Plenty of musicians change their names, but few end up with one that sounds like a small insect. Midge Ure — born James Ure in a Glasgow suburb — turned a phonetic reversal of “Jim” into one of the most recognisable names in British new wave; this profile traces how the Scottish singer-songwriter built that name across Slik, Ultravox, Band Aid, and a solo career, and what he’s doing with it now.
Born: 10 October 1953 ·
Nationality: Scottish ·
Stage name origin: Phonetic reversal of “Jim”
Quick snapshot
- Born James Ure on 10 October 1953 in Cambuslang, Scotland (Wikipedia, encyclopedia)
- Joined Ultravox in 1979 as singer and guitarist (Forbes, business magazine)
- Co-wrote Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” with Bob Geldof (Rhino, record label)
- Exact net worth
- Wife’s name and number of children
- Current illness status
- 1976: first UK No.1 with Slik (Rhino, record label)
- 1979: joined Ultravox (Forbes, business magazine)
- 1984: “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” released (Rhino, record label)
- 2012: Ultravox’s first album of new material in almost three decades (The Scotsman, Scottish newspaper)
- October 2025: “Catalogue: The Hits Tour”
- Continued touring and live performance
Six facts, one pattern: the details people search for most — name, nationality, band, songs, tour — all trace back to the same verified career record.
| Detail | Value |
|---|---|
| Full name | James Ure |
| Birth date | 10 October 1953 |
| Nationality | Scottish |
| Profession | Singer-songwriter, record producer |
| Known for | Ultravox, “Vienna”, Band Aid |
| Upcoming event | Catalogue: The Hits Tour (October 2025) |
The overlap between the snapshot and the table is the point: Ure’s public identity is stable, and the questions fans keep asking have the same short answers.
Why is he called Midge Ure?
His birth certificate reads James Ure. The stage name came from a simple trick: “Jim”, the short form of James, reversed and respelled into “Midge”. He adopted it early, before the hits, and it followed him through every band since.
- Birth name: James Ure
- Childhood nickname: Jim
- Stage name: Midge — a phonetic reversal of “Jim”
The name sounds like a small biting insect, but its real origin is a word game — an early sign of the playful way Ure would later reshape sound itself.
The implication: “Midge” was never a record-label rebrand. It grew out of a private joke and became a public identity strong enough to carry five decades of music.
What nationality is Midge Ure?
Ure is Scottish, born in Cambuslang, a Lanarkshire town on Glasgow’s eastern edge. The Scotsman introduced him in 2012 as “a 58-year-old frontman from Cambuslang, Lanarkshire” (The Scotsman, Scottish newspaper) — an age that lines up with the October 1953 birth date in the table above.
That same profile caught Ure as Ultravox regrouped for their first album of new material in almost three decades, a rare return to the band that made him famous.
Where does Midge Ure currently live?
- Country: United Kingdom
- Exact town: not publicly specified
Ure remains based in the United Kingdom, but the exact location is not part of the public record. He spends much of the year touring, which keeps his address out of the spotlight.
The public record draws a clean line: a Lanarkshire hometown, a Scottish identity, and a UK residence with no address attached. Fans get the music; the home life stays off the grid.
What this means: nationality is easy to pin down, residence is not — and that boundary between public and private looks deliberate for a man who has been famous since the 1970s.
What does Midge Ure do now?
Ure’s current career runs on live performance. He has a run of dates under the banner “Catalogue: The Hits Tour” scheduled for October 2025, revisiting the songs that made his name — and letting the touring circuit do what recording studios no longer do for him.
For a musician who once topped charts with three different acts, the 2025 tour is a straightforward bet: the songs are the product, and the audience keeps showing up.
What is Midge Ure’s most famous song?
- “Vienna” — Ultravox’s defining track (1980)
- “If I Was” — his solo UK No.1
- “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” — co-written with Bob Geldof
Most fan discussions land on “Vienna”. The song dates from his years as Ultravox’s frontman — the period he has called his musical home. “If I Was” is the solo chart answer, and Band Aid is the answer with a cause attached.
Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” carries the largest cultural footprint on his résumé: co-written with Bob Geldof for the 1984 famine-relief campaign, it became a UK Christmas-chart institution. A year later the pair organised Live Aid.
Is Midge Ure a good guitarist?
- Role: singer and guitarist in Ultravox from 1979, with earlier stints in Slik, Rich Kids, Visage, and Thin Lizzy
The résumé settles the question. Thin Lizzy hired guitarists who could carry a twin-lead sound, and Ultravox needed someone who could sing and play at the same time; Ure did both for decades. Add his production work, and the skill is documented rather than arguable.
How much is Midge Ure worth?
- No verified public disclosure of net worth
- Income sources: touring, record sales, production
- Published estimates vary by publication
Search results throw around numbers, but none of them trace to an official figure. Ure has never published accounts, and the sources reviewed for this profile contain no verified estimate.
Any exact net-worth figure online is an educated guess, not a fact. The only verifiable financial signals are the ones that show up in the music industry itself: chart positions, touring schedules, and co-writing credits.
The pattern: Ure’s present-day answer to “what do you do now” is touring, with a back catalogue that keeps the calendar full and the need for new recordings low.
That pattern — a live act feeding on a back catalogue — defines Ure’s current phase.
What’s confirmed and what’s unclear
The public record on Ure is lopsided: strong on career, thin on private life. Here’s where the evidence stands.
Confirmed facts
- Born 10 October 1953 in Cambuslang, Scotland (Wikipedia, encyclopedia)
- Stage name “Midge” is a phonetic reversal of “Jim” (Wikipedia, encyclopedia)
- Scottish nationality and Lanarkshire roots (The Scotsman, Scottish newspaper)
- Joined Ultravox in 1979 and co-wrote the Band Aid single (Forbes, business magazine)
What’s unclear
- Exact net worth
- Wife’s name
- Number of children
- Illness history
- Current town of residence
The gaps in Ure’s record are not oversights; they are boundaries. Net-worth round-ups and family gossip sites fill the silence with estimates that no official source has ever confirmed.
The takeaway: five decades of fame produced a dense public career file and a deliberately thin personal one — and the asymmetry tells you as much about Ure as any chart position does.
This boundary between public and private is a deliberate choice by an artist who has kept his home life off the grid.
What Ure says about his own career
“I found my musical home.”
— Midge Ure, on joining Ultravox, in Forbes (business magazine)
“Being Scottish is about roots, heritage, and history.”
— Midge Ure, in a 2025 interview with dmme.net (music interview outlet)
Scottish singer-songwriter and record producer.
— Wikipedia’s summary line for Midge Ure
The pattern across the three voices: Ure describes his career in terms of belonging — a musical home, a Scottish identity — while reference sources describe him in terms of output. Both readings are true, and together they explain why the name still fills venues.
The takeaway
Ure’s public story is a rare case where the name and the career reinforce each other: a word-game nickname from a Lanarkshire childhood became a five-decade brand, and the songs written along the way — “Vienna”, “If I Was”, “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” — outlasted every fashion cycle. For fans who want to hear that back catalogue live, the decision is clear: catch the “Catalogue: The Hits Tour” in October 2025, or wait for the next round, because Ure is still booking dates under the name that started as a joke.
sco.wikipedia.org, bigfootevents.co.uk, macleanandbruce.com, last.fm, biographies.net, tvtropes.org, martyrslive.com
Frequently asked questions
Has Midge Ure been ill?
No verified public record of a specific illness was found in the sources reviewed. Ure has continued to schedule tour dates, including the 2025 “Catalogue: The Hits Tour”, which points to an active performing career.
How many children does Midge Ure have?
That number is not part of the public record. Ure keeps his family life private, and the research reviewed for this profile does not include a confirmed count.
Who is Midge Ure’s wife?
Ure’s marriage is not documented in the verified sources available. Media coverage centres on his music and touring rather than his private relationships.
How tall is Midge Ure?
No reliable height figure appears in the sources reviewed. Height listings on fan databases vary, and none are confirmed by Ure or his representatives.
What instruments does Midge Ure play?
He is best known as a singer and guitarist — he joined Ultravox in 1979 in exactly those roles. He also works as a record producer.
What awards has Midge Ure won?
The sources reviewed document chart landmarks — a 1976 No.1 with Slik and a solo No.1 with “If I Was” — but they do not list formal individual awards. A more complete honours history is available on Wikipedia’s entry.
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Henry William Bennett Murray is a staff writer for CivicInsight.uk, covering UK public affairs, policy and civic life. He works under Editor-in-Chief Rebecca Langford, following the newsroom standards for sourcing, verification and fact-checking set out in our editorial policies.