The new Ian Curtis book "Torn Apart:The Life Of Ian Cur

[marky]

I'd really like to hear any impressions that McC might have about this book if he's reading it. I'm finding I like it more than I expected to. There are indeed some typos and things, but really not as much as I was led to believe. There are some things in here about Martin Hannett I never knew. Things I can't find a fucking thing about on the internet.

I like the fact that it isn't all Ian Curtis, that the book talks about Durutti Column's early days and all the key people around in those days. The first chapter is a bit dodgy, all from the ladies' point of view, including very minute details that just aren't interesting. But it gets better from there. It is fun to read about the warehouse they filmed the Love Will Tear Us Apart video in, for example. I was delighted to find that the owner of that building was the guy who founded TJM records, a label I knew must be related to Manchester or Hannett but never knew exactly how. In any case it wasn't that great of a label, just basic amateur punk, but I just couldn't figure out why there is this CD that combines stuff from that label and Rabid (the label Hannett was involved in).

Also I thought this was an especially good quote about Hannett:

"Tosh Ryan remembers how Martin was obsessed with digital technology. 'He was researching digital technology way, way before it even became thought about in general terms, in broad consumer terms,' he recalls. 'He said to me once, *I need 700 quid to buy a CD player*. I said 'What the hell is a CD player?'...'He was showing it to me and he said in the future you'd be able to get information on here. He said you'd be able to get movies on them, music, pictures, text. I didn't believe him. I thought he was talking bollocks. He was ahead in his thinking. He was advanced.'"

[marky]

I know it sounds crazy, but I hear something different in Joy Division now, even though I've heard them 60,000 times before. When I listen to Substance, which is basically them in chronological order since the first record...without the proper LP's etc whatever it is...Substance...I hear something in it now that I never heard. There is a bit at the beginning of "Autosuggestion" that I suddenly realized was totally Hannett's doing. It all sounds just a little bit better than it all did when I was an adolescent. I just think it's weird the way Joy Division's appeal just seems to last and only sound better and better every year. Like a river flowing upwards.

And Transmission I never particuarly liked at the time, it struck me as too manic, but I hear something in it now I've never heard. This is timeless music. There is something beneath even the 60,000th layer of it.

[marky]

Oh god "No Love Lost" from their first 4 song demo thing oh GOD that is probably my favourite song of theirs in the whole world. It's on the CD of Substance.

[marky]

Currently I'm listening to Joy Division's Still, which is a really nice record to pull out because I pull it out less than Unknown Pleasures but more than Closer (don't get me wrong, I love Closer, but somehow it's just never sounded the same to me since adolescence).

And I came across an old favourite by Joy Division called "The Sound Of Music". It's interesting to me that here seems to be where they found their black music groove. I'm not sure if it's a bit of soul or disco, but it's something like that and you can't quite believe they've done ANYTHING you would call soul or disco, cause they're not like that really. But something about that song "The Sound Of Music" is like that. Eerie.

Anyway, Still is not perfect, but honestly I just hear these records in a different way now than I did 20 years ago.

[marky]

oH MY GOD IT'S "tHE only mISTAKE!"" tHAT'S MY OTHER FAVOURITE joy division SONG ON "sTILL" BESIDES THE SOUND OF MUSIC IS THE ONLY MISTAKE!!!!!!!!

yeess!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[marky]

hannett chokes me in the beauty of treble in a forest of bass

[Tommy Martyn]

Marky, I will be in the middle of nowhere, Michigan for Labor day weekend. My cell phone will not work out there, so you can call me on my landline 269-651-7735. I look forward to your crazed drunken attempts at a scouse accent. If I don't answer,it means I'm out on the lake fishing - leave your number.

[marky]

When I was a young teenager, first hearing the band, I had absolutely no clue how much he shaped Joy Division's sound, Martin Hannett. No clue at all. But now I'm starting to realize just how different Joy Division would have sounded without him. I'm serious. They would have been a totally different band, either remembered or forgotten, without him. It's scary to think about really. He was integral to the band. I mean it's not to say they couldn't have done some good records without him, but it would have been extremely different.

Hannett's like that. Sneaks up on you. They say he was quite modest. He hid in other people's shadows. Like when I found out he played bass in John Cooper Clarke records. You never would have thought it.

[marky]

Here's a quote from Vini Reilly (who should know) -

"I don't use the word genius very often...it's an overused and lazy word. But with Martin I have absolutely no hesitation in using the word genius. And I have worked with him very closely. I saw into exactly how he operated. And there was no one else on earth like him. No other producer came close to Martin. Genius indeed...yes."

[Tommy Martyn]

Marky, we have had this discussion before. Joy Division would not have produced the music without Hannet and it would not have been accepted as seriously as it was without Peter Saville controlling the look and feel of the band and the label.

[marky]

Oh Whoops Tommy you must have squeezed yourself in there between my ramblings. Yes. (mock southern England accent now)

Well, the main news is I get to see Blondie Saturday afternoon. So I appreciate the advice, because it could get well crazy when I finally get to see Blondie. I had a good dream about it some days ago, too that I was up front and they played two songs but I can't remember which songs I heard in my dream, exactly.

[marky]

Marky, we have had this discussion before. Joy Division would not have produced the music without Hannet and it would not have been accepted as seriously as it was without Peter Saville controlling the look and feel of the band and the label.

Yes, that's true, but as the book says, it WAS actually Bernard that came up with the idea of that design for Unknown Pleasures, the lines going up and down from a star's wavelengths. I actually saw a picture of that sort of thing in National Geographic magazine a long time ago and cut it out and put it on my wall as a teenager, not knowing for sure if it really was the source of the Unknown Pleasures sleeve. But never mind, the point is Bernard came up with it and Saville decided they needed white in the inside sleeve and total black on the outside and shrink those waves to a tiny thing in the middle. That was a controversial but genius move on Saville's part as well. As long as we understand it was Bernard that came up with the root of it.

[Tommy Martyn]

What I'm saying is that Joy Division were just a bunch of drunken scallies from the north - like Frankie goes to Hollywood - Peter Saville made sure they were never thought of like that. (I use that example because both bands owed a lot to Paul Morley)

[marky]

But (southern England accent again) Paul Morley is a cunt, really. He's a total cunt. Sorry but him and Simon Reynolds should go to an island in the middle of nowhere and fuck each other. I'm sorry I will not suck the cock of established pretentious music journalists. They're so vacant. Pretty vacant.

[marky]

I think we're in the pub now. Aren't we? Where's Mark E. Smith?