I’m probably going
to come across like a grumpy old malcontent here. Par for the course, perhaps.
First things first
– I love New Order. I’ve got almost everything they’ve ever released in one
format or another, I’ve seen them perform live, at their peak, and on any
purely non-scientific gut-feel basis, they’re probably the band I’ve listened
to more than any other across the past 35 years. Hell, I even named my blog
after one of their early minor “hits”, albeit an early minor hit that might
just about be the greatest single track ever committed to vinyl. And the band’s
debut album, Movement, is unquestionably my number one album of all-time.
And so, all of that
said, when Ian Curtis died, and Joy Division morphed into New Order across the
second half of 1980 and into early 1981, I really wish the band had taken some
time to find a new vocalist who was a naturally “gifted” singer. I completely
understand why that didn’t happen, obviously, and I also understand that the
passage of time and an ongoing familiarity means that Bernard Sumner’s vocal is
now intrinsically and irreversibly linked with the band’s sound and all of its
most memorable landmark tunes. My issue is that he’s just not a particularly
good singer. That is all too painfully obvious on the band’s latest live
release, Education Entertainment Recreation.
(It’s probably no
surprise then, that Movement, the album where Peter Hook takes care of a chunk
of the vocal duties, is the one right at the top of my own pile. Despite Hooky
having vocal limitations of his own, his voice gels masterfully with Movement’s
more downbeat feels.)
Try as I might, as
much as I don’t want it to be the case, Sumner’s vocal frailty is the biggest
takeaway I have after listening to Education Entertainment Recreation. A
frailty which is far less obvious - although still evident - on much of New
Order’s studio-produced output.
Right. Now for the
positives, because wherever you find New Order, you’ll always find a positive: Education
Entertainment Recreation was recorded at London’s Alexandra Palace (the “Ally
Pally”) back in November 2018 and it contains one of the most comprehensive
career-spanning setlists found on any of the band’s live releases. And the
music itself - beyond those vocal shortcomings - is absolutely stunning in
every respect.
All of the big
guns are fired – ‘Regret’, ‘Crystal’, ‘Sub-Culture’, ‘Bizarre Love Triangle’, ‘Plastic’,
‘The Perfect Kiss’, ‘True Faith’, ‘Blue Monday’, ‘Temptation’, et al. Amongst
many others – there’s 21 tracks in total, a double album (2x CD/3x vinyl), including
a few gems from the Joy Division cannon, notably ‘Disorder’, and the three
closing tracks ‘Atmosphere’, ‘Decades’, and ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’. Sadly,
nothing whatsoever from Movement.
There’s a bit of Sumner
stage banter as he interacts with what sounds like a massive crowd, and there’s
the occasional crowd singalong also in evidence at various points. There is a certain
rawness to the whole deal, a sense that the band remain a tremendous live
proposition, with an off-the-cuff, unscripted spontaneity, even. It is
everything a decent live album should be.
Except for that
one small but still very important (aforementioned) detail.
Then again, it is perhaps
a little churlish to ever expect a perfect live album.
The music of New
Order has always been very special in my little corner of music consumerism.
I’ve collected, give or take the odd live album and a few superfluous
compilation albums, almost everything the band has released. Every studio album
and a whole lot more besides. So I thought I’d offer a quick guide to those
studio albums and rank them in some kind of order of personal preference,
rather than chronologically, which perhaps would have made more sense. I’ve
left out EPs, a couple of very good Peel Session releases, live releases, and
compilations, otherwise we could be here for hours … if I’m perhaps a little
harsh on some of the later period albums, it’s a harshness born only from
love. Tough love, even. Like an exasperated parent expressing disappointment in
the wayward behaviour of a still very much loved child. Or something like
that.
1. Movement (1981)
The debut and ground
zero for New Order as Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook, and Stephen Morris tried to
come to terms with the death of Ian Curtis and the end of Joy Division.
Everything about Movement reflects that enforced transition and the album’s
themes deal with grief, loss, insecurity, and uncertainty. Much like the music
of Joy Division, then. Stark and glacial, it’s a Martin Hannett production
masterclass, and a wholly necessary purging of the past before the band could
move on to embrace brighter and much bouncier things. As such, Movement
represents not so much a template for the direction the band would head, but
more an intimate snapshot of time, place, and circumstance. Many would suggest
that the terrific guitar-led opener ‘Dreams Never End’ is the main takeaway
from the album, but the whole thing is something close to perfect in my view.
Although Movement is not universally popular with all fans, it really is the
only logical starting point for your New Order journey, and nobody will ever
convince me it’s not the band’s best work.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘The Him’
2. Power
Corruption and Lies (1983)
Released eight
weeks after the band’s seminal ‘Blue Monday’ single, which would go on to
become the biggest selling 12-inch of all time, it’s probably fair to say that
sales of Power Corruption and Lies benefitted heavily from New Order’s
new-found crossover popularity. Despite all early editions of the band’s second
album omitting the track altogether - as was the Factory (label) way (at that
stage). Even without the game-changing single, Power Corruption and Lies has
stood the test of time better than most, offering a strong and consistent set
of tunes which, for the most part, strike just the right balance between the
dark and the light. The band was clearly keen to forge a path away from the
bleak soundscapes of the debut, and that’s never more obvious than on the
upbeat, uptempo opener, ‘Age of Consent’. Whatever the intent, the album
definitely represents a seismic shift away from the guitar-based aesthetic of
Movement to a much more radio-friendly electro-pop dynamic. Without crossing
over completely. At a guess, I’d say Power Corruption and Lies is the album
owned by most “casual” New Order fans.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘5-8-6’
3. Technique
(1989)
A highly acclaimed
release - by media and fans alike - which was strongly influenced by the
burgeoning acid house and techno scenes taking shape across the Atlantic at the
time of its release ... the high bpm nature of its content acting as a
precursor for the genre we know today as EDM. Although New Order had already
established itself within the club scene as a reliable DJ “go to”, Technique
was the first album to truly reflect that dancefloor popularity, and the first
full-length release from the band to reach number one on the UK album charts.
Includes the singles, ‘Fine Time’, ‘Round & Round’, and ‘Run’, plus a
strong selection of album cuts like ‘All the Way’, ‘Mr Disco’, and the superb
‘Vanishing Point’. A great way for the band to see out the decade it had helped
to define, and New Order was, by the turn of the 90s, almost completely
unrecognisable as same band who made Movement. And light years away from Joy
Division ... although the magnificence of Technique’s album sleeve would beg to
differ.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘Vanishing Point’
4. Brotherhood
(1986)
Brotherhood is
perhaps the most underrated album of the bunch. A bit of a gem, even. It
possibly resonates more strongly with me because it (more or less) coincided
with my only New Order “live” experience a few months after its release. But
it’s a super strong set that swaggers into life with impressive opener
‘Paradise’ and doesn’t let up through tracks like ‘Way of Life’, the glistening
synths of ‘All Day Long’, ’Angel Dust’, and the lighthearted ‘Every Little
Counts’. Also includes singles ‘State of the Nation’ and the now anthemic
‘Bizarre Love Triangle’. Given what went before, it seems a bit reckless to
suggest that Brotherhood is the album where Gillian Gilbert’s synth work really
comes into its own, but I think that actually happened. There may have been a
case for the now super-dated ‘Shellshock’ to be included here, but that single
was reserved for the Pretty In Pink soundtrack, and would appear on the band’s
Substance compilation a year later.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘Paradise’
5. Music Complete
(2015)
Music Complete was
lovely surprise after a decade of remakes, repackages, and cast-offs. It was
the band’s first album as a fully fledged five-piece (and the rest) and the
first without Peter Hook. We were entitled to expect nothing from New Order in
2015, and we wound with quite a lot of something. Mojo magazine called it the
“comeback of its year”, but even as a one-eyed fan I could never go that far.
All hyperbole aside, tracks like ‘Restless’, ‘Plastic’, ‘Tutti Frutti’, and
‘People on the High Line’ all added to the band’s wider legacy, and the odd suspect
moment excepted (lyrics, mostly), the album proved there was still post-Hook
life in the old dog yet. As ever, Sumner’s vocals leave a fair bit to be
desired in places, but he got some help on Music Complete, with Iggy Pop,
Brandon Flowers, La Roux, Denise Johnson, and longtime collaborator Dawn Zee
all adding vocal chops at different points. And yes, I do recognise the fact
that Sumner’s dodgy singing has become “signature” New Order for a lot of
people, and I retain some affection for it all the same. All told, a pretty
decent return to form.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘Tutti Frutti’
6. Low-life (1985)
By 1985, Blue
Monday had taken on a life of its own and the band was perhaps peaking in terms
of mainstream popularity. And Power Corruption and Lies was just as likely the
only real benchmark for many of those new fans (certainly not the case for
yours truly - see Movement). So Low-life was always on a hiding to nothing at
the time of its release. And while it wasn’t exactly a disappointment at the
time, as an album, as a complete set, I don’t think it has aged particularly
well. It was however, the first New Order full-length release to include
singles - in this case ‘The Perfect Kiss’ and dancefloor banger ‘Sub-culture’.
It opens with the popular ‘Love Vigilantes’ and builds nicely to the mid-album
peaks of ‘Sunrise’ and ‘Elegia’ but the rest veer too close to “filler” for
these precious ears. It’s not Sumner’s best vocal work either, and despite
Low-life’s enduring popularity with fans - which always surprises me when I
read such polls - it’s nowhere near the band’s strongest set.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘Sunrise’
7. Get Ready
(2001)
Get Ready
represented a barely anticipated return after an eight-year break and something
of a return to the guitar aesthetic of old. In fact, Get Ready is probably the
closest New Order has ever come to releasing a “rock” album. It opens with the
double whammy of excellent singles ‘Crystal’ and ‘60 Miles An Hour’, while the
third single, ‘Someone Like You’, appears much later and is rather more
forgettable. It also contains ‘Turn My Way’, which features Smashing Pumpkin
Billy Corgan on vocals, and ‘Rock The Shack’, featuring Primal Scream’s Bobby
Gillespie. That’s some heavyweight help, right there. More generally, Get Ready
is a little bit patchy in that it contains some of band’s best post-80s work -
guitar lines, returning to the minimalism of the Movement-era, etc, but also
some the band’s worst excesses - lyrics (again), and Barney’s singing (again).
But overall, a pretty decent comeback. I think, by this point, I was just happy
to have the band back in the fold.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘Turn My Way’
8. Republic (1993)
I realise it’s not
necessarily the popular view with many New Order fans, but Republic always felt
like New Order’s “jumping the shark” moment for me. Although in fairness that
moment had probably already occurred a few years earlier with the ghastly ‘World
In Motion’ (England World Cup) single. Republic opens with a run of the four
singles eventually culled from the album: ‘Regret’, ‘World (The Price of
Love)’, ‘Ruined in a Day’, and ‘Spooky’. Those singles only make the album slightly
more palatable for me. It’s another one that hasn’t aged particularly well;
it’s super cheesy in places and burdened with cringeworthy lyrics. There are
many examples, the best (or worst!) being the awful ‘Liar’. And try-hard
rapping ruins the gorgeous instrumentation on ‘Times Change’. The band’s mainstream
crossover was now complete to the point of near irrelevance (to me) by this
point. And that album cover!? ... ugh, so at odds with the rest of the band’s great
sleeves. Incredibly enough, Republic was nominated for the Mercury Prize of its
year and became the second New Order album to hit number one.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘Everyone Everywhere’
9. Lost Sirens
(2013)
When I first
learned that New Order had released a set of previously shelved or discarded
tunes recorded during the Waiting of the Sirens’ Call sessions eight years
earlier, I feared the worst. But Lost Sirens is actually not too bad. I mean,
it’s not great, but it could have been a hell of a lot worse (see below). Lost
Sirens did at least include the wonderful swagger of ‘Hellbent’, which first
surfaced on the 2011 compilation, Total, and an alternative version of ‘I Told
You So’, which was perhaps even better than the original take released on
Sirens’ Call. Elsewhere, opener ‘I’ll Stay With You’, and ‘Recoil’, were also
worthy additions to the band’s canon. On the other hand, ‘Shake It Up’ and
‘I’ve Got A Feeling’ are up there with the worst “songs” New Order ever
released. And yes, it does seem odd that I’m ranking the Lost Sirens leftover set
ahead of the “parent” album they were rejected from, but that’s just how I see
it.
EGG’s choice cut:
‘Hellbent’
10. Waiting for
the Sirens’ Call (2005)
Not quite the last
New Order album to feature Peter Hook (see Lost Sirens), but sadly, the first
not featuring Gillian Gilbert. It was also the first to include Phil Cunningham
(synth, guitar), although Cunningham had been a touring/live member of the band
since 2001. To be quite honest, even writing as a fan, Waiting for the Sirens’
Call is not an especially inspiring set. Aside from the funky electro of ‘I
Told You So’, it’s all a bit generic and there’s really not much to get excited
about here. It reeks of a band just going through the motions. Even the singles
lifted from it, ‘Krafty’, ‘Jetstream’, and the title track itself, did little
to allay fears the band had finally reached some sort of studio use-by date.
They remained a hugely popular touring band and a regular festival headliner
but we’d have to wait a whole decade before that studio “use-by” theory was
fully laid to rest (on Music Complete - see above).
EGG’s choice cut:
‘I Told You So’
But wait, there’s
more ... a free set of Hooky steak knives and a Gillian Gilbert calendar? ...
Not quite, but it
would be remiss of me to devote so many words to New Order albums without
acknowledging the sheer majesty and wider importance of Substance (1987), a
compilation of the band’s early singles and their associated B-sides. Many of
which don’t feature on the regular albums, which makes it an essential album in
its own right. Sure, compilations like ‘Singles’,the ‘best of’ and the ‘rest of’, plus
Total, which draws in Joy Division work, are good value, as are a number of
live albums, but Substance really was quite special and served to fill in all of
those gaps from the 80s, the band’s best and most prolific era for singles.
For the blog’s 600th
post (yay me, etc) I want to introduce a new “series” focusing on the small but
precious set of vinyl records in my collection. I plan to roll out a post per
week, over the next few months, looking at ten of the best or most important
records within that collection. But first, some context … We all consume
music in different ways. I’m not much of a fan of Spotify. I don’t have the
premium option and therefore don’t “store” albums for future streaming. I only
occasionally check into Spotify for one-off album previews and only rarely
check out the odd playlist that platform offers. It isn’t that the cost of
premium is prohibitive or anything like that, far from it, it’s just that
Spotify doesn’t really hold much appeal for me. Other members of my family
swear by it.
I’m relatively
old-school, and most of my current music collection consists of CDs and mp3s
(albums downloaded). My collection in each of these formats is extensive and
varied. Some might say its huge and rather excessive. The mp3 option, for all
of its flaws – compression, variations in bitrate quality – offers the
portability I crave in a way that still allows me to “own” a copy or file of
the music I listen to. The CD option appeals because I like to collect
“physical” things and stack them on a shelf.
Having said that,
purchasing CDs is a less frequent indulgence these days, and the vast majority
of new additions to my music collection in recent years have arrived in the
form of album downloads/mp3 files, which are meticulously tagged and filed away
with all the pedantry of a particularly speccy and spotty OCD librarian.
In the late 1970s
and throughout the 1980s, when I first started collecting music, it was a
combination of vinyl records and cassette tapes. By 1992, my collection was
extensive and – in the wake of CDs becoming the most fashionable form of
consumption – largely redundant. Desperate for cash, and determined to embrace
the CD format just as soon as I could afford it, I sold virtually everything
I’d spent the previous 15 years collecting – vinyl and cassette tapes, the vast
majority sold in bulk to a trader on Wellington’s Cuba Street. Sold for
peanuts. It broke my heart.
Well, it did, and
it didn’t. It did because they were my life; the only tangible thing(s) I had to
show for more than a decade in the workforce. And it didn’t because my life was
undergoing major change and I desperately needed the money to fund
long-yearned-for overseas travel. And hey, I couldn’t fit that little lot into
the one backpack I left the country with, could I?
It just made sense
(at the time) and it made even more sense that when I was flush with the green
stuff, I’d be able to rebuild the collection – replicate it, even – in the form
of CDs, which had fast become the mainstream poison of choice. And that's exactly what I eventually did … but I also held on to a number or tapes and records I
couldn’t or simply wouldn’t give up. I stored them at my parent’s abode for the
duration of my travels. The most precious and sentimental stuff; the first
vinyl record my Mum ever bought me (Glen Campbell’s Goodtime Album, 1970). Something
passed down to me by my Dad (The Green & White Brigade’s The Holy Ground of
Glasgow Celtic, 1968), and naturally enough, a childhood first love, 1978’s
Solid Gold Hits Volume 22. Plus a few others, which I may or may not get to in
future posts.
Among the handful
of cassette tapes I couldn’t bear to part with were The Cure’s ‘Seventeen
Seconds’ (1980), and New Order’s ‘Movement’ (1981). Those albums remain firm
favourites today, although I tend to listen to each of them in a newer format
nowadays.
Since then – since
The Great Purge of 1992/1993 – I’ve purchased very little in the way of vinyl,
but I have added a few records here and there, and I’ve “inherited” a few albums
to add to that small core set. Last Christmas, when I was gifted a very cute
and portable “record player” I had yet another purge because it was clear that
some of the vinyl I had was simply unplayable – badly scratched, tatty, and/or
filthy – and I figured there wasn’t much point in keeping them or trying to
salvage them. Which means my collection today is even smaller (about 40 albums
and a handful of singles) but rather more selective. I can play what remains
and what remains tends to be those records I value most. That’ll be my focus in
this series of blogposts.
With new vinyl so
much more readily available than it has been at any time across the past couple
of decades, I also harbour sneaky plans to add to this wing of my wider music collection.
But for now, it strikes me that the most unique or more interesting works in my
post-purge music collection exist in the vinyl format, so I’ll try to cover off
ten of the best in the coming weeks, with a short post about what makes each
one so special.
Movement may well have been New Order’s debut album, the
first in a series of acclaimed releases that more or less defined the Eighties
for many, but it was also very much a transitional album for a band still
grieving the loss of its lead singer. For all that it was “officially” a debut,
it was also a follow-up to all that went before … and given the circumstances,
it really couldn’t have been any other way. It also stands as something of an oddity in the New Order
catalogue in that it most definitely isn’t a dance album. No matter how closely
you listen, you’ll be hard pressed to identify any sign whatsoever that this
band would eventually provide a significant bridge between low key angst-ridden
Indie rock and the rather more glossy Acid House/Techno evolution starting to
take shape across the Atlantic in the nightclubs of Chicago and Detroit. And again … given the circumstances, it really couldn’t be
any other way. Bright lights, dancing, joy, and feelings of euphoria definitely
weren’t on this band’s agenda back in 1981 when Movement was released, and
certainly not part of its makeup when the album was conceived in late
1980/early 1981, during the weeks and months after the death of Ian Curtis and
the demise of Joy Division.
Movement’s bleak themes and grey soundscapes, its angular
guitars and icy synths, are not vastly removed from where Joy Division left
off, and the shadow of Curtis looms large as the defining backdrop to the
album. New Order’s struggle to find its own signature sound – something that
would start to fall into place on Movement’s follow-up, Power Corruption And
Lies – means it isn’t too difficult to view this album as the third studio
album Joy Division never made. Hell, even the vocals of Sumner and Hook tend to
ape those of Curtis at times. As such, Movement pretty much represents a snapshot of a
band in transition, a mandatory step on the road to longevity, and a fairly
emphatic last gasp purging of the past. It seems improbable that New Order
would have morphed into the hugely influential band they eventually became
without this initial small step away from what they once were. In order to
embrace a bright new future, indeed, any sort of future together, it was
necessary to get the grieving process over and done with first. Movement received a belated “Deluxe” makeover of sorts in
2008 – with a bonus disc of essential material from the same period (including
two versions of the fabulous 'Temptation', two of 'Ceremony', plus 'In A Lonely
Place', 'Everything’s Gone Green', and 'Procession') accompanying the original
album.
Best tracks on Movement: 'Dreams Never End', 'The Him' (my
fave), 'Doubts Even Here', and 'Denial'.
