You Can Walk Or You Can Run

Joy Division yesterday, New Order today. New Order in the 1980s were as good as it got, a pioneering, chaotic, independent, wilful, sullen and joyous collision of rock music and dance music, defiantly and stubbornly holding out in Manchester. Their run of singles from Ceremony to True Faith is almost perfect, and distinct from their albums from the same period (Movement to Technique, also containing multiple moments of perfection), a band who saw singles and albums as separate entities. The decision to carry on after Ian Curtis' death saw them edge forward nervously, unbalanced and unsure but embracing new technology and a new sound with a reluctant singer and temperamental equipment. The tensions in the group pulled them apart eventually but they produced some moments of absolute magic- Ceremony, In A Lonely Place, Procession, Everything's Gone Green, Dreams Never End, Temptation and Hurt, Your Silent Face, Ultraviolence, Leave Me Alone, Age Of Consent, Blue Monday, Thieves Like Us, Lonesome Tonight, almost all of Lowlife (Love Vigilantes, Elegia, This Time Of Night, Subculture, Sunrise, Face Up), The Perfect Kiss, Bizarre Love Triangle, bits of Brotherhood, True Faith, 1963, all of Technique... I once tried to pull together ten New Order songs for an ICA at The Vinyl Villain and I couldn't even cut it down to fifteen. 

In March 1986 they appeared on The Tube to perform their then new single State Of The Nation. I don't think State Of The Nation would be anyone's favourite New Order single, it feels like a bit of a stopgap, lacking in flashes of brilliance that the band were capable of previously, caught between the effervescence of the Lowlife era songs and the imperious splendour of True Faith. This performance on The Tube though is magnificent and demonstrates that even when they weren't quite at the very top of their songwriting game, they were still better than almost everyone else.

Across the front, three people who don't look like they should be in the same band- Bernard in his Next jumper and bleached jeans, spikey hair with shaved sides, still unable to play guitar and sing at the same time (this is not a criticism- New Order were better when he couldn't do both simultaneously). Gillian standing completely still, big hair and bright green top, electric guitar. Hooky in pre- acid house/ pre- Viking rock god smart clobber, probably from Commes des Garcons or similar, hair slicked back, bass at the very front of their sound. Stephen half hidden at the back, hitting syn drums and real kit, banks of synths around him, head nodding away as he plays metronomically. Even on a weaker song, they are superb and you don't want to take your eyes off them.

State Of The Nation was originally called Shame Of The Nation. When the group toured Japan the promoter of one of the gigs told them that the young Japanese women who followed groups around from venue to venue were 'the shame of the nation'. This phrase became the chorus of the song but changed to 'state' because to sounded better when sung. The song was recorded in Tokyo in April 1985 which possibly explains the slightly under par nature of it, recording while on tour between gigs and burning the candle at both ends. 

The B-side of the single had a different version, retitled Shame Of The Nation, recorded with producer John Robie (as two previous singles had been, Shellshock and the new version of Subculture). The main difference is the backing vocals, very much a Robie touch. This version was recorded in bursts between October '85 and April '86, in Manchester, New York and LA, which again may explain a lot. It's bright and toppy, aimed at the dancefloor but too soon to be soaking up the new looser, acid house sounds that would change dance music (and then guitar music) a couple of years later. 

Shame Of The Nation

There's No Point In Asking You'll Get No Reply

As if we - the population of the planet Earth- haven't collectively and individually suffered enough during the last couple of years you wake up one morning in late February 2022 to discover that the megalomaniac in the Kremlin has decided to kick off a war in Europe by invading Ukraine. It seems there often comes a point where democracies get hoodwinked by dictatorships, where the application of gradual pressure and due processes is shown up to be not worth anything when a dictator decides the rules don't apply to him (and it is usually a him). Putin has taken a long cold look at Ukraine, a country he believes doesn't really exist anyway- to him it's Russian- and decided that he's got little to lose and factored in that no one will stop him. The Ukrainians may fight but there's no one in the West willing to fight (understandably) and sanctions could take years to have any effect. He just takes Ukraine because he wants it, because he wants to turn the clock back and because his ego tells him he can. There's nothing much to say really is there? What can we do? It's not like this country has improved its standing in the realm of geopolitics and international affairs in recent years. I can't imagine the combined words and threats of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss played any part in his decision to invade. 

It sounds glib but we all stand with Ukraine don't we? Just words to make us feel a little better maybe there's depressingly little else any of us can do. 

In 1989 The Wedding Present recorded some songs for a Peel Session in Ukrainian due to lead guitarist Peter Solowka. I bought it on cassette in 1989, it came in a lovely box. My copy has long since vanished. This photo comes from the internet but shows what a well put together package it was. 

Peter formed a three piece group called The Ukrainians in 1991 to record punk and post- punk covers in a traditional Ukrainian style. He left The Wedding Present in 1992 and has been recording and touring as/ with The Ukrainians ever since. In  1991 they filmed a video in Kyiv, the first Western band to do so (this was in the days before Ukraine gained its independence from the USSR). In 2002 they released a three track EP of Sex Pistols songs in Ukrainian. This one is a hugely enjoyable romp through Pretty Vacant. 

Цiлком вакантный

In November 1981 the fledgling New Order played a gig in New York at the Ukrainian National Home, a venue and gig titled Taras Shevchenko (Shevchenko was a poet, writer, artist, folklorist and political figure and in 1847 was convicted for promoting independence for Ukraine, writing poems in Ukrainian and ridiculing members of the Russian royal family- a worthy stance to take then and if was still alive now). 

The group were taking tentative steps towards dance music, struggling with their equipment a little and incorporating the temperamental sequencers and electronic machines into their live performances. The setlist is half songs from Movement and half singles- Everything's Gone Green, Ceremony, Procession and an early version of the then unreleased Temptation. It was was released on VHS in 1983, titled Taras Shevchenko and given a Factory number (FACT 77) and later released as a DVD along with their 1998 performance at the Reading festival (a very different gig in terms of scale and scope). Despite the slightly shonky, nervous, at the edge of falling apart nature of Taras Shevchenko, it is one of my favourite New Order artefacts, well worth three quarters of an hour today. If you want to skip to Temptation, go to 35.35- anxious, out of tune, bum guitar notes and unfinished lyrics but gloriously, brilliantly alive.

(Blue) Monday's Long Song

There are songs that you can think you've heard enough, that despite loving them since your youth you never really need to actively pull them out and play in full. At a gig or a night out or heard in passing from a shop/ radio/ car they still hit the spot and sound like they used to but there's not much more you can get from them. Sometimes I feel like that about Blue Monday. Then Soulwax/ Too Many DJs did a remix of Blue Monday for the BBC 6 Desert Island Disco a couple of weeks ago, taking the mastertapes, some snippets from interviews, a live performance and turning it into an extended twenty minute version, the familiar sounds- Hooky's Ennio Morricone inspired bassline, the DMX drum pattern, the whooshing sounds, the choir sample (Kraftwerk), the sequencer, Bernard's vocal (from a variety of sources), the handclaps- re- ordered. 

The story of Blue Monday is so familiar to New Order fans- Stephen forgetting to save the original drum pattern, the encore avoiding intention, the die- cut Peter Saville sleeve and floppy disc inspiration for that, the loss on each copy sold despite it being the best selling 12" of 1983, Kraftwerk's dropped jaws at seeing the equipment New Order managed to invent the future on- and it's all part of the history of the record. Sometimes you just need to hear the record afresh. Soulwax have managed to pull that trick off. 

Here's the B-side from that original 12", their own instrumental remix of Blue Monday from 1983 and always worth a spin, giving the familiar a different slant. 

The Beach

In February 2002 (twenty years ago next week if you really want to feel old) Kylie Minogue played this at The Brits, the glorious, irreverent lovechild of her smash hit and New Order's.

Can't Get Blue Monday Out Of My Head

Every Time I See You Falling I Get Down On My Knees And Pray

Heaton Park is all set up for Parklife, a two day festival across this weekend largely attended by people much younger than me. New Order took advantage of the set up and played a homecoming gig there on Friday night. Stepping outside Heaton Park's Metrolink station there's a long line of middle aged fans queueing to get to the gates where Covid passports are checked, bags are rummaged through by security, people are scanned with metal detectors and then finally QR code tickets on phones read by yet another line of security. JD Sports logos are all over the big screens either side of the stage. We arrived late, having missed both support acts (Working Men's Club and Hot Chip) but with enough time to join another long queue to get drinks. No draught beers, just bottles and cans with four cans of Carling coming in at an eye- watering £24. No wonder that so many people turned up having had their pre- gig drinks elsewhere. My unease with Covid and crowds meant we found a spot near the back- usually I'd want to be far further forward. The air is sweet with the smell of substances. The ground is not muddy despite some recent rain. A couple of men near us have a picnic blanket out. There's a chilled atmosphere but as DJ Tin Tin slips Voodoo Ray onto the sound system a palpable buzz starts to fizz through the crowd. Not long after, just as dusk hits, New Order appear. 

I wasn't expecting to be as blown away as I was. Bernard welcomes us all, saying how good it is to be playing live after a shit eighteen months and then adds, 'Fuck Covid', and then they're off into Regret and without much much of a pause Age Of Consent. This is a filled out, muscular New Order, the slightly shonky, thinner sounding, almost on the verge of it all falling apart, group of the 1980s beefed up, loud and powerful. Their romp through the set takes in most of what you'd want New Order to play, the songs that you've danced to at indie nights, clubs and house parties since the mid- 80s plus a handful of newer ones. Ultraviolence, resurrected from 1984's Power, Corruption And Lies, is an early highlight, the bassline bumping and the anxiousness of Bernard's original vocal replaced by something calmer and older (inevitably). They follow it with Ceremony which causes mild mayhem around us, the ringing guitar lines and Stephen's hi- hats cutting through the decades and the masses joining in, 'This is why events unnerve me/ They find it all the same old story'. Moments like this catch you off guard, emotions suddenly bubbling up, songs you've sung for over thirty years that have become part of a  shared history and people's lives. Early New Order songs feel achingly personal, the sound and the words, a response to the end of Joy Division and Ian's death, and when you hear them sung by thousands in celebration it's quite something. Your Silent Face, listed as KW1 on the band's setlist, the working title for the song back in 1983 (KW1 = The Kraftwerk One) is a joy, Bernard's melodica solo just as shaky as it ever was. A friend said elsewhere that half the attraction of New Order is when they 'nearly fall to pieces... they're never quite 100%' and I think that's exactly right. Their frailties and lack of polish still gives them an edge even if they're nowhere near as unprofessional as they used to be and have equipment that is one hundred times more reliable. 

The final eight songs are a blur, one high after another. A monumental Subculture (one of their greatest moments for me), that keyboard riff hammering out and the stuttering drums crashing around Prestwich. Funnily enough the group's old rehearsal rooms are just down the road, the songs that were written and worked out in a bunker in Cheetham Hill now filling the air a mile away. As Subculture ends there's less than a moment to draw breath before the bass intro of Bizarre Love Triangle slams though the PA and we're taken yet another notch higher and then as they segue into the majestic Vanishing Point, they lift us even further- the kick drum, sequencer and those delirious guitars and keys, 'My life ain't no holiday/ I've been to the point of no return...' 

Bizarre Love Triangle (12" Mix)

Vanishing Point

As if that wasn't enough they play The Perfect Kiss next. Plastic from their last album is dedicated to Denise Johnson and then we're into the home straight and True Faith, Blue Monday and Temptation. True Faith has been one of my favourite New Order songs since it came out back in August 1987, I never tire of it- the version they paly live is housed up with piano all over the chorus. Temptation is in a class of it's own- that acidic sequencer line bringing us up and Bernard's words the sound of a million kids now grown up and a thousand nights out, 'Heaven/ A gateway/ I hope... Tonight I think I'll walk alone/ And find my soul as I go home'. We all do the whoops and sing the basslines and join in with the chorus, 'Up, down, turn around/ Please don't let me hit the ground'. The tension and release that everyone knows is coming still hits hard, one of those heart in the mouth moments, 'Oh you've got green eyes/ Oh you've got blue eyes/ Oh you've got grey eyes/ And I've never seen anyone quite like you before'. 

If that was all we got I think we'd have been happy (apart from one of our party, Geoff, who shouts for Procession and in his own words 'always shouts for it but they never seem to hear'). Bernard, Gillian, Stephen, Phil and Tom re- appear for an encore and give us three Joy Division songs- a still fragile sounding Decades with Ian's face projected on the screens, a blistering Transmission and then finally Love Will Tear Us Apart- and that's it, we're done, spent, wrung out, happy. 

At this point my brother's wife's cousin decides to shin up the nearest flagpole and fair play to him, fired up by Mancunian dance rock, lager and natural excitement, he gets a good way up it. 

The Lies We Told Of Youth

New Order are playing a big gig tonight at Heaton Park, North Manchester. I made a fairly late decision a week ago to take up the offer of a ticket from a friend. I was in two minds about going from the moment it was announced, firstly because I came to the conclusion a while ago that standing in a field is rarely the best way to see a band and secondly because I decided also some time ago that I'm not sure it's even New Order without Peter Hook on bass. I understand the argument and split means that he can't be in the band anymore but his playing, presence and sound are such an integral part of the New Order story, especially the glory years of 1981 through to 1990, that without him it sometimes seems more like the Bernard Sumner Experience or Bad Lieutenant plus Gillian Gilbert. But maybe that's just me. 

Why did I change my mind? Firstly because their songs from the 1980s are among the most cherished music I own. Secondly because we've all been starved of gigs and live music recently and we've had to take the decision to avoid indoor events- Isaac, our eldest, is extremely vulnerable and he's at as much risk from Covid now as he was in March 2020. 'Avoid indoor and unventilated spaces, avoid crowds' is the advice we've been given. While we've all been double vaccinated we could still transmit it back to him and being in pubs, restaurants and indoor gigs are about as good a breeding ground Covid as any space as I can think of (excepting schools maybe but I have far less choice about going to one of those every day). I missed Sonic Boom at Yes last week, Will Sergeant in conversation with Dave Haslam a few nights ago and will miss ALFOS at the Golden Lion in Todmorden tomorrow night (an event a small group of us, me included, have been offered an afternoon DJ slot. Gutted does not begin to cover it). So it dawned on me that going to see New Order at Heaton Park could well be the sum total of gigs I'm able to attend between now and next summer. Standing at the edge/ near the back, away from the massed throng, should be fairly safe. And also re: Hooky etc, I thought maybe I should just lighten up.

In April 1984 New Order released a perfect 12" single, the masterpiece that is Thieves Like Us, from the heyday of Factory Records and packaged in typically obtuse but beautiful Peter Saville sleeve. On the B-side is one of the true lost gems in their back catalogue- Lonesome Tonight. Hooky's bass intro snags you immediately, instantly recognisable as him. The guitars are bright and brittle, the drumming understated but spot on- listen to that snare drum snap- and the synths are majestic and soar. Bernard sings something that sounds like he really means it, single tracked and intimate. A happy/ sad mini- epic. The lengthy instrumental end section is where Joy Division were heading (possibly) and where New Order found a way out of the hole they found themselves in in May 1980- the lyrics suggest, a loss of youth, an end of innocence. It is one of the finest things they ever released. 

Lonesome Tonight

Love's Got The World In Motion

If I ever thought (and I don't think I ever did) that popular culture- sport, music, film, fashion etc- existed in an escapist bubble outside society and politics then the last few weeks have really made it clear to me. When Euro 20 started I had a really hard time summoning up any enthusiasm for supporting England. Given their frequent and regular poor performances at major tournaments I have watched them play in since 1982 this could just be down to England tournament fatigue, but there's more to it than that and much of it is down to what's happened during the last few years. 

People like to say that the St George's cross flag was 'reclaimed' from the far right at Euro 96. That may be true but it feels like the far right have claimed it back over the last decade. England flags flying from cars and houses have coincided with the rise of an ugly strain of English nationalism that has been used to drive wedges between communities. The national anthem is a pointless dirge, a celebration of monarchy which I can't sing or feel any kinship to. The never-ending obsession with the Second World war is baffling- it's over, it ended seventy six years ago, really, get over it. The crowd at Wembley booing other nation's national anthems- something they've done for years- looks worse and worse every time it happens. The people booing England's players taking the knee are even worse (and worse than them are those people booing while at home watching on TV and then posting it on social media- grown men filming themselves booing young black men for taking a stance against racism but then cheering them when they score. It beggars belief). You can argue that taking the knee a gesture that doesn't achieve anything but booing people for taking a position against racism is surely showing support for racism. That's the funny thing about modern racists, they want the 'freedom' to be racist but object to being called racist. Johnson's populist government's incessant culture wars are all wrapped up in this kind of politics, button pushing and barrel scraping, appealing to the worst in people, dividing and conquering. The rest of the UK seems to be coming round to a position of wanting to reject England and that small minded version of Englishness, and who can blame them?

On the other hand, the team themselves seem to be a genuinely decent bunch of young men, from multi- cultural backgrounds, led by a manager who is thoughtful and considered. In Raheem Sterling they have a young man from a North London council estate who gets a disproportionate amount of criticism from the press which you can only conclude is due to his skin colour. In Marcus Rashford they have a young man from a South Manchester council estate who has provided more effective opposition to the government and it's policies over the last year than the actual leader of the opposition. In Gareth Southgate you have a man who wrote a much more effective response to and defence of the position the team have taken against racism than any other I've read (a Tory minister has apparently said they regard his statement as 'suspiciously well written'- in other words, he couldn't have written it, a mere footballer, which tells you what you need to know about how this government look down at people they see as beneath them). As the tournament has gone on, I've tried to ignore the flags, the anthem, the booing, the tabloid version of Englishness and just appreciate the matches As they've gone on into the knock out stages (and become more fun to watch) it's become easier to watch and support England, but there's a latent nastiness to Englishness at the moment that is difficult to block out completely.

Overthinking it? Possibly. But none of this stuff- music, football, life- happens in a vacuum and popular culture and pop culture are products of or reactions to the real world. Tonight, England (the team) play Denmark (themselves the true heroes of this tournament with the horrific scenes in opening weekend when Christian Eriksen suffered a heart attack on the pitch and then the rest of the team were given the choice playing the rest of the game then or the day after). For once the England team have a genuine chance of reaching a final. It would be daft not to try to enjoy it. 

Back in 1990 pop culture collided with football in a way it hadn't before. Not New Order's best song but the best England World Cup song and one of the memories of a summer that seemed to go on forever. 

World In Motion (Carabinieri Mix)

World In Motion (No Alla Violenza Mix)

In A Lonely Place Again

The In A Lonely Place cover version tribute to Andrew Weatherall by his brother Ian and Duncan Grey and the remixes courtesy of Keith Tenniswood, Sean Johnston and David Holmes, have sent me back to the original. In A Lonely Place came out in January 1981, the B-side to Ceremony, New Order's first release. Ceremony, with it's ringing guitars and pace has a celebratory feel, a sense that the three surviving members of Joy Division have somehow made it through the night and seen the dawn break. In A Lonely Place doesn't- it is a funereal dirge with Bernard singing Ian's lyrics which can only be read as a cry for help, a man at the end of his tether. 

'Caressing the marble and stone/ Love that was special for one/ The waste and fever and hate/ How I wish you were here with me now

The body that kills and hides/ Matches an awful delight/ Warm like a dog round your feet/ How I wish you were here with me now

The hangman looks round as he waits/ Gullet stretches tight and it breaks/ Some day we will die in your dreams/ How I wish we were here with you now'

The slow rolls of drums, the synths and the laser, Bernard's melodica and Hooky's dramatic bassline plus Martin Hannett's production (the reverb making it sound like it was recorded in a vast empty church), make it an uneasy listen at the best of times, a grimly beautiful song. The song was written (as was Ceremony) by Joy Division and recorded by them and then re- recorded by New Order in 1980 as their first single. 

In A Lonely Place

New Order's first  steps into the world of performing were tentative and uncertain, the band visibly displaying the stresses and strains playing live brought. Gillian learning to play the songs and finding a space in the group, the increasing reliance on unreliable equipment, Bernard's discomfort with singing and being in the centre of the stage and an audience who in some cases came out of ghoulish curiosity and in some cases came because they wanted to see Joy Division. In 1982 they were filmed playing In A Lonely Place at BBC Riverside in London. 

At nearly six minutes this is a longer version than the single and the song has clearly become a lament for their departed friend. Stephen is the key, the drums at the centre of the song while Hooky plays the cymbals. Bernard's vocal is drenched in echo and he looks like he'd rather be anywhere else. Gillian's keyboards and the melodica add the colour- if the various shades of grey this song contains can be described as colour. It is a superb rendition, taut and emotional and intense. When Bernard steps out of the spotlight to play the synth, turning his back on the audience, there is a gap in the middle of the stage- a gap they still haven't really worked out how to fill. As it approaches its end, with the song still playing Bernard walks off stage and the rest then follow. I have an internet friend who saw New Order perform the song in London around this time and he says that when Bernard sang the 'How I wish you were here with me now', his eyes looked to the ceiling and members of the audience gulped and wiped their eyes. 

By 1984 New Order were established, two albums in and with tours and gigs behind them, confident and bolshie and with a pioneering sound, rock and dance fused, Joy Division's basslines and the electro of clubs in early 80s New York and Berlin making something new- the rousing, sensational rush of Temptation, the dance dynamics of Everything's Gone Green, the life affirming day- glo colours of Age Of Consent. The story of their performance at the Radio One studios in summer 1984 has been told before. The group played a gig in Cornwall the night before and assumed that a cross country dash to London would be no problem. It was- bank holiday traffic and stinking hangovers combining to produce a grumpy band arriving at the BBC. The studio wasn't to their liking and all their temperamental synths and machines had to be set up in the summer heat. Bernard in particular is in a foul mood. Both Hooky's and Stephen's autobiographies are pretty candid about the drug use within the group by this point and when watching the four songs played that day, it's looks like at least one member of the group, the one in the short shorts and vest, has guzzled a significant quantity of cocaine. 

In A Lonely Place is a strange choice for a live Radio One session when they had a good number of songs to choose from by this point but it seems typically New Order to play it. As Stephen begins the song, rolling his sticks round the drum kit, at what is the correct tempo, Bernard screws his eyes up at the mic and snarls 'faster, Steve, FASTER'. The song progresses to a pace Bernard is happier with. At one point Hooky shoots his school friend a foul look. Bernard wipes his nose with the back of his hand, again admonishing Stephen to play faster. It is the grumpiest performance of a Joy Division song you'll see. You might feel that it undercuts the funereal majesty of the original recording and the otherworldly quality of the version at BBC Riverside but that's New Order for you, certainly the 1980s incarnation of the group. 

Hooky's amp, if you want another Andrew Weatherall connection, is sprayed with the words Gay Sperm. On the 1998 Two Lone Swordsmen mini- album A Bag Of Blue Sparks there was a song called Gay Spunk- I'm guessing one led to the other. Hooky had a habit of spraying messages on his amp- Salford Rules was a common one. In 2007 as he played what would turn out to be his last gigs as New order's bass player, over four consecutive nights he sprayed the words 'Two Little Boys' , then 'Formed  A Band', followed by /'They Fell Out', and finally 'The End'. 

In A Lonely Place

Ian Weatherall and Duncan Grey's cover version of New Order's In A Lonely Place is out to buy digitally, released on the first anniversary of Andrew Weatherall's passing with the proceeds going to his charities of choice. 

Factory Records held an important place for Andrew and his brother. Early New Order records have been cited by Andrew in various interviews- in Jockey Slut he said Power, Corruption And Lies was his favourite ever album and Your Silent Face crops up repeatedly (not least in his remix of Mike Garry and Joe Dudell's St Anthony tribute to Tony Wilson). His admiration of Martin Hannett as a producer is well documented and Peter Saville's artwork, sleeve design, posters, the whole visual identity he created for Factory, must have struck chords. At one point in his youth Andrew styled himself on early A Certain Ratio's look (bleached crop, army shorts). There are several Weatherall mixes where Durutti Column songs appear (Sketch For Summer is in his Fact Magazine mix). There's an interview where he talks about the more obscure early/ mid 80s Factory bands- The Royal Family And The Poor are mentioned and the slightly better known ones such as Section 25. Ian and Duncan Grey's cover is a work of love and of homage, not just to a song but to a time and place and a way of life- Factory's bloody minded independence, their refusal to play the game and their insistence that they were an enterprise prioritising art over commerce. We all know how that ended but look what it gave us...

Duncan is the boss at the record label Tici Taci, and in the past with Ian made music as The Sons Of Slough. Duncan's solo releases over the last couple of years have been a joy, long chuggy instrumentals led by huge basslines and with trippy FX. Ian and Duncan's cover of In A Lonely Place is a heartfelt, stately cover, dubby melodica and a recreated Hook bassline. 

There are three remixes, all by people with close connections with Andrew Weatherall. David Holmes' remix has a vocal, Ian Curtis' words re- imagined, a ghostly remix, the sounds coming at the listener as if through mist. Or maybe as Martin Hannett would have liked, from the bottom of a lift shaft. 

ALFOS partner Sean Johnston in his Hardway Bros guise remixes the track as a dubbed out chugger, a different bassline driving it, some twinkling synths and a gear change at three minutes fifteen. Duncan's Hooky bassline re- appears at five minutes for an intense last few minutes. 

Former Swordsman Keith Tenniswood's a long, thirteen minute trip, starting out very dubbed out and dislocated, winding it's way onward gradually. Eventually the melodica comes in and then at seven minutes thirty- nine the remix pivots on the line 'How I wish you were here with me now', just as Andrew's dub mixes in two halves for St Etienne and Primal Scream did. The second half is a beautiful but sombre journey. 

There are links to buy the four tracks here. Vinyl to follow in June. 

Monday's Long Song

In 1982 New Order were emerging into becoming a new band, something distinctly different from Joy Division. Stephen Morris writes about the period in the second volume of his autobiography and even at all this distance you can see it was a painful period for them. In the wake of Ian Curtis' death, unsure of what they should do and how to carry on, the only thing they really decided was that they should carry on. Stephen mentions how he became uncomfortable with some of the New Order's fan base, the ones who expected them to be a grieving version of Joy Division, and the initial stirrings of the Ian Curtis death cult. Stephen became immersed in new technology, Bernard was interested in electronics and began to receive disco and electro records in the post from Factory's man in Berlin mark Reeder and manager Rob Gretton suggested that Gillian should join the band. Bernard had 'won' the singing contest and was New Order's vocalist but was clearly not comfortable in the rile. They also decided to jettison Martin Hannett as producer. None of these were easy but they continued to feel their way through. 

In 1982 they managed to sync up the new technology, marry it to a burst of song writing and cut thorough the gloom with Temptation- a record that sounds like a rebirth, a band who have thrown off the overcoats and embrace something sunnier. Temptation, especially in it's 12" form, is one of their finest moments- possibly their finest- a euphoric and massively affecting song, the four members riding on top of their new sound, released and set free. The B-side is less well known but cut from the same cloth and recorded at the same time. Originally titled Cramp, eventually christened Hurt, is it a superb eight minute song. It starts with a vocodered 'one- two- three- four', a nod to Kraftwerk perhaps, and then a hammering rhythm from the drum machine. Hooky's instantly recognisable lead bass takes up the melody line and some keyboards join in before the crunch at just after a minute and Bernard starts singing. The lyrics were a group effort, partly the result of a Burroughs/ Bowie cut up approach.. For the first time on this song and the A-side Bernard sounds like he is relatively content with being the voice, a little more confident, the whoops appearing alongside his melodica. The sequencer line at four minutes fifty is a joy, the disco elements pushing their way to the fore. Hurt is more rhythmic and heavier than Temptation, which shimmers, but is still imbued with feeling alive along with some of their typical surliness and defiance. Suddenly they sound less like they're touching from a distance, more in touch with themselves. 

Hurt

I've Been Waiting To Hear Your Voice For Too Long Now

You'd expect a song called Sunrise to be a lament for the night just gone maybe or music trying to replicate the bliss of the feeling of the sun's rays on your face first thing, possibly the walk home after a night well spent. In 1985 New Order's Sunrise was something else, possibly the angriest and most aggressive thing they recorded. It's a full band performance starting with moody keyboards and an immediately distinctive, upper register Peter Hook bassline and then Bernard's scratchy, raw guitar, an angry urgent sound, harking back to their previous band but definitely bathed in the New Order's mid- 80s light. Speed, tempo, rhythm- lots of speed and some bile too. Bernard sings at an enemy about communication failures, insults and injuries and being the subject of hatred. It's all very specific.

'Why did you never speak my name in front of my family
You gave a gift then you took it away'

'Your name might be God but you don't say that much to me'

'We might be your black sheep
But you forgot us a long time ago'

Hooky's bass rises and falls, the guitar lines go ever upwards, Gillian's synths add weight and Stephen pushes everything on to its conclusion, the pile up at the end and the crash from going too fast, Sumner's guitar finally finishing in distortion as he thrashes away at the strings.

Sunrise 

This version recorded live at The Hacienda in December 1985 shows the song's power played live and the effect it had on their fans- and the playing of the four members together, a modern rock band when they fancied it, as well as dance pioneers.

Monday's Long Song

Tony Wilson, later on Anthony H. Wilson, died on this day in 2007. His gravestone in Southern Cemetery, Chorlton- cum- Hardy, as pictured above, reads-

Broadcaster
Cultural Catalyst

1950- 2007

It was designed by Peter Saville and Ben Kelly (of course) and stands out among the ones around it, all in black, in the same way Wilson did when he was alive. In the film 24 Hour Party People Wilson, played by Steve Coogan, says he suffers from 'an excess of civic pride' and there's no doubt Tony was utterly committed to improving Manchester and Salford, to changing things- a record label founded on revolutionary lines with equally revolutionary design principles, a nightclub, a long line of bands and artists who made art first and commerce second. All these things changed the city partly because he saw no reason to 'fuck off down to London', but to do it here, and partly because (eventually) the nightclub brought people to the city (as revellers, as students, as workers), who stayed and helped the city grow. The nightclub inspired the building of bars and flats and the regeneration of warehouses, new places for people, that have a look, a design aesthetic, a knowing modernism. And so on. Not all these things are solely due to Tony Wilson but they are at least partly due to him.

There's been a tendency since he died to lionise him. While he was alive, especially in the 80s and early 90s, he was sometimes a divisive figure. That twat off the telly. Smug. Too clever for his own good. By all accounts he was capable of falling out with people, his friends, easily and without warning. Tony I'm sure would be amused by the ascension to sainthood he has achieved after death and I think he'd love it as well. 'When you have to choose between the truth and the legend, print the legend', he is supposed to have said. This quote comes from 24 Hour Party People as well. The legend becomes the truth. So it goes.

In 2015 this stunning record was released, Mike Garry's poem about Tony, a figure he knew from growing up, from seeing him on the TV and from his works, set to music by Joe Duddell, based on New Order's Your Silent Face, and then remixed by Andrew Weatherall. It remains one of the best records of the last decade, a nine minute tribute, moving and uplifting and elegiac.

St. Anthony: An Ode To Anthony H. Wilson (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

Isolation Mix Thirteen

Lockdown ends today- at least, that's how the government and the media have been portraying it with occasional reminders that social distancing and a 2 metre gap might be important. The government have largely dropped the daily infection figures and death toll from their bulletins. You don't want to be depressing people at this stage of proceedings with doom and gloom, not when there are pints to be drunk! The media have been splashing stories about Super Saturday, Independence Day and the End Of Hibernation. It does look like they deliberately chose July 4th so they could call it an Independence Day. Meanwhile, Leicester is in lockdown, the R rate in London is apparently creeping above 1, there are Covid hotspots around the country, the deaths are still well over one hundred every day, and lots of people are talking about a second wave and a second spike without the people in charge actually wanting to do anything about it. We are still shielding, the medical advice we received this week is that due to our son Isaac being in the extremely vulnerable category we should stay in isolation until August 1st. Despite a few minor changes to our lockdown lives, we are still very much in isolation.

This mix is an hour and eight minutes of music with a folky, ambient, pastoral tinge with some Balearica and guitars thrown in, some old stuff and some brand new- some birdsong and synth ambience to start and finish, blissed out tracks from Seahawks, Apiento and Ultramarine, Green Gartside solo and as Scritti Politti, acoustic guitars courtesy of Nancy Noise, Michael Head and Barry Woolnough, some understated brilliance from The Clash and Sandinista!, Julian Cope covering Roky Erickson, Thurston Moore covering New Order and Jane Weaver's cosmic/folky weirdness.

Tracklist-
Stubbleman: 4am Conversation

Seahawks: Islands

Nancy Noise: Kaia

Green Gartside: Tangled Man

Barry Woolnough: Great Spirit Father In The Sky

The Clash: Rebel Waltz

Thurston Moore: Leave Me Alone

Julian Cope: I Have Always Been Here Before

Jane Weaver: Slow Motion (Loops Variation)

Michael Head and the Red Elastic Band: Picasso

Scritti Pollitti: The Boom Boom Bap

Apiento: Things You Do For Love

Ultramarine: Stella (Stella Connects)

Stubbleman: 6am Chorus

I Said I Couldn't Hit It Sideways

Sister Ray is a seventeen minute, recorded in one take avant- rock dance song that completes their 1968 album White Light/ White Heat. Lou Reed said that it was done 'as a joke- no, not as a joke... but as a scene of total debauchery and decay'. It was intended to be confrontational. The group agreed to keep playing for the duration and leave in whatever mistakes were made. The engineer pressed record and then walked out. Reed and Sterling Morrison batter the fuck out of the riff and John  Cale plays organ hooked up through a distorted guitar amp. The guitar playing is simple and percussive and completely overloaded and the organ is completely in the red, distorted and wailing.

Sister Ray

Lou Reed had written a lyric about 'a transvestite smack dealer' and in the song 'a bunch of drag queens take some sailors home... and start shooting up on smack and having this orgy when the police appear'. In the song Lou's characters include Doc and Sally, Rosie and Miss Rayon, a sailor who's dressed in pink and leather, Cecil with a new gun with which he shoots a sailor and makes a mess of the carpet. Amongst all this Lou drawls about  'I'm too busy searching for my mainline/ I couldn't hit it sideways' and 'she's too busy sucking on my ding- dong'.

While this is the noisy side of The Velvets at their most extreme the song when played live was often the one that would get the audience up out of their seats dancing. There are multiple live versions out there lasting for up to and beyond half an hour, like this one recorded live at The Matrix in San Francisco in 1969. Starts out slow and sparse and builds but with a noticeably different feel compared to the album version.

Sister Ray (Live)

I'm fairly sure though that the first version I would have heard of the song would have been a cover, probably this one by New Order at Glastonbury in 1987. They had played Sister Ray live as Joy Division and there's a version on Still which I might have heard earlier but I know I had a tape of the 1987 Glastonbury set because it was recorded by Radio 1 and transmitted as part of their Live In Concert series and I taped the set straight from the radio. New Order's version is a comparatively short eight minutes and is a bass, guitar, drums finale after a set chock full of mid 80s dance- pop brilliance that opens with Touched By The Hand Of God and takes in Temptation, True Faith, Your Silent Face, Every Little Counts, Bizarre Love Triangle, Perfect Kiss and Age Of Consent. The group kick up a solid racket, sounding quite like Joy Division in parts, Hooky's ascending and descending bass riding in and out of the mix and Bernard making up the words as he goes along and then sampled voices being dropped in at the end. It captures the spirit and intention of Sister Ray as Lou and The Velvets set out to I think.

Sister Ray (Live at Glastonbury 1987)

50

I am fifty today. When we were young, people who were fifty seemed to have reached an old age but I don't know if I now feel as old as they seemed then. It's just a number I suppose, and I've been to quite a few 50ths in the last year and none of those people seem old, but reaching the half a century mark makes it sound quite old. Lots of aspects of the world of 1970 do seem like a very long time ago. I haven't really been much bothered about this as the months and weeks have shortened and there have been lots of other things that have been more pressing and more important but I did wake up yesterday morning thinking, 'fuck, this is the last day of my forties. Fuck'. Any way it's here, I am fifty.

Factory Records numerical cataloguing system is a good place to stop in today as any. FAC 49 was a single by Swamp Children, produced by Simon Topping. It's successor, FACT 50, came out in November 1981, New Order's first album- Movement. The sleeve is a beautiful Peter Saville design with the sideways F at the top (F for Factory) and a sideways L at the bottom (L being the Roman numeral for 50). The design was borrowed from an Italian Futurist poster by Fortunato Depero. In the US it was released in a brown and ivory sleeve.

The cassette cover, the most throwaway of format artefacts, was beautiful too. I always liked how Factory placed the barcode down the spine on their tapes. Post- modern, probably.

The album isn't much rated by the band and they admit to being confused musically, off balance due to the loss of Ian's presence, voice, lyrics and ear for spotting riffs. The position of being singer had been resolved to some extent although Hooky sings lead vocals on two songs. Gillian had joined enabling Bernard to sing and play guitar, something he couldn't do simultaneously at gigs, and she'd add depth on guitar or keyboards. They also found themselves at odds with Martin Hannett, who was deeply affected by Ian's suicide and deeply into a mess of drink and drugs. They produced themselves after Movement. There are some really good sounding guitars, bass, keys and drums on Movement but the songs on the whole don't stick long in the memory after playing them. There are hints at their future sound and brief flashes or moments but nothing that really matches the songs released as singles and B-sides before it, Ceremony, Procession, Mesh, Cries And Whispers and Everything's Gone Green. Except the opener, the only genuine moment of greatness on FACT 50, three minutes of post- Joy Division perfection. Bernard and Hooky's echo- laden guitars wrap themselves around each other, up and down and in and around for the intro. Stephen comes in drums adding momentum before they all lock in and take off at 53 seconds and then it really is post- Joy Division New Order in full flight. Hooky's vocals suit the song too, indebted to Ian but looking for a way out.

Dreams Never End

Isolation Mix Six

I got this dramatic shot of the sky over the Mersey on Thursday night. One habit I hope I manage to maintain once this is all over, whenever that is, is taking regular walks. You miss so much sitting inside and even the most familiar and mundane places can look different when caught at a particular time. This week's Isolation Mix is a dubwise and post punk excursion from The Clash, some dubbed out Joy Division covers, Bauhaus, The Slits, Killing Joke remixed by Thrash, a bunch of Andrew Weatherall dub versions and some On U Sound from Dub Syndicate.



The Clash: The Crooked Beat

Steve Mason: Boys Outside (Andrew Weatherall Dub 2)

Jah Division: Dub Will Tear Us Apart

Jah Division: Dub Disorder

Bauhaus: Bela Lugosi’s Dead

The Slits: I Heard It Through The Grapevine

Dub Syndicate: Ravi Shankar Part.1

Sabres Of Paradise: Ysaebud

New Order: Regret (Sabres Slow ‘n’ Lo)

Lark: Can I Colour In Your Hair (Andrew Weatherall Version)

Killing Joke: Requiem (A Floating Leaf Always Reaches The Sea Dub Mix)

On A Thousand Islands In The Sea

Thurston Moore is going to release three 7" singles in November and each one will have the same B-side, a cover of New Order's Leave Me Alone. I've said before that I'm not a massive fan of covers of New Order songs. Lonelady's recent cover of Cries And Whispers and Galaxie 500's slow burning take on Ceremony are two of the few exceptions. Thurston's cover will join those ranks, a rather lovely and chilled out take on the song, starting out quite Byrsdy and ending with a restrained squall of acoustic guitars and feedback. Thurston recorded in his version in Salford, Sumner and Hook's hometown, dipping his scuffed Converse into the River Irwell and coming up trumps.



New Order recorded the original at Britannia Row in Islington in 1983 and it closed their Power, Corruption And Lies album, a quantum leap forward from 1981's Movement. Hooky's divine bassline and Bernard's acidic guitar spiralling around each other for ages before Bernard starts singing his plea for solitude. People often cite Age Of Consent and Your Silent Face as the singles that Factory should have released from Power, Corruption And Lies if Factory and New Order had been in the business of something as mundane as releasing songs as singles that had already appeared on albums. Leave Me Alone is right up there with those two songs, a gem surrounded by jewels.

Leave Me Alone

I Like Walking In The Park

New Order's Lowlife album of 1985 remains a career highpoint, as a full studio album only really matched by 1989's Technique. Lowlife is a perfect synthesis of rock and dance, Hooky's metallic bass and the synths and Stephen's metronomic drums all vying for space, matched by Barney's growing confidence as a singer. The nervy early steps, getting to grips with technology, finding a way out after Ian's death, the experimentalism of Power, Corruption And Lies, and the increasing boldness of Temptation, Thieves Like Us and Blue Monday led to Lowlife.

The penultimate song is Subculture, a peak on an album that features several other peaks, songs like Love Vigilantes, The Perfect Kiss and Elegia. In October 1985 the group released a single version of Subculture, a version remixed by John Robie. Robie was a fixture on the 80s New York electro club scene and turned in a version of Subculture which it is fair to say splits opinion. His remix is aimed squarely at clubland, the shonky vocal of the album version replaced by a new one (for the record I love the shonky, all over the place vocal of the album version, the ways it works against and with the synth riff, massive sound and glittering production). Robie's version is much more electronic, added some female backing vocals and then layering more and more sounds. Some people hate it. Peter Saville refused to design a sleeve for it.

In 1986 a new mix of Sub-culture appeared, one song on a four track 7" single given away with Record Mirror magazine (a now long defunct British music magazine). As well as the new exclusive mix of Sub-culture were songs by Raymonde, Hipsway and The Adventures. Robie got the credit, mistakenly or otherwise, but this new remix was by Joseph Watt, a member of the Razormaid! a remix service who worked out of San Francisco in the 80s to produce exclusive versions and edits of songs for subscribers (usually DJs). I'm guessing that the Watt remix came via Robie. It leans back to the Lowlife version with the synth riff and bassline, adding harder drums and percussion. Hooky's bass runs are centre stage before the vocals come in, alternating with extra keyboard parts, building for several minutes before we even hear Barney. When he does come in his voice is harking back to the album cut, detached and human, a bit exposed, singing the words apparently inspired by the groups visits to Skin Two, a London fetish club- tied up in chains so tight, being unable to shaft without someone else, having to submit, it having to hurt you a little bit. A dissonant pumping synth sound comes in and the sound toughens up again, pitched somewhere between the Lowlife song and Robie's single remix.

Sub-culture (Exclusive Remix Record Mirror)

In 2017 New order played a series of shows at the old Granada TV Studios on Quay Street as part of the Manchester International Festival, organised by Dave Haslam. They went back through their catalogue to play songs they'd not played for years and to make it more interesting/difficult for themselves recruited some young musicians from the Royal Northern to form a synth orchestra. The famous synth riff on Sub-culture was played originally slowed down and then sped up for the recording. The group, minus Hooky of course, marvelled at these young geniuses who could not only play the riff but at the correct speed too. Taking from both the Lowlife and Robie versions it's pretty magnificent, despite the absence of the most distinctive bass player of the 1980s, and the wall of synth players is visually and sonically great. The video won't embed but you can find it here.

I've Never Met Anyone Quite Like You Before

On visiting the above building, phare de la Coubre (a lighthouse on the Atlantic coast of France near Royan) I walked along a path looking at the floor and was stuck by these adjoining pieces of gravel.

They reminded me of Peter Saville's sleeve for New Order's 1981 masterpiece Temptation.

You may say, as a friend has suggested on social media, that my interest in New Order 'may have spilled into less than healthy territory' but in response I say 'yeah but it does look a bit like the Temptation sleeve'.

Temptation was the moment New Order escaped the shadow of Joy Division- previous single Everything's Gone Green was a quantum leap into dance music with some dub production techniques (learnt from Hannett, now abandoned as they produced themselves) but it still had Joy Division's DNA running through it. Temptation was brighter, the synths right at the fore, Hooky's bassline and Bernard's choppy disco guitar leading the charge along with the 'ooh ooh ooh ooh' vocal intro. It is also the first New Order song that is distinctly New Order lyrically, a step away from the portentous, Ian Curtis indebted lyrics of the band's songs up to that point. It's fair to say that Temptation's lyrics Curtis couldn't have written anything like Temptation- it's got a lightness, an optimism and a simplicity he wouldn't have come up with. 

Hooky talks about the famous 'eyes drop' in his autobiography, a moment guaranteed to stop hearts and turn gigs. In some ways it could be their greatest song and their greatest single- I know some people think it is. It certainly pointed to the road ahead and the way out of the abyss. They've recorded and released it in various versions. The original 12" from 1981 is still the go to version for me, miles better than the 1987 re-recording for Substance (which has its merits but feels smoothed out).

Temptation (12" version)

They re-did it in 1998, flushed by getting back together. The '98 version came out on the extra disc on the Retro box set. It's a decent updating of the song, modernised without losing the ramshackle charm of the original, with Bernard's guitar's well up in the mix and his voice clearly more used to singing than he was in the early 80s. By this point the song had found a new life in the scene in Trainspotting where Renton withdrawals and Kelly McDonald sings to him in a cold turkey dream at the end of his bed. 'Oh you've got green eyes, oh you've blue eyes, oh you've got grey eyes' 

Temptation '98

Ceremony

I'd forgotten until I posted Galaxie 500 last week that they did a cover of Ceremony, a B-side on the 12" of Blue Thunder.

Ceremony

Galaxie 500 slow it down and make it a bit looser than the original. Dean Wareham's guitar playing is stellar, just enough distortion and fuzz and the drums are less mechanical than Stephen Morris' and avoid the tom toms completely.  It's a slow burn affair, less quiet-loud-quiet than New Order's versions of the song.

Ceremony was one of the last songs written by Joy Division and then New Order's first single- it was released in two different versions in 1981, the first recorded in January and then re-recorded in September when Gillian Gilbert had joined the band, and then issued with two different Peter Saville sleeve designs but both versions were numbered FAC 33. Subsequent pressings saw either version put into either sleeve which seems typically Factory- an obsession with detail coupled with can't be arsed. Famously when they came to record the song they couldn't find Ian Curtis' handwritten lyrics and had to work them out from the demo version, recorded onto cassette- some of Ian's vocals were unclear and they had to put the tape through a graphic equaliser. Even then Bernard was guessing at some of the lines.

Ceremony

In June 1983 New Order played Chicago's Cabaret Metro, a semi-legendary gig due to the heat knocking the power out and the synths and sequencers malfunctioning. Towards the end of the set they played Ceremony, rawer, faster and more ferocious. On fire in fact, as Galaxie 500 called their album. 

Ceremony (Live at Chicago Cabaret Metro 1983)

We Never Compromise

Mancunian artist LoneLady has released a cover of New Order's 1981 B-side Cries And Whispers. Her sound and aesthetic are partially rooted in those early 80s New Order records and Manchester's spirit of those times- her last album was inspired by walking round the concrete and streetlight spaces underneath the Mancunian Way (a section of elevated motorway that skims the southern edge of the city centre). I don't always like covers of New Order songs but this is a keeper.

  

The original was one of two B-sides on 1981's Everything's Gone Green single, a song that skipped the group forward several paces, the moment when they combined rock and dance for the first time on disc and the last time they worked with Martin Hannett. The two songs on the flipside- Cries And Whispers and Mesh- were mislabelled on the disc and then again on Substance, causing confusion for years. One listen to this song, the synth sounds at the intro, the skittering rhythm, Barney's bleak vocal, Stephen's metronomic drumming and the swell of keyboards towards the end, should convince anyone that New Order were a class apart from around this point onwards and for most of the 80s.

Cries And Whispers