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NEW ORDER +
I
Pleasures and
in
Wayward Distractions
Brian Edge
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NEW ORDER +
JOY DIVISION
'One owes respect to the living: owes only the truth.'
to the dead one
VOLTAIRE
WWWi ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^H
NEW
Pleasures and
R D E R S
Wayward Distractions
JOY DIV
ON
Brian Edge
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CONTENTS
FOREWORD
JOY DIVISION /THE YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE 7
THEINTERREGNUM51
THE NEW ORDER 69
DISC0GRAPHY126
FOREWORD
In
the
Summer
of
1979 something strange
industry,
though they
still
remained
at
relatively
happened in Manchester, England. During the space of a week the sewerage system's century-long lifespan finally came to an end when its crumbling Dickensian pipes
collapsed, stench.
It
obscure.
Progressing tentatively
final
first.
New
Order's
departure from their overly Joy Division

status
sound and
came
hit
in
March 1983
with
filling
the city's streets with a foul
the record-selling
single "Blue Monday",
was a timely indictment of the decay and decline in a region which had previously
experienced
heyday.
whose
electronic
dance rhythms resounded
throughout clubs and discos across the
boom
growth during
its
industrial
Ironically,
Manchester's music scene
was
at this
time enjoying a spectacular
Renaissance forefronted by Joy Division, a band whose music uncannily reflected the
atrophying
air in
change of speed, a change of style', went the Joy Division song "New Dawn Fades": this was what press and public were waiting for and what New Order had finally
globe. 'A
achieved.
which not only Manchester
Since then
New
Order have had numerous
but our entire nation
was steeped. No other
music since has so accurately captured the mood of its time nor so profoundly touched
on
this country's plight
commercial successes and toured widely, but have at the same time kept their enigmatic
mystique
your
intact,
a mystique which, as
'really
NME's
as did
theirs.
Paul Morley wrote,
came
out of a "mind
Ignored
in their
early days
Joy Division
in that
own business" defensiveness, some

critical
became
of
band of 1979, subsequent

the
the
moment
year
concentrated music, a death, fans' obsession,
to the release of their
and fancy
hyperbole.'
its
dauntingly powerful d6but LP
"Unknown
the
Yet despite the myth,
inherent
Pleasures". For music press journalists the
preconceptions, and the rewards of
band
lay
somewhere annoyingly between

its
commercial success,
the beginning.
New
Order are always
at
contrived and the inspired, placing their
music,
for all
striking merits,
somewhere
between the conventional and the

unconventional. Developing from strength to
strength Joy Division attracted a fanatical
devoted following,
for
whom
and
the
and band could

remained
do no wrong. Joy
preferring to
It
Division, however,
aloof from this adulation
attention,
to
keep themselves
their
themselves.
was
their off
stage introversion and
reticence,
coupled with
solemn on stage
presence, that contributed to Joy Division's outwardly natural mystery. But as Tony Wilson,
their
they
record label manager said, 'to people seemed a very gloomy band, but as human beings they were the absolute
opposite.'
Tragically,
their
prime
in
Joy Division were cut down May 1980 when their
in
charismatic vocalist Ian Curtis committed

suicide.
The band's three remaining members

Bernard Albrecht, Peter Hook and Stephen
Morris, continued as
fourth,
after.
New
Order, adding a
female
member
Gillian Gilbert shortly

of
their vital sense Joy Division enjoyed an iconoclastic relationship with the music
liberty
New
Order retained
like
and
JOY DIVISION /THE YEARS

OF
INDEPENDENCE
JOY DIVISION
THE YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE
In
the early Seventies cultural wastelands,
wtiere only lumbering rock dinosaurs

"wild
roamed
contemporary music's condition (later diagnosed as "chronic artistic inertia") seemed terminal. The Sex Pistols were therefore a godsend when, in 1976, they
free",
and
became
the bellicose catalyst for youth's
latest social
phenomenon,
the
punk
it
generation,
attractive
who revamped
infectious,
central ethos.
independence and made their The outcome of this secondary manifestation was to provide stagnant popular
culture with a long desired blood transfusion,
while simultaneously causing the music

industry
akin to an
In
behemoth enema.
with
to
experience something
of the
common
many
first
post-
punk bands, Joy
Division's absolute
beginners were creatively inspired simply by

attending one single date on the Sex Pistols'
historic
"Anarchy
In
The
in
U.K." tour. Ian Curtis,
Bernard Dicken, Peter Hook and Stephen

Morris were converted
Manchester's Free
Trade Hall when the Sex Pistols and The

Clash
the
came
gospel
violent
of "Enjoy!
as valiant saviours to preach their - Destroy!" nihilism, to sing

of rebellion
new youth anthems
and
this
change. They were among the small
number so profoundly impressed by

display of raw energy that they were
moved
to
respond
in
kind, their
own
motivations being
engulfed by
New Wave's
radical flux. This
became
the urge to participate rather than
merely spectate.
Thus set in motion, the nucleus of Hook and Dicken, with their replacement vocalist and ex-Salford Grammar School acquaintance
Ian Curtis,
made
In
their formative, primal
sounds as they struggled

musicianship.
that perennial
with rudiments of
addition they encountered

of finding
problem
a dedicated
drummer,
In fact
their erstwhile percussionist Terry
Mason having opted
out of the proceedings.

friend of Ian Curtis's
Stephen Morris, a
recently
in their
who had
School
been expelled from

town
King's
native
of Macclesfield,
only joined the group on the night prior to

their first gig
.
Buzzcocks' Pete Shelley nominally

christened these well-intentioned lads
Kittens,
Stiff
1
Ian Curtis, Rafters,
though they soon dropped this inappropriate moniker in favour of the more serious sounding Warsaw, reputedly derived
l^/lanctiester,
30 June
1977
2 Warsaw
JOY DIVISION /THE YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE
from "Warszawa", a
moody
instrumental track
on the newly released David Bowie LP "Low". But during early 1977 the foursome never
ventured beyond the doors of the proverbial
garage. They
Vi/ere
content to familiarise
their
themselves with each other, as well as
own
respective instruments, yet eager
enough
to anticipate the all-important transition from
auditorium floor onto the elevated stage.
made their d6but at the on 25th May, where they featured as second support to Manchester's finest, Buzzcocks. On stage they looked desperate and nervous, unwilling to pause between numbers which, in all fairness, sounded tedious and so abrasive that they caused the majority of a bored, disinterested audience to face the bar rather than the band.
finally
Warsaw
Electric Circus
After their set
Warsaw
dutifully
instruments, dismantled equipment
unplugged and with
apologetic shyness, departed. Hardly the ideal
beginning.
One
'I
report of their performance
commented: don't think even the most demented headbanger could get off to this.'
3 Bernard Aibrecht
Very
much another case

budding
of,
"the peasants are
revolting." Yet
New
Musical Express
Peter
Hook
correspondent Paul Morley had recognised

their potential: they
were
at least trying to
be a
departure from the thrashing punk norm.

There's a quirky cockiness about the lads
that
made me
think for
evil
some reason
of
The
Faces. Twinkling
charm,' wrote Morley.

little
'Perhaps they play a
obviously but there's

from the
an elusive spark
of dissimilarity
newer bands that suggests that they've plenty to play around with, time no doubt dictating tightness and eliminating odd bouts of monotony. The bass player had a moustache. liked them and will like them even more in
I
six
months'
time.'
Over the following months, while London peers revelled in glamorous antics during the
"Summer
doggedly
of Hate",
In
Warsaw rehearsed
a derelict part of Manchester,
venturing forth only to play Northern
England's premier new wave venues,

including the
now legendary
Eric's in
Liverpool. Despite this creditable activity, they
One commentator 'Warsaw are one of many new wave functional bands; easily digestible,
found
little
sympathy.
surmised
that
doomed maybe
Whether they
to eternal
support spots.
will find
a style of their
own
is
10
5 Joy
Division,
Hulme, Manchester, 6 January 979

1
11
questionable, but probably not Important.

Ttieir instinctive
6
for
Ian Curtis,
energy often compensates
the occasional
lameness
of the
Hulme. Manchester, 6 January 1979
of tfieir
songs, but
7 "Short
Circuit"
they
seem unaware
audience when
EP
performing.'
released 9 June 1978
They became
of
yet another of the
participants unwittingly
competing
for
a share
recognition and appreciation, something

to affirming
which might have gone some way

their belief that
'At that
It
was
felt
after
all
worthwhile.
time
we
very detached from
things,' Ian Curtis later recalled.
'No-one was
.
. .
helping us.
It
was very
disillusioning
Sometimes we felt lil<;e finishing, but was because everyone Ignored us or Interfered
It
that
we
kept thinking "We'll
show
them".'
itself In
This bitterness clearly manifests

lyrics of "Novelty":
the
'When the people listen to means a lot, because you, don't you know you've got to work so hard for everything you've got; can't rest on your laurels now, not
it
when you've got none,

gutter, right
you'll find yourself in
back where you came

at this early
from.'
Perhaps
of
stage they were guilty

of over-reaching
expecting too
much and
themselves; a frustration born of Impatience.

Nevertheless, they clung on grimly to their
faith in their
music, trusting to conviction and
determination, not
air of
succumbing
to a
general
despondency. They were not the only Mancunians suffering from heartache at this time. The Electric Circus faced Imminent closure for breaches of fire regulations and all knew that once It was closed would remain closed, probably for good. To commemorate the loss of a club which had for so long been the
it
vortex of Manchester's
new wave
activity,
the
owners organised a festival for the first weekend In November. It featured many local bands, most of them regulars, Buzzcocks, The
Slaughter And The Dogs, Warsaw, The Drones and other local celebrities like John The Postman and John Cooper Clarke. A
Fall,
rumour circulated among the
turned up to bid the club a fond,
crowd who hot and cramped, farewell that a live album was being recorded. It was true: Virgin Records
loyal
if
subsequently released the 10"

compilation LP,
fittingly
live
in
pressed
"electric
blue vinyl", entitled "Short Circuit".
Warsaw had changed

Division by the date of
Its
their
name
to
Joy
release and were
12
JOY DIVISION
8 9 "Sounds" photo
session, Stockport,
fortunate to have
one number from
tfieir
set
included on the album.

Altfiougfi
it
28 July 1979
documents a stage
in
the
band's
history, "At
Later Date"
is
musically
messy and undisciplined. It is only memorable unfortunately because Ian Curtis, by way of an introduction, yelled 'You all
forget Rudolf Hess!' This
to
little
outburst served
heighten the criticism already levelled at

for latent Fascist
Joy Division
for
persuasions,
criticism derived mainly from their
penchant
a distinctive 1940's quasi-uniformed
mode
of
dress and occasionally blunt
lyrics.
Take "They Walked In Line" for example: dressed up in uniforms so fine, they drank and killed to pass the time, wearing the shame of all their crime, with measured steps they walked in line.' Similarly, Siouxsie Sioux
'All
had been persecuted
in
manner
In
for the tactless 'Too
much the same many Jews for my
Banshees song "Love who wore swastika armbands and t-shirts as a cheap shock tactic were blindly accredited with Nazi ideologies. Any lunchtime sociologist would waive such incriminating evidence knowing that this definitive hate symbol has for several decades been directly associated with pop and youth rebellion.
liking' line in
the early
Void". Likewise people
These, however, were the days

anti-Fascist hysteria
when
was
at
its
zenith.
Organisations such as the Anti-Nazi League and Rock Against Racism, endorsed by the socially conscious populace, frequently and vehemently protested against any and all
displaying the taboo signs of Nazism.
It
may
but
be
better to 'love
God
than hate the
Devil',
these four young Mancunian musicians found
themselves on the receiving end

attitudes time
of
lynch-mob
and again. Take the name

learned writers
Warsaw
for instance:
obdurately informed an ignorant public that

during the
capital of
Second World War the Polish Warsaw had been systematically

as a
razed on
Hitler's specific instructions
reprisal to the abortive insurrection led
by
Polish resistance forces. But as Bernard
Albrecht (born Dicken) explained, 'We picked
Warsaw because
name.
it
is
a very nothing sort of a
We
didn't wish to
. . .
be called
"the"
somebody
People tend
to take a radical
if
viewpoint on everything, whereas

just think for
they would
it
a change, they would see that
JOY DIVISION
13
was absolutely
nothing.'
People again jumped to naive conclusions when they saw the Aryan drummer boy on the
cover of the group's very
first
single,
their
and
rally
beside him was the
name on
new
banner, Joy Division, written

script. In
in
bold Germanic
subsequently disclosing that Joy
Division
was
the popular
euphemism applied
wing
of a
to
little
by SS guards
alleviate
to the prostitutes'
concentration camp, the band did
and obvious misunderstandings between them and moral arbiters of the day, the ever-virtuous music press. Having had these serious ramifications
irksome
friction
10 "An
Ideal For
pointed out to them, the punters

Division's burgh, as elsewhere,
in
Joy
to
Living" 12"
came
released October 1978
regard them with prejudicial suspicion.

Clearly the
just
name
is
open
to interpretation,
lyrics to be. Is
it
as Curtis suggested his
then perhaps an ironic statement highlighting

their
assumed submissive role in a prurient music industry? Whatever, this adverse publicity did bring them a little beneficial
if it
exposure, even
wasn't quite on IVIalcolm
"Machiavelli" McLaren's scale.

In the meantime the band casually drifted away from an incestuous, 6litist Manchester scene and entered Pennine Sound Studio in December 1977 to record a four tracl< EP "An Ideal For Living". They emerged a little more
consolidated as Joy Division, but found
themselves lumbered with 5000 sub-standard

pressings of their "home-made" record. After
an
initial
delay of
six
months they were

seven-inch
label, lest their
obliged to release
disc on their
this gravelly
own Enigma
name be ploughed
wave. To
this
under, recycled and
forgotten by the overall
momentum
end
Curtis, Albrecht,
of the new Hook and
Morris conscientiously stayed

folding single sleeves
up all night which bore the arrogant

not a concept it
claim that
'this
. . .
record
is
is
an enigma'
bear
though
its
contents failed to
this out.
The four tracks - "Warsaw"/"No Love

Lost "/"Leaders of Men"/"Failures" -
showed
Joy Division
have some interesting ideas, but the relative crudity in music and lyhcs kept the general enthusiasm of record buyers and harsh record scrutineers at bay. Even
to
when
a superior twelve-inch version of "An
Ideal For Living", rendered powerfully
impressive due to an incredible loudness of
11
12 13 14
Shadowplay, "Futurama One", Queen's Hall, Leeds, 8 September 1979
16
pressing,
later
saw release a couple

little
of
months
label,
its
it
on
their
Anonymous Records
attention. Oddly,
too
was paid very

visual
cover
ambiguous metaphor - a once grand building shored up by rusty scaffolding - drawn from their immediate environment, which was far more relevant than playful flirtations with decadent Nazi chic. 'Each time we go one step forward,' said Bernard Albrecht, 'and that draws you on.' It
hinted at development, offering an
all
pointed to a future.
Later
in
that hectic
December Joy
Stiff
Division
took part
In
an abysmal
Test/Chiswick
this
Challenge talent contest.
On
occasion
it
was held
Club in tvianchester. Resident DJ Rob Gretton looked on as seventeen hopeful bands slugged out, Joy Division coming on last at 2.30a.m. to play a
at the Rafters
it
requisite
two numbers. Tony Wilson, the
first and badly received programme to champion new wave "So It Goes", was m the audience. The bands were all good and they were all boring,' he recalled. 'The other bands were on stage because they wanted to be musicians. But Joy Division were up there because they had something to say -you could tell by the look in their eyes, the sound of their music and by their style. was as different as chalk and cheese. thought Joy Division were wonderful and so did Rob, because after that
presenter of the
television
It
he became
their
manager.'
As their manager, Gretton relieved the band from the mundanities of business and organisation, allowing them to retreat into
Rehearsal
strength.
Room Number
in
Six,
a squalid studio
antechamber
central Manchester, to gather
Here they tightened existing songs
as well as writing and developing

material, venturing out to
new
make
their first full
appearance as Joy Division on 25th January 1978 at Manchester Pip's.

'All the business side - that really fucks you up,' moaned Peter Hook. 'Once you get back in the rehearsal room and there's just the four of us with instruments we're back
where we
you're
started. It still hangs over you like a cloud - but once you get your instrument
free.'
'You're always working towards the next
15 Peter Hook. The Factory. 13 July 1979
song,' explained Curtis. 'No matter
how many
for
songs you've done, you're always looking
16 Joy Division The Factory. .13 July 1979

17 Bernard Albrecht,
Ian Curtis & Peter Hook, The Factory. 13 July 1979
18
JOY DIVISION
the next one.'
During early 1978 Joy Division took good
advantage
by
thie
of
equipment and
facilities
offered
Mancfiester tvtusicians Collective, a cooperative set up by Dick Witts of The Passage,
among
others, to help local talent flourish
outside prohibitive restraints of the music

industry.
'The Collective
was a
really
good
'It
thing tor
Joy
Division,' reflected Ian Curtis.
gave us
somewhere to play, we met other musicians like A Certain Ratio and The Fall, talked and swapped ideas. Also gave us a chance to
it
experiment
allowed
to
in front of
people.
We
were
isn't
take risks - the Collective

that
about music
In
needs
to
draw an audience.'
firing
addition to usual managerial duties,

the
promoting the intermittent gigs and
band
with a positive direction,
Rob
Gretton
gently
the group on their travels.
smoothed over a few blunders made by The most notable

dubious arrangement with
of
was a
'We
particularly
an eccentric subsidiary
tell in
RCA
records.
with Northern Soul
DJ Richard
Searling
who wanted
us to record a cover of
N.F. Porter's Northern Soul classic
"Keep On
fucking
it
Keeping On" - which he planned
to sell to the
TK
label.
We
at
tried to
do
it
but
we were
did
hopeless
way:
cover versions.
riff
We
on
do
in
we
learnt the
- that's as far as
it
we
could get - and
we used
"Interzone".'
Incongruous as this incident may now seem, illustrates the pressures on aspiring
it
bands to make any break into the highpowered commercial world of pop music. The
"album" which they spent the next
recording
five
days
was structurally sound but direly produced and has never seen the light of day. The tapes were bought by the group and at one stage before the release of Joy Division's first LP proper there was talk of a severely
remixed version being issued.
Joy Division's few early gigs at venues like Band On The Wall were as surprising as they were erratic. One night a
IVIanchester's
notoriously non-committal
to a
crowd were moved
standing ovation after a set that included
"Ice
Age" and "The
Kill".
At the following gig,
a hushed and expectant crowd, interested to
hear the band
whose bass
player 'could eat

for
The
Stranglers'
Jean-Jacques Burnel
were treated to a lacklustre performance of the same songs, a set

breakfast',
JOY DIVISION
19
that lived
up
to
no-one's expectations.
Nevertheless, the band were undeterred by
18 19 Sound
Central
Studios,
these apparent misfortunes and

stealthy progress as possible
limited
made
as
tvlanchester,
6 Januar/ 1979
under these
circumstances.
Division,
all in their late teens and early needed the patronage of more experienced partisans, businessmen who dealt in areas where they themselves were
Joy
twenties,
lacking,
pitfalls.
who could
point out the club circuit's
Tony Wilson, who had expressed keen

band, was the perfect wise
interest in the
counsellor, yet importantly
share
their idealistic objectives.
young enough He had

Durutti
to
recently
formed a partnership with
Column manager Alan Erasmus - also

late
at
in his
twenties - which would promote concerts
Manchester's Russel Club, then run by

Delegating Erasmus to organisational
Wilson.
duties,
Wilson sought out more worthwhile
acts currently working locally,
booking them
to
appear
Factory.
quietly
at
the club he later re-named

this project,
He financed
The which
succeeded, with income from his daytime job at Granada Television where he
worked as a
journalist.
But as
remarked, running The Factory

limiting to Wilson.
Rob Gretton seemed a bit
When
he did "So
It
Goes", the major labels
were snapping up the bands he was

showing,' explained Gretton,
like
an
A&R man
telly.
on the
He was acting and Repertoire) So he thought - 'Why don't

(Artistes
I
start putting
out records for myself?'"
In
October 1978 Wilson and Erasmus began

concentrating their talents on the business of
establishing their
own independent
its
label.
Factory Records, which unlike
counterparts
would never lease acts
to majors.
The fortuitous friendship between Wilson and Gretton enabled Joy Division to move
comfortably behind the protective
veil of
Factory Records and with the addition of
Rabid Records' house producer Martin "Zero"

Hannelt, the team
'
was
in effect in
complete.
Hannett's avid interest
him
to
Joy Division had led persuade Rabid Records boss Tosh

"An Ideal For Living" using
If
Ryan
their
to distribute
own
outlet network.
regarded as the band's
fifth
Rob Gretton was member then

first
Martin Hannett could be counted as the sixth.
The idea
for
Factory Records'
vinyl
20 JOY DIVISION
/THE YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE
20 21 22 Leigh
Valley Festival.
endeavour was a compilation
of various acts
27 August 1979
already associated with the label via the club. It was allocated the product number FAC 2
FAC
of
constructivist poster
had been a yellow and black announcing the opening

latest
Manchester's
live
modernist night spot
and
music venue. The Factory, an old reggae dive nestling beneath an imposing
Hulme tower block
set
in
a bleak futuristic
landscape ravaged by urban decay. To the crepuscular clientele who came to haunt
The
Factory, these
doomed surroundings
town planners
epitomised the
inner city
failure of the
dream environment, A Clockwork

in
in
Orange nightmare
wit,
"the concrete jungle"; to
the ideal place
which
to
experience Joy
Division.
And
into the
it
was
not long before Gretton
surreptitiously
manipulated Joy Division

slot
billing,
on an otherwise aware that The Factory was the platform from which to launch the band, a venue that was fully commensurate
headline
unremarkable
with their dolorous image.
On the night Joy Division were sadly under par. Their performance lacked the spontaneous sparkle of which they knew themselves to be capable. True, the music had pulsed with a measure of conviction, and
although the idiosyncratic spasms of Curtis's
manic hand-jive dance routine caused some mild amusement, the crowd remained
unimpressed.
After
two months
of solid rehearsals they
returned to The Factory, taking the stage

apologetically as
if
embarrassed
for
having
reappeared again so soon. But doubts on both sides were instantly dispelled as
Joy Division launched into a memorable performance. They were magnificent that night. Hook stood back to the crowd swaying, hammering out wrenching bass lines; on
Hook's beam was Albrecht, stock
still
with
concentration, briskly picking out the runs
across the fretboard of his guitar; behind
them Stephen Morris made the drum
kit
shiver
with energy, while slightly off-centre the jerking
dervish of Curtis returned again and again to
microphone, pulling it violently to him as he drove towards the emotional climax of another soulful, brutal song. All were stunned by their impassioned power, and no more so than Joy Division
his
JOY DIVISION
21
themselves.
When
they
left
the club most were
utterly spent,
mentally and physically, unable

this local
to explain
why
band had made such
a strong impression upon them. Coming at a time when blinkered cynicism infused most
musical appraisal,
when
the old
maxim
in
'prophets are never given credence
their
home
town' increasingly held true with
narcissistic crowds, this reaction
was perhaps
lie in
doubly surprising.
Reasons
for this
transformation
those
two months spent rehearsing, the time when
Joy Division suddenly gelled. No longer were
gaps or looseness. Their new style was and invigorating, a sideways step from the sound normally generated within a
there
original
traditional four-piece rocl< format.
With bass
and drums upfront to create a pliant standing rhythm for guitar and voice to emerge
through,
it
was animated
to their
rather than frenzied,
communicating
sharp contrast
with a vivid subtlety
and
in
former graceless,
this transition
inarticulate selves.
Perhaps
could be attributed to the influence

Hannett,
of Martin
who produced
their contributions
in
on
the "Factory Sampler"
back
October, just
after the label's inception.
Working with Hannett Joy Division found with an implicit understanding of their musical aims and the technical expertise
someone
to
execute
this potential in
a professional
manner. To
his credit,
Hannett had already
produced the Buzzcocks' "Spiral Scratch" EP, most of John Cooper Clarke's material (whom he also managed) and one hit wonder Jilted
John.
Behind
Hannett
is
that
vague, "acid casualty" fagade

In
an astute man.
one
article
he
was described as 'working

to himself
like
some
sort of
wizard of the console, occasionally chuckling
as he fiddles with the digital

in for
devices he's brought
the session. His
productions are imprinted with a generous but
supple use
years to
of electronics. He has the auteur's mark and the entrepreneur's eye and in the
come
he's unlikely to fade away.'
and "Glass", Joy Division's tracks on the double EP "Factory Sampler" package, bear out these observations. Hannett was at least partly responsible for the enhanced
"Digital"
definition of these sculptured
sounds, further
removing them from the

of earlier
frantic
harshness
recordings. Yet Joy Division had
22 JOY DIVISION
themselves attained a new maturity, clearly

exemplified by a compelling intensity
Curtis's lyrics
"Digital",
in
Ian
and
delivery.
brilliant
inversion of rock cliche,
came
across as a precis of the Joy Division
credo, a succinct glimpse into the dark
where they were soon to move. feel in - patterns on the floorfeel cold and warm - shadows start to form - feel closing in - feel closing in The confusion with which this is sung changes suddenly to horror as the music climaxes: 'Day in, day out! Day in, day out! - see you fade away, don't ever fade away, need you
territory
it
'I
closing
it
it
it
.'
here today, don't ever fade away

.... fade
fade away away fade away "Glass" was simply massive, a promise
. . . '
of
as yet unleashed anger, of unrestrained
power. This was the
first example of the fullblown Joy Division sound, complete with
disturbing subliminal noises.
Joy Division did not
suffer from having
these two superb tracks included on what
was essentially a compilation. Tony Wilson gave the problem some thought and placed each of the four acts, all then comparative unknowns (Joy Division, Durutti Column, John Dowie and Cabaret Voltaire), back to back on two EPs. This arrangement was preferable to
picking one's
of
way through an album's worth

though
this
dross
to find highlights,
does
not imply that Factory included anything but

quality acts
on
their
sampler. Their overliberal
ambitious competitors were often rather

with the stuffing.
The "Factory Sampler" was a success. The limited edition of 5000, complete with teasingly moderne dummy's head stickers, sold out within two months of release. tvlanager Rob Gretton was asked the
question, 'Which direction wouldn't you like
see the band go in?' Laconically, he answered, 'South!' Despite these engendered
to
misgivings he arranged Joy Division's d6but
London show
grotto, the
at the
popular Islington rock

This
Hope And Anchor.

to
was
scheduled
earlier
coincide roughly with the
release of the "Factory Sampler", a few days
23 Bernard
Albrecht,
on Christmas Eve 1978. it was 1979 that belonged entirely and undeniably to Joy Division. The year got off to
But a promising
start
Electric Ballroom,
London, 26 October
when
radio's
new wave
to record a
1979
Samaritan John Peel invited them
session, which he later aired
in
the middle of
February.
The
four
songs broadcast were
"Exercise One", "Insight", 'She's Lost Control"
Peter Hook. Leeds Futurama 8 September 1979

I.
24
and "Transmission", which offered instant nationwide exposure as their habit-forming

music took seed
in
late-night provinces of the

to capitalise
young. Yet the band refused

this,
on
preferring instead to continue at their

to
own pace, choosing

their
communicate the
in
merest handful of shows, mostly back

northern homeland. Rare London
at
appearances during March,

Sundays"
slot,
Walthamstow
of
Youth Club and the Marquee "Dose
indicated their increasing
popularity with the silent arrival of cult

followers, the "raincoat brigade".
It
was back
had
in
Manchester where Joy
Division
attracted this self-styled hardcore
young men wearing severe and moody, downcast expressions, and the badge of this particular tribe, the
following; serious
haircuts
"angsf-ridden" raincoat. Sartorial expression
has always enjoyed a symbiotic relationship

with the generic
yet there
music
of
its
given culture,
their
was nothing outlandish about

in
image. Like the group, they dressed
unassuming blacks and greys and dark

greens; really rather ordinary, with a hint
of austere sobriety and muted discipline. These were the devotees (as distinct from the transient nature of mere "fans") whose enthusiasm for the group was inspired by a was by healthy jealousy, just as much as their music: Joy Division were their group. The loyal cadre would follow the band everywhere: on the long haul down to the Capital, across on the East Lanes Road to Merseyside or over the Pennines and down
it
into the industrial
heartlands of Yorkshire.
When Joy
right at the
Division played they
were mostly
very front of the stage, where you
would expect them to be, but some would be in some vacant space in the crowd dancing madly with trenchcoat-tails flailing, mimicking
Curtis, their frenzy only
subsiding with
the music's termination. For them,
each
performance was a moving personal

experience, not simply the raucous adulation
of
an appreciative mob.
it
This is not as condescending as sounds. Though some of the sceptical audience members viewed this 'pretentious cult band' with predictable scorn, seeing them as
24 JOY DIVISION
purveyors of 'boring self-indulgent dirges',

the trained heart
and ear
of the convert
its
felt
the music's tension, thrilled to
purgative
ardour and related directly
to the
anguished,
intangible sensations Curtis emoted.
Behind the scenes, however, the band were faced with something of a dilemma during the early Spring of 1979. There was
the nagging realisation that
in
committing
themselves
Joy Division (as a career of sorts) they would have to abandon the secunty of employment. 'Now we've reached a point where we all
totally to
(at
work work
'But
day
jobs)
and we
all
need
to give
up
in
it's
order to continue,' explained Curtis.

not worth signing to a record
company
a
living.
unless they can supply you with
like to stay on the outside. We'd love Tony Wilson said he'd pay us to do an album on Factory. That would be great. We can't afford to do ourselves, which we'd
'We'd
it
if
it
really want.
But you either stay outside the

in totally
system or go
'I
and
try
and change
think we're
it.'
bet there are people
who
stupid
where
'It's
there's
because we are going into a position no security,' conceded Albrecht.

lifetime.'
not going to last us a
Assessing
their
market value and going
on the strength
of their current form, several
major record companies

record
made
overtures to
the band. Joy Division even went so far as to
Rushent,
some demos with producer Martin who was then working for Radar
after serious
Records, but
out, this
consideration
it
all
of
these advances were rebuffed. As

Factory Records
turned patience - and shrewdness - paid
off.
knew they were very

this
much
part
"great leap of faith",
and parcel of and
gamble,
this
that
Joy Division
were quite
clearly their surest bet.
Tony
Wilson, too, had read the market.
'What happens,' he said,

first,
'is
that after the
naive stage of the music, the kids mature.
And as they mature they begin to want more and more from And, hopefully, the bands
it.
that
have grown up with them

like
moreIt
will give them The Beatles moved from "Please,
Please Me"
to
"Strawberry
Fields".'
would be rather simplistic to believe that Tony Wilson's motives were based on something as divorced from the hard, real
world of business as, say, altruism. For him,
25 26 Rainbow
Theatre, London,
investing
in
Joy
Division's future
would be
spent savings - a
included
financially rewarding as well as vicariously

gratifying. Tal<ing a calculated risk, fie
4 April 1980
Factory's profits
total of
and
first
its
fiis
own
life
8,500 - on the connplete production

Division's
of
Joy
album.
Thiis
everything from
of the initial
recording to the pressing

It
10,000 copies.
was a
tight
gamble, the opportunity having only

presented
itself
due
to a
to the
band's
unwillingness to compromise themselves
through coming
with a major.
permanent arrangement
'There
was a
point
where we were thinking

'We went down
to
about signing, but we weren't rushing

anything,' said Curtis.
London to see what kind of relationship we would have, but by that time we'd already agreed to do the first LP with Factory. So we decided to wait and see how that went. It started selling well so we realised there was no need to go to a major.' Working with Factory also proved advantageous in that exempted them from possible interference by mercenary executives and accountants in the sway of
it
music industry conglomerates. Joy Division's

of movement within the Factory realm was summed up by Stephen Morris: 'We don't
freedom
have a contract;
that.'
don't think they run
it
like
Rob
Gretton
was
of the
same mind:
'You
don't sign contracts with them, they just put
out the records for us;

'IVIutual trust
we
both benefit.'
far,'
has worked so
concurred
Wilson.
In April, under the wing of Ivlartin Hannett, Joy Division retired to Strawberry's hilltop studios in nearby Stockport. Over just four
and a
two
they
in
half days,
working, as Curtis said, 'from

in
the afternoon to four
the morning,'
fully
completed
fifteen tracks.
From these
fifteen
they selected ten which appeared on
"Unknown Pleasures". The LP was pressed and packaged

standard
of
to the
any major release,
if
not better.
Factory took great care to maintain their

flawless esoteric image, exemplified by such
previous releases as Orchestral Ivlanoeuvres

In
The Dark's
single, "Electricity".
The design
to
work at Factory Products was far superior the customary do-it-yourself knock-ups of
their "alternative" peers.
There was nothing
amateurish about the presentation of their
26 JOY DIVISION
27 "Futurama One", Queen's Hall. Leeds, 8 September 1979
JOY DIVISION
THE YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE 27
records. Despite Factory's

liking for in-jol<;es
sometimes
gimmicks,
irritating
28 29 Rainbow
Theatre, London,
and
arty
like
FAC
8,
a sort of menstrual egg-timer designed

(of
4 April 1980
by Under
Ludus and Buzzcocks "Orgasm

tfie
Addict" montage fame),
often exquisite
quality of artwork indicated that they at least
took themselves seriously
enough
terms.
to
compete
on the open market

presentation
advertising.
is
in real
Good
better than the best
Wilson, 'but
'We are only a small label,' offered Tony we have one of the best
in
designers, and one of the best producers

the country.'
Factory's designer,
young Peter
Saville,
became
covers
is
involved after leaving Manchester Art
College the previous year. Each of his record
based on information supplied by The unusual symbol on the cover of "Unknown Pleasures" is a graph of the radio waves emanating from an imploding star, which Bernard Albrecht discovered in a
the group.
science book.
'Everything on Factory
is
designed, as
'IVIy
opposed
to decorated,' intimated Saville.
primary concerns are typography and the
arrangement
of information.'
The
results are
functional clarity
and
classical elegance, a
welcome change from brash technicolour

waffle usually
found on record sleeves issued
by larger concerns. Saville also avoids the

easy, unimaginative option of an unnaturally
posed group photograph on

solution
his covers.
in point, this
Taking Joy Division as the case
would have been totally inapplicable, quite out of keeping with their discreet low
profile.
"Unknown Pleasures" was released in June to an astoundingly rapturous press

reception. Appearing during a
quality of
lull
in
the
"new wave" music, the energies of the primal punk orgasm having long since been absorbed and redistributed by pop culture's carpetbaggers, was hailed not only as a stunning, awesome LP, but also the most original d6but album of the decade. Its importance is vouchsafed by the overwhelming number of bands who so openly emulated Joy Division, some of whom deserved more than a cursory glance, most of whom were dull, turgid plagiarists, all
it
eminently disposable.
It
is
shame
that
Factory went on to patronise most of these
28 JOY DIVISION
Joy Division derivatives, for although convoluted form of flattery, gratuitous
it
is
repetition of wholly misinterpreted style
by
what were termed "Factory bands" only served to weaken Factory's reputation as a
bona
fide
contender.
far
All
too often the artwork
on the sleeve
offering
for
it
outshone the hollow musical
sheathed.
And
yet their fascination
Joy Division's music is so understandable; mute acceptance was impossible. Some believe that Romanticism gave rise
Revolution which
thing though
in
to the Industrial
the face of Britain during the 18th
changed and 19th
Centuries.
One
is
certain: the
ideals cherished
imaginations born of that
heroic tradition are the
same as those
espoused in rock's matchless universe - 'we can change the world', 'love conquers all',
there
is
always hope', etcetera.

to find a
It
is
therefore
of
no surprise
band by the name
Joy
Division staking their claim from the heart of a
world that has Romanticism both as a

heritage
and a first principle. Today the spectre of alienation haunts

where once noble and mighty
the
barren, diseased heart of 20th Century Great

Britain
provinces of the prosperous Industrial

Revolution are no more than decaying
wastelands. This malaise pervades even our

culture
which has atrophied, abandoned
to
survive with the most severe form of

aesthetics; the
rectilinear.
monochrome and the The nebulous areas are

of
unequivocally grey.
The black and white cover

Pleasures"
is
"Unknown
all
a stark monolith, devoid of
information save an enigmatic cipher
and the
names
of
those
its
product and
contents.
who manufactured the And is a neutral

it
photograph, "The Enchanted Hand" on the

inner sleeve, which leads us into the
track.
for a
first
Here
is
the
first
clue;
'I've
been waiting
guide
to
could these sensations
come and take me by the hand; make me feel the

is
pleasures of a normal man?' For Joy Division

this atavistic
It
environment
their
domain and
is
totally
compelling.
The
Curtis.
vision surely
belongs
to
songwriter Ian
He
with
that
him
we
to take us disenchanting landscape so might witness the horror for ourselves.

is
the one
who dares
into this
30 31 T
Davidson
Rehearsal Studios,
The beginning
is
the only time to
escape and
Manchester,
19 August 1979
avoid the manifestly distasteful, but
we
too
30 JOY DIVISION
share his compulsion; as

"Disorder"
we
are led through
we
vicariously experience this
exhilaration through desolation.
The
track
is
buoyed by Peter Hook's

guitar
overloaded and distorted bass, and the crisp
drumming of Stephen Morris. Albrecht's is economic and unobtrusive; nothing is

wasted
retains
or superfluous.
its
Each instrument surrounded by space. And the song ends with Curtis, a voice
distinctive identity,
lonely
spirit,
in
the speaker, declaiming,

.'
. .
'I've
got the
but lose the feeling
in
a tone that
is
suggests
lost.
his capacity for reaction
already
The momentum
at
its
carries to the almost

is
Gothic "Day Of The Lords", where the music
doomiest. Immersed
shrill
in this,
yet riding
is
high on a
sustained synthesizer note,

will
is
it
the hoarsely repeated chorus; 'Where
end? Where
will
it
end?' "Candidate"
by
icy guitar
another chiaroscuro abstract, whose austere

rhythm section
is
skirted
in
ambience which blows

as Curtis laments,
'I
from the perimeter

get to you
.' .
.
tried to
"Insight" begins with the subliminal
sounds
of a
lift,
a Hannett touch, and
is
probably the most evocative, emotional song
on the album. 'Guess the dreams always end,

they don't rise up, just descend; but
I
don't
care any more,
I've lost
all,
the
I
will to
want more;
all
I'm not afraid, not at
watch them
as
remember when we were young.' deals with the madness that is memory; mourns what is past. 'But remember when we were young' is such a poignant and perhaps damning line, yet the
they
fall;
but
It
it
tempered by recognition is surpassed to become bewilderment, at which point the music breaks down into incandescent noise before a fragile composure is once again maintained. The man dreams as we all dream,
grief
of
evinced
is
not
its
source. Bitterness
alone.
"New Dawn Fades"

defiant.
its
It
is in
comparison
melancholy.
is
majestic on the plateau of

in its
own
despair, brutal
'Directionless,
so plain
free,
won't set you

drink
loaded gun so you say - We'll share a

to see, a
and step outside, an angry voice and one who cried; we'll give you everything and more, the strain's too much, can't take much more. Oh I've walked on water, run through any more; was me, fire, can't seem to feel
it
it
31
waiting for me, hoping for someffiing more;
me, seeing
else
.'
. .
me
tfiis
time, hioping for somethiing
Tfie lyrics are not

in
so
pleaded
a voice so naked as
much sung as to make one
avert one's gaze.
And as
the pow/er of the
winding, surging fusion of bass and guitar
diminishes
we
are carried to the far end of the

last
song, leaving Curtis behind. With the
drumbeats the head
is
bowed
Whereas the
"Outside",
is
first
half of the
album, the
of the
an externalisation
conscious mind, the "Inside", the white

introspective.
It
side,
is
opens
with the intensely
personal "She's Lost Control", a kind of
exorcism of Curtis's epileptic
affliction.
The
is
electronic effect through which his voice
recorded accentuates the graphic dissolution

of
the
lyric,
'And she kicked out screaming on
and said, "I've lost control again"; and seized up on the floor, thought she'd died, she said, "I've lost control again".' The
her side
I
backbeat, however,
the
is
decidedly danceable;
drumming
is
echoed and embellished

line.
with a
syndrum, which acts as the perfect

in
counterpoint to a high, teetering bass

This appears to be perverse
putting
the extreme,
to
such sensitive subject matter

'real
an
accessible, danceable tune disco',
death
it.
as one reviewer described
Fleeing the curses and elemental incubi,
we
are driven with sickening
momentum
'into
the centre of a city in the night'
and the harsh
opaque
thunder
surrealities of
"Shadowplay",
the irresistible
"Wilderness" and "Interzone". The metal

of the
music rejoices
of
in
violence of this place; abrasive chords cut
through the tense interplay
bass and
drums,
'trying to find
a clue, trying to find a
way
to get out!'
"I
Finally,
Remember
Nothing".
Curtis, giving
'We were strangers,' intones

a touch
track
of
beauty
with
is filled
humour. The ambient noise, glass breaks

to this abject
last
sharply as the music swells for one

strident
moment
the
before subsiding once more.

metallic swirls of the
And as
fade,
ominous
synthesizer finally give out a
new dawn does
though no birds do sing.
Listening to
"Unknown Pleasures" one

32 33 34 T
J
experiences a welcome catharsis. Whereas
most modern music utterly refuses to confront what we glibly call life, the exhilarating and exhausting music which Joy Division created
Davidson Rehearsal
Studios, Manchester,
19 August 1979
32 JOY DIVISION
leaves one feeling mentally unburdened,

viscerally cleansed, with a
is
purged
soul.
There
in
no dishonesty here. As Steve Grant stated Trouser Press', Joy Division's music
life in
'looked
the eye without flinching or
Joy Division, reality, no matter how bleak or oppressive, is better than fantasy. That attitude can frighten and
retreating into fantasy. For
confuse some people.' The music critics were unanimous
in
their
into
commendation.
'Private
music forced out

Paul Morley.
And hitherto outspokenly dismissive voices, who gave the band little more than a nod of acknowledgement for their contributions on the "Factory Sampler", now paid them all the
the open,' praised
NME's
band of Joy undoubtedly deserved. In the face of such overw/helming evidence even the known dissenters had to concede that "Unknown Pleasures" was something rather
attention (and more) that a
Division's calibre
special, that
mill
it
wasn't just the usual run-of-theIt
collection of inchoate songs.
professed
totality that
was nothing
short of
breathtaking.
Joy Division themselves, however, remained aloof from the fact that they,
together with Factory, had
j^j'.
_.
35
become
literally
overnight the hippest of the hip. They viewed

their mercurial rise to critical acclaim, with
its
incumbent overboard
praise, rather
because for all they knew the "backlash" might have been waiting for them just around the corner. The mighty have a marked propensity for tumbling ignominiously from their ivory towers, pushed out in the
dispassionately,
majority of
cases by the same people who

in
put them up there
the
first
place.
It
now
became
clear that their innate suspicion of
the established music industry
machine
satellite,
extended
the
to that industry's
capricious
smug, sycophantic music
press. Their
distrust of a rock journalist's healthy curiosity
often led to prospective interviews being
refused on the grounds that the band
genuinely regarded the formalised "question
and answer" approach as being out-moded. Peter Hook was most militant regarding this matter. He, along with Rob Gretton, was most
vociferous
in
his
condemnation, seeing no
rest within the
it
need
to qualify his position in print, preferring
to let his
statements
music.
'To
me
personally,
is
redundant,' he
35 36 Joy Division, Manchester, 6 January 1979
asserted.
'I
don't read interviews.

I
read the
music papers but can't read a question and answer interview. One of the best things
I've ever read was Lester Bangs' article on The Clash in NME, because was full of stories and things about the tour. That was interesting, but interviews as such don't find interesting The way we look at is that any interview is a bit forced. The only reason a journalist wants to do an interview is that
it
I . . .
it
it
makes
to
it
easier for him to write his piece. But

is
me
it
obvious that
If
time with people and get to
you spend a bit of know them in a

lot
very informal way, you'll get a

of them.'
more out
And
whilst the rest of the
band tended
towards a similar stand, they were generally

less intractable.
Stephen Morris and Bernard

of
Albrecht were the most affable, with Ian Curtis

reflecting the
withdrawn and insular nature

in
the band, talking as he did
a high, faltering
voice, a stark contrast to the Ian Curtis
he
projected from the stage.
Of course Joy Division did

interviews to the
relent,
granting
more
persistent hacks, albeit
infrequently. After the investigative journalist
had dealt with the tangled informations web which surrounded Factory Records and had overcome manager-minder Gretton's stonewalling tactic of refusing to let anyone near the band, a time and a place was
dutifully
arranged. But during these
painstakingly organized meetings the
band
were wary and evasive, not only reluctant to answer the odd question, but also guilty of
that
most heinous
of journalistic
crimes superficial
withholding information.
Division couldn't
And seeing as Joy

because
be asked about
things
like their
"stance", primarily
they didn't have one, an interviewer found

himself having to broach the particularly
touchy subject
of their music and meaning behind the moaning,' as Lydon would say.
lyrics; 'the
PiL's
John
'You get people
who seem
on
to think
you
should put your
lyrics
(the sleeve)
so you
can get your message across,' complained Peter Hook. 'They ask us what our lyrics are about and we say, well they're whatever you
hear
really.
The songs mean something
personal to us, but that's not the point. Our

lyrics
different to
may mean something completely every single individual means

it
34 JOY DIVISION
something
to
you;
it
means something
cut him out?
different to him.
Why
We
don't
want
to
say anything.
We
don't want to
influence people.
We
don't want people to
know what we
force, but
think.
lyrics
'People think that
are the guiding
Ian as
we like to think that we influence much as he influences us; that we

if
stopped playing Ian would never write again.' This kind of hostile reception earned Joy
Division a reputation as
as their defensive manner
awkward customers, made them less
than easy to interview. Whilst

failed to get
some
journalists
beyond this first hurdle, others were a little more fortunate. Persistence would sometimes pay off and another handful of facts carefully gleaned from the band would appear in print.
'I
don't write about anything
in
particular,
write very subconsciously,' confided Curtis.
'I've
got a
little
book
I
full
of lyrics
and
just
fit
something
so
I'll
in.
have a
lot of lyrics in
reserve
use them when the
right
tune
comes
of
all
along.
sorts
The lines are usually made up of odd bits.'
Producer Martin Hannett detailed
"Unknown Pleasures" as 'dancing music,

with Gothic overtones.' Bernard Albrecht
accurately defined "gothic"
in
describing his
favourite film "Nosferatu": 'The

really evil,
atmosphere
he
think
if
is
but you feel comfortable inside

'
it.'
'We wanted an empty sound,

continued, 'we
like
it
that way.
it
We
you
have a
'And
really full
I
sound can become boring.' made go bang!' regaled Hannett,

it
referring to the
drums' gun-like report

I
'And to think bought my first drum kit by chopping the furniture in our house to sell as firewood!' quipped Stephen Morris. Behind their natural off-stage joviality Joy Division were aware of the realities of their situation, stubbornly refusing to accede to rock's more commercial traditions. 'We don't want to get diluted, really,' said
Curtis, 'and
by staying
at
Factory
at the
moment
we're free to do what
we
want.
There's no-one restricting us or the music, or
even the artwork and promotion. You get bands that are given huge advances - loans
really - but
all
what do they spend

to
it
on? What
going
to
is
that
money going
get?
Is
it
37
Morris, Curtis.
make
Albrecht
& Hook.
the music any better?' Only seldom did an interview progress
JOY DIVISION
I
beyond the stage where Joy Division expressed opinions on the band's position
the grand
38 Joy
in
Division,
Central
Sound
these
scheme of things, and despite all freedoms was still very much an uphill
it
Studios, 6 January
1979.
struggle for them. But on occasions a luckier

interviewer might tease that rare creature from
the
first
band - a Joy
Division anecdote. Like the
time they went into a television studio, for

. .
example
This actually
at the Rafters
came about
after
an incident
of
Club on the evening
the
had approached Tony Wilson and, by way of an introduction, said, 'You bastard. You put Buzzcocks and Sex Pistols and Magazine and all those others on the telly, what about us turned out, he did get them into then?' As
Stiff/Chiswick talent contest. Ian Curtis
it
Granada TV's studios

to
to
record before the
cameras. However, the band didn't see eye
eye with the director, who at the end of each successive take would ask them to go through one more time. They obliged,
it
but no-one would

satisfactory or not.
told
let
them know was Then the floor manager

if
it
them
to
it
was
all
its
over at which point the
entourage
made
way up
to the control
room
see what was going on.
In his attempt to be creative, the director used hackneyed video effects on the footage. The group responded to this adultery with a shocked silence. Eventually Peter Hook broke
the
air.
'I
thought
rubbish,'
he
said.
was a load of fucking And Joy Division filed out.

it
Another amusing interlude - following

another fraught Joy Division interview - was
reported and
commented upon by"Sounds"'

evening the
guitarist
Dave McCullough.
'Later in the
was seen
searching around the Mayflower (on the night

they had played at the "Stuff
festival) for his "woolie",
The Superstars" which he'd lost. It was
a funny, contrasting scene, but

don't think
it'll
somehow
into a
ever
It's
Division song.
for that.'
make maybe
in
its
way
Joy
too close to reality
There
as there
is
a tendency
music
critique, just
is
with art critique, to

in
become
over
the
interested
finding out what really
makes
artist(s) tick,
pushing
their
work - now sadly
relegated to a subordinate role - into the
shadow
of personality reportage.
So
it
has
to
be expected that a few minor blemishes on the edifice will be revealed, but rather than
36 JOY DIVISION
viewing these with undue disappointment, an

artist's
shortcomings l<eep him human. Mozart

worl<s of great musical
may have created
genius, but as a person he
was
quite infantile
and excessively crude

others.
in his
dealings with
Bernard Albrecht explained concisely what motivated him as an artist, as a creator

of
music.
I
'I
don't like a
lil<e
I
lot of
music, but the

of
music
that
well.'
do
get
I
more out
want
than from
anything else
I
in life.
to put the feeling
get out of music back into music as
Such concessions made towards playing

a
game
defined by unwritten rules did not
completely assuage the music writers as a

whole. Joy Division would have
come
in for
some
very bad press had their music been

it
anything less than what
was, and they
professed
or bad.
'If
to
take
little
notice either way,
good
you bothered what was said
of
you,
bothered whether people clapped, bothered
whether your records sold, your music would
be so fucking dissipated,' said Albrecht, 'We don't judge whether Joy Division are
successful by whether the records
or
sell
or not,
to
by the number
us.
of
people who
come we
see
the
We
judge whether Joy Division are

write are
to write.'
successful by whether the songs
songs we want
'Basically,'
stressed Curtis, 'we play what
we
be very easy for us to say: well, all these people seem to like such and such it'd be very easy to knock out a song
want.
It'd
.
.
another one. But
we
don't.'
Yet perhaps the most annoying aspect
common
to
most
of the articles, record
reviews and gig reports ever written about
Joy Division was the reasonless necessity to compare them to their apparent forerunners
of the
previous decade. Musical
style, like
history,
never repeats
itself;
it
may be
comparisons between two dangerously inaccurate, and in the instance of music criticism detract from the merits of the most recent - and hence most vulnerable - addition to the annals of rock. Chicken is just chicken, is cooked, the but the manner in which flavourings used and the way it is presented
paralleled, but
distinct eras are
it
makes some chicken

than the
this
rest.
taste that
much
to
better
Joy Division spice,
continue
39 40 Sound
Central
Studios,
1
analogy,
was unique.
6 January
979
38 JOY DIVISION
Joy Division
in
The clever commentators who compared to The Doors, pointing a
"j'accuse!" finger at Jim Morrison inflections
and thereby discounting part, had their timing all wrong. The two bands were not interchangeable; each was the product of its own era. Small wonder these myopic dismissals enraged Joy Division disciples. Joy
Ian Curtis's voice
talent
any
on the band's
Division
were as much a break from

in their
tradition
as The Doors had been

Similarly, there
is
time.
influences, which
situation. Cite
is
the burning question of another "Catch 22"
your influences, which must in have some bearing on the matter, and you are pedantically accused of imitation; remain silent and there in the bumbling autopsy is printed the closest and most
all
actuality
convenient reference point. This leads

journalists,
to
who
desire to deal only with pure

hybrids, coming up And The Stooges in an
this in his
it
definitives
and not messy

like,
with phrases
Iggy
English context.'
On
reading
will
newspaper the punter

as a self-evident
truth
automatically take
it
and take
no further
talent
than
In
will
that.
ten years time
some homegrown
to
Joy Division, much to their dismay. Outwardly the similarities will be there, but again it will be something entirely different, something to be ludged on its own terms and not the criteria of
past culture. Joy Division were
all
no doubt be compared
too aware
that the press
were
in
a powerful, responsible
blundering
position;
it
is
quite likely for this reason that

distrustful of this
it
they
became so
organ. For them

criticised
in life
became
tiresome to be
"fun"
by egotistical hedonists whose ethic was something as superficially banal as and whose main aesthetic was a
bnlliantly-hued "quirky", or the right haircut.

just happened to be above all this. actually dared to be so presumptuous as to take itself seriously- an attribute entirely worthy of credit, not mockery or derision - and to all intents and purposes
Joy Division's music

It
it
known as "pop culture". The only compromise Joy Division ever made was to make music: they were young people who made music that
existed outside what
is
lovingly
virtue of this they
in which they lived - by were included in the proceedings, though they did very little
reflected the times
41
42 43
Ian Curtis.
themselves
to
engineer
this state of events.
Joy Division made as

Despite the
little
fuss as possible,
they just got on with the job.
summer
normally being a time
band played a number of one-off gigs and appeared regularly at their residency. The Factory. In May 1979 they
of great inactivity, the
viêre just
two years from
their starting point,
though the difference between the two

incarnations
was
of
quantum
proportions. At
the time they recorded "Transmission" Ian
'We wrote those songs on the album a long time ago; the sound of the album isn't dated, but stylewise has.'
Curtis said,
it
Round about
promoters took
it
this
same
time certain
to
upon themselves
organise degenerate celebrations
of the
"new" music, sprawling
festivals featuring big
names like Public Image Limited and the Gang of Four, trying desperately to burgeon the faith in a great show of numbers; and the
audiences turned up to see the bands. Joy Division too appeared at three of these
philanthropic but sadly irrepresentative affairs
during the months of August and September.
They played
Festival,
at the three-day London Punk Leeds' Futurama '79 (subtitled 'the
world's
first sci-fi
music
festival'
and
as being
'described by Green of
'like
Scritti Politti
Reading without the mud and different badges'), and the open-air Leigh Valley Festival held on August Bank Holiday Monday. The last of these, FAG 1 5, was an attempt to get Manchester and Liverpool's independent labels, Factory and Zoo, to meet
literally
"half-way". Set in a Lancashire
landscape surrounded by slag heaps, old collieries and the ubiquitous Victorian cotton
mills,
the site
was
for
perfect, but regrettably

to
inaccessible
attend.
most people wishing

turn out (200 or so)
was also blamed on inadequate promotion and the

The poor
British weather.
threat of that perennial bugbear, the
changeable
Nonetheless,
following such notables as
Echo And The Bunnymen, A Certain Ratio and The Teardrop
Explodes, Joy Division came on at nightfall and gave a spirited performance of both familiar material taken mainly from the album and new songs like "Colony" and "Dead Souls". These songs were impressive even in their unrefined state and marred by occasionally shoddy sound quality.
40 JOY DIVISION
Just over a fortnight later Joy Division had
second and more successful encounter wtU television. They recorded a couple of numbers live for BBC 2's "Something Else" when the alternative culture magazine visited
their
Manchester region. Since national radio apart from that trusty stalwart John Peel the
refused to play the band's material on the
grounds that was a trifle maudlin and uncommercial (i.e. of limited appeal) this was an ideal opportunity to showcase their new
it
single "Transmission". For the interested

parties watching the show, especially for
those not fortunate enough to have seen Joy

Division
live,
it
them
in
the flesh.
was an And
early
it
chance
to
see
was
the other song
they performed, "She's Lost Control", which
made
the biggest impression. Beneath the
studio lights' unsympathetic glare, watery-
eyed Ian Curtis looked pallid to the point of illness as he voiced the words. Confusion in
her eyes that says
it
all,
she's lost control
.'
. .
When he
of his
then broke
it
off into
the convulsions
dancing
left
veracity of his "act", that his
no-one doubting the were not popstar
histrionics of the conventional, theatrical kind.
Compared
Banshees,
to
"Top Of The Pops" fodder, even
from the likes of their peers PiL or The

this
of entertainment.
make-up
or
was a most cross-grained form was unaffected, without studio trickery, the power of their
It
bare statement speaking

This natural energy
for itself.
was
the hallmark of
their latest single, "Transmission",
and
at
the
time
it
too sent the press into raptures. Another
enigmatic cover and another barely contained nova, "Transmission" surges and glimmers as
Curtis so passionately discharges that
memorable hookline, 'Dance, dance, dance,

dance, dance
to the radio!' This
record
is
proud Joy Division rock, with Hook's powerdriven bass reaching towards pop in the
same way
that "She's Lost Control" fuses their
& Northern sound with commercial rhythms of the disco. Again the song is about alienation, but with the seventy of a line like 'we would go on as though nothing was wrong' tempered by that
familiar Industrial
deceptive chorus, 'Dance
to the radio
.'
.
.
44 45
"Stuff
The
Superstars" Festival,
'No language, just sound is all we need know, to synchronise love to the beat of the
Mayflower,
Manchester, 28 July
1979
show' evokes the desperation of clutching straws, at which point the song hits its
at
41
I
screaming climax, 'and we could dancel' "Transmission" is one of those songs that must be caught at the right angle to be able
to
hear and
it
feel
it
properly,
much
flip
like
the wild
orgasm
It
describes.
the record over
is
then bewildering to
to
hear "Novelty", where Joy Division commit
to vinyl
a slovenly piece
of
probably
over.
their only track that requires
heavy metal; passing
Released around the same time as this 45 were two Joy Division tracks from the "Unknown Pleasures" sessions, which
surfaced courtesy of
Bob
Last's Edinburgh-
based Fast Products label on a compilation maxi-single called "Earcom 2: Contradiction". Ian Curtis explained the circumstances which
gave
rise to this
tor
arrangement. 'We've known
we knew that he was on Fast; we'd also played a few dates on The Rezillos last tour, so it really came about through that. We had some tracks left over from the album and it was an outlet for them. Really, would have
Bob
a long time and
going
to
do
this single
it
taken Factory Records a long time to get
them
out.
We
might as well release everything

it.'
rather than save
These two offerings, "Auto-Suggestion" .?" are as good and "From Safety To Where
.
"Unknown Pleasures" itself, but the overall sound and feeling set them the band were apart quite conclusively, as caught in a lighter mood. The tracks are dark green as opposed to sombre black; but that
as anything from
if
doesn't
mean
to
say that they're
froth - "Autois
Suggestion"; 'Here, here, everything

inside,
kept
so take a chance and step outside,

. .
.
your hopes, your dreams, your paradise
Lose some sleep and say you've

frustrations face to face.' This
Curtis's soulful,
is
tried,
meet
indicative of
crooning
. .
style.
And "From
Safety
riding
To Where
.?" verily
bounces along,
an agile bass melody. Only spiralling guitar noises come across as the swarf for the song's cutting edge. 'The broken hearts, all the wheels that are turned, the memory's
scarred and the vision
is
blurred.'
While
some were
content to hunt
records and
listen in the
privacy of their
down the own

46 "Unknown
Pleasures" LP
released June 1979
rooms, others were unsatisfied with anything

less than the real thing. that
And with the news The Factory was closing down 'for an indefinite period' as its licence had come up
42 JOY DIVISION
for renewal, there
was only one possible place

this last
to find
them: headlining on
In front of
Factory
Division
Weekend.
full
house Joy
gave a superb, beautifully controlled performance that opened with the new song "Atmosphere", which found Ian Curtis in the unaccustomed role of guitarist, as ever reluctant to play safe by pampering to those who begged for 'Transmission!' The truculent bunch finally relented, playing their "hit single" as part of their encore. They reached mid song when Peter Hook lashed out with his bass at someone baiting him in the front row. Hook retaliated further by chasing the antagonist through the crowd, a pursuit which ended in a scuffle by the cloakrooms. Hook was disgusted and made straight for the
dressing room, leaving the remaining
trio to
mop up
it
with "Auto-Suggestion".
And who was
that said
Joy Division gigs were dull?
Ahead of them, during the months of October and November, lay an extensive
nationwide tour as support
It
to the
Buzzcocks.
was an odd double

had
in
billing
as the two bands
weren't even vaguely similar; about the only

thing they
common was
that they
had
both originated from Manchester.
Stylistically
they were poles apart. Undoubtedly the

majority of the
audience who attended these
dates had
to see their heroes the Buzzcocks perform a bedazzling singalong set of old favourites and generally partake of an evening's comfortable and undemanding rapid-fire entertainment. So it was hardly surprising that they became hushed to silence when Joy Division took the stage under an
come along
eerie blue glow, beginning their set without
any introduction. It was reminiscent of the reaction they had encountered on The
Rezillos dates twelve
Naturally there were
months previous. some who were
familiar with this routine,
who warmed
to the
swirling intros of "Insight" or
"Shadowplay";
who
didn't know what was to follow. But by and large the crowds as a whole failed to respond to Joy Division's music. The codes
were all wrong. Where was the witty repartee, the gay banter with the crowd, the plug for the
latest
record or the next gig?
Why
the long
pauses between numbers and this rum business of swapping instruments? All they were presented with was the rising, falling music, the doomy rhythms and the occasional
JOY DIVISION
I I
47 48 49
Stockport,
28 July 1979.
44 JOY DIVISION
disco texture, and the disturbing focal point of

Ian Curtis.
And when, as happened on a few

off
occasions, he had to be helped

suffering
stage
after
what appeared as an epileptic seizure, the audiences were left dumbstruck till house lights illuminated and the pounding of
a sound system resumed, wondering what
had happened, wondering what they had
just
witnessed. At other venues on other nights
Joy Division would show themselves to be less solemn and intense than one had been led to believe and expect; sometimes they
stole the
show, sometimes they seduced only

to lend a
a few willing concert

first
sympathetic
ear.
A welcome break came on

in
the one-off
Belgium
at
Plan K, Joy Division's
ever date on the Continent. They were
there, along with
Cabaret Voltaire and the

arts centre in Brussels.
real
star of the evening, writer William to
Burroughs,
open the new
The
owners
offering
of this former
sugar refinery treated

like true
the two British
bands
rock stars,
and beer, and asking whether or not they would require the services of groupies, which the management would be only too glad to oblige them with
them
free food
. .
But generally the British trek

Division rather
left
Joy
confused and
slightly bitter.
They had anticipated a welcome from the public in line with the praise bestowed upon them by the press, but the reality of the
cavernous venues which lacked any kind of intimacy, appeared far less one-sided than Joy Division had supposed. They took a final glance over their shoulders and disappeared once more
situation, particularly in the larger,
into the
sanctuary
of the
recording studio.
These sessions at Rochdale's Cargo Studios produced among others two masterpieces of modern music, "Atmosphere" and "Dead Souls", which later appeared as a single on the French magazine-cum-record
label
Sordide Sentimentale.
it
controversy
arose because
was
ludicrously hard to
obtain as only the obscure number of 1578 were pressed. Despite howls of anguish from the thousands of Joy Division enthusiasts unable to acquire a copy (some even made an unprecedented journey to France or paid upwards of 15 for on the black market) and
it
,^ 50
Leigh 'Valley
,,
,,
accusations from the press that they had '

,
Festival,
27 August
^^^"
P^''^^ ' y^'
another
of
^ Factory s
1979
increasingly tedious gimmicks, the group
JOY DIVISION
were unrepentant and claimed that beyond recording the music the affair was out of their hands. AH post-production work had been entirely at the discretion of the Frenchmen.
whatsit,
'We had a pleading letter from Jean-Pierre and we agreed because it's interesting to see how different people handle
different aspects,' said
Rob
Gretton. 'There are
no
restrictions from Factory
on
this sort of
thing.' His reaction to the finished

'I
product
it
was a little more down to earth: thought was a bit over the top.' The single came as part of a lavish package bearing the conceptual title of "Licht Und Blindheit" and featured a eulogic text by Jean-Pierre Turmel and a fold-out cover of a hooded figure surveying a mountainous vista,
painted by his associate Jean-Frangois
Jamoul. Their
first
venture into what they

(total art)
termed Gesamtkunstwerk
involved
Throbbing
and on the strength of its apparent success Joy Division were persuaded to condone their involvement. Though much of the accompanying essay is dense and verbose, Turmel accurately assessed Joy Division as more than just entertainment, placing their music in the Romantic Gothic context 'at the intersection of luminous and dark worlds, between silence and the cry.' This is a particularly apt
Gristle,
description of "Atmosphere", which

in
is
a dirge
the true sense of the word.
It
is
dominated
by Albrecht's funereal synthesizer playing,
drumming punctuating washes of sound. Into this painted landscape comes Curtis's vocal, 'Don't walk away in silence "Dead Souls" is another those almighty Joy Division songs where
with Ivlorris's leaden
majestic
.'
of
absolutely no holes are barred.
It
is
foreboding, full-blown assault on the senses
where
its
force only relents to
Curtis's forlorn words,
dreams away,
that
make way for 'Someone take these point me to another day

of the
.'
.
Again the crushing weight
music resumes, this time with Curtis adding to the onslaught, 'they keep calling me!' Surrender
inevitable.
Prior to leaving for a small scale
is
European Joy Division were again invited to record a session for the John Peel Show. This comprised "The Sound of Music", their best
tour,
ever rendition of "Twenty Four Hours",
51 Electric Ballroom, London, 26 October
"Colony" and the
latest
stage favourite "Love
1979
46 JOY DIVISION
Tear Us Apart". The European tour took in eleven dates, opening w/ith a one-off at Les Bains-Doucfies
Will
in Paris,
but beginning proper
in
the
New
Amsterdam's Paradiso. Most concerts were in Holland and neighbouring Belgium, though they also performed at The Basement in Cologne and Berlin's Kant Kino.
Year
at
It
was
really strange, the
atmosphere.
'It
Strange,' recalled Bernard Albrecht.
was
It
quite a
lot lil<e
Manchester, Berlin
...
had
a cold atmosphere, anonymous.
An
evil
. .
atmosphere. You could

could
feel
it
feel the evil
You
from The War.' But here too the
crowd loved them and the tour was an unqualified success. Back in the more
Joy were in their element, spinning enchanted webs around their audiences.
intimate surroundings of smaller clubs Division
The
feeling
in
these places was delectably
clandestine, just as
halcyon days
This
of
had been during the 1977 when Warsaw played

it
at the Electric Circus.
was 1980 and Joy
Division,
now
waiting
unquestionably the new wave frontiersmen,
seemed unstoppable. And

for
Britain
was
them. Tony Wilson, reckoning that
'the
intellectuals will love them,' was eager to get them on the college circuit. But first the band chose to undertake a little charity work. Joy Division's first U.K. date was promoted under the heading "FAC for CITY FUNds", a
benefit
in
aid of the local fanzine "City Fun".
Held
at
Manchester's newest seedy club, the

(but a stone's throw from the
it
New Osbourne
and two
extinct Electric Circus),
featured Joy Division
of their Factory stablemates,
A
an
Certain Ratio
and Section
25. Despite
enthusiastic reception from the audience
who
doubtless viewed Joy Division as conquering

to live up such high expectations. But as reporter Mick Middles commented in 'Sounds'; 'They needn't worry, in fact they always were prone to playing below par gigs at the worst to
heroes returning home, they failed
possible time, but
in
true
r'n'r
irony,
they are
forced into an encore situation. They tried to
sound
full
of purpose, but
nobody
is
perfect.
'Not even Britain's finest rock band.'
The following night

52 53
1979
Leigh Valley
it
was a
different story.
Their concert at the University of

Festival,
27 August
sell-out, the
guest
list
London was was huge and Joy

goods.
Division, as they say, delivered the
JOY DIVISION
As on the previous night, the set comprised new material and apart from brief pulses of nostalgia the crowd were treated to a display of the brave new Joy Division. "Love Will Tear Us Apart", now the highlight of their renovated set, showed clearly how the band had evolved, relying more on synthesizer rather than guitar and placing yet more emphasis on the bass by bringing right upfront. The combined effect of these developments made the music sound less claustrophobic, with the fourth instrument, Ian Curtis's voice, moving into the misty space created by the synth. Though the overall sound colour had changed, they still confronted the same
it
shadows and
fears with the
same courage
such a way
as
before, dealing with
them
in
that
demanded
attention. NIVIE writer Paul
Morley
indicated a fate that could so easily have
had they been a lesser band than they were. 'As Danny Baker said to me, Joy Division are due some sort of backlash, but he's not the one to do If the group had shown the
befallen Joy Division
it.
slightest indication of slackening or
straightening out
they are better
now
would have attacked. But than they have ever been.
'Joy Division will tear you apart. Still.' Seeing out the remainder of February with
a few
more impromptu
gigs,
entered Islington's Britannia Studios
Joy Division in March

work
with producer Martin Hannett to begin
second album, and a forthcoming single, "Love Will Tear Us Apart". They stayed in London to play The Rainbow where they supported The Stranglers, and to take part in three "Factory By Moonlight" evenings during
on
their
the beginning of April.
For the
first
of
these dates Factory issued
an information sheet which said that 'Joy Division have been banned as a result of their appalling behaviour on the night of Sunday
23rd March.' But there they were, opening
proceedings with the solid rhythms
of "A
Means To An
End". For an encore they

of Velvet
played a lengthy cover version
Underground's "Sister Ray", with Curtis joking with the audience at its end. 'You should hear our version of "Louie Louie",' he dead-panned.
the
The second night went well enough, band in their customary role at the
billing.
with
top of the Factory
During their
to
final
appearance, however, Curtis had
be helped
48 JOY DIVISION
ttie end of the fifth) song. was becoming increasingly obvious that Curtis was either or suffering a great amount of
offstage at
It
ill
strain.
His illness led to a near

Hall
riot at
Bury's
Derby
rest of
on stage
where he was only able to come two numbers. The "Joy Division's" set was played by Joy
to sing the last
Divison, the three
members
of Section 25, with
vocals by
Simon Topping. This unusual performance didn't go

Certain Ratio's
54 55 56 T
Davidson Rehearsal Studios. Manchester, 19 August 1979
50 JOY DIVISION
57
Electric Ballroom,
down
well with the
audience who had

to
London, 26 October
understandably paid
see Joy Division and

it
1979
Joy Division
only.
When
was
over, chairs
and
pint
glasses were hurled
at the stage.
Rob
Gretton, obviously incensed as he
knew
the real reason for this "masquerade", averted
the crisis by tactfully laying out a few of the

culprits.
As one disgruntled
it
fan said, 'they

at
might have got away with

but not
here.'
in
The Factory,
up
Bury.
mean,
they're big stars
and the grew longer. Sadly, Joy Division's few live performances became restricted to the north of England and publicised only by word of mouth. Apart from these few gigs, which seemed to indicate that they were for the time being taking it easy, Joy Division were under great organisational pressure. Along with a number of arranged British dates, which they still hoped to fulfil, there was the up and coming three week tour of America for which to prepare, and the
Ian Curtis's health deteriorated
list
cancellation
promotional video for the single "Love
Will
Tear Us Apart" to shoot.
The
latter
was
filmed
in
a dilapidated
IVIanchester warehouse, which the
band used
as a rehearsal studio, only four days before
Joy Division gave what was concert on Friday 2nd May

Birmingham's High
the video that the
Hall.
to
at
be
is
their final
the University of
it
And
evident from
band were
their usual
irascible selves, disinclined to "perform" for
the camera, content instead to lethargically
go
through the motions to
make
the point that
they viewed even this as being something of a
sham. Factory played another
of their rueful
jokes by airing the "Love Will Tear Us Apart"
video not on "The Old Grey Whistle Test",
"Top Of The Pops" where was for, but on the cult Saturday morning ITV children's programme
or even
it
probably intended
"Tiswas".
In
a word, everything
was normal;
surrounded
counting
off
the tangled
web
of activity that
and included the band was

United States. Nothing
just
the last few days before they departed for the
seemed outwardly
together with a
untoward.
But
for Ian Curtis the strain,
combination
at his old
of
personal problems, proved too
great. In the early
hours
of
Sunday
18th
IVIay,
home
in
Macclesfield, he
hung
himself.
THE INTERREGNU
52
THE INTERREGNUM
58 59
The
Ian Curtis.
Ian Curtis died at the
age
of tw/enty-three.
Factory,
The
child.
official
inquest over, his funeral w/as
13 July 1979
held on 23rd
May
980.
He
left
v^îfe
and
The
principal reason for his suicide
was
acute depression, brought on by progressively

viôrsening epilepsy
his marriage.
and the
disintegration of
previous
the note
just
He had apparently made two attempts to take his own life. Part of he left read, 'At this very moment
I I
wish
were dead,
in
just can't
cope any
more,'
Those
and around the band were

first
among
the
to learn of his death, but
as
Tony Wilson commented, 'It came as one bloody shock For although Curtis had frequently been especially of late, and was often depressed, no-one seemed to have suspected anything. Even those closest to the man himself could not have guessed that something of this magnitude was about to occur, primarily because the conclusive
.
,
'
ill,
finality of
anticipate,
forecast
makes impossible to A nervous breakdown can be with some accuracy, but the prospect
suicide
it
of self-murder
is
just too appalling for a
countenance. Hence was one of universal disbelief. Nobody was willing to accept that this fait accompli was irreversible fact. 'Sounds' writer Dave McCullough, in his
concerned
initial
third party to
the
reaction
"The Short Goodbye ", detailed his own incredulous response. 'Last Tuesday was filling in an expenses form when somebody told me a joke. They said they'd had a phone call from Scotland
.
article
saying The Teardrop Explodes had dedicated

a song on stage the previous evening to Joy
Division's Ian Curtis
who was dead,

I
laughed,
for
and
half self-consciously
compensating
said
I
bleak and industrial jibes,

surprised
'But
I
wouldn't be
if
he had,
half
was
worried as well, so
to
phoned
Factory's Alan
Erasmus
erase the joke from
my mind and let expenses sheet.

probably
still
me
In
return to
my
difficult
a frightening calm, most
shell-shocked voice, Alan
Erasmus
dead,
I
told
me
all
it
was
true; Ian Curtis
was
forgot
about
my expenses
it
sheet.'
Appropriately
enough
was John Peel
who brought unexpected

listening world:
confirmation to the
Joy Division has
'Bad news lads. Ian Curtis of died.' As a tribute he played
THE INTERREGNUM 53
the band's last single, "Atmosphere".
The world
performer.
in
of
rock music
was now suddenly
missing a very talented songwriter and
losing the
of their
future,
The ranks of the music press had, esteemed Curtis, been deprived great white hope for a more palatable
Division. But the
Joy
members
of the
band were mourning the departure of a close friend. Stephen Morris recalled, 'On Sunday night was turning up my trousers; on Monday morning was screaming.'
I
I
Bernard Albrecht expressed how deeply

Ian Curtis's suicide affected him:
'I
will
never
be able
me
for
cope now, and

to
with lan's death.

forever.
I
It
will affect
will
never be able to
it
forget
it.
Personally, as a friend -
means so
much
friend.
to
me, regardless
a real
of the
group - as a
He was
good
friend.'
Emerging from their collective catatonic trance, the music lournalists sought whatever scant details that surrounded the tragic circumstances of Curtis's death. Tactless and insensitive as might be, coming so soon after the event, the' press nevertheless had to
it
undertake the messy task

relating relevant facts
if
of ascertaining
and
only to discount wild
speculative rumours then circulating. They returned repeatedly to the only reliable source
of information.
Factory Records.
An
"official
statement" by Tony Wilson

of the brief
appeared as part
'Record Mirror'.
'I
obituary
in
can't
go
into detail yet, obviously. All
can say is morning -
that
I
he was found on Sunday found out about while was

it
I
in
new album - and that he was a very sensitive young man. He obviously decided he'd be happier somewhere else
the studio mixing the
. .
but at least we'd had the opportunity of
meeting him, getting

left
to
know
him. We're just
feeling sorry for ourselves,

is
which
suppose
the
wrong kind
of emotion.'
Bernard Albrecht
tried to
shed what
pile
it,
light
he could on the matter.

'Well,
hundreds
. . .
of
reasons
on top
of
each other people don't.

about
life,
Some people feel some Some people are hard-skinned

was
not.
but Ian
'Things like ... Ian could not ignore his
problems, even the

person's
couldn't.
little
ones, the things

to
which crop up from day

life.
day
in
every
but he
He
tried,
yes he
tried,
'
54
THE INTERREGNUM
'There are
many
different sides to
people
of
and
could not describe \he complexity
lan's personality in a
whole day
don't think.
'He was not a weird guy.
person
like
anyone
else, that
He was a normal was the thing
about
It,
but a very emotional person, and
some people can show their emotions, but he didn't show his, except on rare occasions. In
his lyrics
. .
.
The
utilitarian
nature of his suicide did not
belie the fact that his lyrics reflected
deep
it
undercurrents within him. Songwriting had
become
helped
this
part of Ian Curtis's
life,
and while
to
to alleviate
some
internal pressures,
form of self-therapy also served
attenuate his acerbic perspective of the world,

a vision which
lies
dormant
in
every one of us.
Curtis confronted those
immutable
60
absolutes which so infurlatlngly confound

reason, the contradictions and irrationalities
that exist
life.
behind the
thin
veneer
of civilised
But as the weight of
this reality
began
to
prey on his mind, he remained unaware of the
induced by performing such Immoderate open-heart surgery on our society and culture. Where we would not care to go, he explored with abject wonder; we only
side-effects
followed as voyeurs, thus avoiding the true
to
he did not seem seek or expect any answers nor find escape routes. His conviction went beyond
Intensity of this exposure. Yet
stating
mere truisms; his vignettes stung because he was not scared of the real and
truths that are
absurd
an
Intrinsic part of the
human
condition. Curtis did not avoid severe
actualities like alienation, degradation,
suffering
and
loneliness; for
to
him
to
trivialities of
compromise,
life,
accommodate
the
was
It
not only a weakness, but anathema.
Gradually, he
became estranged from
life,
but
Is
not easy to exist as an outsider. His
defences crumbled as he submitted to the fears he was confronting, which in turn permeated the commonplaces everyone has
to
deal with, making even these unendurable.
His resistance eroded, these anxieties

to
began
Death
denude the core, the very became the only option.
will to live.
His suicide could therefore not
fall
to
"validate" his work, his lyrics, his art,

ironically dealt with the various
which so
of
Is
aspects
psychic collapse. Such an endorsement

unjust, but the act of suicide
has long been
THE INTERREGNUM 55
regarded in a romantic light as the last desperate gesture, the ultimate statement
60 61 Hulme,
of
Manchester,
6 January 1979
an
artist
dying for his
art.
It
happened
to the
poet John Keats, painters
like
Jackson
Pollock and Mark Rothko, the photographer
Diane Arbus, and
in
the artistic niche Ian
Curtis inhabited there
was no shortage
of
canonised predecessors. Jimi Hendrix, Janis

Joplin, Otis Redding, Brian Jones, Elvis
Presley ef
a/,
were
all
there
in
"Rock's
Hallowed
Hall
Of Fame". And
now
the
comparisons drawn between Ian Curtis of Joy Division and Jim Morrison of The Doors
seemed more applicable than ever Numerous obituaries appeared in both well-established rock tabloids and humble
. .
fanzines alike, ranging from the necrophiliac

to
obsequious
hagiolatry.
Dozens
of fans
wrote to 'Sounds' to complain about Dave
McCullough's dramatic statement,

cared
for
'That
you, that
man
in
died for you, that

area.' This
man man
saw the madness

quote
is,
your
notorious
however, less extreme than most.

in
Many wallowed
in in
the personal tragedy of Ian
Curtis instead of placing
Joy
Division's
work
perspective
now
that
it
too existed only
the past. (The international press

in
had
reacted
the
same
fashion following Marilyn
Monroe's demise.) Curtis's death tainted some

writers'
perception of events, causing them
to over-react
and
distort the
man
out of
all
proportion as they squirmed with candid

humility to deal with his passing.
How many
times
in
the past had there

wrists
in
been quips about slashed

Division articles?
Joy
such blunt chance? Even with the benefit

if
And who would not retract inferences now given a second

of
20/20
hindsight the lournalists
felt
as impotent
and inadequate as the other onlookers, as 'Melody Maker's' Neil Rowland pointed out.
'I
think the real tragedy
in
music and
sorrows
of fan's death, of the
Joy Division's unending

is
we have
to suffer, the inexplicable

is
agonies, and betrayals,

to blame.'
that there
no-one
The matter could not have been quietly Such is not human nature. Morbid might be, but there was also a fascination most genuine interest. The profusion and length of subsequent "heart of darkness-style" articles came about not least because Joy Division dwelt beyond the spiritual divide and
laid to rest.
it
61
56
THE INTERREGNUI
that Curtis's suicide fitted their dejected
image. Ian Curtis was not of the

"live fast,
die young" mould,

for
was more room here

and-roll deaths" of
James Dean hence there assessment and
interpretation than with the "standard rock-
contemporaries Malcolm
inimitable Sid
Owen
of
The Ruts and the
Vicious.
With the demise of their singer, Joy

Divison's mystique
lay not in
became
myth. The danger
eulogising the band, putting them
on a pedestal, but in actually exalting death through unfettered romanticism because Ian
Curtis
conclusion.
'
had prematurely taken life to its logical NME's Paul Du Noyer remarked:
...
if
it
was ever Joy
Division's intention to
glorify
despair then
I've
misinterpreted them
will
its
quite seriously.'
And time
sacrosanct myth, blurring
enhance the edges as

it
grows exponentially. 'Melody Maker's' Neil Rowland summed up the problem in saying, we could keep him as a 'It would be great
if
human
being.'
is
Immortality
certainly his by virtue of the
eclectic portfolio of work, the priceless legacy
Joy Division bequeathed by default

music's archives.
to
rock
And considering
that there
was less than a year between the band's first and second albums, the rate at which they
were accelerating into their future would have clearly assured them "living legend" status.
prior to Curtis's
Embarrassing though the prospect was, death the band realised
they were on the verge of at least commercial
success and recognition. Factory had great

expectations for Joy Division's forthcoming
single
and accompanying
in
LP. Curtis himself
anticipated success, but

rather than at
outcome
will
Europe or America home. Sadly, the envisaged never be known; as they say,
June, the single "Love
Will
"the biggest sleep - the biggest hype".
Released
in
Tear Us Apart" sold 160,000 copies and

Twenty.
reached number 13 in the national Top Many were of the opinion that its ascendance rang hollow, that the song lacked any real tension or attack. An alternative version of "Love Will Tear Us Apart" appeared along with the robust "These Days" on the B-side, showing the band were divided as to how should finally sound. They had traumas,
it
spending vast amounts
of
time and money,
remixing the track. "Love Will Tear Us Apart"
THE INTERREGNUM 57
62 63 64 "Futurama
One", Queen's
Hall,
Leeds, 8 September
1979
58
THE INTERREGNUM
suffered also from over-exposure

tfie
in
much
same way
it
that their earlier recordings

this
endured the converse. But

from
did not detract

right.
being a classic
in its
own
CLOSEK
Bernard Albrecht's silvery synth playing
pervades the muscular drumming and

physical bass
line,
creating a kinetic
medium
lyrics.
for Ian Curtis's restrained,
emotional
'When routine bites hard and ambitions are low, and the resentment rides high but emotions won't grow, and we're changing our
ways, taking different roads, then
will
love, love
tear us apart again
.'
.
And as
the fluid
melody moves towards its conclusion a series of monumental guitar chords resound, with
the diminishing bass mimicking the
Phil
riff
from
Specter's "Then
He Kissed Me".
65
The long awaited second album "Closer" was released in July after some production problems had been ironed out. too charted, reaching a peak at number 6, and like the
It
single dominated the independent charts for
many months,
unable
to
with
Joy
Division's
in
contenders
displace them
the ratings.
Similarly,
sporadically
"Unknown Pleasures" had featured in the independent album charts

slot in late
since relinquishing the top
1979,
and by 1982 had sold upwards of 100,000 copies. "Closer" had by the same date exceeded sales totalling 250,000.
was hailed by many as a masterpiece. Where the world of "Unknown Pleasures" is

It
unforgiving
and claustrophic, "Closer" reveals

in
Joy Division
a beautiful, opalescent
is
light:
between cast concrete and a marble slab. The band's narrow, selfimposed limitations are dropped, making the music less defined and broader in its scope; a refreshingly different method of approach and execution in contrast to the clarity and hardness of its precursor. "Closer" opens with "Atrocity Exhibition", a
the difference
that
grim scenario of degradation related by Curtis

with deliberate control as the
music contorts
rhythm.
beside him, throwing up abrasive, angular
shapes amidst the

'The silence
taut, insistent
when doors open
wide, where
the people have paid to see inside, for
entertainment they watch his body
twist,
is
behind
his
eyes he says,
.'
.
"I
still
exist" - this
the way, step inside
The second
on a
futuristic
track, "Isolation", relies heavily
65
"Closer" LP
metal
dance rhythm
for
its
released July 1980
THE INTERREGNUM 59
66 Mayflower,
Manchester, 28 July
appeal, and whilst

offerings
it
shames
similar sterile
it
by John Foxx or Gary Numan,
1979
rests uneasily w/ith the
album as a
for
w^hole.
The
song
'.
. .
is
characteristically unsympathetic
Carefully
watched
a reason, mistaking
self-
devotion as love, surrendered to

preservation, from others
who
care for
themselves, but
life
as
it
appears
a
just like
anything
of
touches perfection else.' spirals to

it
halt at the
beginning
"Passover", the
lull
before the storm. Precise

guitar entice the listener
drumming and
into a
icy
down
spacious, eerie intehor where Ian Curtis

reciting lyrics with brittle
I
is
composure. 'This is the crisis knew had to come, destroying the balance I'd kept, doubling and settling and turning around, wondering what will come next; is this the role that you wanted to live? was foolish to ask for so much, without the protection and infancy's guard, all falls apart at first touch.' Here the music rises, ascending
I
it
the gradient
in
a wonderful asymmetrical
is
fashion, a gradient that

final
maintained
until
the
moments
of the
first
side. This too
enhances
the sequencing: as the
tempo
and
is
quickens, the environment sickens.

"Colony", with
its
fractured guitar
staccato beat, emphasises the album's sense

'of
dislocation; the
ambiguous vocal
best
described as Kafkaesque. 'Cruel wind that

howls
down
to
our lunacy, and leaves him

in this
standing cold here
colony."
in
in
an eternal damnation, 'God

took you by the hand,
His
His
God
ends with wisdom wisdom

It
made you understand

The ensuing
... in
His colony.'
track, "A tVleans

its
To An End",
careers relentlessly along
course, driven
by a descending bass line and Olympian drumming, making instantly accessible. The put hookline is bitter, a mark of betrayal it
'I
my
trust in you!'
is awash with synthesizers, a advancement on the previous tracks where the relationships between instruments was linear as opposed to textural, though the
Side two
further
lyrical
content takes a turn for the worse,
walking
down avenues devoid
deceptively brisk
of hope. The drumming on "Heart And
Soul" cannot conceal the forlorn understanding - 'Heart and soul, one
burn.'
will
The
it
guitar
is
held
in
reserve to act as an
extra sting to the lines, 'Existence, well
does
matter?
exist
what on the best terms can.

I
60
THE INTERREGNUM
the past
is
is
now
part of nny future, the present

.'
.
well out of
hand
it
"Twenty Four Hours"

centrepiece,
is
is
not just a majestic
the album's turning point, a

Its
decisive threshold.
structure
is
grounded
motif that
on a sonorous, melancholic bass

explodes as heights
of fury are scaled. Rising
and
falling with the
music's troughs and

first
I
swells are verses at
quiet then raging. 'Oh
how
I've
realised
how
I'd
wanted
time, put into
perspective, tried so hard to find, just for
one
moment
thought
I
found
it
my
way, destiny
unfolded -
watched
slip away.'
Descending, "The Eternal" and "Decades"

are seen as a woeful, uniform plain.
One
leaves the album with an impression created
by these two
sensation
felt
final tracks, rather
than a
during the brief embrace of
"Passover", "Heart
And Soul" and "Twenty

in
Four Hours". Here the mist swirls thickest,

outlining the
silhouette.
sombre players
dark
'Procession moves on, the shouting

praise to the glory of loved ones
talking aloud as they
sit
is
over,
now gone,
the
rain.'
round
their tables,
scattering flowers
washed down by
"The Eternal"
reflective
is
a funereal dream; poetic,
particularly mournful.
and sad, the additional piano The song is carefully
to maximise the effect of instruments such a reserved and gentle way. "Decades" too is slow paced, a disturbing cocoon of synthesized sound punctuated by clicking guitars and finally heavy drums. Curtis's words seem to be a portrait of the group, where they had been and where they 'Here are the young men, a were going weight on their shoulders, here are the young men, well where have they been? We knocked on the doors of Hell's darker chambers, pushed to the limits we dragged ourselves in, watched from the wings as the scenes were replaying, we saw ourselves now as we never had seen, portrayal of the
arranged
used
in
traumas and degeneration, the sorrows we Where have suffered and never were freed
.
been? Where have they been?" With "Closer", as one reviewer commented, there was 'the temptation to treat the album as a kind of elaborate musical suicide note,' and
they
67 68 Joy
whilst this
Division,
would be
insulting, references to
all
Manchester, 6 January 1979
self-destruction are
too vivid to ignore.
'Now
that I've realised
how
it's all
gone
THE INTERREGNUM
61
wrong, got
to find
some
in
therapy, this treatment
takes too long,
deep
the heart of where

to find
sympathy held sway, got

before
it
my
destiny
gets too
late.'
("Twenty Four Hours")
Other subsequent posthumous releases,

including repacl<aged, remixed twelve-inch
versions of "Transmission" and "Love Will
Tear Us Apart", cast aspersions on the

motives behind Factory's apparently
mercenary behaviour. They came in for the most severe flak after issuing the retrospective double album "Still" in 1981, a limited edition of which sported a stiff hessian cover and a is doubtful whether an higher price tag. But
it
concern such as Factory could withstand the repercussions had they blatantly
Intimate
exploited Ian Curtis's death
in
the
manner
clear that
Implied by reviews. At the time of his death
Factory went to great pains to
make
the sleeve designs for "Love Will Tear
Us
Apart" and "Closer" had been decided on

several
weeks beforehand. They did

of
not want
the "tombstone" cover of the former
photograph
latter to
a dead Jesus Christ
and the on the
be misconstrued as ghoulish. But such justification did not seem necessary as Factory had been fighting to stop unscrupulous record stores selling the band's free flexidisc. The problem arose when the initial 25,000 had all but sold out and Factory had insufficient funds to press more in order to fulfil their promise that, '"Komakino" will be re-pressed until everybody who wants one has one.' Copies of this "rarity" exchanged hands for 5 until the second run appeared, despite Factory's and Joy Division's attempts to halt this distasteful
profiteering.
Factory were forced to release

in
"Still"
partly
response
to a
wealth of bootlegged records
and cassettes, most of which emanated from Europe and America following Ian Curtis's death. For devout fans bootleg albums like "Amsterdam", "Le Terme" and "Gruftgesaenge" were the acquisitions, the ultimate in Joy Division memorabilia, but proceeds from these illegal recordings went straight into the pockets of pirates and not to
the artists themselves.
For those unable to acquire these

(or
rarities
who were
for
unwilling to pay through the

in
69
"Still"
LP
nose
what was
some cases
grossly
released 1981
November
inferior quality material) "Still"
was a welcome
62
THE INTERREGNUI
collection of previously unreleased
and
otherwise unavailable tracks. The album did
have
its
critics
however. 'Sounds' writer Dave

that 'There
exist.
Is
If
McCullough opined
reason why
"Still"
no clear
anything.
It
should
leaves a slightly bad taste at the end of the
JD
myth, rounding
this
It
all off (at

all off)
least,
one
of
hopes
rounds
it
on a weak note
conformity and orthodoxy.'
Packaged In tasteful grey card, the album was split into two distinct parts, the second of
which
Is
live
recording of Joy Division's
final
public assembly at Birmingham University
on 2nd
IVIay
1980.
It
may be
nice to hear
"Ceremony" and
but after an
is
"Digital" in unfamiliar form,
initial listen
the overall impression

fallibility.
one
of
lameness and
The
is
Inclusion of "Decades", even to give an
unexpurgated account
of the concert,
downright embarrassing, and seems
to justify
Dave McCullough's sarcastic jibe, even Tolstoy didn't have shopping

wrote whilst at "War
after his
'I
mean,
he
forth
lists
And Peace" spewed

.'
.
departure
criticism
Such
Is
trifle
excessive
set.
considering the
first
record of this double
Though
by Its very nature somewhat fragmented, a patchwork compilation of unrelated material, redeems Itself through
it
is
it
such classic Joy Division as "Dead Souls"

(from the Sordide Sentimentale single), "Glass"
(from the "Factory Sampler")
and the
brilliant
opener "Exercise One" (from the first Peel session). Other notables are "The Sound Of
Music" (taken from the second Peel session) and the two studio out-takes "The Only IVIIstake" and "Something Ivlust Break". These far outshine three early Warsaw numbers "Ice Age", "They Walked In Line" and "The Kill" also Included, which sound dated and
unsophisticated by comparison, yet
nonetheless acceptable. The only

is
Irregularity
a live version of Velvet Underground's
"Sister
Ray" recorded
at
The
IVIoonllght Club,
which serves as an Irritating filler when Factory could have so easily included another
two studio recordings.
70
Electric Ballroom,
London, 28 October
1979
Joy does no dishonour to the band's good name, completing an excellent collection of essential songs. Its shortcomings did not hinder Its sales: "Still" reached number 5 In late 1981
retrospective, rather than
Division's third
Seen as a
album,
"Still"
THE INTERREGNUM 63
the highest chart position

attained.
Joy Division ever
"Here Are The Young Men", the only Joy

Division video,
a unique record of the
complements "Still" in that is band performing live.

it
at Brussels' Plan K (19-10-79), Manchester Apollo (27/28-10-79) and Effnar, Eindhoven (18-1-80) "Here Are The Young Men" documents Joy Division in transition, and w/hile sound and performance quality are good, visual quality is poor and camerawork
Filmed
regrettably minimal. Nevertheless, this video
has the
same appeal
In
as a collection of
treasured polaroids; a vague atmosphere, a
warm reminder.
addition Factory have
included the "Love Will Tear Us Apart"
promotional video, which ends with a door
closed by "an enchanted hand", opened once
an empty room where Joy had been. Only one other new Joy Division record had been released between "Closer" and
more
to reveal
Division
"Still",
the twelve-inch discomix version of
"She's Lost Control" intended for America.

This take of the familiar
song appeared
in
radically altered format, far looser than
anything previously recorded, even the

instrumental experiment entitled "Incubation"
appeared alongside the uncredited "And Then Again" on the flipside of the free flexidisc. In fact the sub-funk guitar and
that
inverted disco
drum
motif
on "Komakino"
is
the natural evolution of this earlier endeavour.
She's Lost Control" was also covered by Grace Jones, indicating that Joy Division's canon had increased greatly during the last few months of their existence. "Atmosphere", hitherto available only on
the Sordide Sentimental single, resurfaced
here on the B-side,
much
to the delight of
those unable to obtain the original. Released

in
demise,
October 1980, some time was seen as "the

it
after the
last
band's
Joy Division
is
song", effectively fading the Joy Division

story to white.
On
the record's cover
a
for
photograph
of
a snowscape, empty save
distant line of pine trees
and a
tangible, silent
script,
atmosphere. Beneath,
is
in
Romanesque
an epitaph - "Joy Division".

During the
latter half of their
short three
71 Ian Curtis & Bernard Albrectit.

T.J
year lifespan Joy Division had so conclusively
Davidson's
broken free from the constraints
of
new wave's
Retiearsal
Rooms,
Manctiester.
new
ruts that
they
left
their
contemporaries
19 August 1979
64
THE INTERREGNUM
Standing or turning up creative blind alleys. Where stalwarts of the old school - Sex
Pistols,
The Damned
etc.
- had achieved
artistic fertility
through healthy internal
anarchy, Joy Division's alchemical constitution
was such
that they thrived
on equilibrium.
'Friendship has always been

said Bernard Albrecht, 'that
is
more important,' what produces

collective
the music'
Thus united they survived the

different in direction to the
decision to embark on a course vastly
common
flow of
They worked together as individuals to form an incremented, cohesive whole balanced by each member's equal contribution. Stephen Morris composed the rhythms; Peter Hook and Bernard Albrecht worked on the music and melodies; and Ian and the mystery, Curtis provided the lyrics a mystery which could not be explained away. Whether or not he was aware of (he never acknowledged the fact) Ian Curtis was the magic ingredient, the compelling charismatic figure who drew people to the band during both live performances and on record. Joy Division were special because of that mystery, the facet so conspicuous by its absence in the creative art world today, where results are governed by function and not
the day.
.
it
emotion. Rock's greatness

effect
is its
emotional
The very best in rock music is a perfect marriage of the most abstract, evocative art form, music, and the most subjective, expressive branch of
on the
individual.
literature, poetry. In
achieving their
own
kind
of perfection,
Joy Division created the very

not have
best
in
rock music.
Though they may

as The
Fall,
been as
lyrically explicit
musically radical as PiL nor as
Joy Division demonstrated
awesome possibilities in using this powerful medium for communication. As Dick Witts of
The Passage
said,
'In
rock you have to use
What goes on in rock music is fantastic, far more complex than anything that goes on in experimental music, because
practical images.
it's
an absolutely natural social
thing.'
What was not expressed by their words was conveyed in their music. Joy Division accurately and exhaustively defined the mood
of
an
era, Britain's
cancered heart during the
72 73 Central Sound Studios,

Manchester.
late
Seventies and the bleak future envisaged
for
an already disaffected youth. They made
THE INTERREGNUM 65
66
THE INTERREGNUI
74 75
Stockport,
overtly "political"
bands seem redundant;
the
28 July 1979
problem's core was constantly alluded
to in
Joy Division's songs, implied by the music. The Pop Group's blinkered ranting. Killing Joke's bombastic left-field theatricals and the specious sedition espoused by Crass, while creditable on their own terms, were unrefined,
revelling in the
symptom
rather than dealing
with the disease.

In
tampering with the disorder, however,
Joy Division found themselves unable to which would have control let alone cure
it,
it,
endowed them
genius was not
with an ability to
draw the
gift of
expected Utopian conclusions. The

theirs,
hence the courageous champions were defeated in battle and our hopes were dashed once again. Their music is neurotic and insecure, but that is because of the territory in which they dwelt, because their approach was nothing short of total.
Joy Division forewent
mortals
in
all
standard safety
precautions normally employed by dissatisfied

of fulfilment, namely complacency and mediocrity; they aspired to more than the usually acceptable half-measures and gave their all in trying to attain For the band music was the inestimably rewarding product of pain and joy,
search
hypocrisy,
it.
a mutually shared labour of unrequited love.
Joy Division never took rock's

potency
it
volatile
for
granted; neither did they
abuse
for
quick financial
gam
or gratified egos.
There was simply input and output; none of

the
band perceived themselves as anything
other than ordinary musicians, musicians
who
communicate. People listened and heard, determined their worth, and when the adulation came Joy Division did not rest on their laurels by adopting roles
above
all
desired
to
specially reserved for culture's minor deities.
They continued instead with their work. They at least were not content to join this nation of
under-achievers. Thus set apart Joy Division provided an
entertainment
far
star-struck peers.
folk
more provocative than their Rock is a late 20th Century
music that suffers from the Hollywood movie star syndrome, a hangover from the pre-War years. Today, the sound of most popular music seems to be a secondary
consideration
making
it,
an image that has
trusting to
people be right. By these external appearances, which

to the
image
of the to
THE INTERREGNUM 67
make
stars grossly larger than
life,
we
reach
In
the realms of deception, of
bluff.
This
turn
leads to "hype", fraudulent advertising that

dictates what is good taste and what is de rigeur in pop fashion. These decisions are conveniently made by an invisible demagogue, who in an attempt to appeal to mass audiences (what a hideous, herding notion) exhibits an appalling tendency to plumb for the lowest common denominator. This is both dangerously cynical and morally
Hence the greater proportion of Mark E. Smith calls 'rock and pop filth' is crude, stupid, vulgar and superficial. The harmless palliative trash and
bankrupt.
what The
Fall's
glamorous diversions seen on television, in magazines, heard on the radio, in

discotheques, pubs, clubs, burger bars, jean
shops and supermarkets is neither stimulating nor demanding on the intellect. Constant exposure to these fast, cheap and clean products conditions the market to accept and future wonderful offerings, not so much without question but with blind faith and great enthusiasm. But every once in a while the grinding wheels of the music industry churn up bands who are sincere, who are neither vain nor corruptible, whose music can be described as art, which is nothing to be
it
ashamed
Sex
of or
prejudiced against. Like the
Joy Division were such a band, innovators whose example

Pistols before them,
others followed. Steve Grant perceptively

outlined the band's appeal
in
'Trouser Press'.
intimate,
'Above
inability to
all,
Joy
Division's
of
it
was
personal music.
Much
deals with the
communicate
feelings accurately,
to
break through barriers that isolate people

existential rock
from each other, which

the
first
makes Joy Division band in history. Why,
would a group seemingly so convinced communication try so desperately to communicate - and how did
then,
of the impossibility of
they
do
it
so well?
darkness surrounds Joy once cracked yields up warm, afflicted souls; and listening to them just gets better and better. 'Language may never quite represent Joy Division's appeal. Then again, everything could be expressed by language, there would be no need for music' While current pop culture trends rely on
'A shell of
Division;
it
if
68
THE INTERREGNUI
76
Ian Curtis.
carefully cultivated vertical haircuts
and
attire,
Liverpool University.
derivative Vivienne
its
2 October 1979
Westwood punk
generic music bears the mark of Joy
Division's once unique sound and style. Commercial bands ready-made for t-shirt and
badge manufacturers, like Tears For Fears, Icicle Works and Fiction Factory have taken that spacious, velvety sound and dominant echoed drumming. Synthesizer orientated bands like Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark and Depeche Mode took Joy
(I),
Division's lead
their
on structured melodies, though techno-pop is dehumanised v;/hereas Joy

use
of electronics
Division's subtle
and preat
programmed computerised tapes hinted advanced technology's introduction to

society.
long
Echo And The Bunnymen inherited the macs and the angst, though perhaps the
interpretation of
Viôrst
Joy Division's moodier
aspect was Ultravox's "Vienna", a vainglorious

pastiche of Gothick nonsense which
that they too
showed
on the fashionable raincoats. As NME's Paul Du Noyer rightly said, "Handled with less power, skill and verisimilitude, Curtis's images and metaphors would seem almost risible Visually, "gaunt and serious" became the order of the day, and was adopted by a plethora of "the dialectics of sex and death bands", including The Cure and Bauhaus,
tried
.'
. .
had
whose "profound"
to Ian Curtis's
lyrics
- when compared
cold outrage -
seemed
clearly
adolescent. Their pretentious, self-conscious

lyrics
suggested a meaningful value

in
absent when viewed

least disco
the light of day. At

to
music never pretends

Ballet
be
anything other than lascivious party fun.
And
it
was the poseurs Spandau

hands on
it
who
took Joy
Division's romanticism, affectedly placing their

their
brows, and recklessly applied
to disco, posturing late into the night in
underground clubs. The

heralded as a
New
Romantics were
it
new beginning, but was background music for those who would rather
be stepping out onto a catwalk.
None
of
these
will
stand the, test
of time,
except perhaps as names associated with
passing vogues. Their music

but Joy Division
will
will be forgotten, be as durable as the
imposing classical architecture

finest
that their
music so sensuously emulated.
THE NEW ORDER
70
THE NEW ORDER
77 Bernard Albrechl
During the months that followed Ian Curtis's
death no word was heard

three extant
of
Joy Division's
Albrecht, Peter
members Bernard
IVIorris,
Hook and Stephen

name.
It
save that they were
new was mutually agreed, while the band had been in existence, that should any
resolved to continue operating under a
member
leave for whatever reason those
remaining would use a different name. They
recognised that Joy Division was something

quite singular, something special,
and
that a
change
in
circumstances would herald a new
beginning. The
their fresh start
name
they chose to signify

Order, indicating
to their
was New
that
it
was an
it
entirely
separate entity
previous incarnation. Like the group's former
name
proved controversial, the main bone

being that
of
in
it
of contention
identified with the
"oppressors" rather than the "oppressed".

'A stupid
choice
name
for a
group
in
previously steeped
gloomy, magnificent
golhic romanticism,' wrote Biba Kopf

'The term
NME
New
Order
is
irrevocably associated
with Hitler's vision of a racially pure Europe.
Joy Division's influential position makes their choice all the more disturbing.' So they again found themselves unfairly branded as fascists. Even the non-music,
satirical publication 'Private Eye'
voiced
its
opinion on
'the rise of
fascism
in
the rock
scene' saying, 'This

the unpleasant
is "New Order", which is new name of an even more

.'
. .
unpleasant band called "Joy Division"

that
The
gravely concerned article went on to point out
Certain Ratio, another Factory act (the
conspiracy deepens), featured a photograph

of
Wehrmacht
Officers
on
their
"To Each
."
. .
album cover, implying

extreme
a
little
that they too
had
Had they researched would have seen Donald Johnson, A Certain Ratio's black drummer, superimposed, looking down on (the rest of)
right affiliations.
further they
the group; simple visual metaphor, nothing
more.
By seeking
to
condemn
these perhaps
mischievous actions, journalists had added

yet another teasing attraction, extra free
publicity
which enhanced
their distant
first
appeal.
to
New
Order weren't even the
band
go
under that name, and their music, like that of Joy Division, holds no attraction for genuinely dangerous British Movement skinheads who would view as "high-brow" to say the least.
it
THE NEW ORDER
71
78 Stephen Morris 79 Peter Hook 80 Gillian Gilbert
72 THE
NEW ORDER
'Thinking of a
name
is
very
thinking of a tune,' explained

tvlaker's
much like Hook to IVIelody
Frank Worrail and Neil Rowland.
'You put forward suggestions and you pick

out the one you think sounds best.
A name
it
has
to
to
be with you
right one.
for
a long time, so
like to
is
has
be the
People
attach
importance
to the
name; there
none.
draw a picture of us having a load of Nazis following us around in their jackboots, marching up and down, doing the
'The press
goose-step.'
'We thought
it
was a
neutral name,'
added
Albrecht. 'You see
when
all
the
it
accusations were made, the press did

independently, they
quite
We
in
are not fascists.

that,
people believe
politics ...
I
made up their own minds. Maybe a few thousand but we are not interested
in
have never been interested
politics.'
'What do we have to do?' asked Hook, becoming exasperated. 'Apply to "The NME Book Of Names"?' Paul Rambali of The Face met a similar aggravated response. 'They used
exclaimed.
it
in
"Tron"
but no-one calls Walt Disney a Nazi!' they
As a three-piece
unit
New
Order recorded
demos
played
at Sheffield's
Western Works and
their
tVlanchester's
debut gig on 29th July 1980 at The Beach Club, where they
went on unannounced. In September they achieved as New Order what they were on
the verge of accomplishing as Joy Division:
crossing the Atlantic. They played four dates
on America's eastern seaboard, the first as support to A Certain Ratio. But as Debra Rae
Cohen reported
in
"The Soho News",
New
Order's scars were manifestly visible.

'Hurrah, September 27: Sometimes absence can be almost palpable; tonight fills up center stage. Guitarist Bernard Albrecht hugs the left-hand wall, bassist Peter Hook crowds right, edging away from the center the way that horses shy at phantoms. The darkness in front of drummer Stephen
it
Morris has the impact of a spotlight. Grimfaced, sombre-toned, eyes always straight
New Order wind swatches of sound around the space where Ian Curtis isn't.' 'A band decapitated,' as Sounds' writer Dave McCullough later put New Order were understandably slow to rebound, trying to
ahead,
it.
81
10
Gillian Gilbert.
Victoria Hall, Hanley.
May 1983
THE NEW ORDER 73
82 Bernard Sumner,
Victoria Hall. Hanley,
gain inner strength and
tlius
consolidate what
10
May 1983
was
for the
moment a
vulnerable position.
Their past
After
was still uncomfortably close. he died we had a bit of a break
to
think things out,' said Albrecht to
Maker
on,
writers Neil
Worrall.
Melody Rowland and Frank 'We never doubted that we would go

after the
and
'His
break
we
started to rehearse
again.
death was stunning;

It
was very
is
shocked.
is
one
of
those things which

it
so
bad you
sort of
can't believe
it
is
true,
you don't want

to
to believe
is true. The break was a way comprehend things.'

it
'We've accepted
time,'
with the passing of

'but, of
continued Hook philosophically,
would have been nice to have seen how we'd have developed Ian was still around. wish we'd had the chance, you know. 'Continuing was the most natural thing to do, there were no doubts. Yes, lan's death
course,
still
we
miss him.
It
if
was a
the
surprise,
it
was
after
totally
it
unexpected. And
short
first
meeting
happened was
to
and very
difficult.
But
we had
I
continue.
'That's the last thing
you think about. What
am
all
I
supposed
can do.
I
to
do?
am
a musician, that
is
couldn't give up just
because
Ian died.'
On returning from America New Order asked Gillian Gilbert to join the band as keyboard player and occasional guitarist. A long-time friend of Stephen Morris and also from Peel Green near Macclesfield, she first became acquainted with them back in 1978 when in an all-girl punk group. The Inadequates, who used the rehearsal room
adjacent
'I
to
Joy
Division's.
Division,' recalled
I
vaguely knew Joy

'I
Gillian,
got to
used to go and see them and then know Stephen - think was one night
I
it
at Liverpool Eric's
and
Ian
had hurt
his
hand
on a
bottle or
something, so he couldn't play
the guitar for

bit,
one number.
It
wasn't a very big

bit,
I
so as
'Then,
could play guitar a
played that
one number.
some months
later the others called
wanted someone without any knowledge of guitar whatsoever to remind them of when they started and couldn't play. think they were also looking for somebody who didn't have any particular style, so they could work them better into the band.'
me.
I
think they
74 THE
NEW ORDER
83 Tony
Wilson,
Factory Records
play,'
'We didn't really vi/ant anybody who could agreed Steptien Morris. 'If we got
impresario
the
someone who could he might not fit in with way we write songs and stuff, so we
to do was get someone in fresh. Gillian was the only person we knew who couldn't play. We'd seen her
decided the best thing
play
and she
definitely couldn't!'
Gillian joined
New
Order immediately on
where she was on a graphic design course. Though preferring to merge into the background
leaving Stockport Technical College
herself, Gillian's
musical contributions
of the overall
is
became
an integral part
sound; her
regular,
supplemental guitar
synthesizer
keen and
while her digital sequencer textures
and washes unify the music's individual components of voice, melody and rhythm and enhance its inherent atmosphere. But behind
her concentrated yet disarmingly nonchalant
stage presence, Gillian admits performing
live
can be an ordeal.
out
'It's
just
when you
look
and
think "flippin' 'eck! There's
all
these
people
I
come
try
not to
see you. You better be good." think about

to
it.'
'Gillian
has been a big
help,'
stressed
lot would have been possible. You can only do so
Bernard Albrecht. 'Without her not a
much.'
New
Order also gave serious
consideration to finding a replacement

vocalist but after
proved suitable,
with
it
none of those auditioned was decided that Albrecht

of the vocal duties
'It
would take over the bulk
Hook
singing the remainder.
wasn't
difficult to
take over singing,' he says. 'The

to sing
main problem has been

the
and play
at
same
Fit
time
that
is
extremely
difficult.'
rehearsing a
and working again. New Order began new set of original material. They
of 1980,
played a handful of gigs during the remaining
months
single,
and recorded
"In
is
their
first
"Ceremony".
A Lonely
line
Place", the
record's B-side,
a desolate, imposing
"tribute" to Ian Curtis.
The
you were here with

affords only
me
now,'
controlled melancholy, with
'How wish sung with deep regret,

I
one
its
interpretation.
"Ceremony",
salver,
is
served up on
got to be
embossed golden
rousing, impassioned, defiant. 'Heaven

it's
knows
this time!'
declaimed Albrecht,
the
will to live, to
radiating a dauntless
spirit,
continue.
THE NEW ORDER 75
84 85 New Order
with
John
'Jellybean'
Benitez
76 THE
NEW ORDER
Both songs are credited on the label
to
Joy
Division.
Released in late January 1981 "Ceremony" reached 34 on the U.K. chart during March. With its ascendance into the
all-important
invitation to
Top Forty came an official BBC make the almost obligatory
appearance on "Top Of The Pops", the nation's premier televised pop music platform.
Current
BBC
policy,
however, dictated that

live in
bands could not perform

"stars",
order that
their
by miming, could divert

it
energies
of
to
hamming
in
up
for the
cameras instead
indulging
boring, po-faced concentration

"let's all
out of keeping with the programme's

party" image. With
commendable
offer
integrity
New
Order turned the
down.
the record
this lack of
National Radio
One gave
minimal prime-time airplay, but
exposure didn't perturb the band. Said
Stephen Morris:
'If
you believe
in
the charts,
then you might as well believe

Shifting extra product units
in fairies!'
was
not high on
New
Order's
list
of priorities.
Similarly they faced
unprecedented media
attention with their forthcoming

at
London debut
Heaven, the gay "Ultradisco" owned by Virgin Records impresario Richard Branson.
There were enough
the 1000-capacity
ticket applications to
fill
venue ten times over, which not only showed the amount of interest in the band per se but indicated also the overwhelming pressures placed on them by ever-present press scrutiny and desperately expectant fans alike. They were expected,
altogether unrealistically, to re-emerge from
relative
reclusiveness
in
a perfect state at the
forefront of
contemporary music with new

flaws.
songs complete and without

'Oh
God
the anticipation,' said freelancer
Paul Wellings.
mystical force.
'New
Or;der
- the
fearful
New
Order - who can cut so
deep
into
all
our experiences.
New
Order -
who must keep away from

legend
thrufet
the Joy Division
upon them
less
in
if
they are going to
survive.'
Audiences no
awe
in
of the
group's
name and
this
reputation had greeted
them on
their "preparatory"
dates
the provinces, but
spectacular occasion transcended

It
86 87 "Futurama
Four", Deeside,
11
September 1982
witnessing New Order's muted pageantry. was almost as they were welcoming a second dynasty. In Heaven's electric
if
THE NEW ORDER 77
atmosphere New Order came on to rapt applause and performed the new holy music. Stage centre, sporting a severe haircut, was Bernard Albrecht singing in a fragile voice which gave the impression of menace, like "The Tin Drum" character Oscar, outwardly boyish but inwardly possessed. To
the right
was bearded, stocky Peter Hook

left
fighting with his bass, driving out the notes,
and on the
pale, calm,
behind the synthesizer,

lost.
Gillian,
somehow
Behind, dressed as
impelling
soberly as the others, Stephen Morris furiously
pounded out contagious rhythms,

each
vital
episode forward, onward, outward.
And
set,
to their credit
New
Order did not resort
to
playing material from their old Joy Division
though the crowd must have been

to
literally
aching
hear
it.
For New Order this was a conscious move away from any languishing, yet the fact that they often soundcheck with Joy Division numbers bears unhappy testament to their
passing.
'It
is difficult
not to play Joy Division

it
songs,' admitted Albrecht. 'And

It
is
upsetting.
is
upsetting to play them after
all
the work
we
put into Joy Division with Ian. Without Ian
they are not the same.' Just as John Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten) had to 'get rid of his albatross' following the Sex Pistols debacle when he formed Public Image Limited, so New Order too were struggling, and thus far only succeeding, to overcome the burdensome legacy of
preconceptions, hopes, and moreover the
myth they had

dismantled
inherited from
Joy
Division.
That particular pedestal would have to be

if
they were to carve out their
own
distinct niche conclusively as
New
Order.
For themselves they were willing to
make new
its
mistakes, allowing their present embryonic
form to adjust, relearn and mature at

pace.
own
'We do tend to run ourselves in an unplanned sort of way, like day-to-day,' said Stephen Morris. 'There never seems to be time to actually sit down and plan something.
No
great master plan.

all
it
We
are
all
too
knackered
'That
is
the time.'
really,'
concurred Albrecht. 'We

it
are growing, the music

feelings together,
comes from our

it
between
release
us.
it
We
is
and from a natural empathy play and comes out, we

of
it,
a part
us that
we cannot
78 THE
NEW ORDER
explain,
It
we do
not
know where
it
comes
from,
IS
natural.'
During the week following
their
appearance
at
Heaven,
New
Order's
first
Peel
session ("Dreams Never End"/"Truth"/

"Senses"/"I.C,B")
came
out as a bootleg
was broadcast, and this EP shortly afterwards.

Joy
Having
Division
learnt a valuable lesson with
and
realised the fanatical
instant relics, bootleggers
demand for were now keeping
pace
with the activity,
and by marking out

fill
New
Order's steady progress they acted as a
kind of service industry to
gaps created by
the band's well-maintained press blackout.

Live recordings taken during their successful
May
'81
tour of Britain,
Europe and
of
Scandinavia, together with intermittent gig

reports,
were the only available indications

It
New
style,
Order's development.
became
clearer
more than their present was a direct contrast to Joy Division's despair. They were offering hopes beyond the
that their attitude,
conspicuous
'.
.
anxieties.
And
into a stunning,
overwhelming
like
"Ceremony",' wrote Dave McCullough, 'Your
Humble
Narrator's
qualms evaporating
ice in the
saw that and a pop group

one.
'I
sun as he looked around him and increasingly rarer sight: an audience

gelling,
meeting head on,
at
honestly looked around
me and
it
was
time for love and cuddles. For pure,
unaffected optimism. The spirit of that first song lifted everybody. was genuine warmth, a communication, heaven knows
It
.'
. .
After
appearances on Granada Television

1981 Glastonbury Fayre,
for
and
at the
New
what was to be the last time with Martin Hannett as producer. Problems arose concerning production on the band's first album, though work on their
Order entered the studio
forthcoming single had gone well. The band were happy with the songs but not satisfied with their production. In the end there was too
88 89 90 91 Bernard Sumner
much compromise from both sides, so band and producer agreed to part company. Martin Hannett concedes that ideally any group should produce itself, and while in the past they had been unable to do so, perhaps now they were prepared for When came, the split had been amicable between these two parties, but was exacerbated at the time by
it. it it
Hannett suing Factory Products, of which he
TH'E
NEW ORDER
79
R
^^^11
90
;*
^^^^1
80 THE
NEW ORDER
was a
director, over the
company's running, a
matter later settled out of court.
"Procession'V'Everything's
Gone Green"
In
tail
was released
the
in
September and reached 38

into obscurity.
UK
singles chart before finally turning
and heading back
refreshing,
and ends with a shimmering synthesizer line, though like the accompanying and equally up-tempo "Everything's Gone Green" Its roots tapped the Joy Division source and lacked the immediacy of New Order's current live form by sounding circumspect and anonymous. Their first album was equally disappointing and for much the same
exhilarating song, "Procession" begins
It
reasons.
In November, as New Order began their second and longer visit to America, the LP "Movement", In lis MarlnettI look-alike sleeve, was finally released. Strong sales pushed
It
into the charts but critics reacted Indifferently,
saying that Insufficient links with the past had
been broken, that they were still heavily prompted by the Joy Division umbilicus. Though displayed no distinct flaws as such, "IVlovement was marred generally by grey, flat production which gave the songs a homogeneous feel and only moderate Impact. was as all concerned had experienced a power loss, enfeebled when their potential promised dominance and majesty. Stirring though Is, the opener "Dreams Never End"
it
"
It
If
It
nen/ously
falls to
climax; Itching rhythms of
the effervescent "Senses" are dulled by

gratuitously "epic" effects as they
swell from
roll
and
speaker
to
speaker. Reserved,
mellow bass
their
lines prevail without resorting to
former violence, rarely sub|ugated except
during the thunderous, crashing breaks of
"The Him". The criticisms of 'gloom and doom'
appear
spirit;
It
valid
Is
because
"fv/lovement" lacks
laboured and serious, yet "Chosen
Times" and "Denial", both end plays, are vigorous with only heavy synth drones
preventing the
like
latter
sounding
Is
bright.
Tracks
"Truth"
may be
faltering
and ponderous,
a nice touch,
though Albrecht's melodica

but this
Is
really to find fault
because
"Movement" does
within
exhibit the obvious desire

to
92 New
Order,
The Funhouse,
break new ground. By annexing technology - drum machine, digital
New
Order
New
York
City.
sequencer, string synthesizer, electronic

effects - their
9 July 1983
music has advanced, reaching
THE NEW ORDER
81
further forward;
"Doubts Even Here" however shows they are not far enough removed from "Decades" and -"Atmosphere" as other tracks suggest. Lack of confidence is also evident in the timid, self-conscious vocals whose lyrics are distinctly "sub-Curtis" as on "I.C.B." - 'Line
of force
93 New
Order.
Paradise Garage, New York City.

7 July
1983
from heaven, a tear

it
in
a stranger's
goes on forever, where all things never die, these people look whenever places have been won, minds just go on breathing when these moments have begun; it's so far
eye, then
away
.'
.
.
Inside
('Inside
"Movements"
safe, introverted world
my soul, inside of me,' sings Bernard Albrecht) New Order experimented with sound
rather than creating finished songs,
convey a mood
finding
faith.
of determination, the
it
and they sense of

Order
But
was not
1982
until
the release of
"Temptation"
finally
in April
that
New
stepped out firm on once wobbly legs. Though aided by engineer Pete Woolliscroft, was New Order's first attempt at producing
themselves.
it
Performed on
BBC
2's "Riverside",
"Temptation" was a romantic, sweet pop
development
of "Everything's
Gone Green"
...
setting catchy, natural lyrics - 'Well I've never
met anyone quite
like
you before
oh you've
got green eyes, oh you've got grey eyes, oh you've got blue eyes' - to its serviceable
dancebeat. The B-side "Hurt" attracted
comments
remarkably
to the effect that

like
it
sounded
Duran Duran.
Tragically, too
many
reviewers failed to see
found their way. They dismissed "Temptation" out of hand as being more of the same murky ilk because, as
that
at last
New
Order had
NME's
Paul Morley put
it,
'they weren't
concentrating.'
'Such a beautifully unattached record

allowed to float into the mist,
certain lazy people
it
is
is
swept along
'If
with everything else,' raged Morley.
only
would stop blocking the could be seen very clearly view of others that New Order are within reach of everyone who wishes to liberate themselves from readymade ideas, in music as in life.'
Since Joy Division's demise in 1980 the music press had quickly reverted to indolent
type,
becoming passive reggae rebels and The Jam's retrograde nostalgia as 1980's music. They were again sold on gold,
hailing
candidly identifying with the disciples of
82 THE
NEW ORDER
business acumen and concerning themselves

with superficial details
and shallow analyses,
drawing the inevitable, ludicrous comparisons.
As Paul Morley stated, 'The distance between Pink Floyd and New Order is the distance between a cardboard box and a dream.' So perhaps "Temptation" would have surpassed the number 29 slot, the highest position New Order had thus far reached, had the record been given the loving attention deserved, and had not foxed moronic Radio One DJs by playing at the unorthodox speed of 33 r.p.m., so when they played at the standard 45 - 'That doesn't sound right, does listeners? We'll come back to that one a little later on in the show. Meanwhile, here's It was almost criminal the sunny sound of to walk into department stores and find
it it it it
.'
. .
copies
of this
gem
languishing
in
the
"dumper".
But New Order hadn't loosened up that much; they were still playing the game by their own rules. Remaining remote from the bizarre pandemonium of the music scene.
their reticence
was repeatedly
misinterpreted
and New Order were portrayed as dour, even

hostile individuals, despite retaining
an
air of
mystery by effectively maintaining
their
if
seemingly deliberate low-profile

the band.
strategy, as
they were consciously creating a barrier round
'We've never deliberately isolated ourselves

for
any
ulterior motives,' said Peter
Hook.
to the
'We're just normal really, I'm afraid,'
confessed
Gillian. Sensitive
almost
she too is extremely wary of being interviewed, though like the rest of the band she claims not to object to talking with
point of shyness,
reporters, but sees an interview situation as
false.
'We don't
Albrecht,
like
doing
interviews,'
confirmed
music press modus operandi stems from his Joy Division days. 'The questions asked have already been answered a thousand times and can be looked up so easily. There is really no point in going over all that groundwork again. But we
distrust of
whose own
anybody, really. We don't strive to be aloof and we do in fact quite often politely answer the same questions. We only become angry when we're tired and bored.'
will talk to
94
Gillian Gilbert.
Paradise Garage,
New
York City.
7 July 1983
On
stage
New
arrogant, rarely
Order appear aloof, even communicating with their
95 Bernard Sumner. Washington DC. 8 July 1983
THE NEW ORDER 83
audience except
off
j
for the
occasional derisive
their habit of wall<ing
acknowledgement, and
the digital
stage after a standard ten songs leaving
sequencer playing can equally appear disrespectful. Peter Hook, however,

maintains that the opposite
think
is
I I
true.
'I
don't
to
anyone could be stupid enough
worry
about
I'm
me
saying "goodnight"! he says. 'And

in
NEW ORDER
FACT. 50 1981
not interested
the idea of playing out
encore game, anyway. We respect our audience too much to have them waiting
the
MOVEMENT
around
like
mugs
for us.
hate the idea of

of fact.
coming back on as a matter

are so cold!'
Encores
But any arrogance they do have is a measure of their firm conviction in music
which they take very seriously. This

that they project their
is
clear
in
music rather than
96
themselves.
'I
just don't think the
group should be
assertively.
If
'I
at
the forefront,' states
Hook
don't
think we're that important.
we've got
If
something
to say,
it
we say
doesn't
anything to say
It
we haven't got mean we're dumb.

it.
I
just
means we
off,
don't fancy shouting our
something like that. But consider the music very important because
or
it
mouths
affects
me, so
don't see
well.
why
I
it
shouldn't
it
affect other
people as
find
exhilarating, depressing, happy,
sad or
whatever.
just don't think
our personalities
need
to
be pushed.'
Yet their widespread following have to be
understandingly patient since

not undertake
New
Order do
massive tours
like
established
or aspiring rock giants in order to
spread the
says Hook,
word.
'I
am
not interested
in all that,'
with disarming honesty.
'We
just
do what we
it.
want
to do. It is alien just to think about 'We have never done before, and there is no prospect of doing it now,' Neither has a propensity for doing brusque
it
40 minute sets and their obstinate refusal to play the expected encores endeared them to a potentially wider audience. In Rotterdam this
led to a near-riot, as fans
felt
they were being
ripped
off,
despite the club's

of
management
warning them
New
Order "policy"
a kind of back-
beforehand. Perhaps these complaints that

their sets are too short
is
handed compliment. 'When go to see a

I
96
band,' explains Hook,
"IVIovement" LP
released
November
1981
84
THE NEW ORDER
97 "New
1982" 12"
released
Order, 1981-
'I'm
bored
silly after
40 minutes -
it
seems a
right length of time!
November
We
only play 40 minutes
1982
N
E
because
See,
it's
that's the perfect length for a set.
compact; we can do everything we
W ORDER
want
to
do
in
that period of time.'
New
Order have accidentally led rather
than followed trends, and as there are no

pressures from Factory to conform they have
developed along
discovery,
their
own avenues
of
becoming
stylistically less
serious
and more dance-orientated.

EVEVTTKINC-S
PROCESSION
CONl CBEEN
'We're always maturing, always developing
MESH -TEMITATION HU>T
and
us,'
that's probably why people develop comments Hook.
with
By the standards
surviving
of
contemporary rock
is
they are something of an anomaly, admirably
beyond what
currently fashionable
97
to
become
'I
a constant rather than transient
feature.
think this idea of being hip or not

shit,'
is
a a
load of fucking
trap that
affirms Albrecht.
into.
If
'It's
you see the progress of music as a maze, well now has arrived at a dead end. 1 he idea of hip has stopped people expressing themselves as
it
music has got
much as
'I
they should do. because they're
afraid of not
being
hip.
think
it's
terrible
because
of
it's
stopped
people producing music unselfconsciously.
They are too conscious

they're doing
is
whether what
will
fit
into the
mould
or not. Hip
making a
is like
lot
of
people very narrow minded.
Hip
a chain reaction.
A music paper
approach,
gets very narrow minded

the people
in its
who
it
read
it
get that
way and
works its way into music. Then everything starts going in one direction. The music scene in England does not allow for
eventually
any kind
Eire,
of fringe to
be successful.'
Infrequent 1982 touring took
New
Italy,
Order
to
Greece and Finland, while on a visit to Britain in June they recorded their second Peel session and
Holland, Belgium, France,
played at fVlanchester's latest Factory night

club, the 1650-capacity, their
home
roost.
of
later
The band's successful month long tour Australia and New Zealand undertaken
that year
saw
the transition from cautious,
sullen creatures to relaxed, fun-loving
human
beings nearly complete, a change that was to

threshold
in
1983.
New
at
Order began the
New
Year playing
The Hacienda and moving
off briefly to
THE NEW ORDER 85
98 Bernard Sumner.
Paradise Garage,
New
York
City,
7 July
1983
86 THE
NEW ORDER
Sweden
record a
before returning again to England to
new
single.
Released
In
in
March 1983,
"Blue Monday", housed
fake computer
floppy disc packaging devoid of information,
was succinctly described in 'The Face' by Paul Rambali as 'a thin melody nailed to a hard motor beat.' But the ecstatic club and disco crowds hailed as definitive slamdancei
it
material, not only in this country, but in
America, Europe and Japan as
well, verifying
unsung universal appeal. "Blue Monday", issued only in twelve-inch form and without the aid of any promotional advertising, soared to number 12 in the singles chart, and sold 250,000 copies in the
Order's
New
UK
alone. Radio stations, which normally
insist
on seven-inch discs were offered the

it
record on a take
or leave
it
basis.
And on
relented,
their fourth time of
asking the
BBC
allowing
New
live
Monday"
Order to perform "Blue on "Top Of The Pops", albeit
in
a truncated four minute form. Ironically, this
supposedly
boost sales
appearance did not any noticeable degree. The sound of things to come, "Blue
lucrative
to
Monday"
titled
effectively constituted the only
promotion
for New Order's uncompromisingly second LP "Power, Corruption And Lies"
whose cover bore no

origins.
indications as to
title,
its
100
no token glossy group portrait, just the words 'Fact Seventy Five' along the spine and an impressionist painting of roses, offset by counterfeit colour coding, on its front cover. The inner sleeve as
a legal requirement informatively reveals that
the aforementioned
Latour.
still-life is
No name, no
by one Fantin-
The sought-after
details are in fact
itemised concentrically on the black record

label,
meaning one has

in
is
to
stoop over the

listing,
turntable
order to read the album
which
most inconvenient
for "coffee
table" listeners.
'What
we want
it.
to do,'
argues Albrecht,
'is
present music without any of the peripheral rubbish around

or even
It
doesn't matter
played what solo or what instruments
who we
usedl
who we
are.
If
people
like
the music,
that's what's important; that's
what they're
Order produced
buying.'
Like "Blue
Monday",
New
we
"Power, Corruption
And
Lies" themselves.
'Producing ourselves
satisfaction,'
get
more
says Albrecht. 'We know what
we
THE NEW ORDER 87
want and we can do
it.
With Martin the songs
often turned out different,
sometimes
better,
sometimes
not.'
'He taught us what to do very early
on,'
adds Hook. 'We

him, although
learnt the actual physics
from
we could have
learnt
it
from
anybody.'
'We always know how we want the songs

to sound,'
continues Albrecht. 'The

is
way we
write a
song
out
usually to start
off
by
improvising
take
lyrics
it
Then we Sometimes you haven't got any so you just make up some garbage.
in
the rehearsal room.
live.
Then you listen to the live tapes, write some more words, and go back and rehearse some we pretty well more. By the time we record
it
know how
"Blue
it
should
be.'
"Power, Corruption
And Lies" testified Monday" was no freak expression;
that
it
too
marked
an
New
Order's complete break with
their past, final proof that

identity.
they had arrived at
Proceedings begin with the bouncy "Age

Of Consent", enlivened by a familiar interplay
between looping bass and insistent drums, and sharply counterpointed by sparse guitar. Electronics are used here with subliminal subtlety though they feature as the album's
essential discipline.
Worked
intelligently
in
they
have become primary constituents

Order's palette, giving each track
distinctive
New
and
102
its
shade and
colour. Stripped
simple, the protracted late evening tones of
"We
All Stand" bear lyrics typically ambiguous; 'At the end of the road there's a soldier waiting for me, night goes on and on
in this real-life
fantasy, forever to
be
still,
breath held tight inside of me.'
Carried high over love
in
"The
Village",
which houses a sting
('Their love
died three
years ago, spoken words that cannot
show
.'),
we encounter a warm, sleazy

fading to yield
"5.8.6.",
interlude slowly
a re-strung, more
sophisticated version of "Blue Monday".
"Power, Corruption
And
Lies" lucidly
asserts that there are no hidden meanings,

the exact opposite of the sleeve's inscrutable
inferences. Songs, no longer
weighed down
at
by such portentous claims, can be taken

face value, or not at
banal, travelling an
all.
It
is
pleasant, but not
even course without
displaying extremes of
mood,
intensity or
99 100 101 102

Stills
from
tempo. This impression of
level flight is
"Confusion" video
88
THE NEW ORDER
emphasised by
vocal.
Silent
the
detachment with which
Bernard Albrecht delivers each successive
The incongruous punchline to "Your Face" (You've caught me at a bad time, so why don't you piss off) and 'Everybody makes mistakes, even me (on
.'
. .
"Ultraviolence") are funny/embarrassing,
depending where one places the importance ... as appears New Order are not being
it
precious
at all.
The penultimate
is
painterly track, "Ecstasy",

its
replete with arresting patterns,
hard
functionalism happily being
made
to grin
and
smile by the loose vocoder vocals. "Leave
Me
Alone" too occasionally lapses

teeth through
into
splendid
103
nonsense ('From my head to my toes, to my my nose') though its plaintive vitality is its own celebration, one last endorsement of the album's freedom. Time and again reviewers were struck dumb by New Order's lyrical developments. How had they come about?
'Well
when we
first
I
started,
tried writing
it,'
serious lyrics and
was
I
just shit at
Albrecht
just
freely admits. 'So tor the
second LP
I
wrote
down whatever
I
felt like.
didn't really
care whether the

the
lyrics
were good or bad on

. . .
second one so was more relaxed songs on the second LP mean a lot more to me. And because they're less self-conscious, they're more truthful to myself. 'Like, on "Your Silent Face" everyone was thinking of really beautiful, poetic, meaningless lyrics. Then thought, instead of having something beautiful, poetic and
Ironically, the
I
meaningless,
we might
as well have
something dumb,
idiotic,
coarse and
to the rest.
.'
meaningless. An absolute contrast

. .
Even roses have thorns By July, as New Order prepared for their third American tour, "Power, Corruption And
had notched up sales of 75,000 in reached number 4 in the (where album charts), and more abroad, particularly Holland, Germany and Belgium. An undoubted moneyspinner, but as Factory still remained a cottage industry compared to major companies, British rock journalists
Lies"
Britain
it
quickly discovered that
if
they intended
covering
New
to
Order's American tour they
103 And
would have
"Power, Corruption
Lies"
do
it
under sponsorship from

is
their respective publications
released March 1983
customary,
at the
and not, as charming host record
THE NEW ORDER 89
104
Peter
Hook &
Bernard Sumner. The Funhouse,
New
York
City.
9 July 1983
105 New York
6 a.m.
90
THE NEW ORDER
106
company's expense. NME's Chris Bohn sets 'If in Britain forming a group is - as Julien Temple fias said - about as rebellious as joining Vne army, in America being into rock is on a par with being in the civil service. Being into rocl< is being part of a nonVne scene:
productive, non-reactive glorified fan club
there to service the needs of an idol
elite.'
where New Order come in,' claims Sounds' writer IVIick IVIiddles. 'No band is better equipped to ridicule the American system than New Order. 'Above and beyond, their careers do not depend on being nice to people they have no respect for. With a natural fviancunian
'Which
is
106
Gillian Gilbert,
Washington DC. 9 July 1983
brashness they smash the polythened American rock package wide open.' Primed by their recent releases, the singles compilation "t\/lini-Album" and imported knowledge, America awaited New Order's
arrival.
New
Order, however, disapproved of
TH'E
NEW ORDER
91
what they
all
too often encountered; minimal
audience participation, even when goaded by eminently danceable rhythms.

'All
all
107 Stephen Morris. Washington DC. 9 July 1983
these Americans
know
all
the
stuff,
but
'It's
they
do
is stare,'
says Hook, perplexed.

half
really weird.
The
first
dozen gigs before
we
bit
got to
New
It
York went
like
down
pretty well - a
too well.
was
they were just waiting

to
tor us,
we
didn't
have
win them over or

All
anything. We'd already won.
we had
isn't
to
do
was
play.
'Preaching to the converted

is it?'
any
fun,
Whilst
in
New
York
New
Order recorded a
couple
of tracks with
maverick disco producer

they met through Ivlichael
Arthur Baker,
whom
Scamberg,
office.
controller of Factory's
New
York
Arthur Baker,
whose previous
credits
include Freeez's
"Planet
"1.0. U.",
Planet Patrol's
Rock" and Rockers Revenge's
"Walking
On
Sunshine", found
to
New
Order
of
like
surprisingly
'I
easy
gather
New
work with. Order have a reputation
being
difficult
but working with them
was
in
a day at the beach

others,'
compared
to
some
of the
he
said.
'We only had two days
the
in
studio - they had no prepared material so

that time
we had to get to know each other and come up with new songs. worked very well though - we did "Confusion" and another
It
108 Bernard Sumner. Washington DC. 9 July 1983
track "Thieves Like Us".'
New
Order, however, thought the
experimental collaboration was a murderous

experience.
'God,
was
it
hard!' recalls
Hook. 'Arthur
at us, sort of
Baker
going,
just
stood there staring
go on go
on, write something,

in
and we
it
were walking around

time to
well
circles thinking, isn't
go home yet?
We
don't normally work
under pressure.'
The cascading "Confusion" appeared only as a twelve-inch single and featured four mixes of the basic track, each one with alternative variations on drum machine and
electronic disco punctuation. Released
in
August, "Confusion" reached No. 12

charts during the following
in
the
it
month when
was
overtaken by the re-released "Blue Monday",
which
finally entered the Top Ten in October. By the end of 1983 "Blue Monday" had sold over one million copies worldwide, which
made
all
it
the best selling twelve-inch single of
108
time.
92
THE NEW ORDER
Apart from being repeatedly pestered as to
why Bernard had dropped "Albrecht" in favour of his new surname "Sumner", another
aspect
of
American music
grief
life
which gave
the ubiquitous
New
Order endless
to
was
In Los Angeles the band wear Mickey Mouse ears (!) during one photo session, and surprisingly
rock photographer.
were asked
only Bernard,
er,
Sumner
refused.
in
'Then
made
the mistake of sitting
the
pram we use to push around the video equipment,' he chortles, 'and while was jammed there he rammed the ears on me head and took the photograph!'
I
In
New
York,
New
Order
failed to oblige
a Rolling Stone photographer
who had
gone
to great lengths preparing the "shoot".
They did not even

to partake of
turn up, opting instead
a local brew. Stymied, the

reporter
off
photographer asked Sounds' own lensman

Kevin
Cummins and
pose, passing themselves
Mick Middles to as New Order

the
as 'they are a faceless bunch, are they not?'

Declining this deceitful
offer,
Sounds
109
American them they are the most unprofessional band have ever
team were informed by
their irate
counterpart, 'Well, I'm going. Tell
met.' This, of course, delighted
New
Order.
Following the rigours of the American tour,
Stephen Morris and

their
Gillian Gilbert returned to

in
newly-acquired terraced cottage
Macclesfield.
When
not 'knocking out fireplaces
and
in
all that,'
the homely pair liked to dabble
video.
'We try
to
make,
er,
weird videos,' Gillian

videoing dead moles.
confessed. 'We go
off
That's our most recent one.
We went round
all
these farms just up the road and they've got these moles hanging up by
like trophies.'
their
noses, sort of
Hook and Sumner unwound

('Very nice, but
in
the
Mediterranean. The former headed for Crete

I
got bored and
was dying
')
to get
home:
the
just like
being on
tour, really,
the latter to
Italian island retreat of Capri.
'It
was dead
expensive,'
is
moaned Sumner.
and they
'The whole place
run by the Mafia
put a tariff on
'This,
all
the drinks.'
as you can imagine,' quipped Sounds

'raises the cost of
109 Stephen
Morris
<
writer
Dave Rimmer,
New
Asti
Gillian Gilbert.
The Funhouse,
New York City. 9 July 1983
Order holiday quite considerably.' Long known for their lethal Pernod and
Spumante
cocktails, appropriately
dubbed
THE NEW ORDER 93
110 L'Ancienne
Belgique, Brussels,
Belgium, 1981
May
110
94 THE
NEW ORDER
'Headaches',
New Order are not averse to

rocl<
over-indulging themselves. Time-honoured

'n' roll
excesses, be they recreational or
creative, are certainly
no strangers
in
the
New
Order camp. Many an observer has
commented on
tell-tale Rizia
the band's spoor bearing

. . .
packets
Swiftly
resuming daytime rehearsals, the
individual
band members
often
worked
overtime, dispersing after dark to produce other

acts, frequently offering their services gratis.
Bernard Sumner tackled label-mates Section 25
and Quando Quango, not

outfit
to
mention the Berlin
Shark Vegas, former Sweet Sensation
111
number one hit 974 with "Sad Sweet Dreamer"), an Italian band named Surprize ('A pretty weird experience because none of them spoke English. We had to do with a phrase book.') and last, but by no means least. Foreign Press.
singer Marcel King (who had a
in
1
it
basically did that,'
Sumner fondly
still
explained 'because we'd known them since Joy

Division
days and they
have the enthusiasm
after
seven years. They've stuck together and

practise together.'
Gillian
they
still
produced American (much to the amusement of everyone else), Red Turns To ('just a group'), and Life.
avant-gardists Thick Pigeon
of our roadies.
Stephen and
Andy Robinson,' revealed Gillian, 'one It's a single called "We Couldn't Manage Our Way Out Of A Wet Paper Bag".'
'That's
In
an equally bizarre vein,
for
nothing that
New Order put their hands to ever seems to be

that straightforward, Peter
Hook had taken on

Poor),
variously
(alias
'a
wild satanist called Mike Keane'
The Royal Family And The
Some
well').
Now Are from

Neither
with
Burnley ('mad they are') and Tony
Wilson's ex-wife Lindsay ('she's
mad
as
was this madness balanced working the more 'conventional' likes of punk band
La Volta La Kota, Hull-based Nyam Nyam or Factory fodder Stockholm Monsters. But as
Peter
Hook
stated, the
whole exercise was,

'It
for
him, an invaluable creative outlet:

I
gave
me a
chance to try things wouldn't do in New Order. The only problem is it's very time-consuming.' 'You get really knackered,' agreed an exhausted but no less philanthropic Bernard Sumner. 'It's okay doing because although the groups are skint, you learn a lot and you're helping somebody.' In November of what for New Order had
it
J.
THE NEW ORDER 95
been both an exhausting and rewarding year, band travelled to the TVS studios in Southampton. Here they taped their forthcoming single "Thieves Like Us" live for December's edition of the low-budget pop
the
I
111 112 Stephen

Morris
Gilbert
and
Gillian
forum "DJ", presented by a reformed Kid
Jensen and aided and abetted by Trade of The Style Council (whom someone once described
as
'a
self-contained Martini ad on parole').
Unusually, their very capable
soundman Oz
room where he
was given access

worked
'It's
to the control
his
magic.
New Order were pleased.

far
our best TV sound so
and
it's
really
difficult to
mix that song because there's so

on, so
it
much going
Initially
sounded good.'
Saville's
delayed by designer Peter

in
slowness
finishing the
pseudo-di Chirico
surrealist cover,
"Thieves Like Us" eventually

outside the
saw release
in
March 1 984. This second Arthur

just
Baker production settled
UK
Top 1 in April and like its forerunners "Blue Monday" and "Confusion", soon became a great club favourite. A swooning song, featuring the beautifully melancholic hook line from Hot Chocolate's "Emma", "Thieves Like Us" showed New Order at their most sensitively human and most ably professional. However,
it
took a dive of four places
when they aired live (of course) on "Top Of The Pops". Though the
irony
Is
not lost on them, the day

for
itself is
remembered
an altogether
different reason.
to
'Bands were coming over and apologising

us for miming,' smiled Hook, 'which
I
thought
really funny. Everyone did - KajaGooGoo and Human League apologising to you for miming. Saying, "We wanted to play live but we thought was a bit tricky. We must be striking something really deep within them to annoy
was
it
"
them.'
The curse
refuse to
live.
cf lip-synching
lies
is
another of those
music business
New Order steadfastly

tells
it
Stephen Morris
like
it
is:
of
'We play live not really for any strong sense commitment, like 'Keep Music Live' or
like that
anything
it
is
just that
we feel
are playing, so
complete and
utter prats
miming. We're
probably worse miming than

. .
.
we
we just don't want to

in
mime.'
in
"Thieves Like Us" resurfaced
instrumental
form
June as the B-side

It
of the single
"Murder".
import, the label
appeared as a Factory Benelux which had given us a superior,

of "Everything's
extended version
Gone
112
96 THE
NEW ORDER
Green", backed by "Mesh" and "Cries
And
Whispers", more than two years previously. Due

to
its
general scarcity as an import, "Murder"

in
received scant attention and featured only

'indie' charts: strictly
It
the
minor league.
may seem
strange for a record
release material by a top

of
company to name band as a kind

an untypical
of
sideshow, but Factory

with, at times,
is
guardian
a perverse sense
Big Brother,
patronage. Not so
much a
eccentric yet respectable
Guardian's
in
mad uncle. Adam Sweeting perceived
more an The
Factory
more contextual terms: 'The company remains a great Mancunian curiosity, a quirky
to the arty
throwback
days
of
post-punk
the
somehow threading
More came
this
its
way through
revisionist mid-eighties.'
to light
about the machinations of

At
leader of independent industry, as Channel
4's
wacky popumentary "Play

it
Home"
regaled the story of Factory Records. Screened

in
August,
co-starred everyday
New Order
Hook And
at
in
folk in their
home environment
(Peter
the controls of a speeding
trials bike).
keeping with that other great rock

tradition, the
'n' roll
programme featured a bathtime
Wilson,
man himself, namely Tony hands clasped coyly over his genitals. 'That's where he keeps his money!' jibed an otherwise reticent Bernard Sumner. 'We do not exist merely for the sake of making money,' countered Wilson. 'Only three of Factory's bands show a profit: A Certain Ratio, Durutti Column and New Order. 'Business is a form of communication between a creator of artefacts and people who buy the artefacts. It's a very strong form of
interview with the
human
relationship.
We see the construction of

of
product and the sale
product and the
process
a
is
of
doing that as a fascinating form of
relationship.
And the simple human process of company surviving and how you keep going
it
just interesting
on a purely technical
level, like
a carpenter building a bed - there's a series

techniques, there's a series of imaginative
of
moments.
It's
fascinating
in its
human activity which own right.'
is
quite
The long-awaited royalties from "Blue Monday" helped to pay off a few debts, the of the band's own earnings being spent on
equipment. At
to
this
bulk
time they were allowing

of just
themselves a weekly wage

live.
72 on which
coffers
Factory's formerly
cobwebbed
113114 Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook
THE NEW ORDER 97
were
further swollen
when
Paul Young's cover
version of "Love Will Tear
Us
Apart", already a
minor
hit
throughout Europe, reached number

in
one in Germany. They collected royalties excess of 30,000. But how did the band
about
'I
feel
this unfaithful rendition?

it's all right,'
don't mind,
conceded Hook.
it.
'It's
a sort of vocal interpretation of

I
But,'
he
telly
added, grimacing, 'when saw him on the

in
Germany miming to
it,
just
thought
. .
.
New Order themselves attracted

when they
into
criticism
re-released "Love Will Tear
Us
Apart". Bernard
Sumner found
himself forced
defending
of
their motives.
it.
built up, people wanted So we had a choice of selling to them or not. As they wanted we sold to them. Some people said we were cashing in which really fucking annoys me. We're not preaching our own wonderfulness but all you have to do is look at what we've done in the past and believe in us. We've not cashed in on anything. We're not that
'Loads
orders
it
it
it
type of people.'
Ian Curtis's royalties
go
to his wife
and
daughter.
"Blue Monday"
ripped-off
in its
turn.
was copied - or blatantly But the band were

appearance
of
likewise unflustered at the
Divine/Bobby O's "Love Reaction".

'It's
not sacrilege,' stressed Sumner.

I
'It's
interesting to
care
if
see somebody else do it. don't the bloke in the local British Legion gets
It's
up and sings "Blue Monday"!

bootlegs,
isn't it?
only
like
We know bootlegs go on. We
114
down but we don't. All the same thing in my eyes, anyway.' And to their amazement Radio 2 doyen James Last (And His Silken Strings) had
could track them
applied to do a cover of their universal
hit.
New
Order joked about
it
netting 1 00,000.
On Factory's part they channel proceeds back into the company, launching new bands The Wake, James, The Inca Babies, the inimitable Paul Haig - and into running The Hacienda (in which New Order themselves have a substantial shareholding), one of Britain's premier nightspots. The club's genesis
was
outlined thus:
'The idea of
The Hacienda was a club

bullshit,'
in
that
wasn't accompanied by any
recounted
Hook, 'where you could get

like,
It
dressed as you
time didn't have.
out.
I
which Manchester
at that
didn't
have a club where you could go
98 THE
NEWORDER
115 Peter Hook
never used
to get in
anywhere, except
if
there
was a gig, then they'd let you in. The Hacienda was the first club where you could get in dressed as you like. And had to fucking open
I
it!'
'Originally
we
intended
it
to
be a
it's
bit
more
of
a
,
venue,' interjected Sumner. 'But

to
turned out
be more
'In little
of
a disco than a venue.'

!
terms,' reflected Wilson, 'the fact that

significant profit,
is
it
isn't
making a
in
fact
it's
only
!
just
it
about breaking even,
annoying, because
means we can't reinvest: we can't redo the toilets, we can't restructure the restaurant. But
generally speaking, on a Saturday night
it's
marvellous.
It's
great and
enjoy
it
tremendously. There's a general clientele of two

or three
thousand people whose

it.'
lives
would be
much poorer without

Peter
really
Hook agreed. 'The Hacienda has had a good effect on Manchester as a whole. Again, think it's important to show that you're willing to put something back in. We work really hard on this place. do the sound system
I I
%.,
^JhWv'
'-5 '1^ '.':

.
-.9^
-^
-^
^lOi
'.^
#-?*
115
THE NEW ORDER 99
PA for the disco and things like that. good because you can learn to do something different, as opposed to just knowing
myself, the
It's
about being
club runs.
in
a group. You're learning how a
You gather a wealth of experience.' Factory have also been able to help finance
emancipated video arm. Run
largely
various video projects through Ikon Video, their

recently
by
Tim Chambers and cameraman Malcolm

Whitehead, whose tireless pursuit of Joy
Division
became "Here Are The Young Men",
Ikon has enjoyed repeated, though modest,
occurrence
success and drawn critical praise, a rare in this most banal realm of pop
by-product. Several of their dozen or so diverse
releases have sold remarkably well, from
unembroidered compilations
like
"A Factory
Video" and "A Factory Outing" to the downright
abnormal. As the cassette case biography of
FAC 89 "Dowie"
via Bacup.'
testifies:
'John Dowie
is
comedian, a performer, a disgrace; out
of
at
The contents are even more

Adopting the
Brum odds
with Factory's usual poise.
persona
state of
of
a putrefying corpse describing his

whilst six feet under,
mind
Dowie
meditates: 'Let's look on the bright side

least I'm not Welsh.'
- at
116
"Here Are The Young Men"

sales of
seller in the
itself
it
notched up
a major
more than 6,000, making
video marketplace. Collaborations
with extra-Factory concerns, for

Ivo of fellow
example
with
in
independents 4AD, resulted
the
superbly wretched "Pleasure

Burn",
Heads Must
in
The Birthday Party cavorting

Bis"
is
their
particular corner of hell. Equally, "Perverted
By
Language
arguably the quintessential
insight into the wonderful, frightening
and
grubby world
infancy. Ikon
of
The
Fall.
Whilst video art
is still
very
much
in its
industry's
vogue
it
Nor does
pop unashamed commercialism. pretend to compete in terms of

Video has not aspired
of to the
of production, nor
budget or volume
indeed
It
align itself therewith in
terms
of taste.
is
perhaps
differ
for this
if
reason that their considered
individual,
occasionally unvarnished works,
from the French-polished plywood
productions of the more popular video fashion
houses. They are above the frequently

simplistic art direction, unimaginative
photography and crass storylines which,

disturbingly short
in
a
116 Bernard Sumner
space
of time,
have become
the globe's staple video diet.
100 THE
NEW ORDER
So, whilst others were conceiving
promotional videos and compilations of promotional videos, Ikon had had the foresight
to
engage an American camera crew through
their
New York office,

.
to film
the city's Ukranian National
New Order live at Home on November
19,1 981 By the time of its release, "Taras Schevchenko" was already an historic document, capturing the group moving confidently and methodically towards their present articulate selves. This development was most notably signposted by the enlighteningly advanced "Temptation". August 1 984 also saw New Order
undertaking a brief seven-date English tour.
They deliberately played
in
those out-of-the-way
places, as their promoter Kevin Millins of Final

Solution eagerly pointed out,
because they are

Gloucester,
ignored by those groups on the Odeon/Apollo/
Mecca
circuit:
Sunderland,
Hull,
Margate, Chippenham, Bursche,
St. Austell
and
Portsmouth. Interviewers, such as No.1 s Paul
who managed
to
catch up with the

in
band remarked
tendency to
not only on the crowd's shift
emphasis, but also

party.
New Order's
increasing
117
These days
be
identified
the hardcore element are not to

their attire, but
by
by the portable
cassette recorders tucked surreptitiously under

the arm. Disco kids mingle with
mohicaned
punks and youths in long macs. There are girls, there are boys, young and old. It's the sort of
audience most other bands lie about having The band do actually seem to be happy playing. Lead singer Bernard Sumner
continually grins at his companions, while
. .
drummer Steve Morris practises spectacular leaps from his drum kit to the computer so he can feed in countless floppy discs. The combination of live and computer sound is
particularly impressive. Everything
clear.
is
loud but
By the time the band finally leave the stage, after a solid hour of thumping dance music, they leave an exhilarated, sweating
'Playing these gigs has
throng.'
Bernard Sumner.
seeing whether
exciting.
'It's
also
been fun,' enthused been a gamble,

not,
it'd
work or
which
is
very
You see, we're very unpredictable as a group and that makes everything a gamble.
And that makes

use a
lot of
everything exciting
We also
is
technical equipment which
very
unpredictable.'
117118 Bernard Sumner
THE NEW ORDER 101
The occasional sub-standard performance and their habit of debuting unfinished songs has often irked New Order's critics. The band defend themselves by saying that trying out a new song live is a creative experience, that performing a set should not merely be a reproductive exercise. New Order always change their set each night they play. Bernard
Sumner takes this up: 'Bands play exactly the same set in exactly the same way at the same
kind of place five or six nights
deceitful of bands; they get to
little
in
a row.
It's
know when every
twitch
will
get a cheer.'
is
The other criticism - performing sloppily freely conceded. 'We lost our immunity to
Hook, referring
to
alcohol!' joked Peter
disastrous one-off at the Brixton
Academy the
and
critics
previous December. This inconsistency,

disappointing as
alike,
it
is
to both fans
weighs heavily on the band, especially when anger is construed as arrogance.

'These are the things nobody ever knows,'
said
Sumner more
seriously, 'but
it
was
the
It
first
time
we
played
in
three or four months.
was a
bad gig; we thought we played badly. ashamed. felt mad at myself, didn't feel mad at the audience. When get mad, people construe as being aloof and snotty, but
really
I
just felt
it
I'm not.
get
mad
at
myself a
tail
lot.'
Unfortunately, at the
successful tour.
end of what was a New Order found themselves

of
once more the victims
circumstance.
band put in an appearance on BBC 2's epic bash "Rock Around The Clock", broadcast simultaneously
Interrupting their schedule, the
on Radio One's "Saturday

For
Live",
of rock
'n'
commemorating 30 (thousand) years

roll.
New Order
it
it
didn't turn out the
celebration
It
up.
was meant to be. was awful,' groaned Sumner, 'a total fuck We'd played in Cornwall the night before
118
and during the day we got stuck in holiday traffic for two hours, which meant we had to drive at 1 20 mph for the last three hours and we got there only 25 minutes before the programme went out. Not only that, but a piece of equipment had broken down which meant we couldn't play the songs we wanted, and everyone was in a pretty bad state after that horrendous journey. just wanted to get
I
It
over
with.'
'We're a product of whatever atmosphere
we
have around
us,'
added
Gillian, referring to
the
102 THE
NEW ORDER
119 New Order
live
in which they played. atmosphere then our music will sound shitty because the feel will be all wrong, we'll be round pegs in a square hole.'
anonymous
'If
studio
there's no
During the relative quiet of their subsequent
European
tour,
contractual
and without the normal demands, New Order made
unhurried progress with their latest material,

continually shaping and re-shaping sounds and words to their satisfaction, bringing songs first to one conclusion then another.
'We've got
six
new ones,
Hook,
all
medium-paced
have
to
to slow,' offered Peter
'We'll
see
lot
how they turn
out. They'll
probably change a
before they get to the recording stage anyway.
We never finish anything - we're always

changing
it
all
the time.'
working sees both
method of and musical writing duties shared, an uncommon example of

Their seemingly loose, relaxed
lyrical
successful composition by committee.
Democracy so
But
often fails
in
the creative sphere.
New Order members were
created equal
THE NEW ORDER 103
or
and as such the no less a part

line.
lyrics, for
example, are no more
of the
is
music than, say, a bass

outvoted, absent.
So any egotism
Apart from writing his share of the music,
Bernard Sumner as lead vocalist takes

responsibility for
around 60 per cent
of the
in
words. Yet he claims never to have even sung

the bath before
lyrics.
New Order,
let
alone penned
Td neverwanted
to write lyrics in
my
life!'
he explained pointing out that the vacuum by Ian Curtis had, by necessity,
within the
right
left
to
be
filled
from
band. 'Losing Ian was

off
like
having your
arm ripped
- you've got to
learn to
do
everything that you normally did, with your

left
arm.'
of the
The remainder
indomitable bass
phrases, melodies, rhythms and ideas:

lines, Gillian
band contribute Hook
his
her seven veils of 120
sound, and Stephen Morris the punctuation.
Songs are then hacked about both in the studio and in a live situation, the rubbish is deleted, and in-fills are sometimes cobbled together from scraps and snatches from various tapes stored on home recording gear. They maintain that this is far and away the most natural way for them to work, the least contrived, and leaves ample room for an acceptable dosage of spontaneity. In fact seems to work so well that they eclipse all-comers. They admire the work of The Smiths' Morrissey and Johnny Marr, whose words and music complement each
it it
other so perfectly, but feel that the traditional
singer-songwriter partnership plays no part

the
in
New Order equation.
origins,
Though many compositions have rhythmic Stephen Morris for one confesses to this
being perhaps the most frustrating aspect of

creating a
'It
new song.
drives
me
piggin'
mad
actually,'
he says.
'It
takes up considerably more time than playing

up.'
something or making something

It
eventually
became so time-consuming
to
that
New Order afforded themselves the

employing someone
luxury of
programme
the
sequencers. The value of technological
advances
in
music
are,
however, greatly
appreciated. "Temptation"
electronics that Bernard
was written using Sumner himself put
together from a
kit.
'You can't ignore technology,' Jamming's
Mick Middles was
told.
'More importantly,
It
you've got to play these things.
doesn't matter
120 Bernard Sumner
104 THE
NEW ORDER
121
Gillian Gilbert
if
you play a
Fairlight or a
saw,
it's
the tune
ttiat
matters.
strong melody
important thing
was always ttie most and always will be. However

you have
still
easy
that
it
is
to play,
got to produce
melody. That's the
art.'
New Order maintained

low profile well into
1
a characteristically
result of their'
985 when the

in
recent hard graft culminated

first
"Low-Life", their
album
in
nearly two years. Having reached

in
a consensus that the sound
digital studio
was too clean for their style of music, "Low-Life" was recorded and mixed, in contrast to "Power, Corruption And Lies", 'with antiquated
equipment because we wanted the dirtiness back, particularly on the lower, bassier levels.'
As mixing
of opinion.
is
such a
vital
process, and one
which could easily lead
to fractious differences
New Order resort to the tried and
tested voting process to circumvent possible
arguments,
'We have
to
compromise,' said Hook. 'We
vote on where
we want the
levels and,
live
if
you're
it.
out-voted, you just have to learn to
with
If
we
didn't
compromise, we'd never get anything

in
done.'
Four weeks
the recording, two
in
the
opens with a bright melodica and the zooming bass of the bittersweet ballad "Love Vigilantes". The song tells the tale of a young soldier returning home victorious, full of hope - want to see my
mixing, the self-produced "Low-Life"
'I
family,
to
my wife and
I've
child waiting for
me,
I've
got
been so alone you see' - only to find an M.O.D. 'he was a brave man' telegram clutched in his dead wife's hand. Scarcely
go home,
typical
New Order fayre,
but certainly the
strongest track on the LP.
The accompanying 12-inch "The Perfect

Kiss" appears here
the album's
in
a different incarnation as
displaced
second
track. This re-mix
an already recorded eighth song judged by the
group to be deficient. 'We spent 48 hours re-mixing that song,' recalled Hook. 'And I'm talking about two days
122
without sleep!'
Rhythms punch and tumble insistently as the bass steps out the beat, and the Synth's hot breath cascades into the inspired quiet of a pool where croaking frogs are heard. ("The
Perfect Kiss"
"This
-get it?) Time Of Night"

is
is
as
rigid
is
as the closer,
122 Stephen Morris traced for "Low Lite"
"Sunrise",
solid.
"Sunrise"
surprisingly
redolent of
The Cure's "A
Forest", from the
THE NEW ORDER 105
protracted drone of the introduction to Sumner's
123 Bernard Sumner
melodramatic Robert Smith vocal. But

cannot be ignored.
its
power
The second side begins with a serene

instrumental entitled "Elegia".
the album's tracing
sanitized beauty.
It
is
as tasteful as
effect
is
paper sleeve: the
of
As Stephen Morris said to Cash Box's Peter Holden; 'We tried to do some
different things
on "Low-Life",
classical
like
it
"Elegia". That
one's a touch
more
doesn't just tick
to the 4/4 beat.'
"Sooner Than You Think",

a whole,
is
like
"Low-Life" as
itself.
assured,
at
ease with
And
illustrates
whilst "Sub-Culture" suffers from
a weak,
it
though
truthfully
undisguised vocal,
New
Order's undeniable awareness of state-of-
dance music: a metronomic beat, and an elastic tempo. With "Face Up" the album gallops and ricochets its way to a conclusion. "The Perfect Kiss" spent only four weeks in
the-art
arrested phrasing
the charts, reaching 46, doubtless
overshadowed by "Low-Life". featured in the album charts for three months, attaining a high of number seven shortly after its release in mid-May. "Low-Life", licensed to Qwest Records, operated by mega-star Michael Jackson's producer Quincey Jones, fared
It
123 124 Stephen Morris
equally well on the other side of the pond.
New Order appeared

Festival
Fall,
at the 1 985 WOMAD on Mersea Island in July, alongside The Certain Ratio, The Rogues, James and
Fine
Young Cannibals, before departing on

success
for
the
crest of "Low-Life's"
exhaustive
The band recalled their touring the manner of homesick travellers, remembering the damp mattresses, strange customs and alien cuisine, rather than a country and its people. 'In Japan,' squirms Morris, 'they had live
foreign touring.
exploits
much
in
chickens
in
plastic bags.
It
was
like
the Middle
this
bit of
Ages! And when
we
it.'
visited
China we got
soup
all
the time, sort of dishwater with a

in
privet floating
was great,' regales Hook. 'But Switzerland was awful. It's the most expensive
'Austria
place
in
the world.
It
costs about four quid for a
cornflake!
And
there are televisions everywhere
so you can check your stocks and shares.'
There are tales

threatened with a performing
rat
of
a gun being waved
in
Belgian audience, Bernard

knife,
Sumner being
getting
all
and a girl with a the applause when

124
'
106 THE
NEW ORDER
they played
in Berlin.
But predictably America,
125 127 Bernard
where New Order are wont

their touring time, invol<es
spend much of a more ambivalent

to
Sumner 126 Peter Hook
with
response. Stephen Morris says, 'It's like being chucked on to the set of Dallas when you're used to Coronation Street.' America, where New Order records appear in shops bearing special peel-off labels so they can be identified by the natives; America, where New Order play in yawning stadia to audiences of 15,000-plus; America, where New Order videos are occasionally found on the non-stop music channel MTV, rubbing shoulders with the
corn-fed gargantuans of
US
rock.
'Interesting place, America,'
mused Hook.
like
'You can be as rebellious as you

without trace. Their industry
is
and sink
run purely by
businessmen. At least few

just
in
England there are a
111
idealists
who think of the music first. So you
have to compromise, and it's a real bind. They just don't seem to be that artistic; everything has to be easy.' The American rock business is used to mainstream types producing commercial anthems, even "hydrochloric shaved weirds"
so over-the-top they register
for charity status,
but not the unorthodox and apparently
unconcerned
likes of
New Order
producing
streetwise lovelies such as "The Perfect Kiss"
and "Blue Monday".

practices.
In
We
are two nations
inextricably linked by mutually alien business
(And they can keep Jonathan King.) October New Order returned home for a
at
handful of dates, including the Mexican
Earthquake Appeal Fund gig

Festival Hall.
London's Royal
benefits
As
with
numerous other
that here
they had played (AIDS, the unemployed).
New
Order had quietly decided

just got
was
it.
something they couldn't ignore any longer and

on with doing something about
'There are things that are obviously
good
really.
causes and deserve
attention,' stressed Morris.
'But we're not crusading
about anything
Convictions cause convicts.

It
was
in this spirit
that they
had taken a
leaf
out of the Test Department's
little
red book,
playing at a fundraiser
Strike.
in
aid of the Miners'
The proceeds had not gone directly to the miners and their families - official collectors armed with plastic buckets gathered such contributions on the nation's street corners instead they went towards funding a film which, they said 'Went to redress the media
.
.
THE NEW ORDER 107
127
108 THE
NEW ORDER
imbalance over the issue which was

the Government.'
in
favour of
At the Festival Hall
New Order encored

shadow of Joy
with
"Decades", displaying a confidence with

having overcome the long
Division.
They now felt able to play some of their old songs for the first time in five years. Bernard Sumner, telling Smash Hits reporter Chris Heath of how they played "Decades" and "Love Will
Tear Us Apart"
play those
'But
in
at
a concert on the anniversary

'It
of Ian Curtis's death, said:
feels really
good
to
songs now.
It's like
the storm's over.'
America,' continued Sumner,
bemused, 'we played "Love Will Tear Us Apart" and nobody could understand why we were playing They knew the song, but they didn't know was by us.' New Order are constantly picking up new followers, especially abroad, and more
it. it
especially from the dancefloors. However, gigs

in
Great
Britain, particularly
those close to
New
Order's
home territory, have become

And Mary
128
notoriously boisterous affairs, though not on a
par with the concerts by The Jesus
Chain. With a predominantly male following
does the many-fold youth band witness their fair share of audience trouble. A gruff Peter Hook, fed up with the band's token leather jacket being used as a spittoon, has been known to harangue the audience and even lash out, but the band cannot be accused of inciting their audiences to violence. Beastie Boys tactics are neither original nor responsible. The disturbances are more likely to be due to a heady combination of lager and loud music. The sheer power and suppressed violence of a New Order gig does create a tension, but is that tension which makes a performance memorable. The band take the realistic view that crowd trouble is inevitable; they would be foolish to deny happens, but Gillian for one would rather
it
encompassing as
cults,
it
is
hardly surprising that the
it
it
it
didn't.
you when they start throwing she says. think look more at the audience than anyone else, apart from Hooky
'That really gets
bottles,'
'I
I
who tends
attitude
to look out for bottles.'
New Order have always had
an ambivalent
to
towards fans en bloc, refusing
establish the obligatory fan club. Peter
Hook
like-
recoils physically at the term 'fan', preferring

to
see
New Order's
ardent followers as
THE NEW ORDER 109
minded people.
'Like attracts like mostly,'
lot
128 129 Peter Hook
of
he considers. 'So a our serious fans might not come up and

us because they're
like
talk to
us as people.
like
It's
those people you impress most. People

that, that like
our music tend to know our history, know our music, know that there is a depth. What the fuck is there to know about Wham I?' There are those, however, who insist on
coming backstage to meet the band. New Order find this curious adulation nothing less than embarrassing, but give autographs and
the
answer questions gracefully enough, when in mood. Gillian maintains that it's all down to basic misconceptions, that when you meet 'stars' they're not what you think they are. 'You got really upset when you met Sooty,
didn't you?' ribs Morris.
bands have a certain idea of how you Hook told Record Mirror's Eleanor Levy. 'We played in Greece with The Birthday Party. We thought they were wild and they thought we were dead ... but worse. We got there and we were wild and they were bookworms. Pissed bookworms, mind.' Over the following 1 2 months the fad of Frankie Goes To Hollywood fizzled out, the
'Other
will
act as well,' Peter
premature ejaculations
of
Sigue Sigue Sputnik

in full
came and
went, and
New Order were
commitments abroad included two lengthy American tours, a spell in Australia, and a second visit to the Orient, this time taking in
spate. Major
Hong Kong. On
the
home
front, television
appearances became a common feature in the band's calendar. Performing on shows such as
BBC 2's
now-defunct "Whistle Test"
(live
from
The Hacienda) and Channel 4's recently axed celebrity showcase "The Tube", New Order's assertiveness mirrored what was to be a period of unprecedented vinyl activity. 'The newest songs seem immense,' wrote
Adam Sweeting,
'giant structures of sound encompassing long climactic instrumental passages. Sumner doesn't have to worry too much about his singing, and hunches twistedly over his guitar as his hands scrabble spastically across the strings. Hook does the splits. Iron
Maiden-style, over his bass. Gillian
is
improbably
still,
busy channelling
New Order's
his
new technology
kit
into strong glittering patterns,
while Morris batters
away
at the
back among
of
and
his
machinery. The sense
aimlessness they sometimes used to display

129
110 THE
NEW ORDER
130131 132
133 Bernard Sumner, Stephen Morris, Peter
Hook,
Gillian Gilbert
has
gorne,
it's
now
and the songs are getting longer because the group have learned how
if
to
manipulate atmosphere.'
(Macclesfield Sports
As yuppies might say

market
flotation.
of
a Government stock
Centre 1986)
New Order were about to go

their increasingly
live sets,
public. Taking
songs from
accessible and ever-powerful
the
band released a song for every season, each one an incursion into the lower reaches of the
British charts.
November saw
track to
63.
"Sub-Culture", the second be lifted from "Low-Life", reach number Re-mixed by American producer John
in
Robie, the single appears
a radically different
form from the album version, with Bernard
Sumner's voice beefed-up by the use of female backing vocals. The song still pulses to its
Eurodisco metronome, but the almost cliched
dancefloor orchestration
is
totally
convincing,
the whole production taut.

'It's
'I
about shagging,' said Sumner,

it
gleefully.
thought
'Still,
was
really
trite,'
it
commented
and don't
I
Gillian.
my mother
liked
think
she noticed the naughty words.'

"Shellshock", released at the end of IVlarch
1
986,
is
the
cream
of the crop.
It
was recorded,
at
break-neck speed, as part of the soundtrack

the film "Pretty
In
for
Pink", 'one of those
American teenage
to
it.
things' as the
band
referred
Their original atmospheric instrumentals,

all
which they had spent

with the film,
week synchronising
were rejected and producer John Robie was called upon to save the day. "Shellshock" was put together in less than 24 hours. Jamming's Mick Middles remembers the
scene
like this:
'Robie dances with ecstasy, spinning round,

sliding faders
in
perfect time with his

of
movements. He looks like Ken Russell's idea a modern pop producer ... the whole room
swirls with his
madness.'
'John gives you discipline,' says
Sumner of
Robie. 'Then
that
can put my own expression into discipline, whereas what I've been doing in
I
the past
is no discipline, complete expression.'
just
expression,
"Shellshock"
is
a perfectly crafted pop song,

It's
the refrain addictive: 'Oh!
never enough,
never enough
until
your heart stops beating!
The deeper you get, the sweeter the pain; don't give up until your heart stops beating!' Repetition of this simple chorus and its polyrhythmic patchwork makes the joyous
130
THE NEW ORDER 111
132
112 THE
NEW ORDER
"Shellshock"
New Order's most commercially
accomplished and musically sophisticated compositiorn, even more so than the titanic
"Blue Monday",
in
spite of
it
only
managing
number 28 in the charts. As Bernard Sumner himself

heartily sick of
people saying
I
am says, we peaked with

'I
"Blue Monday". Personally, believe we've not even been near peaking. We'll continue to get
better, to look for the perfect beat.'
"'Blue
Monday"
is
going
to
become a
'Still,
it
millstone round our necks,' agrees Hook.
put up our
wages 30 a week. And then

us.
the
taxman caught up with

street
We're
all
up
shit
now.
've
got an estimate for ten
thousandl'
July's
G-Mex
last
Festival
in
Manchester drew a
capacity crowd of 8,000 and deserves to go
down as the
the mighty
great music festival of the

Ratio,
decade. The Smiths were there, A Certain

Fall,
Echo And The Bunnymen - and New Order. Bernard Sumner described the
this
event as 'one of the nicest things that has

year - the atmosphere was just end of a euphoric set. The Bunnymen's Ian McCulloch was invited to do the vocal honours on "Ceremony". That little
happened
great.' At the
touch set a glowing seal on the day.
September, with
exceptionally
its bumper crop, was an good month for New Order
devotees. Archive material from the band's
first
Peel session surfaced on a retrospective fourtrack EP, thus usurping the priceless bootleg.
It
came
the
out on John Peel's

(in
own Strange
Fruit/Peel
Sessions label
terrible sleeve),
capturing
band before "Movement", and had a mixed response from the band members.
'We thought
Melon. 'So
the time
not
I
it
was going
1
to
be re-mixed,'
Gillian told Bluer Skies fanzine writer Peter
we
got the
2-inch
really liked
"Turn The Heater
and cringed. At On" but
Peter
now -it's embarrassing -it is to me.' Hook agrees. can listen to Joy
'I
Division but not
New Order. Joy
Division
is
over
so
can
listen for
musical enjoyment, whereas
when you
that
listen to
is
something that
New Order you're listening happening now, something

for
to
you play. So you're always looking something to pick up on.'
"State Of The Nation", the band's next single, reached number 30. Initially recorded prior to
"Shellshock", the track
was removed from

off
the
Factory vaults, the dust blown
and, after
134
THE NEW ORDER 113
136
135
134 135 136 Bernard
Sumner
KTtrir^^rriBS
114 THE
NEW ORDER
137 138
New Order
137
'
THE NEW ORDER 115
some discussion,
"State Of
re-recorded.
its
The
Nation", with
tingling
and
loose-limbed synths, runs to a peculiar off-beat

rhythm, almost overbalancing when bared of sequencer motorcadence. But when those multiple rhythms are at their most dense, Peter Hook's bass is let loose to fire the song with
melody, the kind of graphic delivery that
New
Order have
made their own.

bassist Les
As Echo And The Bunnymen's
Pattinson observes, 'Hooky plugs his bass
through every device available, and

like
it
hits
you
falling log,
a soaring, super-charged
walls
of sound. It seems to push back the and raise the ceiling, giving everybody else room to do whatever they like, secure in the knowledge that a noise like that couldn't
cudgel
possibly
let
you down.'
The follow-up was New Order's best-selling fourth LP "Brotherhood", a title which, as Peter Hook expresses, 'says a lot about the way we've stuck together and stuck with it.' Very apt when you consider the group had just made an auspicious sell-out appearance at that cathedral of classic music. The Royal Albert Hall. Peter Hook also defended the album's
metallic blue 'titaanzink' cover, the latest
in
the
series of
anonymous
aesthetic sleeves from
Peter Saville Associates.
'People are used to

well,
essays on them.
didn't
(
have a
lot
album covers having, most album covers of shit on them, nobody would
all
If
notice ours
- nobody would say we were

is
mysterious.'
Side one
flawless, energetic.
I I
The vocal
'I
want you,
want you, need you, need you', low In the mix, draws the listener urgently into "Paradise". "Weirdo" jangles with guitars and a plunging, driving bass emphasises side one's wholly acoustic nature. "As It Was When It Was"
I
begins with acoustic guitars plucked
to the
melancholy
on
like
of the line
'I
always thought
we
got
a house on
fire.'
From there the song

in
builds,
into
always holding something
reserve,
is
139
a snarling crescendo. "Broken Promise"
pacey, a
New Order rock song,

you,'
if
with a
bass can
riff
reminiscent of "Isolation".
'Just
shows
off,
beams Hook,
it
'you
rip
yourself
you do unconsciously. Better than having Trevor Horn doing for you Thunderous drumming heralds the buoyant even
it
"Way Of
demise.
Life",
which
flies its
way to an abrupt
139 Brotherhood
116 THE
NEW ORDER
Side two reveals

synthesis of
New Order's more

facet, the
commonly recognised
immaculate
truncated
man and machine. The
album version of "Bizarre Love Triangle" (it appears later in characteristic 12-inch format) but one example of New Order's other self, of
their
is
unique
versatility.
understated vocal on
"All
And Bernard Sumner's Day Long" displays a
formerly underestimated strength.

is a song about an innocent, who died hands of a desperate man,' he intones. "All Day Long" is about child beating. Its spangled, swelling synths and soaring bass
'This
at the
give the track a force necessary to

sensitive
show that a
pop band
is
is
able to handle such an
emotive subject
"Angel Dust"
in skilful
musical terms.
it
not about drugs, though
does sound
like
It
a soundtrack to a
TV thriller
about drugs.
also features the wailing of a

official who calls the much beloved of the
muezzin - the Muslim

faithful to
prayer -
'sampled' hip-hop scene.
"Every
with the
Little
Counts" ends "Brotherhood"

of
sound
a needle jumping the grooves

heavily here: the
of a record.
Humour figures
sounds like a spoof of Lou Reed's "Walk On The Wild Side". You can almost hear 'and all
track
the coloured girls
go
. . . '
before
up
with his do-do-do's! But the piece
resistance
comes
right at the
Sumner pipes de beginning when

I
he dissolves into laughter having sung, 'Every second counts when am with you, think you
I
are a pig, you should be
in
a zoo.'
spirit
It
was
off'
it
included
line
in
much the same
as the 'piss
on "Your Silent Face": works, leave in. There aren't many bands who would have
if it
the courage
vanity sufficiently
- or be able to overcome their - to immortalise their sense
of
humour on record. Then again, their undying sense of humour is perhaps the main reason why New Order are regarded by the music
press as perverse, flippant creatures given to
glib behaviour. Far easier to
handle flavour-ofthese tabloid
the-month rockbiz superegos, to get an angle
on the larger-than-life antics

abstract as music.
for protracted,
articles,
of
personalities, rather than focus
on something as
Would
this explain the
vogue
self-absorbed introductions to
train
about nervous
journeys or lengthy
pubs? How would they cope with the symphonies of Haydn or Schubert? And is that why rock musicians feel the need to make embarrassed qualifications about liking
waits
in
140
THE NEW ORDER 117
classical
music because music
to journalistic spil<y-tops?
is
Is
it
actually out of the

tfiat
common
frame of reference
writers are given to
concentrating overly on lyrics?
As long as
will
words remain easier to define than music, statements easier to dissect than mood, this
be
New Order's
lot,
even when the band

lyrics
themselves maintain that
are relatively
unimportant, that they are only part of a far
more
complete whole. Lyrics are either poetic,

catchy, incidental, irrelevant or just plain bad.
And New Order have gone through

spectrum
for
in their
the whole
time.
New Order have
no use
to
portentous words.
What more needs
be
said than they
make occasional departures

message
into
from the recurring theme of love?

'We're not trying to get a
across,'
says Bernard Sumner. 'Just emotion. But
emotions weren't meant
to
be put
.
words:
they were meant for feeling
think
music was
meant
is
for feeling
as
well.'
"True Faith" co-written with Stephen
Hague
a case
in
point.
New Order reached the

in
illustrious
top five
1987 with
that song. Yet
there remains the paradox of intelligent
141
musicians having great commercial success

with
a record
that wouldn't stand

it
up
to rigorous
analysis. Not that
was ever meant to.

its
Like
its
precursor "Bizarre Love Triangle", "True Faith"

simply reverberates with rhythm,
giant
molecular structure tangled with scraps and
shards of sound.
Because
into taking
of their history the
press are forced

This
it
New Order seriously at all times.
probably makes the band laugh no end, but

their eternal
is
curse to suffer in-depth analyses
at
every
turn.
Some music journalists seem to

horribly tedious for the
realise this.
'It
must be
group
to
suffer
these oft-repeated probings,' wrote

Carroll,
NME's Oath
sympathising with both
parties. 'But apart
from those
who seek to
suckle on the significance of the band's every
bottom burp, there are those of us who

appreciate a
little
background
colour.'
'We've nothing against journalists,' teases

'Barney' Sumner, recalling the
'fan'
if
who
I
produced a tape recorder -'Mind

half
use
if
this?'
way through a
drink,
conversation. 'But
we've
got something better to

for
do like watch telly or go we'd rather not be interviewed.'

140141
Gilbert
Gillian
'We're a very close group of people,' says
Hook. 'You can get very deep relationships with
118 THE
NEW ORDER
142143 Bernard Sumner
just certain
I'nn
people, and
thiat's
good because
and
not a very sociable person anyway.'
Rob
Gretton, the band's minder
manager, is more scathing: 'The problem with most music journalists is that they realise they're
irrelevant.'
'New Order are

sense of
Carroll, '-well mostly
concluded Cath certainly have a humour, albeit obscure in parts. And
polite -'
- and they
they are not
in
the least
pompous
or self
They are all very charming when they are not being asked to account for themselves. New Order are pleasant people - but they don't seem to want
important. Quite the opposite.
to talk
about New Order.' New Order do not conform,
neither are they
excitable music business puppies clamouring

for attention.
Hence they
don't
make the
of
journalist's job
any easier, which they would
course
prefer,
so a love/hate relationship has
developed over the years. But

play the
New Order are
in
the fortunate position where they can afford to
For
game by their own rules. New Order, the limelight does not include
image or merely
is
projecting an obliging public
asked of them. Lighter-hearted they may have become, but they will still not
doing what
142
THE NEW ORDER 119
143
tolerate fools gladly; that they
have done
it
their
way
is
quite rightly something of which to
be
proud.
'It's been pretty enjoyable the way we got where we are today,' reflects Sumner. 'It's been really good the way we've done because we've not gone through the system and for
it
I
,
one, feel better for
it.'
'To be a pop star,' he told Melody Maker's Ted Mico, 'I'd have to have a permanent suntan, a voice lil<e Zeus, take dancing lessons, and sign to a record company that knows how to beef up chart returns. When we first released
"Love
Will
Tear Us Apart", a certain well-known
record
retailer
phoned us asking whether we

for
would give them the single

cost
told
in
25 per cent
of
of the
return for four times the chart returns.

to fuck
off.
I
We
them
also
know
one record
company who were

would have
to take
deliberately selling duff
records that were unplayable just so people
them back and exchange
them
for another.
That counts as two sales.
We
couldn't play that game.'
'We're the only respected

mate,' Peter
band in music, Hook informed NME's James

truly
Brown. 'We're the only
independent band,
we're the only ones that
want
to
do things because we do them. There isn't anyone comparable
120 THE
NEW ORDER
to us.
You must know
that.'
Not playing the
game
includes not doing
personal appearances - once
Birmingham
HMV shop,
Gillian
was enough, in a grimaces - or
radio phone-ins.
'I
could never imagine doing what Duran

did,'
Duran
says Hool< adamantly. 'Radio

shit
lil<e
phone-ins and
respect themselves.
People ought to be embarrassing.' Looking back over New Order's history, a

that.
It'd
history retold
in
the best-selling singles

it
compilation "Substance",
their
is
plain to
see
that
rank
is justified,
their
own confidence
not
misplaced. The seven years and 12 songs that
comprise "Substance", and not least the album's title, speak volumes for a band that
have resolutely ploughed
their
own
furrow.
The
1
mere
X
1
fact that they are able to put together a
2" chart singles collection vouchsafes their

in this
success. The songs
twin-vaulted strong-
box are gems ("Ceremony"/"Everything's Gone

Green"/"Temptation"); precious metals ("Blue
Monday"/"Confusion"/"Thieves Like Us");

pearls ("The Perfect Kiss"/"Sub-Culture/ "Shellshock");
("State Of
and sometimes black pearls The Nation"/"Bizarre Love Triangle"/

is
"True Faith").
"Substance"
1
what many bands
of the late
980's lack -
New Order share the same
unimpeachable pedigree as Talking Heads, The Fall, Echo And The Bunnymen; one might even overlook U2's bombastic flag-waving. Snapped up by voracious A&R men, and no less eager to be taken, today's adolescent newcomers arrive on the scene with half a hit, a glossy video and often no live experience
whatsoever.
'I'm
not saying their
songs are bad,'

'but they
thtm^..
complains Bernard Sumner,

put songs together
bits,
seem
of
to
144
like Airfix kits.

it
You buy
a couple
all
the
glue
it
together, look at
it
for
days and throw

these days
away.'
'And another of the troubles with records

is that they're all vocal,' Peter Hook expounded to NME's Dave Haslam. 'If you took the vocal away from some songs you wouldn't recognise them. you're listening to the radio in the garage or wherever - it's always the
If
singer you pick out;
when
you're screwing a
wheel on
it's
the vocal line you find yourself
whistling.'
Unable
to
keep up the momentum, many

like
new bands fragment -
man who
can't take
THE NEW ORDER 121
144 145 146 Peter
Hook and Bernard Sumner
*-
S;-
'145
^M^^..
146
'
122 THE
NEW ORDER
end up crying in their passing mourned by no-one except their record

his beer, they
it,
companies. There were even rumours that New Order were going the way of all flesh, but the
band countered
with the terse statement 'Up yer

its
bum!' Being over 30 clearly has
advantages.
public,
"Substance" also traces the development of
Bernard Sumner's voice as
it
grew up
in
breaking around the time of "Low-Life" and maturing with every delivery.
also matured musically
New Order have

is
- Gillian
currently
learning to use the black keys on her keyboards
- though Stephen Morris says

'You find yourself getting a
to
this is usually
by
default rather than a willingness to learn.

bit more musical communicate with a machine,' he explains. 'It's got to speak a language, and the people who make the machines decided the accepted notation of music was the way they'd do You found yourself being forced to get a bit more musical, so suppose we got a bit better.' The band are totally committed to New Order and they regard as more than just a full-time
because you've got
147
it.
it
job.
'Sometimes,'
muses
in
Peter Hook,
'I
drive to
I
gig at about eight
the evening and
see
pisses
people going out
for the night. Their

just
working
It
day
but
is
ending as mine's
stay together
beginning.
me off that music takes up so much of my time we

together and besides,
///<e
because we work well we actually happen to
each
the
other.'
In
same
interview with Sounds' Maurice
Lomas, Bernard Sumner confessed, 'I'm a complete and utter lazy bastard, and if we're not
recording
I
don't
do anything,
just lie in
bed
and
think.'
Rob Gretton
as
.
defines
New Order as
'a
successful cult group'; the band define success

.
.
'being able to buy three
new sets of
!
and throw the old ones away! Or give them to the Stockholm Monsters It seems that success hasn't gone to their heads, and apart from the obvious material
strings at a time
.
. .
rewards
like
a better class
it
of
car (each
purchased on H.P.), hasn't changed their personal circumstances either. When idle they tend to gravitate back to their North of England homes, nothing ostentatious, but music remains
their
primary consideration.
is
'Success
confusing,' says Sumner, 'but

like
having more people
us won't stop us,
we
THE NEW ORDER 123
150
124 THE
NEW ORDER
must continue
...
it
doesn't matter so long as
we are achieving something, doing something new and not just reproducing ourselves. 'You don't realise when you are successful ... feel dubious about when people come to
it
I
it
see
us.
careful
like you have to be because success can become a reason

It
doesn't feel natural
in itself.'
1
987 also saw the release
of
a second Peel
joint
Session EP, an American tour with

headliners Echo
And The Bunnymen, and a

Sumner has shed
to
renewal of their acquaintance with producer

Arthur Baker. Bernard
light
further
first
on what attracted them

first
him
in
the
instance.
'We
of
got into him
when he
did that rip-off

it
and So Kraftwerk sued him, then he just put up the price of his records by about 1 0p and paid the fine! thought, "What a fucking gall." So that got
hadn't told Kraftwerk
"Trans-Europe Express". He'd done
- he just
did
it.
us interested
in
him.'
hit
Arthur Baker produced their current
"Touched By The Hand Of God", a

in
it
single
much
the
same magnetic
vein as
its
predecessors:
could have been born on the dancefloors. They may have donned Bon Jovi wigs and hammed up for the cameras, but their parody of a rock promo video didn't appear in time to
it
pump up
Hand
of
its
position
in
the charts approaching
Christmas.
By The God" has taken New Order over the

All
the same, "Touched
cusp into 1988. As the force to be reckoned with. New Order should continue to fare well. As one observer 'When they are at their best there are few put
it,
to
is
touch them. They possess a muscularity that

almost
awesome
but marry
still
it
to
emotional range that

their audience.'
cajoles
a textural and and surprises
Existing outside rock's
mainstream
New
Order are a law unto themselves, continually
making a mockery
of
its
established and
revered traditions with sterling style and
uncompromising grace. As Paul Rambali concluded in The Face: 'Proud, stubborn, unique, they court resentment and - perhaps
for the
same reason -inspire

into
devotion.'
a future as uncharted and uncertain as ever. New Order are not simply
Heading
enduring but stoically prevailing by refusing
to
acquiesce
151 Highlights of the month.
to
its
spurious demands.
In short,
New Order have come out winning.
THE NEW ORDER 125
152 Bernard Sumner
152
126
DISCOGRAPHY
JOY DIVISION SINGLES
'^-Sfe-
Closer June 7 980 Factory FACT 25 - Atrocity Exhibition/lsolation/Passover/
An
Ideal For Living
EP 7" June 1978of
Colony/A Means To An End/Heart And Soul/ Twenty Four Hours/Tfie Eternal/Decades
Warsaw/No Love Lost/Leaders Failures - Enigma PSS 139
Men/
An
Ideal For Living
EP
12" October 1978
(re-issue: identical
tracl<. listing)
Anonymous
Records
ANON
FAC 13 FAC
Transmission/Novelty 7" September 1979

Factory
Transmission/Novelty 12" September 1980

Factory
13.12
Still (double) October 1981 Factory FACT 40 - Exercise One/Ice Age/The Sound Of Music/ Glass/Tfie Only Mistake/Tfiey Walked In Line/
Atmosphere/Dead Souls 7" March 1980 Sordide Sentimentale 33002

Komakino/lncubation/And Then Again (flexidisc) April 1980 Factory FAC 28
Love Will Tear Us Apart/These Days/Love Tear Us Apart (re-mix) 7"/12" May 1980
The Kill/Something Must Break/Dead Souls/ Sister Ray (live) + live LP Ceremony/ Shadowplay/A Means To An End/Passover/
New Dawn
Fades/Transmission/Disorder'
Will
Isolation/Decades/Digital
Factory
FAC
23/23.12
SAMPLERS/COMPILATIONS
She's Lost Control (version)/Atmosphere 12" only October 1980 Factory FACUS 2
ALBUMS
Short Circuit - Live At The Electric Circus 10" LP June 1978 Virgin VOL 5003 - At A Later Date
Unknown Pleasures June 1979 Factory FACT 10 - Disorder/Day Of Tfie Lords/ Candidate/Insight/New Dawn Fades/
She's Lost Control/Shadowplay/Wilderness/
lnterzone/1
Factory Sampler (2 x 7" EP) December 1978 Factory FAC 2 - Digital/Glass
Remember
Notfiing
Fast
Earcom 2: Contradiction 12" October 1979 FAST 9 - Auto-Suggestion/From Safety

.?"
. .
To Where
DISCOGRAPHY
127
NEW ORDER
SINGLES
Ceremony/In
ALBUMS
Lonely Place
7"/72" January 1981 Factory
FAC 33
LL!
NEW ORDER
FACT 50 1981
Everything's
7"
Gone Green/Procession September 1981 Factory FAC 53 Gone Green/Mesh/Cries

Factory
MOVEMENT
Everything's
And Whispers 12" November 1981 Benelux FBNL 8

Temptation/Hurt 7"/12" FAC 63
April
1982 Factory
Movement November 1981 Factory FACT 50 - Dreams Never End/Truth/Senses/Chosen

Time/I.C.B./The Him/Doubts Even Here/Deniai
Blue Monday/The Beach Marcti 1983 12" only Factory FAC 73
Confusion/Confusion Beats/ Confusion Instrumental/Confusion Rough Mix 12" only September 1983 Factory FAC 93
Thieves Like Us/Lonesome Tonight 12" only March 1984 Factory FAC 103
Murder/Thieves Like Us (Instrumental) 12" June 1984 Factory Benelux FBN 22
l1
1981-1982 November 1982 FACTUS 8

- Everything's
only
Gone Green/Procession/
The Perfect Kiss/Kiss Of Death/The Perfect Pit 7" and 12" May 1985 Factory FAC 123
Sub-Culture/Dub Culture 7" and 12" November 1985 Factory FAC 133
Shellshock/Thieves Like Us (Instrumental) 7" and 12" March 1986 Factory FAC 143
State Of
7"
Mesh/Temptation/Hurt
The Nation/Shame Of The Nation

September 1986 Factory FAC 153
Powrer, Corruption
and
12"
Love Triangle/Bizarre Dub Triangle 7" and 12" November 1986 Factory FAC 163
Bizarre
And
Lies March 1983

All
Factory
FACT 75
Age Of ConsentAWe
True Faith/1963
Factory
7",
12"
and
12" remix July
Stand/The Village/S.S.eAour Silent Face/
1987
FAC
Ultraviolence/Ecstasy/Leave
183
Me
Alone
Touched By The Hand Of God/Touched By The Hand Of Dub 7" and 12" December 1987
Factory
FAC
193
May 1985 Factory FACT 100 Love Vigilantes/The Perfect Kiss/This Time Of Niglnt/Sunrise/Elegia/Sooner Than You Think/
Low-Life
Sub-Culture/Face Up.
y^T*!
128
OISCOGRAPHY
VIDEOS
Joy Division Here Are The Young Men FACT 37 - Dead Souls/Love Will Tear Us Apart/ Shadowplay/Day Of The Lords/Digital/Colonyi^
New Dawn
Fades/Auto-Suggestion/
In Line/I
Transmission/The Sound Of Music/She's Lost

Control/They Walked
Remember
I
Brotherhood September 1986 Factory
Nothing/Love
Will
Tear Us Apart (promo)
FACT 150
ParadiseA/Velrdo/As
It
Was When
Little
It
Was/Broken
PromiseA/Vay Of Life/Bizarre Love Triangle/All
New Order A Factory Video

A
(compilation)
FACT 56
Day Long/Angel Dust/Every
Counts.
- Ceremony/In A Lonely Place
Factory Outing (compilation) FACT 71
- Everything's
Gone GreenATruth
ORDER
SUBSTA^CE
1987
Taras Shevchenko FACT 77 - I.C.B./ Dreams Never End/Everything's Gone Green/ Truth/Senses/Procession/Ceremony/ Little Dead/Temptation
Substance
(subtitled 1987)(double)
August 1987 Factory FACT 200 Ceremony/

Everything's
Gone Green/Temptation/Blue
Monday/Confusion/Thieves Like Us/The Perfect

Kiss/Sub-Culture/Shellshock/State Of The
Nation/Bizarre Love Triangle/True Faith
PEEL SESSIONS
SFPS001 released September 986 SFPS039 released July 1 987
The author would like to thank the following sources and their respective publications:Chris Bohn, Debra Rae Cohen, Paul Du Noyer, Steve Grant, Mary Harron, Dave McCullough, Mick Middles, Paul Morley, Paul Rambali, Dave Rimmer, Neil Rowland, Jon Savage, Paul Wellings and Frank Worrall.
FLEX! DISCS
The IHacienda Christmas Flexi (Rocl<ing Carol/Freude Schoener Gotterfunlten (Song Of Joy)Dec 1982 Factory FAC51B (Limited edition of 4400 given away at Hacienda
XmasEve
1982)
NEW ORDER +
J
OY
A
critical and biographical analysis of New Order and their parent band Joy Division which examines how the musicians involved overcame the tragic death of singer Ian Curtis and flourished in the eighties.
Fully illustrated and including a comprehensive discography.
Omnibus Press
DP 43009

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NEW ORDER +

Digitized by the Internet Archive

2011 with funding from

to the dead one

Brazzle Atkins, Pages: 78, 79L,

(A Division of Book Sales Limited)

Chris Ciunn. Pages: 100 and 101

Edited by Chris Charlesworth

Kevin Cummins. Pages:

Book Designed by Laurence Bradbury

44, 46, 47, 48,

ISBN 0,7119.1439.7 Order No. OP 43009

publisher, except by a reviewer

Paul Slattery. Pages: 12 T&B, 22, 40, 41 T,

43 T&B, 45, 50, 62, 66 and 67.

Etienne Tordoir. Pages: 76, 77 and 93.

Book Sales Limited

New York NY 10003 USA

To the Music Trade only:

Music Sales Limited 8/9 Frith Street

Limited, Tiptree, Essex.

JOY DIVISION /THE YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE 7

1979 something strange

departure from their overly Joy Division

the city's streets with a foul

single "Blue Monday",

dance rhythms resounded

throughout clubs and discos across the

Manchester's music scene

time enjoying a spectacular

which not only Manchester

Order have had numerous

but our entire nation

was steeped. No other

Paul Morley wrote,

own business" defensiveness, some

band of 1979, subsequent

concentrated music, a death, fans' obsession,

to the release of their

dauntingly powerful d6but LP

Yet despite the myth,

Pleasures". For music press journalists the

preconceptions, and the rewards of

somewhere annoyingly between

Order are always

contrived and the inspired, placing their

between the conventional and the

and band could

aloof from this adulation

stage introversion and

Joy Division were cut down May 1980 when their

charismatic vocalist Ian Curtis committed

The band's three remaining members

Gillian Gilbert shortly

JOY DIVISION /THE YEARS

THE YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE

the early Seventies cultural wastelands,

wtiere only lumbering rock dinosaurs

the bellicose catalyst for youth's

while simultaneously causing the music

punk bands, Joy

beginners were creatively inspired simply by