Rarely has an album sleeve so poorly represented the mood and the message of the music inside than ‘The Fury’, I dare say. Musically, this was a hard-edged, tough, largely electronic sound filled that mined the technology of the day to keep up with the in your face sound of acts on ZTT, et al. To the extent that it left behind the earlier, more unique Numan sound, much to the alienation of a good chunk of existing Numan fans – even more so than ‘Berserker’ (which we looked at before) already had, as it had ushered in the move to digital synths, leaving behind the analogue warmth. Partly, that fan exodus may well have been because they never made it to the music, such was the antipathy to the image. Fair to say that both ‘Warriors’ and ‘Berserker’ had already been a tough sell, image wise – but this time round, beyond the pale for many a fan, I would wager. While the music may have been edgy and electronic, the image was – as Numan himself would later describe in his autobiographies – less the intended James Bond and more “the man who lost it all at Monte Carlo” casino wheel/cards table.

The album itself as released on the Numa label though comes in two distinct versions – the ‘regular’ standard issue and the ‘extended mixes’ version – much like ‘Berserker’ had ushered in, but this time every track was longer on the extended mixes version. Continue reading “Gary Numan ‘The Fury’ – Numa variations”