Tag: Factory Records (Page 1 of 3)

A SYNTH IS FOR LIFE & NOT JUST FOR CHRISTMAS…

As the Yule Tide season gets into full swing, ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK presents a collection of modern seasonal tunes with a more artful slant…

With a song to play on each of the 25 days in December until Christmas, some are covers with a modern approach while others gather their thoughts and emotions into original compositions. But each has their own take on the holiday period, whether happy or sad or both.

Synths at Christmas are not entirely new; ‘Last Christmas’ by WHAM! was primarily made with a Roland Juno 60 while BAND AID’s ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas? was dominated by PPG Wave 2.2 with a percussive sample taken from ‘Memories Fade’ by TEARS FOR FEARS also being key to the intro.

However the traditional nature of Christmas often dictates traditional instrumentation in its songs, which means that Christmas synth songs are comparatively uncommon and a more recent phenomenon.

Whatever your plans whether with the family or in the studio, please remember, a synth is for life and not just for Christmas… may it bring you lots of cheer! The 25 songs are presented in yearly then alphabetical order within…


BE MUSIC Rocking Carol (1982)

A Be Music production given away as limited edition flexi-disc of 4400 given away at The Haçienda on Christmas Eve 1982, with the greeting “Merry Xmas From The Haçienda And Factory Records”, this was NEW ORDER covering the traditional Czech seasonal tune also known as ‘Jesus Sweetly Sleep’ and ‘We Will Rock You’ as a robotic electronic tone poem.

Available on the compilation album ‘Ghosts of Christmas Past (Remake)’ (V/A) via Les Disques du Crépuscule

https://www.neworder.com/


EURYTHMICS Winter Wonderland (1987)

Recorded as part of an album on behalf of Special Olympics that featured U2, Madonna, Whitney Houston, Bruce Springsteen, Bryan Adams and Alison Moyet among others, EURYTHMICS’ glistening electronic take on romance during the winter season was cited by ASCAP as now the most played version of the song which was made famous by Darlene Love.

Available on the compilation album ‘A Very Special Christmas’ (V/A) via Universal Music

https://www.eurythmics.com/


S.P.O.C.K White Christmas (1992)

Originally recorded by S.P.O.C.K for Energy Rekords’ ‘Virtual X-Mas 92’ EP and then a bonus song on their 1995 compilation ‘A Piece Of The Action’, this cover of the Irving Berlin standard made famous by Bing Crosby was suitably melodramatic as the holiday season was celebrated in The Neutral Zone while under threat of an alien attack.

Available on the compilation album ‘Virtual 2020 X-Mas’ (V/A) via Energy Rekords

https://www.facebook.com/StarPilotOnChannelK/


SAINT ETIENNE Featuring TIM BURGESS I Was Born On Christmas Day (1993)

Delightfully catchy with a house-laden bounce, ‘I Was Born on Christmas Day’ was written in acknowledgement of band member Bob Stanley’s birthday for an EP ‘Xmas 93’. Featuring a duet between Sarah Cracknell and special guest vocals by Tim Burgess from THE CHARLATANS, the joyful narrative saw the couple elope, confusing some fans and press.

Available on the SAINT ETIENNE album ’A Glimpse Of Stocking’ via PIAS

http://www.saintetienne.com/


DEAD OR ALIVE Blue Christmas (2000)

Originally recorded as a sparse ballad for the B-side of 1990 single ‘Your Sweetness Is Your Weakness’, Pete Burns’ foray into the music for holiday season was given a dancier makeover in 2000 and in hindsight, now sounds like a stylistic blue print for PET SHOP BOYS ‘It Doesn’t Often Snow At Christmas’. The two would later work together on the excellent ‘Jack & Jill Party’ in 2004.

Available on the DEAD OR ALIVE album ‘Fragile’ via Demon Music Group

https://www.discogs.com/artist/46720-Dead-Or-Alive


SALLY SHAPIRO Anorak Christmas (2006)

With their naïve wispiness, understated cinematics and disco beats, if there act who are ably suited to Christmas pop music, it is Swedish duo SALLY SHAPIRO. A cover of a song by fellow Swede Nixon, the lines “The first time that I saw your face on a cold December night, it was a Tuesday on a gig with a band that we both liked” captured an innocent romance and the aural warmth of the named apparel.

Available on the SALLY SHAPIRO album ‘Disco Romance’ via Paper Bag Records

https://www.facebook.com/shapirosally


PET SHOP BOYS It Doesn’t Often Snow At Christmas (2009)

Pet_Shop_Boys_-_ChristmasOriginally recorded in 1997 for an exclusive fan club single but remixed in 2009, ‘It Doesn’t Often Snow At Christmas’ was a suitably cynical offering. Famous for keeping THE POGUES ‘Farytale Of New York’ off the 1987 UK Christmas No1 spot with their cover of ‘Always On My Mind’, while this didn’t hit those commercial heights, it provided a very PET SHOP BOYS take on the madness of the festive season.

Available on the PET SHOP BOYS EP ‘Christmas’ via EMI Records

http://www.petshopboys.co.uk/


CHEW LIPS When You Wake Up (2010)

CHEW LIPS might have disbanded but in 2010, on the back of their only album ‘Unicorn’ and its subsequent tour, they were on a productive high. ‘When You Wake Up’ was a bonus tune recorded and given away as a Christmas gift to fans at the end of that very successful year. Delivered with lead singer Tigs’ usual feisty panache, listening back only highlights how much CHEW LIPS are missed.

Originally released as a free download

https://www.facebook.com/CHEWLiPS/


HURTS All I Want For Christmas Is New Year’s Day (2010)

Hurts-christmasWith their TAKE THAT dressed as ULTRAVOX template, Theo Hutchcraft and Adam Anderson turned their attentions to memories of “the worst Christmas of our lives”. In true Bros Go To Bavaria style, despite the mournful start, ‘All I Want For Christmas Is New Year’s Day’ transformed itself into a hopeful anthem with a big chorus and lashings of tubular bells.

Available on the HURTS album  ‘Happiness’ via Major Label / RCA

http://www.informationhurts.com/


LOLA DUTRONIC Another Christmas Without Snow (2010)

Lola Dutronic-Christmas without snowIn the UK, a wet Christmas is always more likely,  but LOLA DUTRONIC’s ‘Another Christmas Without Snow’ resonated with its melancholic yet pretty demeanour. The project of Canadian producer Richard Citroen and using a flexible roster of wispy female vocalists, the tones of Lola Dee came over all dreamy like SAINT ETIENNE and conveyed the season’s mixed emotions.

Available on LOLA DUTRONIC single ‘(Another) Christmas Without Snow’ via Lola Dutronic

https://www.facebook.com/LOLA-DUTRONIC-80232595392/


ERASURE Gaudete (2013)

ERASURE GaudeteAndy Bell and Vince Clarke’s version of this traditional Ecclesiastical Latin carol continued an ERASURE tradition that had begun with ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’ for the CD edition of the ‘Crackers International’ EP in 1988. With a precise electronic backbeat, ‘Gaudete’ was taken from its 16th Century origins and thrown into the new millennium with a cheeky ‘Ice Machine’ reference for good measure.

Available on the ERASURE album ‘Snow Globe’ via Mute Artists

http://www.erasureinfo.com/


HYPERBUBBLE A Synthesizer for Christmas (2013)

HYPERBUBBLE A Synthesizer for ChristmasWhether it was a Casio, Yamaha or Roland, everyone wanted ‘A Synthesizer For Christmas’. Texan couple HYPERBUBBLE took that enduring memory and turned it into a delightful synthpop ditty that could resonate with electronic geeks from 8 to 80 the world over. Short but sweet, it was another joyous “cartoon automaton symphony” from Jess and Jeff.

Available on the HYPERBUBBLE single ‘A Synthesizer For Christmas’ via Socket Sounds

http://www.hyperbubble.net/


VILE ELECTRODES The Ghosts Of Christmas (2013)

VILE ELECTRODES The Ghosts Of ChristmasIf ‘Twin Peaks’ met ‘Leader Of The Pack’ under the mistletoe, it would sound like this. Possibly the best Christmas tune of the last 10 or so years, VILE ELECTRODES’ harrowing tale of a departed loved one is strangely enticing, with the beautifully haunting echoes of Julee Cruise’s ‘The Nightingale’ lingering over the frozen lake.

Available on the ILE ELECTRODES EP ‘The Ghosts Of Christmas’ via Vile Electrodes

http://www.vileelectrodes.com/


HANNAH PEEL Find Peace (2014)

HANNAH PEEL Find Peace‘Find Peace’ was a Christmas song longing for the cold but merry winters of yesteryear under the modern day spectre of global warming, armed conflict and political tension. The off-kilter analogue buzzing and almost random sequences made for a striking listen as a frantic percussive death rattle and an emotive synth drone take hold to provide an appropriate backdrop for the eerie but beautiful voice of Hannah Peel.

Available on the HANNAH PEEL single ‘Find Peace’ via Snowflakes Christmas Singles Club

http://www.hannahpeel.com/


MARSHEAUX We Met Bernard Sumner At A Christmas Party Last Night (2015)

GHOSTS-OF-CHRISTMAS-PAST-twi158cd‘We Met Bernard Sumner At A Christmas Party Last Night’ was a wonderfully whispery synthpop number that was classic MARSHEAUX. The lyrics were constructed from the song and album titles of NEW ORDER to provide an imaginary narrative on Marianthi Melitsi and Sophie Sarigiannidou surreally bumping into the Manchester combo’s lead singer at a Yule Tide function.

Available on the album ‘Ghost Of Christmas Past (Remake)’ (V/A) via Les Disques du Crépuscule

http://www.marsheaux.com


SPARKS Christmas Without A Prayer (2015)

SPARKS Christmas Without A PrayerOn 1974’s ‘Kimono My House’ album, the Mael brothers recorded a song called ‘Thank God It’s Not Christmas’, a typically perverse SPARKS romp that had nothing to do as such with the holiday season. After their FFS collaboration, Russell and Ron ended the year with ‘Christmas Without A Prayer’, a fitting offering which also amusingly outlined that albums by WINGS were actually unwanted gifts.

Available on the SPARKS single ‘Christmas Without A Prayer’ via Lil’ Beethoven Records

http://www.allsparks.com/


VICE VERSA Little Drum Machine Boy (2015)

“A twisted cover of a cover of a cover”, this synth laden reinterpretation of the tune based on a traditional Czech carol made famous by a bizarre but highly enjoyable version by David Bowie and Bing Crosby, saw former ABC stalwarts Mark White and Stephen Singleton reconvene as  VICE VERSA to wax lyrical about 303s, 808s, 909s and a “shiny new Roland toy”. It was a fabulous combination of sleigh bells, squelching arpeggios and of course, drum machines…

Available as a free download via Soundclod

https://www.facebook.com/Vice-Versa-Electrogenesis-806726912703189/


ASSEMBLAGE 23 December (2016)

When you’ve had enough of Christmas shopping and the in-laws, there’s probably nothing better to let off steam than a bit of ASSEMBLAGE 23. While not exactly seasonal, Tom Shear’s Futurepop discoscape captured many of the mixed emotions endemic with the final month of the year, all “Silent and alone, trying to make sense”.

Available on the ASSEMBLAGE 23 album ‘Endure’ via Metropolis

https://www.assemblage23.com


SIN COS TAN Dead By X-Mas (2016)

A cover of Finnish metal glamsters HANOI ROCKS, this take on ‘Dead By X-Mas’ from the nocturnal synth duo SIN COS TAN aka Juho Paalosmaa and Jori Hulkkonen came over a bit like Billy Idol gone electro, but with an elegiac twist. Bizarrely in 2006, the former William Broad issued his own collection of seasonal themed tunes entitled ‘Happy Holidays’ … it’s a nice day for a ‘White Christmas!

Available as a free download via Soundcloud

https://www.facebook.com/homeofsincostan/


FERAL FIVE I Want U (2017)

With female empowerment lyrics like “I don’t need any money or a new handbag, I just need a kind of thing I’ve never had, who says you have to have some shabby gifts”, FERAL FIVE attacked tacky commercialism in a sonic cacophony of crunchy bass guitar, big beats, sparkling electronics and chilling string machines for an alternative take on festivities.

Available on the FERAL FIVE single ‘I Want U’ via Primitive Light Recordings

https://www.feralfive.com/


CIRCUIT3 I Believe In Father Christmas (2018)

Made famous by Greg Lake, CIRCUIT3 used analogue synths such as a Sequential Pro-One, Roland JX10, Korg Wavestation and Moog Sub37 to add an eerie chill to the already cynical song protesting at the commercialisation of Christmas. The lyricist was Peter Sinfield who later wrote the words to BUCKS FIZZ’s No1 ‘The Land Of Make Believe’ which warned against the evils of Thatcherism.

Available on the CIRCUIT 3 single ‘I Believe In Father Christmas’ via Diode Records

http://www.circuit3.com/


WAVESHAPER Walking In The Air (2020)

Written by Howard Blake for the 1982 animated film ‘The Snowman’ which later added a cameo intro by David Bowie, ‘Walking In The Air’ became a hit for Aled Jones although the original version was actually sung by choir boy Peter Auty. Tom Andersson is the Swedish synthesist and retro gamer known as WAVESHAPER and his symphonic instrumental synthwave cover was both respectful and beautiful.

Available as a free download via Soundcloud

https://www.facebook.com/Waveshaperofficial


RODNEY CROMWELL Cold Christmas (2022)

If ACTORS did Christmas songs, then it would have probably sounded like this gothic motorik number from the ever cheerful Rodney Cromwell. Written for by Cherryade Records’ ‘A Very Cherry Christmas’ compilation, its chilling ARP synth strings and driving bass guitar was in total antithesis to Cliff Richard with bleak observational lyrics “like ‘Eleanor Rigby’ turbo-charged for 2022”.

Available on the RODNEY CROMWELL single ‘Cold Christmas’ via Happy Robots Records

https://www.facebook.com/rodneycromwellartist


SOFTWAVE featuring Barney Ashton-Bullock Will It Ever Be Christmas Again? (2022)

Presented as “Probably the first synthpop Christmas song in Danish music history”, SOFTWAVE provided a hopeful message to hold back on overindulgence. ‘Andy Bell Is Torsten’ writer Barney Ashton-Bullock made a cameo as Santa Claus to remind everyone that “Self-service, doesn’t mean self, self, self…” and that joy comes from being able to give to others.

Available on the SOFTWAVE single ‘Will It Ever Be Christmas Again?’ via Softwave

http://www.softwavemusic.com


GEMMA CULLINGFORD In The Bleak Midwinter (2023)

Something of a tradition having covered ‘Walking In The Air’, ‘Lonely This Christmas’ and ‘Deck The Halls’ in previous years, Gemma Cullingford took Christina Rossetti’s poem and Gustav Holst’s musical arrangement of ‘In The Bleak Midwinter’ into darker and colder electro dance territory, reflecting today’s divided world in a cost of living crisis.

Available on the GEMMA CULLINGFORD single ‘In The Bleak Midwinter’ via Elmo Records

https://www.gemmacullingford.co.uk/


A further varied collection of seasonal synth based tunes compiled by ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK can be listened to at: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7vIIjZkGd3cVOSarUPvX85


Text by Chi Ming Lai
2 December 2023

Substance: The Legacy of NEW ORDER

Photo by Anton Corbijn

What began as a request by Factory Records impresario Tony Wilson to play NEW ORDER’s singles on the CD player that came with his brand new Jaguar XJ6 Coupé led to what was to become the band’s biggest selling album.

Originally released in Autumn 1987, ‘Substance’ was a compilation of NEW ORDER’s 12” singles to date and it is to finally get the reissue treatment. Although at the time, NEW ORDER had already released four albums ‘Movement’, Power, Corruption & Lies’, ‘Low-life’ and ‘Brotherhood’, the Manchester quartet comprising of Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook, Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert could often be better represented by their singles rather than their albums, as many were standalone non-album releases and quite different in musical style, being often more electronic and danceable.

‘Substance’ was issued in a variety of formats including double vinyl, cassette, DAT and CD, the latter three variants made use of the extra playing time available and included bonuses such as B-sides, tracks only previously issued in Belgium, instrumental versions and those rarely essential dub experiments. Perhaps not unsurprisingly, despite its flaws with re-recordings, edits and omissions, it went on to sell around a million copies worldwide as many fans’ entry point into NEW ORDER.

The new deluxe 4CD reissue includes a live disc of the band performing the entire ‘Substance’ album at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre in California and a bonus disc of tracks omitted from the original edition of ‘Substance’ such as the superior original hit version of ‘Ceremony’ and the mournful if excellent B-side ‘Mesh’, as well as the original 12” versions of ‘Temptation’ and ‘Confusion’.

The world knows what happened on 18th May 1980 and with the tragic passing of charismatic front man Ian Curtis, the end of JOY DIVISION led to the formation of NEW ORDER. Produced by Martin Hannett who had produced most of JOY DIVISION’s recorded portfolio, the guitar driven first single ‘Ceremony’ was one of the last songs written with Curtis and a magnificent start. But as the first purely NEW ORDER material was being written, the former members of JOY DIVISION were struggling to escape the shadow of their previous incarnation.

Although the often forgotten second single ‘Procession’ showed progression with a greater use of synth and backing vocals from Gillian Gilbert, it paled next to ‘Ceremony’. The fraught debut NEW ORDER long player ‘Movement’ was underwhelming, confused and perhaps too close to ‘Closer’, the final JOY DIVISION opus. Among the reasons were ongoing tensions in the studio with Hannett and the internal dilemma as to who was to take over the mantle of front man from the dearly departed Ian Curtis.

While Stephen Morris was originally mooted to become lead vocalist, Bernard Sumner was eventually settled into the role at the behest of manager Rob Gretton. Having already sung on the JOY DIVISION track ‘Interzone’, Peter Hook tried out for the role and provided lead vocals on two of the best ‘Movement’ tracks; the solemn ‘Doubts Even Here’ also included a stark Bible reading by Gillian Gilbert while much more spritely, ‘Dreams Never End’ was later appropriated by THE CURE for ‘In Between Days’.

But the pointer to the future of NEW ORDER was not on the album but the ‘Procession’ B-side ‘Everything’s Gone Green’. Introduced to European electronic dance music like Giorgio Moroder by his friend Mark Reeder, Sumner had become more interested in synthesizers and sequencers. Meanwhile, as Stephen Morris had used Synares and early Simmons drum synthesizers in JOY DIVISION, his progression into the purchase of a Boss DR55 Doctor Rhythm was only natural.

Using the Doctor Rhythm to pulse sections of their new ARP Quadra synth which replaced their stolen ARP Omni, the throbbing sequencer-like backbone on ‘Everything’s Gone Green’ was a pointer to an exciting new direction. Stephen Morris told ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK in 2011: “With ‘Everything’s Gone Green’, you had a Moog Source doing a 1/16th pulse and the Quadra doing the ‘da-dah, da-da-dah’. Then what you’d do is take the ‘CV’ out of the Quadra and take that into the Moog so that the Moog is playing a different rhythm but following the pitch of the other thing. That’s what we used for ‘Temptation’ as well.”

A self-produced electronic breakthrough away from the haunting legacy of JOY DIVISION, ‘Temptation’ was NEW ORDER’s only single of 1982. The recording itself was marvelously flawed, with Stephen Morris’ overdriven Simmons snare panned too far to the right while band members could also be heard calling instructions and tutting. The pulsing hypnotism of the triggered electronics and the iconic “oooh-oo-ooh” vocal refrain made ‘Temptation’ joyous and magical.

There was further trailblazing with an actual sequencer on the ‘Temptation’ B-side ‘Hurt’ as NEW ORDER grappled with a Powertran 1024 Note Composer. Home-built from a kit by Bernard Sumner, it was customised by the band’s electronic boffin Martin Usher to expand its memory. However, it was cumbersome to use and had to be programmed in hexadecimal! Around this time, NEW ORDER recorded a self-produced John Peel radio session that showcased the band’s transitioning sound with the throbbing sequences of ‘586’ highlighting a proto-dance direction.

Also part of the session, ‘Turn The Heater On’ was a cover of the Keith Hudson reggae song in tribute to Ian Curtis and ‘We All Stand’ which had avant jazz overtones. But ‘Too Late’ was significant, sounding like it could have come off ‘Movement’ with its lingering gothic doom, but later discarded as if a relic from another era; it was to remain unreleased until 1986 and never to actually appear on a NEW ORDER album or single…

Things were changing in the drum department too as Stephen Morris saw Stevie Wonder demonstrate the Linn Drum Computer on ‘Old Grey Whistle Test’. Eventually plumping for the slightly cheaper Oberheim DMX, programming it was like Morse code; The Human Drum Machine later quipped in his 2020 autobiography ‘Fast Forward: Confessions Of A Post-Punk Percussionist – Volume II’: “I always found the record and erase buttons a little too close together for comfort!”.

With NEW ORDER making use of the solid bass possibilities of the Moog Source and expanding their synth armoury to include an E-mu Systems Emulator, Pro-One and several Prophet 5s, in tandem with the Oberheim DMX, they put together ‘Blue Monday’ to help discover how all this equipment worked! Originally conceived as a cheeky self-playing jape on the audience who were complaining that the band did not do encores after their 10 song gigs, this 7 and a half minute slice of doom disco was a combination of several key pieces of music.

The ‘Blue Monday’ bassline and chord structure came from ‘Sylvester’s ‘You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)’, the frantic drum attack was inspired by Donna Summer’s Giorgio Moroder-produced ‘Our Love’ and the groove off Klein & MBO ‘Dirty Talk’. Meanwhile the ominous bass guitar motif was based on an acoustic six string line off ‘Paying Off Old Scores’ from the Ennio Morricone-composed soundtrack to ‘For A Few Dollars More’. More obliquely, KRAFTWERK made an appearance via a choir sample taken from ‘Uranium’, an interlude art piece on their ‘Radio-Activity’ album.

Despite being effectively an ideas mash-up, ‘Blue Monday’ was to be influential itself with THE CURE playing their tit-for-that game with NEW ORDER with the heavily sequenced ‘The Walk’ while the Bobby Orlando produced ‘Love Reaction’ for Divine was much more blatant. And that was just the start…

For the companion album ‘Power Corruption & Lies’ released in 1983, KRAFTWERK were to have a big influence on the record’s best song ‘Your Silent Face’; with the working title of ‘KW1’, it was the ultimate homage to Kling Klang and the romantic ‘Trans-Europe Express’ era of the Dusseldorf quartett with a replication of the pulsating Synthanorma sequence and Vako Orchestron strings from ‘Franz Schubert’ using a Sequential Polysequencer and Emulator.

‘Power Corruption & Lies’ was not entirely electronic and there were still guitar driven songs such as ARP Quadra assisted ‘Age Of Consent’ and synth-less ‘Leave Me Alone’, as well as hybrids like ‘Ultraviolence’ and ‘The Village’. Speaking of the former in 2023, Peter Hook said to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK: “‘The Village’ has got an amazing sequenced keyboard line by Bernard, he really went to town in programming that! The way the keyboard line builds and the way that it changes over those 4 and a half minutes…”. Not every track was a success and strangely ‘586’ lost its menace in re-recorded form while ‘We All Stand’ laboured when compared to its Peel session premiere.

Although ‘Power Corruption & Lies’ showed NEW ORDER had not left alternative rock music completely and would go on to maintain a balance on their next trio of long players, with an increasing interest in dance music from some members of the band and having opened The Haçienda with Factory Records in the vein of the clubs they had visited with New York, there was collaborative union with electro producer Arthur Baker who had worked with Afrika Bambaataa.

Baker wanted to make ‘Blue Monday’ while NEW ORDER wanted to make ‘Planet Rock’, so the result quite literally was ‘Confusion’! Stephen Morris in particular was frustrated during the sessions as Baker would not let him alter his Roland TR808’s pre-programmed patterns which were a major part of his sound. However, there was plenty of fun had and if you listen carefully, you can hear the band and Baker shouting “W*NKER” as it heads into the final straight.

The 1984 interim non-album single ‘Thieves Like Us’ offered a lusher sounding NEW ORDER that recalled THE HUMAN LEAGUE and a Hooky bassline borrowed from HOT CHOCOLATE’s ‘Emma’. But the third NEW ORDER long player ‘Low-life’ saw for the first time, a single taken from an album as a compromise following a new US deal with Qwest Records, a joint venture between Quincy Jones and Warner Brothers. Opting to replace their Prophet 5s with rack-mounted Octave Plateau Voyetras in their synth armoury, ‘The Perfect Kiss’ came in the usual 12” version as an epic 9 minute sequencer adventure but was sympathetically abridged for album consumption.

‘Low-life’ featured several other highlights and opened with the Country ‘n’ North Western ghost story ‘Love Vigilantes’. The mighty ‘Sunrise’ was another number in the tit-for-that exchange with THE CURE which was clearly influenced by ‘A Forest’ while the brilliant ‘This Time Of Night’ exuded a throbbing post-punk growl to shape one of NEW ORDER’s most underrated songs.

The influence of Enno Morricone returned for the gloriously emotive instrumental ‘Elegia’ while the HI-NRG sex anthem ‘Sub-culture’ provided a potential hit single, although this was not realised despite a club enhanced remix by John Robie featuring additional soulful female backing vocals which dismayed many NEW ORDER fans. However, the dreadful closer ‘Face Up’ proved to be the low-point in an otherwise good record.

The link with Qwest opened up doors to Hollywood and although THE PSYCHEDELIC FURS and OMD bookended the 1986 John Hughes teen movie ‘Pretty In Pink’, NEW ORDER contributed three tracks to the soundtrack including a brand new single ‘Shellshock’; produced with John Robie, the 12” version was painfully overlong and while the final mix was also very busy and messy. It would take another year for NEW ORDER to get that mainstream pop hit.

NEW ORDER were gaining momentum and this put them in good stead for their next album. Deciding against the purchase of the very expensive Fairlight, they went for the more cost-effective Yamaha RX11 drum machine and QX1 sequencer combo with Emulator IIs. Although technology was now a major part of their modus operandi, NEW ORDER continued with their original band-oriented sound which could make them quite unique compared with their contemporaries. This existential compromise was made quite explicit in the concept for their fourth LP ‘Brotherhood’.

Divided into distinct rock and electronic halves, although it suffered from comparison with ‘Low-life’, ‘Brotherhood’ contained one of NEW ORDER’s most enduring tunes in ‘Bizarre Love Triangle’; the rugged self-production was a glorious electronic number with a slight mechanical offbeat while providing space for Hooky’s distinctive bass. Here was another potential hit but the version released for single consumption was a frustrating, four-to-the-floor remix by Shep Pettibone which took all the character out of the song with a barrage of overdriven percussive samples. A belated 1988 remix by Stephen Hague which eventually appeared on a free cassette with Select Magazine in 1991 was much better and in slightly reworked form, resurfaced in 1994 for ‘(the best of)’ compilation.

While ‘Brotherhood’ did not consistently reach the heights of ‘Power, Corruption & Lies’ or ‘Low-life’, it did feature a number of other brilliant songs; although ‘Paradise’ featured on the rock half, a sequenced bassline provided its hypnotic core thanks to the acquisition of the Roland SPX Sync Box which could clock sequences from a live drum track. On the other side, the beautiful ‘All Day Long’ combined THE VELVET UNDERGROUND with New York electro and soaring classical melodies while the amusing ‘Every Little Counts’ synthetically pastiched Lou Reed’s ‘Walk On The Wild Side’ at funereal pace with a hilarious scratched vinyl ending.

The inclusion of the pre-album single ‘State Of The Nation’ on the CD edition of ‘Brotherhood’ had signalled how marketing releases with bonus songs was to be a lucrative strategy thanks to the extra playing time accorded by the silver discs. So for the release of the ‘Substance’ compilation, there came a new brand single ‘True Faith’ which proved to be NEW ORDER’s most immediate and accessible pop song yet.

Co-produced by Stephen Hague who had worked with OMD and PET SHOP BOYS, the band were transformed without hindering their ethos. During the recording, Hague insisted that Bernard Sumner laid down his lead vocal early on so that the instrumentation could be built around his voice. The result was that there was a more subtle dynamic space in ‘True Faith’ compared to the occasionally messy wall of sound effect that had been a characteristic of NEW ORDER’s self-produced recordings.

On the B-side was ‘1963’, a song driven by E-mu Systems SP12 sampling drum computer that some reckoned was even better than ‘True Faith’; Stephen Hague felt it should have been an A-side. Much to Hooky’s annoyance, his contributions on ‘1963’ were virtually written out, only making a brief appearance at the end. However, the bassist had the last laugh when ‘1963’ was belatedly released as a single in its own right in 1994 as a more Hooky audible rework by Arthur Baker.

Arthur Baker himself had developed an enduring relationship with NEW ORDER, having co-written ‘Confusion’ and ‘Thieves Like Us’ like he was a member of the band. Working as the music supervisor for the movie soundtrack of Beth B’s parody of televangelism ‘Salvation’, he invited NEW ORDER to contribute 5 tracks, the best known of which was ‘Touched By The Hand Of God’; in a sign of the future, its title was inspired by the controversial Argentine footballer Diego Maradona.

Not featuring on ‘Substance’ but mixed by Baker for single release to coincide with a three date European tour in late 1987 that included the band’s biggest headlining UK concert to date at Wembley Arena, ‘Touched By The Hand Of God’ was another of NEW ORDER’s more underrated singles. With a synth riff borrowed from Shannon’s ‘Let The Music Play’, it successfully combined some gritty rock energy to a solid Italo disco backbone featuring a great sequenced bassline.

Meanwhile, ‘Blue Monday’ got a second life and an edit in a remix supervised by Quincy Jones, but by the end of 1988, the world was gripped by acid house with The Haçienda becoming its UK Mecca. NEW ORDER decided to record their next album on the sunny Balearic party island of Ibiza. But with its various hedonistic distractions, the band got very little done apart from a couple of drum tracks! So recording began in earnest at Real World Studio in Box near Bath, the renowned state-of-the-art and pricey studio complex owned by Peter Gabriel.

A sly send-up of the acid house scene, one track inspired by all the partying was ‘Fine Time’. Utilising Akai 900s samplers, it featured a pitch shifted vocal sounding like an inebriate jackmaster impersonating Barry White, while the untidy backing track was complimented by some bleating sheep. Bernard Sumner admitted ‘Fine Time’ was “a novelty record” to Melody Maker and luckily the single edit was one and a half minutes shorter than the album version, which with its overlong bass drum breakdown, spoilt the start of what was an otherwise excellent album in 1989’s ‘Technique’.

With its combination of alternative rock, electronic and hybrid tracks mixed with greater clarity by Alan Meyerson, there was a sunny vibe, even on the melancholic glory of ‘Vanishing Point’ which appeared in instrumental form as the end credits theme to the BBC comedy drama ‘Making Out’. ‘All The Way’ was another tit-for-tat jibe at THE CURE resembling ‘Just Like Heaven’ while the wonderful countrified ‘Run’ was similar enough to ‘Leaving On A Jet Plane’ that John Denver sued the band successfully to bag a cut of the publishing.

A development of ‘Paradise’ from ‘Brotherhood’, ‘Dream Attack’ was an ecstasy song but with acoustic guitars syncopating off the deep synthesized bass although in a sign of developing tensions, Peter Hook’s sliding melodic bass could barely be heard. Among the other highlights of ‘Technique’ were ‘Mr Disco’ and ‘Round & Round’ which saw NEW ORDER in their glitterball disco prime; there were tongue-in-cheek holiday romance lyrics and syndrums on the former while on the latter, its orchestral stab-laden Europop prowess made ‘True Faith’ sound like ‘Atrocity Exhibition’, especially in its later Stephen Hague produced single mix.

However, some of the band’s hardcore following were dismayed these songs’ sonic affinity with PET SHOP BOYS. With NEW ORDER in hiatus after an appearance at the 1989 Reading Festival where he announced that the band were not splitting up, Barnard Sumner did a whole album of electronic disco with Johnny Marr in ELECTRONIC, aided and abetted by Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe!

Dismayed, Peter Hook formed the appropriately named but less well-received REVENGE, supposedly a statement for “real guitar music” as a reaction, according to Stephen Morris, to NEW ORDER’s “synthesized sequenced sh*t” but ended up using “synthesized sequenced sh*t”! Meanwhile, Morris himself and Gillian Gilbert settled into domestic bliss on a farm near Macclesfield with a home studio, doing TV soundtrack work and their own pop project THE OTHER TWO.

But during this break, NEW ORDER reconvened temporarily having been commissioned by the Football Association to record a song in support of the England World Cup team for Italia ’90. Based on a theme that Gillian Gilbert had composed for the BBC Youth TV magazine show ‘Reportage’, ‘World In Motion’ was released 4 days after the 10th anniversary of Ian Curtis’ passing and hit No1. Sumner told NME at the time that ‘World In Motion’ would be “the last straw for JOY DIVISION fans”. Meanwhile, in another end-of-an-era moment that was not apparent at the time, ‘World In Motion’ was to be the final NEW ORDER release to have a Factory Records catalogue number, although MCA handled the wider manufacturing and distribution responsibilities on behalf of the FA.

By the time of the next album ‘Republic’ where NEW ORDER were persuaded to make a new record to recoup some of the money that Factory Records still owed them for the success of ‘Substance’. Much of the cash had been syphoned off to fund the label’s less viable acts, The Haçienda and a lavish new HQ in Manchester’s trendy Charles Street while the band were still kept on a modest wage.

Although an attempt was made to start recording the album with Pascal Gabriel, Stephen Hague was brought in to helm the ‘Republic’ sessions at Real World. However, with the various band members not speaking to each other, the American producer (who was also an accomplished musician) took control to get ‘Republic’ finished on time and within budget. Two notable session musicians, David Rhodes on guitar and Andy Duncan on percussion were even brought in. Hague would later lament that ‘Republic’ featured too much of him and not enough of NEW ORDER.

However, it was all too late for Factory Records which collapsed towards the end of 1992. Released in 1993 on London Records, while it was to become a highest charting album in America, ‘Republic’ was a lukewarm record although there were some high points. The bittersweet first single ‘Regret’ sampled ‘Atmosphere’ for its intro and was a fabulous band centric opening track that had haunting echoes of ‘Ceremony’. ‘World’ though could have been ELECTRONIC and was notable for its absence of Hooky’s bass, while the serene ‘Ruined In A Day’ took Ennio Morricone’s influence on the band to its zenith despite also not featuring the bassist.

Actually featuring Hooky, ‘Young Offender’ was one of the album’s few non-single highlights, but the troubled atmosphere and financial turmoil that was lingering could be sensed lyrically on songs like ‘Times Change’ and especially ‘Chemical’. While ‘Liar’ was possibly a scathing attack on Tony Wilson, the song itself was poor while ‘Special’ was an attempt at MASSIVE ATTACK’s ‘Unfinished Sympathy’ but less successfully realised.

An indicator of how different ‘Republic’ could have turned out was when ‘Spooky’ was released as a single. Underwhelming as an album track, it was remixed by house dance trio FLUKE who provided a more spacious rhythmic backdrop, with the song-based ‘Minimix’ allowing the best elements to shine.

NEW ORDER went into a second lengthier hiatus after another Reading Festival appearance in Summer 1993 but they had already made their mark on popular music. They had been at the forefront of adopting early affordable programmable technology in music. During a period when bands like OMD, SOFT CELL, DEPECHE MODE and YAZOO used backing tapes, NEW ORDER risked all by taking this equipment, complete with their mini data cassette dumps, out on the road and using it on stage! They had furthered the cause of electronic dance music by introducing the sound of New York electro and Italo disco to UK audiences from within their own work. They even made a football record that was actually very good and captured the zeitgeist.

But while NEW ORDER remained credible thanks to their independent Northern English bloody mindedness and not playing the game, with the reality of having to pay the bills, they eventually headed for London. Against the odds, NEW ORDER were reunited in 1998 at the instigation of Rob Gretton after a headlining offer was made by the promoters of the Phoenix Festival. Although that event later collapsed, there were triumphant shows at Manchester Apollo and another Reading Festival that summer. However, the quartet were less impressive at Manchester Arena for the ‘Temptation’ dance event before New Year’s Eve.

But the untimely death of Rob Gretton in 1999 and the departure of Gillian Gilbert latterly from the band for family reasons changed the dynamic of the band considerably. Ultimately, it left a power struggle between Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook to fester, with Stephen Morris stuck in the middle and unable to referee.

As their imperial phase proved, despite all the creative and personal tensions, the band were better together than torn apart. But as Peter Hook remarked in his 2016 ‘Substance: Inside NEW ORDER’ memoir, “chemistry is combustible”. A second more joyless division was on the horizon, but that is another story…


‘Substance’ is reissued on 10 November 2023 as an expanded 4CD set as well as double CD, blue + red double vinyl LP and double cassette formats by Rhino

http://www.neworder.com/

https://www.facebook.com/NewOrderOfficial

https://twitter.com/neworder

https://www.instagram.com/neworderofficial/


Text by Chi Ming Lai
31 October 2023

PETER HOOK Interview

Photo by Mark Walker / MNW Visuals

Best known as a founder member of JOY DIVISION and NEW ORDER, Peter Hook is the bassist with the low slung melodic style that has spawned many imitators including Simon Gallup, Carlos Dengler, Rodney Cromwell and Pavel Kozlov.

Since his more than well-documented joyless division from NEW ORDER, Peter Hook has focussed on his biggest love, the live stage to present the albums of JOY DIVISION and NEW ORDER in full to The True Faithful. He has also published books about his time in both bands and as a co-owner of the Manchester night club ‘The Haçienda’ subtitled ‘How Not To Run A Club’.

There have also been the side-projects REVENGE, FREEBASS and MONACO, the latter of which with David ‘Pottsy’ Potts was the most successful, spawning the No11 hit single ‘What Do You Want From Me?’.

As well as undertaking an Autumn tour of Europe performing the material from the JOY DIVISION and NEW ORDER compilations ‘Substance’, PETER HOOK & THE LIGHT will be playing a number of festival dates including Rochester Castle Concerts in Kent with SOFT CELL on Friday 7 July 2023.

When the people listen to you, don’t you know it means a lot? In a break from rehearsals, ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK had an interesting lively conversation with Peter Hook about his past, present and future…

Photo by Mark Walker / MNW Visuals

You are going to be opening for SOFT CELL at Rochester Castle, did you know that ‘Temptation’ came out the same week as ‘Torch’ in May 1982?

No I didn’t! You’ve been doing your homework…

Haha! I’m just old enough to have bought both on release day! Did you feel you were onto a breakthrough when you recorded ‘Temptation’?

Not as such, we’d already experimented with the synths and drum machine on ‘Everything’s Gone Green’ which was the B-side of ‘Procession’, so we felt we were well on the way with that. ‘Temptation’ was jammed live which seems quite radical these days. Barney would have a few Pernods and then warble; we would listen to the tapes and pick bits that we thought sounded good, work on the lyrics together and then the song was done.

So ‘Temptation’ and funnily enough, all those early songs, we finished them afterwards live, we honed them and used the record as an experiment as well as using the live renditions. My god, we don’t do that anymore! *laughs*

But we did have a very strange attitude as soon as we’d written a song… to be honest, we had very little interest in it after it was done and the big interest was the next one. So after ‘Temptation’, we were off doing ‘Blue Monday’ and working on through to ‘Power, Corruption & Lies’. It was a very young attitude, we played them live because we needed to, but every time you got a better song, it would knock an older one off y’know… they were heady days shall we say!

Does this explain why in the rarer days back then that NEW ORDER would get on the telly, it would tie in with the release of a new single, but then you didn’t perform that new single and played something else? *laughs*

Yeah, we would just move on, we really weren’t made to “play the game” as such by Factory and we could more of less do what made us happy. It’s quite interesting because it’s quite naïve, we weren’t interested in chart success, we still wanted to act like THE SEX PISTOLS acted, to be awkward, to be anarchistic! The whole point about being in a group was to tell everyone to f**k off and enjoy it, to get your own back on all the people who made you do what they said etc and all this cr*p.

The thing was, we were very happy to “cock a snoot” shall we say, in the true tradition of punk bands by not doing what people expected. It got us into a few nasty situations all over the world from Bradford to bloody Hamburg to Australia, we’d have riots with people quite rightly not agreeing with what we were doing! It was intensely exciting and intensely intoxicating, we were very awkward for a very long time! *laughs*

‘Torch’ was actually a dancefloor favourite during the early days of The Haçienda, it was No5 in the first Members’ End Of Year Newsletter while ‘Temptation’ was No9!?

There you go, how interesting…

… but The Haçienda was quite different in 1982?

Oh my god! Y’know, The Haçienda was quite post-punk then, there weren’t many people there, it was very much a “dressed-up” audience… when you get to acid house and Madchester, it was very dressed down. But those days in 1982-1983-1984, the audience dressed up in The Blitz mode, that New Romantic style, there was quite a fashion aspect to the very few people that were there at that time. So I can well imagine ‘Torch’ being popular because it was very much of its day musically at that time, but things changed completely in 1986-1987 onwards!

Photo by Chi Ming Lai

For an event like this at Rochester Castle where you are not headlining, how do you go about choosing the setlist? Do you get all bloody minded and not play any hits, or… what’s your take on it now? *laughs*

Haha! My take on it now is that everyone is there to do the same thing, which is to enjoy themselves. And what we love is a bit of familiarity and shall we say, paying homage to great things that have happened to us while we were listening to this music. So it’s much easier to throw yourself into it. I mean, I do loads of gigs, so if I want to do a really awkward gig and play all the daft B-sides or the album tracks that are really out there, I can do that and most of the audience still turn up and that’s cool!

But the thing with a festival, it has a different vibe and you want to be part of it, it’s a wave and you want to go with the wave and surf on the top of it! You don’t want to be fighting your way through it. So it’s much easier to be of the moment at these gigs. The thing is, it’s SOFT CELL so if they didn’t play their hits, people do feel aggrieved don’t they because they want to celebrate the great times that have been a soundtrack to our lives.

So I will be doing songs like ‘Temptation’ and ‘True Faith’ etc enjoyably… the weird thing about NEW ORDER is we can safely say none of us enjoyed ourselves for year after year after year. I’m a lot happier and it’s about having that freedom to be able to play what you want to play, when you want to play it, without some miserable tw*t giving you grief! It’s just as simple as that! What do you need at a festival, you don’t want someone miserable do you?

Photo by Chi Ming Lai

This year, there’s been the 40th anniversary of ‘Blue Monday’ and ‘Power Corruption & Lies’, how do you look back on the making of those records?

Hahaha! The way I look at NEW ORDER, it’s like a parallel universe! We were together for 31 years, Barney, Steve and I, we wrote all the music together, we did everything together and the thing is, we fell out, just like most groups do. But in a typical NEW ORDER fashion, we’ve managed to carry this for nearly 20 years and none of us have been big enough to put an end to it. I always view anything to do with a celebration with… we don’t do celebrations in NEW ORDER because we can’t! It’s just the way it is! But ‘Blue Monday’ is still being used in motion pictures, five this week, it’s a wonderful achievement after all that…

‘Age Of Consent’ is rightly hailed as a NEW ORDER classic but ‘The Village’ is very underrated…

Hahaha! Songs like ‘The Village’ and ‘Face-up’, they’re such great pop tunes, yet never released as singles. ‘The Village’ has got an amazing sequenced keyboard line by Bernard, he really went to town in programming that! If you listen to the keyboard programme without taking notice of the vocals, he did an amazing job on it… it was really experimental, in a funny way like SOFT CELL or THE HUMAN LEAGUE than what people think of as NEW ORDER.

The thing is, NEW ORDER had to compromise between the rock side because of me (*laughs*) and the keyboard side because of Bernard, so you’ve got that wonderful marriage of rock and pop, whereas THE HUMAN LEAGUE or SOFT CELL would be much more keyboard-led. Do me a favour and listen to ‘The Village’ and the way the keyboard line builds and the way that it changes over those 4 and a half minutes…

I spoke to someone who Bernard has produced and he has definitely got this “something” when it comes to programming sequencers…

Oh god yeah, I mean Bernard really bored the arse off us while he was programming all these slightly different things. But then when you put them together, run it as a backing track and everybody goes over it, you got to give it to him, it’s the mark of a genius… I can’t stand the b*stard but I do have to give him his due for being such a wonderful musician.

The thing is, if you’re not programming, you can’t see or have the vision to wonder what’s going to happen and what you are searching for. And when you are doing it and you are right on the moment, you have a knack of disappearing and Bernard did that, shall we say! *laughs*

Photo by Chi Ming Lai

The ‘Low-life’ boxed set came out earlier this year, is ‘Brotherhood’ on its way? How do you compare the two albums as I see those as like sonic cousins?

Yeah, the ‘Brotherhood’ one is on the way… obviously we don’t work together on these! *laughs*

It’s done completely separately and very coldly, the record company are usually the referee on those, but they have put some wonderful stuff together. On these two albums, we had a lot of money so we could actually experiment more and were able to do more versions because we could afford the tape. When we were doing ‘Unknown Pleasures’, ‘Closer’, ‘Movement’ and even ‘Power, Corruption & Lies’, we didn’t have the money for tape, so we had to be very economical with what we were doing. We couldn’t even afford to put a cassette into the machine, we just didn’t have the money to do it.

So by the time of ‘Low-life’ and ‘Brotherhood’, there was a lot more freedom to have different versions, so that means the record company when they go through the tapes, they’ve got loads of different things that they can feature, even stuff that I’d forgotten about. They are exciting from that point of view. And also, you do get the thing about the rehearsal tapes which I don’t have access to sadly. They do have access to a lot of unfinished songs like they did on ‘Low-life’… these sounded quite interesting, even I was listening and thinking “we should have persevered with that one, we could have got a great song out of it”. These boxed sets are interesting but because we can’t stand the bleedin’ sight of each other, they’re always tainted…

Photo by Chi Ming Lai

You will be touring Europe playing both JOY DIVISION and NEW ORDER ‘Substance’ compilations this Autumn, is working out the running order some kind of art or is it actually really straightforward?

No, it’s really straightforward because its chronological as they happen on the records. The only problem you have really is whether you play the vinyl or the CD, because the CD obviously a lot more tracks on it, so you’re actually trying to work it out. The weird thing about the JOY DIVISION ‘Substance’ was a kind of clean-up album, it was everything that we left off or rejected from ‘Unknown Pleasures’ and ‘Closer’, so it’s much more of an intense deal. ‘Substance’ by NEW ORDER was a collection of the singles that largely weren’t on the LPs. So it’s like putting in a heavyweight with a lightweight! *laughs*

So you’ve got to be careful how you do it. The lucky thing for me as a musician is that both JOY DIVISION and NEW ORDER left all their best tunes off the albums! So you can indulge yourself in the albums and there are some really good songs there, but they tend to be heavier and more intense than the single. The wonderful get out clause is that you’ve got the singles at the end! So even though you’ve had a heavy atmosphere, particularly with JOY DIVISION, you’ve got ‘Glass’, ‘Transmission’, ‘Novelty’, ‘Atmosphere’, ‘She’s Lost Control’ and ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ to play.

For the people, and I must admit the whole reason I do this is to be with the people, who love JOY DIVISION and NEW ORDER and who’ve seen it before, it’s interesting for me to put different tracks in each time. So this time, we’re going to try and feature more tracks off the CD… because I don’t want to keep them there for 4 hours, you do have to be careful, I’m not Ken Dodd! *roars of laughter*

It’s funny now to think that ‘Substance’ partly came about due to the then-new technology formats like CD and DAT, yet decades later, the public want vinyl and cassettes?

I think it’s because they have a lot of soul… I did a programme for the BBC about the 80s, it was dead wacky and I really enjoyed it… they sent me a cassette of the interview and when I got it, I thought “oh my god, that’s wonderful”! *laughs*

Luckily for me, because I’ve got a huge collection of cassettes of JOY DIVISION and NEW ORDER, when cassettes started to go, I bought about 4 or 6 cassette players and I’ve got 3 of them still boxed downstairs in my studio. So I can play it… the noise, the imperfections on the vinyl and the cassette, it has a warmth and a personality that let’s face it, a computer and a memory stick just doesn’t.

What’s next for you after the ‘Substance’ tour?

I’m getting ready funnily enough (Boom! Boom!) to do ‘Get Ready’, so I will be doing that in its entirety very soon after the ‘Substance’ gigs in the Autumn.

Photo by Chi Ming Lai

And finally, is there any truth in the rumour that you’re going to do MONACO again?

Yeah, both Pottsy and I ARE going to play more MONACO when we do it… we’ve just had a request to do the first MONACO album ‘Music For Pleasure’ to be reissued on double vinyl with the singles and B-sides by a Dutch company, so you never know.

Both of us have actually moved on from MONACO, we did flirt with it for that festival in Belgium but then Covid came and it sort of just disappeared. It’s one of those funny things, both Pottsy and I are having a great time doing what we are doing, he’s now releasing a lot of music himself that he’s amassed over the years, so he’s happy now. And we’re happy doing THIS together.

So I don’t think we’d do MONACO again even though when we did the JOY DIVISION ‘Orchestral’ shows, we did a wonderful song inspired by Ian Curtis called ‘Higher Love’ which turned out wonderful… we never recorded it, just played it live at the gigs. It’s one of those weird ones, it’s a weird situation but you never know if this reissues LP comes out and it does well, maybe, but I’m not sure…


ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to Peter Hook

Special thanks to Sacha Taylor-Cox at Hush PR

PETER HOOK & THE LIGHT play Rochester Castle with SOFT CELL on Friday 7 July 2023 – tickets from https://www.rochestercastleconcerts.com/events/

Details of the ‘Substance’ tour and other concerts can be found at https://peterhookandthelight.live/

https://www.facebook.com/peterhookandthelight

https://twitter.com/peterhook

https://www.instagram.com/peterhook_thelight/

https://www.youtube.com/user/peterhookandthelight


Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
1 July 2023

25 FAVOURITE MUSIC BOOKS

Factory Records impresario and Granada TV presenter Tony Wilson once said: “When forced to pick between truth and legend, print the legend.”

Books about the trials and tribulations of the music industry come in all shapes, sizes and angles. The approach can be tricky… should they be personal accounts, encyclopaedic histories, stories based on real life but with some spin, or just snapshots of an era?

In recent years, autobiographies and memoirs have become very popular as money for old rope in the absence of physical music sales. These can range from being informative and hilarious to extremely bitter, with others coming over very dull in an attempt not to upset anybody. Meanwhile others feature so many falsehoods that they may as well be placed in the ‘Fiction’ section.

One less appealing format that has been gaining increasing prevalence is the fan memory compendium; this could be seen as a lazy and cheaper way of producing a publication as followers compete to be seen as the biggest fan. Meanwhile others, notably members of lower league bands, try to make out they were massive fans in the first place with recollections that are actually veiled attempts to promote their own music.

When writing a music book, it helps to actually read and research a few beforehand. In addition, when deciding whether a point is worthy of inclusion, the viewpoint of the reader must always be taken into consideration as they hypothetically ponder “so what?”. 

The 21st Century ubiquity of social media has proved that not everyone can string a coherent sentence together.  But where that may seem a barrier, a ghost writer can be the subject’s best friend and a number of the books listed here have taken that route.

Not a best of list, here are 25 music books that have become the personal favourites of ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK listed in yearly and then alphabetical order by title.


DEPECHE MODE: BLACK CELEBRATION Steve Malins (1999)

Steve Malins’ biography features interviews with Alan Wilder, Daniel Miller and Flood. Offering assessment on the unusual band dynamic, one story that highlights things were going south is the debauched cricket match between DEPECHE MODE and OMD during the 1988 US tour. The continually underappreciated Wilder declares how he proudly bowled out Andy McCluskey whom he intensely disliked. Meanwhile Dave Gahan hovered up a line of coke before going into bat and was inevitably out for a golden duck!

‘Black Celebration’ was originally published by Andre Deutsch Ltd with 2001, 2005 + 2013 updated editions

https://www.depechemode.com/


TAINTED LIFE Marc Almond (1999)

This is a frank but humorous autobiography by the SOFT CELL frontman about living life with art school aspirations but suddenly thrust into becoming a pop star and having false tabloid stories written about him in a homophobic world. Attempting to rebuild a career having signed to Warners in 1991, in a reality check, he is told by MD Rob Dickens that the world does not need another Marc Almond album and suggests recording a Trevor Horn produced cover of Jacques Brel’s ‘Jacky’ as made famous by Scott Walker…

‘Tainted Life’ was originally published by Pan Books

http://www.marcalmond.co.uk/


I WAS A ROBOT Wolfgang Flür (2000)

‘I Was A Robot’ was the controversial autobiographical exposé of the KRAFTWERK machine combined with Wolfgang Flür’s partying exploits. However, as his account of OMD coming backstage to meet the band after the Liverpool Empire gig in 1975 has since proved to be false while his musical contribution to KRAFTWERK recordings has been shown to have been minimal, although entertaining, parts of this book should be taken with a pinch of salt.

‘I Was A Robot’ was originally published by Omnibus Press with 2003 + 2017 revised editions

https://www.facebook.com/WolfgangFlur1


THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF CLASSIC 80s POP Jonathan Blythe (2002)

Written in the irreverent vein of classic Neil Tennant-era Smash Hits, the best quote in this amusing book is about DURAN DURAN: “You will have surely have wondered why the girl you fancied seemed far more interested in a slightly porky bloke with bleached-blond hair and a foppish name. The compilation ‘Decade’ contains the 80s hits, but if you want a more comprehensive overview, go for the other one ‘Greatest’. You can usually find them both in the ‘CDs for £5.99’ section, to be honest”

‘The Encyclopaedia Of Classic 80s Pop’ was originally published by Allison & Busby

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/1172733.The_Encyclopaedia_Of_Classic_80s_Pop


24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE Tony Wilson (2002)

Given the Factory Records catalogue number FAC 424 and subtitled “What The Sleeve Notes Never Tell You”, this account of the Manchester independent label is centred around Wilson’s noted ego where the narrative reads as enjoyable spin rather than factual stories about the label, its bands and The Haçienda. His alleged legendary quote that ”The musicians own everything. The company owns nothing. All our bands have the freedom to f**k off” was to prove to be his downfall…

’24 Hour Party People’ was originally published by Macmillan

https://factoryrecords.org/


NEW ROMANTICS: THE LOOK Dave Rimmer (2003)

Smash Hits writer and author of ‘Like Punk Never Happened…’ Dave Rimmer takes a look at the flamboyant New Romantics via The Blitz Club playlists and profiles of SPANDAU BALLET, VISAGE, DURAN DURAN, SOFT CELL, DEPECHE MODE, KRAFTWERK and DAF. The Myth of Berlin and Futurism are also discussed and there are plenty of glossy photos that encapsulate its spirit.

‘The Look’ was originally published by Omnibus Press

https://www.rocksbackpages.com/Library/Writer/dave-rimmer/


IF I WAS Midge Ure (2004)

With dry humour, this is a sincere and honest account by Midge Ure of his career which included being a teen pop idol with SLIK who had their own Look-In magazine comic strip. As well as accounts of his success with ULTRAVOX and VISAGE and as a solo artist, there is also his darker descent into alcoholism in the wake of low sales. Our hero is candid about the occasionally tense dynamics with his colleagues, while an insight into VISAGE’s original contract with Polydor makes very interesting reading.

‘If I Was’ was originally published by Virgin Books with 2011 revised edition

http://www.midgeure.co.uk/


PET SHOP BOYS, CATALOGUE Philip Hoare & Chris Heath (2006)

This is a superbly presented visual retrospective of PET SHOP BOYS up to ‘Battleship Potemkin’ featuring artwork, video stills, stage sets and other artefacts accompanied by insightful commentary. There is also a chronology included as well as an interview with Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe who again steals the show with the quip “We still are grumpy, actually”!

‘Catalogue’ was originally published by Thames and Hudson Ltd

https://www.petshopboys.co.uk/


BRIAN ENO: ON SOME FARAWAY BEACH David Sheppard (2008)

Credited with taking David Bowie into “a whole new school of pretension” with The Berlin Trilogy, this authorised biography on Brian Eno traces his career beginning as a self-confessed non-musician with ROXY MUSIC twisting knobs on a VCS3 to producing U2. In between, he makes synthesizers go bong, popularises ambient music, develops Oblique Strategies with artist Peter Schmidt and gets his head around programming the Yamaha DX7. But the biggest revelation in the book? “Eno was shagging more women than Ferry”!

‘On Some Faraway Beach’ was originally published by Orion

http://www.enoweb.co.uk/


SPARKS: No1 SONG IN HEAVEN Dave Thompson (2009)

An enjoyable unauthorised biography of SPARKS, Ron and Russell Mael’s endearingly witty contributions to this book come from the author’s interviews with the brothers conducted between 1985-2009. There are also press cuttings, an expansive discography and a collector’s guide alongside quotes from former backing band members. But while the stories of the various albums are detailed, those wanting gossip on personal lives will be disappointed.

‘No1 Song In Heaven’ was originally published by Cherry Red Books

http://allsparks.com/


GARY NUMAN: BACK STAGE Stephen Roper (2012)

‘A Book Of Reflections’, long time Numanoid Stephen Roper gives a comprehensive account of the imperial years of Gary Numan from 1979 to 1981 via a series of interviews and memories from band members Chris Payne, RRussell Bell and the late Cedric Sharpley as well as the man himself. OMD’s Andy McCluskey, SIMPLE MINDS’ Jim Kerr and Nash The Slash give the viewpoint of the support acts while there are also additional observations from John Foxx, Richard Jobson and Jerry Casale.

‘Back Stage’ was originally published independently with revised 2017 eBook edition available from https://back-stage.dpdcart.com/cart/view#/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-rRuX6k___Y4ZkTHwQg–Q


IN THE PLEASURE GROOVE: LOVE, DEATH & DURAN DURAN John Taylor (2012)

This autobiography traces the story of how a nervous bespectacled Brummie lad called Nigel became an international sex symbol as John Taylor, bassist of DURAN DURAN; “Now, I had only to wink in a girl’s direction in a hotel lobby, backstage or at a record company party, and have company until the morning” he recalls. As outrageous and debauched as some of these anecdotes of sex and drugs and rock ‘n’ roll are, it would have been very difficult for anyone thrust into this position aged 21 to have acted any differently.

‘In The Pleasure Groove’ was originally published by Sphere

http://www.duranduran.com/


MAD WORLD Lori Majeski & Jonathan Bernstein (2014)

‘Mad World’ delves into the spirit, the politics and the heartache behind some of the greatest songs in popular culture with an American MTV viewpoint courtesy of enthusiastic Duranie Lori Majewski, balanced by the critique of Glaswegian Jonathan Bernstein. The contrasting dynamic ensures a celebration of the era while simultaneously pulling no punches with Bernstein lobbing hand grenades in the direction of KAJAGOOGOO and THOMPSON TWINS!

‘Mad World’ was originally published by Abrams Image

https://www.facebook.com/madworldthebook


JAPAN: A FOREIGN PLACE Anthony Reynolds (2015)

With the co-operation of Richard Barbieri, Steve Jansen and Rob Dean, this book is the first of its kind about the influential enigma that was JAPAN. With detailed accounts by band members and controversial manager Simon Napier-Bell among others, notably absent is David Sylvian who appears via archive interviews while the late Mick Karn is quoted from his own autobiography ‘Japan & Self Existence’.

‘A Foreign Place’ was originally published by Burning Shed

http://nightporter.co.uk/


ELECTRI_CITY: THE DÜSSELDORF SCHOOL OF ELECTRONIC MUSIC Rudi Esch (2016)

First published in German in 2015, this history gives a fascinating insider’s account of The Düsseldorf School and its cultural significance via interview quotes. Contributors on the home side include Wolfgang Flür, Robert Görl, Gabi Delgado, Hans Lampe, Ralf Dörper and Susanne Freytag, while the Brits they influenced feature Andy McCluskey, Martyn Ware, Dave Ball and Daniel Miller among their number. As Robert Görl says: “Wir wollten lieber mit Maschinen arbeiten… We always preferred working with machines”.

‘Electri_City’ was originally published by Omnibus Press

https://www.facebook.com/Electri.city.Esch


LET’S MAKE LOTS OF MONEY Tom Watkins with Matthew Lindsay (2016)

Subtitled “Secrets of a Rich, Fat, Gay, Lucky Bastard”, this is the autobiography of the late Tom Watkins, the Svengali who managed PET SHOP BOYS, BROS and EAST 17. “A big man with a loud voice” said Neil Tennant, but he had a bolshy ability to extract favourable deals including a rumoured 20% commission on gross income while always asking “What would Edna in Huddersfield think?”. Later becoming disillusioned with the pop industry, he describes ‘The X Factor’ as being like “a Nuremberg Rally on pink drugs”

‘Let’s Make Lots Of Money’ was originally published by Virgin Books

https://www.electricityclub.co.uk/tom-watkins-lets-make-lots-of-money/


SUBSTANCE: INSIDE NEW ORDER Peter Hook (2016)

An informative in-depth look inside NEW ORDER, this huge memoir running to over 750 pages by Peter Hook was informative but not unsurprisingly tinged with bitterness and anger. But if you want to know where the band played on 9 April 1985, it’s here! There are track-by-track rundowns of each NEW ORDER album (apart from ’Republic’) and if you’ve always wanted to find out which sequencer was used on ‘True Faith’ or what Hooky’s Top16 bass cab messages are, then look no further!

‘Substance’ was originally published by Simon & Schuster

https://www.facebook.com/peterhookandthelight/


RECORD PLAY PAUSE + FAST FORWARD: Stephen Morris (2019 + 2020)

Effectively a lengthy book divided into two parts, Volume I of Stephen Morris’ memoir demonstrated his abilities as an engaging storyteller blessed with an entertaining dry wit, able to convey his growing up in an amusing and relatable manner. In the NEW ORDER dominated Volume II, readers cannot help but laugh out loud when our hero discovers that the 10 mile shooting range of his newly acquired ex-British Army Abbot FV433 self-propelled gun will make Bernard Sumner’s house in Alderley Edge an easy target!

‘Record Play Pause Rewind’ + ‘Fast Forward’ were originally published by Constable

https://twitter.com/stephenpdmorris


ELECTRONIC BOY: MY LIFE IN & OUT OF SOFT CELL Dave Ball (2020)

The quiet half of SOFT CELL, Dave Ball attended the same Blackpool school as Chris Lowe from PET SHOP BOYS but they never met. There was obviously something in the sea and the accounts of the Northern Soul scene point towards how that influence, along with the affordability of synthesizers, was to seed a long and successful music career which later included THE GRID. The Electronic Boy is honest about his various demons, but there is also humour and an equipment list appendix plus plenty of technical talk.

‘Electronic Boy’ was originally published by Omnibus Press

https://www.facebook.com/daveballofficial


ADVENTURES IN MODERN RECORDING Trevor Horn (2022)

Chaptered around 23 significant pieces of music in the life of Trevor Horn, the producer provides an insight into the making of his greatest moments. Music industry politics are discussed, notably with his ZTT signings FRANKIE GOES HOLLYWOOD, PROPAGANDA and THE ART OF NOISE. Among the revelations are getting bassist Mark Lickley fired from ABC but in all, this is a fun read with lots of name dropping… so imagine sitting in a van with Grace Jones and Jackie Chan that has no seat belts!

‘Adventures In Modern Recording’ was originally published by Nine Eight

https://www.facebook.com/trevorhornofficial


ELECTRONICALLY YOURS Vol1 Martyn Ware (2022)

An autobiography that covers up to the end of 1992, a quarter of the book is brilliantly devoted to a track-by-track analysis of every released recording that Martyn Ware was involved in by THE HUMAN LEAGUE, HEAVEN 17 and BEF. Politics looms within ‘Electronically Yours Vol1’ but without this socially conscientious drive , there would be no ‘Penthouse & Pavement’ or ‘The Luxury Gap’. With the recent passing of Tina Turner, Ware’s accounts of working with her now have added poignancy.

‘Electronically Yours Vol1’ was originally published by Constable

https://martynwareofficial.co.uk/


LISTENING TO THE MUSIC THE MACHINES MAKE Richard Evans (2022)

Focussing on “inventing electronic pop”, ‘Listening To The Music The Machines Make’ tells the story of the Synth Britannia generation by referencing archive material rather than via new interviews with the protagonists of the period. The end result is a more accurate picture of how synthesized forms were derided by a hostile music press back in the day, contrasting the rose tinted view projected by some cultural observers and fans today. But over 40 years on, this music has won the fight with many of the acts still performing today.

‘Listening To The Music The Machines Make’ was originally published by Omnibus Press

https://inventingelectronicpop.com/


THE SOUND OF THE MACHINE: MY LIFE IN KRAFTWERK & BEYOND Karl Bartos (2022)

A detailed autobiography of Karl Bartos about his time in KRAFTWERK and more, his optimistic disposition is a key aspect of this story. But although rising to the ranks of co-writer for ‘The Man Machine’ album, some members were more equal than others as Ralf Hütter bagged himself 50% of the publishing for the lyrics of ‘Spacelab’ and ‘Metropolis’ despite those tracks containing one word, thus reducing Bartos’ musical share! Bitterness is largely absent from this book, but it is no “sex, synths und schlagzeug” romp either.

‘The Sound Of The Machine’ was originally published by Omnibus Press

http://www.karlbartos.com/


THEMES FOR GREAT CITIES: A NEW HISTORY OF SIMPLE MINDS Graeme Thompson (2022)

Featuring new interviews with original members Jim Kerr, Charlie Burchill, Mick MacNeil and Derek Forbes, this biography focuses on the SIMPLE MINDS era of 1979-1985 when they were at their imperial and imaginative best. So where did it all go wrong? The book reveals what ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK has thought since buying the album in 1984 and that Jim Kerr himself now confirms… the second half of ‘Sparkle In The Rain’ is not particularly good! So who agrees? “LET ME SEE YOUR HANDS!”

‘Themes For Great Cities’ was originally published by Constable

https://www.simpleminds.com/


CONFORM TO DEFORM: THE WEIRD & WONDERFUL WORLD OF SOME BIZZARE Wesley Doyle (2023)

The story of Some Bizzare was always going to be a grand undertaking but Wesley Doyle managed to assemble Marc Almond, Dave Ball, Matt Johnson, Daniel Miller, Steve Hovington, Neil Arthur, JG Thirlwell, Stephen Mallinder, Anni Hogan, Stevo Pearce and his long suffering personal assistant Jane Rolink to document the rise and fall of the label that got into bed with the majors. Opting for a chronological quotes narrative, the book captures the personality of the characters involved and the tensions between them.

Conform To Deform’ was originally published by Jawbone Press

https://twitter.com/WesleyDoyleUK


Text by Chi Ming Lai
13 June 2023

FROM BRUSSELS WITH LOVE

Originally released on 20th November 1980, the deluxe cassette compilation ‘From Brussels With Love’ celebrates its 40th Anniversary.

Writing for NME, Paul Morley said at the time: “The arrival of this thin tape from Belgium provides a reminder – without really trying, without being obvious – that pop is the modern poetry, is the sharpest, shiniest collection of experiences, is always something new”.

It was the first proper music release on Les Disques du Crépuscule, a boutique Belgian label that emerged from Factory Benelux.

FBN was the European Low Countries wing of the iconic Manchester label that at the time was the home to JOY DIVISION, A CERTAIN RATIO, THE DURUTTI COLUMN and SECTION 25. It had primarily been set-up as an outlet for spare tracks by Factory Records acts and one of its later notable releases in Autumn 1981 was the 12 inch remix of NEW ORDER’s ‘Everything’s Gone Green’ which featured the non-album songs ‘Mesh’ and ‘Cries & Whispers’ on the B-side.

But from its inception with direction from head office, the Obscure Records influenced Les Disques du Crépuscule was to be a separate entity despite being run by the same Factory Benelux founding team of Michel Duval and Annik Honoré; the pair had established the Plan K venue in Brussels which hosted two JOY DIVISION concerts to establish the Manchester link.

‘From Brussels With Love’ was notable for featuring the first released recording by the three surviving members of JOY DIVISION following the sad passing of Ian Curtis before they adopted the name NEW ORDER; ‘Haystack’ was a collaboration with Leicester-born singer-songwriter Kevin Hewick. Conceived as a concert journal and curated by Duval, Honoré and radio show host / composer Wim Mertens, as well as a range of international avant-garde and new wave music,  it contained modern classical work from Gavin Bryars and a then-unknown Michael Nyman.

There were also spoken segments including a poetry reading from THE SKIDS’ Ricard Jobson plus interviews with Brian Eno and Jeanne Moreau; the latter featured a beautiful piano background by Claude Coppens to accompany the words of the notable French actress, thus producing an art piece in its own right.

‘From Brussels With Love’ was diverse, varying from exquisite ivory pieces like ‘Children On The Hill’ by Harold Budd to ‘The Music Room’, a Frippish guitar noise experiment from JOY DIVISION producer Martin Hannett accompanied by a drum machine.

But of interest to electronic music enthusiasts were three exclusive jingles by John Foxx and an early rhythm machine backed take on ‘Airwaves’ by Thomas Dolby. Meanwhile from Europe, there was the doomy synth laden post punk on ‘Cat’ by THE NAMES and the quirky electronic Neue Deutsche Welle of DER PLAN’s ‘Mein Freunde’.

To celebrate its 40th Anniversary, ‘From Brussels With Love’ has been reissued as a lavish 10” x 10” 60 page hardback earbook with rare images, posters, sleeve designs and memorabilia, plus a detailed history of the Crépuscule label between 1979 and 1984. The audio features not only the 21 tracks from on the original cassette in 1980 on one CD, but a bonus collection of 18 related tracks from the period on a second CD including those contributions unable to be included due to space considerations.

For John Foxx completists, this set will be essential as it includes two more jingles from the former ULTRAVOX front man, as well as his superb garage robo-funk instrumental ‘Mr No’.

Among the other musical highlights are Bill Nelson’s ‘Dada Guitare’, a Far Eastern flavoured instrumental of glorious E-bow and THE DURUTTI COLUMN’s beautiful ‘For Belgian Friends’, composed by Vini Reilly in honour of Michel Duval and Annik Honoré. Produced by Martin Hannett, his technologically processed techniques made Reilly’s dominant piano sound like textured synthetic strings, complimenting his sparing melodic guitar and the crisp percussion of Donald Johnson.

Also produced by Martin Hannett and another welcome inclusion in the ‘From Brussels With Love’ appendix is THE NAMES ‘Nightshift’ with its chilling synth embellishing the archetypical arty post-punk miserablism of the period. Another Belgian band POLYPHONIC SIZE make an appearance with ‘Nagasaki Mon Amour’, an intriguing minimal tribute to ULTRAVOX with its detached Gallic delivery over buzzing synths and icy string machines produced by Jean-Jacques Burnel of THE STRANGLERS.

Of interest to PROPAGANDA fans will be JOSEF K’s frenetically paced ‘Sorry For Laughing’ which was covered on ‘A Secret Wish’; their front man Paul Haig went on release a number of EPs and albums via Les Disques du Crépuscule including the acclaimed ‘Rhythm Of Life’ and ‘The Warp Of Pure Fun’.

Over four decades on, the catalogue of Les Disques du Crépuscule included artists like Anna Domino, Isabelle Antena, Alan Rankine, Winston Tong, Blaine L Reininger, John Cale, Helen Marnie and Zeus B Held as well as bands such as TUEXDOMOON, MARINE, CABARET VOLTAIRE, MIKADO, THE PALE FOUNTAINS, ULTRAMARINE, MARSHEAUX and LES PANTIES.

Sophisticated and exhibiting a tasteful visual aesthetic, Les Disques du Crépuscule established itself as a cosmopolitan and culturally significant artistic outlet with a distinct identity that outlasted its parent company Factory Records. ‘From Brussels With Love’ was the start of a story that continues today.


In memory of Annik Honoré 1957 – 2014

‘From Brussels With Love’ is released on 6th November 2020 by Les Disques du Crépuscule as a deluxe 40th Anniversary 10” x 10” 60 page hardback earbook with 2CDs, available direct from https://www.lesdisquesducrepuscule.com/from_brussels_with_love_twi007.html

It is also reissued as a limited edition facsimile cassette package in PVC wallet and gatefold double LP set featuring first disc in black vinyl and the second in white; both come with a download key

https://lesdisquesducrepuscule.com/

https://www.facebook.com/LesDisquesDuCrepuscule

https://twitter.com/twilightdisques

https://www.instagram.com/lesdisquesducrepuscule/


Text by Chi Ming Lai
20th October 2020

« Older posts