STEVE Strange, New Romantic fashion icon and the painted face of Eighties’ synth-pop in Visage, had not been having a good day.

“I could be a little better,” he said, when beginning an unexpectedly detailed answer to What’s On’s standard opening pleasantry of enquiring “How are you today?”.

“We had a bit of an accident getting ready to come home from Turkey. My hand was trapped in the shower door and it put me into delayed shock and made me unsteady on my feet. Then I had my phone, my wallet stolen, so it’s been a b****y nightmare!

“I’ve been flying all night and then there was the Gatwick Express for three hours…”. Not for the last time, What’s On would lose the thread of what Steve was saying, in part because of a dicky phoneline, in part because the conversation tended to roam. “Then I had to go to Vodaphone to prove my identity,” the story ended.

It was not so much a case of (1980 hit) Fade To Grey as fade away, but we persevered. And it must be hoped Steve has less trouble wending his way north to York on Tuesday to play The Duchess, where the 2013 version of Visage – led by 53-year-old Welshman Steve – will showcase their first album in 29 years, Hearts And Knives, as well as playing songs from their three earlier albums. More of that later.

The conversation’s serpentine route was still taking Steve through his Turkish experiences. “We were just meeting sponsors from Istanbul for a deal that I can’t really talk about, but if it comes off, it will be massive event,” he said.

“Because I’m so well known in Bodrum [a port city in Muğla Province, in the south-western Aegean region of Turkey], it took me an hour to walk down the street. What has been great is that this album has been so critically acclaimed and is doing so well.”

Steve starts another stream of thought. “The album was released as a limited-edition signed CD and 15,000 went straight away, and if the record label had listened to me, I wish I had done what Alison Moyet has done with her new album [The Minutes], which was record my album my way.

“The record label aren’t experienced in dealing with someone like me; it’s always been an indie rock band label, whereas Visage has always been about the videos, the visuals, as well.”

There followed a discussion about Visage’s last release, a compilation with mash-ups with Kylie and re-mixes by the Ministry Of Sound. “Frequency 7 [originally the B-side to Visage’s first single, Tar, in 1979] has been a hit in America, and we’re going to go to America next March and April, and also Japan and Australia,” reveals Steve.

What’s On decided to switch tack to reflecting on Visage’s impact on music, its performance and visual presentation. “The name is French for face, but also Visage was about the visual and the ‘age’ also referred to us being the new age of electronic music,” said Steve.

“Now bands like La Roux and the singer Little Boots have said there wouldn’t be a new electronic scene without Visage. We didn’t need good reviews from people like Melody Maker and the NME, who just wanted to find the next indie band.

“We supported our own creativity – and don’t forget Blitz was a very creative club, spawning Spandau Ballet and Depeche Mode and designers like Galliano and even Gaulthier.”

Ah, The Blitz Club, the one decorated with images of the Second World War. That was where it all began for Strange, after the banished grammar school sore-thumb Steven Harrington ran away from the South Wales valleys town of Newbridge for a new London life as exotic peacock Steve Strange.

Together with club DJ Rusty Egan, he set the New Romantics fashion in motion, subsequently catching the eye of David Bowie, who cast him in his ground-breaking Ashes To Ashes video, and forming Visage with Egan on drums and Midge Ure as the lyricist.

All these years later, Strange performed at the opening of this year’s sold-out-before-it-opened David Bowie Is exhibition at the V&A in London. “The phone rang and this voice went, ‘Hey, it’s DB, and I was thinking, ‘Stop winding me up’, and he said ‘No it’s me’,” recalls Steve.

“He asked me what time I would be arriving, and as soon as I arrived on the red carpet, he rang again, and I’d put the phone on speaker phone, so people could hear him when he said. ‘Sorry I’m not there but I love your new Visage album!”

After releasing Hearts And Knives in May, Steve is relishing taking to the concert stage with the latest line-up of Visage, featuring long-time bass player Steve Barnacle – the perfect surname for band member who has stuck around – plus Robin Simon from the second album and various new members.

“When I was first in Visage, I was the most frustrated when we couldn’t go out and perform live,” said Strange, who promises two costume changes in Tuesday’s show.

“The new band will not be a fashion-conscious one, but then I never have a stylist. I never will. You can’t buy style. You have to be creative yourself, create your own style. You can’t be taught it…though I’m told I’m a fashion icon.”

Steve and Rusty Egan had worked together on a new Visage project for four songs but then Steve walked away from the collaboration as he “didn’t want to argue with Rusty”. “I have to say the new drummer plays much better than Rusty and he hasn’t got such a big gob on him!” he said.

“I’m really happy with the new band; we’re tight knit. No-one is on drugs. No-one is on drink.”

Ah, those troubled days of drink and drugs and Strange behaviour that Steve catalogued in his best-selling 2002 autobiography Blitzed!

“Those dark days are in the past,” he said. “And we’re now being approached about doing a film of my life story…and I’m possibly launching a fragrance.”

Where are we now? New album. Possible film. Maybe a fragrance. Definitely not the 2013 series of Celebrity Big Brother. “Everybody thought I was going to do it but how could I do it when I was going on this tour? Tell all my fans – my friends – I turned it down for them.”

Flamboyant as ever at 53, Steve Strange is not ready to fade to grey.

Visage play The Duchess, York, on Tuesday; doors open at 7.30pm. Box office: 0844 477 1000.