band and Dramatis.
Egan’s public campaign to claim part of the royalties for “Fade to Grey” has failed for one, very simple, reason: he didn’t write the song. He added sounds to it and said “Fade to grey.” His then-girlfriend spoke in French over it (and, according to Midge Ure, returned to claim £7,000 for the translation). Decades after Chris Payne, Billy Currie, and Sharpley crafted the song, and Ure laid down the lead vocals at Martin Rushent’s studio, Egan’s frustration at being a session man in his own project has become an obsession.
The tension between Egan’s ego and achievements is the crux of the stories he has dined out on (literally and figuratively) since the 1980s. On the one hand, his gift for the gab and engineering spirit often found him in the right places at the right times. On the other hand, being a gobby drummer with lots of ideas doesn’t translate directly into success in art or business. In his newly-released autobiography, Egan points to a number of cases in which he acted as the motivating spirit but came up short in the execution.
As Egan told New Sounds, New Styles about “Blocks on Blocks,” the Visage song:
I couldn’t say that I wrote that song, because I had no idea of how to turn it into a piece of music.
Egan has revealed many times – as a raconteur at Pizza Express and perennial interviewee – that he is fuelled by resentment that “his” accomplishments aren’t recognised (least of all by publishers, despite his background in publishing). The problem is, many of what he thinks of as “his” ideas were carried into practice by people more talented or charismatic than him.
Take Visage – which is where we came in. The project coalesced around Egan’s Rich Kids band-mate, Midge Ure, whom he surrounded with the members of Magazine and Ultravox. Ure was at the core; setting himself up to write the songs. Steve Strange – Egan’s nightclubbing partner in crime – was brought in as the face of the studio project and lead singer. Just listen to the recordings, however – certain of the tracks sound curiously like Ure’s guide vocals were left in. It was that kind of project.
One of Egan’s complaints is that Visage was meant to be a collective, and that the production credit should have been for the group alone. In his own autobiography, Ure, who claimed a production credit alongside Visage, set out his perspective:
Rusty’s production contribution was when he turned up for twenty minutes in the evening before he nipped out to the clubs, said, ‘Oh, I like that,’ and then disappeared. That pissed me off.
After two successful albums with Visage, Ure moved on to focus on his career as the front man for Ultravox. Egan and Strange decided to carry on by themselves, releasing Beat Boy in 1984. Without Ure’s talent, however, it foundered. The dream of being Visage and living the Visage lifestyle doomed the duo: they both ran out of money and suffered from the effects of various substances.
The next thirty-odd years were spent pining for the glory days. There were false starts to relaunch Visage, which ended in derision and acrimony. A fight over royalties turned into a public and mostly one-sided flame war. Egan was barred from Strange’s funeral by his family, after their patience was exhausted by years of online abuse. In 2024, Egan and Strange’s estate were still locked in litigation over the Visage trademark. What began as a way to move Ure in a more electronic direction, married to the flamboyant costumes of the New Romantic movement, turned into one of music’s longest-running and ugliest disputes.
Anyone who has endured one of Egan’s spoken word shows has heard his side already. Strange had the royalties for some of the band members paid to him to evade record company commitments and simplify administration. Instead of collecting the money and sharing it out, he did what any dedicated, serious, experienced drug addict would do: put it straight up his nose or into his veins.
The tragedy of the Egan-Strange Wars is that the men were brothers who loved each other. Egan’s anger poorly conceals the pain of betrayal. This was a man who kept Ure fed in London cafes during his lean times. He shared what he had from his meagre DJ pay with Strange; helping to keep his friend afloat while they dreamed their dreams. Part of Egan’s resentments arise from the failure of his friends to reciprocate with the same Catholic sense of charity.
At the same time, Egan’s elitist attitude turned a lot of people off. In his own autobiography, Soft Cell’s Marc Almond recalled showing up at a festival organised by Egan and Strange in Finsbury Park. He found Egan slagging off the New Romantic punters who were paying his way and headed back into the night.
Egan’s various claims to have “signed” big name artists have been mocked for his failure to add, “for publishing.” His claims to have “discovered” various artists have been derided, because they were already on established labels. Even the mythology of his “innovative” DJing has been undermined by comparison to another controversial figure: Stevo Pearce, who launched Some Bizarre and ran club nights around England based on a strikingly similar “futurist” playlist.
What made Egan’s reputation was the eulogising of friendly journalists, like Robert Elms at The Face, of Tuesdays at the Blitz Club. The Blitz night only ran for 18 months, but the procession of fashion students decked out in discounted costumes attracted the mainstream press. Egan and Strange made the most of it, so that the Blitz night – which closed in September of 1981 – is treated by some as synonymous with the 1980s. So is the excess they shared with City brokers and hairspray, but Tuesdays at the Blitz have been romanticised beyond reality.
One name that doesn’t appear in the book with any prominence is that of John Pitcher. Attacking Pitcher in print and online used to be one of Egan’s most visible past-times. Have they made up? Were lawyers involved? Has Egan finally learned to let go? After years of laying the blame for his failures at Pitcher’s feet to any audience he could find, Egan has left this thread unresolved for readers.
A name that frequently appears is that of Jean-Philippe Iliesco. The producer of Space teamed up with Egan, who wanted him to manage Visage after their first blush of success. Ure saw the red flags and declined to get involved with the French “entrepreneur.” Egan joined with Iliesco to start a series of ventures: taking over Trident Studios; launching Metropolis, a publisher; and running the Camden Palace. That all came crashing down when Iliesco finally made his move to squeeze Egan out.
Iliesco was part of one of Egan’s more controversial projects. In 1981, the team reworked “Burundi Black,” a 1971 single that featured the appropriated work of African drummers. Robert Palmer described the issue in The New York Times:
This latest ”Burundi Black” is glitzy pop-schlock, a throwaway with a beat. But its perpetrators are making money with it, and so is Mike Steiphenson, who has held onto the ”Burundi Black” copyright. […] But the Burundian drummers who made the original recording are not sharing in the profits.
This sorry story of cultural colonialism was just part of the wreckage that Iliesco trailed behind him. Was Egan blinded by the halo over the man who produced “Magic Fly”? Ure saw the horns it was balanced on, but Egan’s lack of judgement ultimately cost him his major source of wealth – his share of the Visage advance from Polydor.
Ure explained how badly things went for Visage, once Egan and Strange were in bed with Iliesco and his colleagues:
being in charge of their own destinies, Rusty and Steve went off and buried themselves in two seconds flat. Visage made one more album, Beat Boys, which was such a mess that Billy [Currie] left halfway through the recording. They made two videos for the same song, didn’t tell Polydor they were making one of them, and then tried to get them to pay for it. They drowned themselves in debt and Visage fell apart at the seams.
The result was that Egan was left practically destitute – which is where he came in.
The first part of the autobiography is devoted to Egan’s family history and a childhood spent in social care and as a young offender. Egan’s Irish family made its way to London when he was young, giving him a schooling in music and a passport to the streets. Egan explains that he learned to detest violence while in the care of the Church, but the book omits the story – reported in the British music press – about him punching Johnny Rotten for calling Rich Kids copycat punks.
There are other gaps, too. No mention is made of Belgium’s W Festival in 2021, when Egan assembled a group to perform Visage’s first two albums. A driving storm didn’t help, but the lack of rehearsal time meant the crowd had to endure Egan leading on vocals while tapping on drum pads. It was another big idea defeated by the reality that the songs required Midge Ure to work. Ure was performing at the same festival but didn’t feel the need to get involved in “Rusty Egan Presents…”.
Chaotic, disorganised, narcissistic, hard to follow, but occasionally capable of raising a laugh – the book is pure Egan. If you want to know what he wore, what he listened to, and who he dated at different stages of his life, the detail is there. If you want the full story about Visage – and how “Fade to Grey” was made – then there are other voices to be heard.