Systems of Romance, released on 8 September 1978,[2] is the third album by British new wave band Ultravox (an exclamation mark having been dropped from the name earlier in the year).

It was the final recording for the group with original lead singer, lyricist and co-composer John Foxx, and their first album without guitarist Stevie Shears, who had left the band.

Among Ultravox's own repertoire, antecedents included Billy Currie's distinctive synthesizer work on "The Man Who Dies Every Day" and the romantic balladry of "Hiroshima Mon Amour", both from Ha!

The former song was imbued with a heavy proto-industrial flavour; the latter featured church-like vocal and keyboard effects that would be echoed on Foxx's second solo album, The Garden.

Personally I don't think it's their best (album) but the deftly alienating production and the tricky use of electronics make it an important enough development in the career of a band that always aims for the unusual".

[11] The band was eventually dropped by their label Island Records just weeks after they had made a performance on The Old Grey Whistle Test and prior to a 1979 tour of the US.

[13] John Foxx's first record as a solo artist was the almost fully electronic Metamatic, however, his next release, The Garden, took Systems of Romance as its starting point, to the extent of re-recording the earlier album's previously unpublished title song, utilising Robin Simon on guitar.

Gary Numan, himself often called the "godfather of electropop", described the record as his single biggest musical inspiration;[14] he invited Billy Currie to tour with him in 1979 and contribute to his album The Pleasure Principle, prior to Ultravox's second incarnation.