"Ultravox’s sound incubated in the Doll Factory –a perfect name for their rehearsal space, given its echoes of Warhol and New York Dolls. It was literally the premises of mannequin manufacturer Modreno, located in an old warehouse in a seedy area behind London’s Kings Cross station. (John Foxx had met the guy who ran it when they both worked painting the faces of showroom dummies at another company). Ultravox rehearsed in the big room, surrounded by “dismembered plastic humanoids”: an ideal environment to hatch songs influenced by dystopian science fiction writers like J.G. Ballard and a sound that would ultimately evolve into robotic synth-rock." - from S+A
Around the same time....
The pic disc of the album had the mannequins in the nuddy
The singles off Manifesto continued the 'living doll' thematic
While this generic (I assume) sleeve for the American release of "Angel Eyes" fits with the general vibe of artifice, fetishism and retro-glamour
Irresistible as always in this context to think of "the sex appeal of the inorganic", Roxy Music's "In Every Dream Home A Heartache" and its (accidental?) semi-rewrite as Ian McEwan's 1977 short story "Dead As They Come"....
Earlier post on the Roxy Girls and the nude mannequin picture disc version of Manifesto
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