version

Well-known member
Mani's tweet at Peter Hook hasn't aged well what with Man City's success, but I remember going "Oof" at the time.

"Three things visible from space, Great Wall Of China, Peter Hook’s wallet stuffed with Ian Curtis’ blood money, Man City’s empty trophy cabinet!"
 

sadmanbarty

Well-known member

that bass is nice. very mod mentality; short cut, slim fitting shirt, the veneration of cheek bones. it's about being tight.

then the guitar comes in and it speaks to a manchester over half a decade away. the psychedelic, expansive manchester. a more wholesome side of it though. none of the grubbiness of drug fiends or sweating to much. mdma roaming an open field on a sunny day. "i've got the spirit"

that guitar solo speaks to one of joy divisions strengths. their love for very economic and direct melodies. you tend to notice in the bass in most tracks.
 

version

Well-known member
The whooshing sounds in 'Disorder' are great, makes it sound like it's in space. LV-426, the planet they find the alien on in Alien.
 

sadmanbarty

Well-known member

this brings out the worst in them; ian curtis.

he falls into a long line of white fellas ruining songs by not being able to sing them; bob dylan, mic jagger, etc.
 
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mvuent

Void Dweller
I remember finding Closer really dull as a teenager and preferring the sleeve art for Unknown Pleasures to the music.

I was always more drawn to Closer. one of the great examples of an album sounding exactly like its cover art.
 

version

Well-known member
one of the great examples of an album sounding exactly like its cover art.

Definitely. I haven't properly listened since then though. I heard it at like sixteen and it's always been "the album everyone says is really good but is much more boring than the other one" in my head.
 

entertainment

Well-known member
Never really got into the albums but some of the songs are immortal. Was once not that far from getting "The past is now part of my future, the present is well out of hand" tattooed but thankfully pulled out of that gaffe
 

version

Well-known member
I can't think of anything I'd be willing to get a tattoo of. I'd regret it pretty swiftly whatever it was.
 

version

Well-known member
Unknown Pleasures seems like one of those rare instances of something arriving fully formed.
 

blissblogger

Well-known member
it's weird being vastly older than everyone else here - because i can remember a world without Joy Division in it, and then suddenly there was a world with Joy Division in it

i can remember seeing them on TV, by accident, in real time - Ian doing the dance, those arm movements, with the fixated trance gaze

i can remember them rising, emerging as a phenomenon - the first thing i noticed was Peel playing "Transmission" a lot, and then a few of the more daring early evening Radio 1 deejays playing it too, so it was something that would come on while you were doing homework.

they seemed to escalate into being the band very swiftly - it was them and Public Image Ltd as twin leaders of postpunk

then Closer and "Love Will Tear Us Apart" - which happened to coincide with a very glum summer, my first heartbreak, so that's what i associate it with, although none of the contents of the album actually suit that, lyrically, and "Love Will Tear" is about the break-up of a long established relationship, whereas i'd never been in a relationship, so yeah no real resonance there - but certainly unsurpassable as a bleak soundtrack to a dismal summer.

one thing that i always like to point out is the fact that we didn't know anything about all the stuff that is now considered the Story, inextricably entwined with the music

we didn't know about the marriage falling apart, the affair, the epilepsy

'we' being the general postpunk public, people who read the music papers

it wasn't common knowledge, only a few people close to Factory would have known, there wasn't a gossip culture, at least not for a group at Joy Division's level - and the group didn't do any interviews, and even if they did they would never have talked about this stuff anyway, since they are intensely private, typical Northern English (or just English), emotionally-repressed, laconic types - they didn't even talk about with each other while it was happening - even at the funeral, I gather.

so it's kind of weird to see in the wake of Deborah Curtis's memoir and the two films etc, all of that being turned into the Meaning of this Music - feels reductive

at the time it was a surprise that he killed himself - and it was never explained, then
 
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blissblogger

Well-known member
Unknown Pleasures seems like one of those rare instances of something arriving fully formed.

"seems" is the word though, cos they did some pretty pedestrian formative stuff that is on various box sets

their arc is the archetypal punk to postpunk to new pop trajectory

punk/ Stiff Kittens (think they were only called that for half a second - but typical puerile sick-humour cruelty name of the era)

postpunk / Warsaw (wintry, Eastern Bloc, bowie-Low reference etc - except that while the name is perfect, the sound is still a bit punk-pedestrian, a fast noisy pummel)

postpunk / Joy Division (even better name), sound gets spartan, production spacey etc

new pop / New Order - danceable, hooky, hits, infatuated with NY clubs
 
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blissblogger

Well-known member
they're totally rock

some of their earlier tunes are only a hair's breadth from Sabbath's "Paranoid"

but it's true they don't rock out

they all loved the Stooges but they couldn't be Iggy, or indeed the Asheton brothers

the energy is imploded

i also think of the Doors - Doors without libido

Jim M was like "death and my cock is the world", Ian C was like "death is the world"
 

mvuent

Void Dweller
This band became an influence for a number of bands such as The Cure, Radiohead and Editors. Specifically, the album ‘Unknown Pleasures’ inspired the (back then) newly-formed band U2 and their lead singer Bono. In fact, after the death of Ian Curtis, Bono allegedly told Tony Wilson: ‘not to worry because he would take over from where Ian left off.’
lol. maybe that sounds less absurd if you've actually listened to early U2.
 

version

Well-known member
I remember hearing a story, maybe blissblog can confirm it, that Bono tried to collaborate with Beefheart and got a response from The Captain which read "Dear Bongo, no."
 

mvuent

Void Dweller
lol yeah Beefheart didn't have time for any of those Rolling Stone Magazine Top 10 bands. didn't like the Beatles or Bob Dylan either.

apparently This Heat opened for U2 once too.
 
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