Tag: New Order (Page 20 of 20)

MARK REEDER Interview

21 November 2011 / electricityclub

Renowned remixer Mark Reeder’s first flirtation with near fame was when he was in punk band THE FRANTIC ELEVATORS with SIMPLY RED’s Mick Hucknall.

In 1978, he moved to Berlin and became Factory Records German representative in Germany while also working in the studio with bands such as all-girl avant noise terrorists MALARIA! who he co-managed and DIE TOTEN HOSEN.

In 1981, Reeder formed post-punk duo DIE UNBEKANNTEN while in 1983, he helped put together the Berlin Special of ‘The Tube’ TV music show which featured acts such as DIE ÄRTZE. Later on, DIE UNBEKANNTEN changed their name to SHARK VEGAS and toured Europe with NEW ORDER.

In 1990, Reeder established his own electronic dance music record label Masterminded For Success (MFS) and discovered Paul Van Dyk who he guided into becoming an internationally famed DJ and recording artist. His passionate approach and highly respected reputation for care and attention in all areas including concept, artwork, PR and sound gained many notable admirers within the music industry. So when Reeder focused on remixing in the late noughties, he was given the opportunity to work for a number of major artists including John Foxx and PET SHOP BOYS.

He also collaborated with popular German dance duo BLANK & JONES on a musical restyling project entitled ‘Reordered’ which featured among its vocalists NEW ORDER’s Bernard Sumner, Robert Smith from THE CURE, Steve Kilbey of THE CHURCH and Claudia Brücken. Its highlights however were probably the ‘This Time Of Night’ aping Alone In The Dark Mix of ‘Loneliness’ sung by Bobo and the Save Yourself Mix of ‘Manifesto’ featuring Vanessa Daou.

Reeder is about to release his brand new labour of love entitled ‘Five Point One’. It is a dream compilation album of new, rare and unreleased remixes by his own hand of established heavyweights such as DEPECHE MODE, PET SHOP BOYS, BLANK & JONES and BAD LIEUTENANT alongside cult favourites DIE TOTEN HOSEN and Anne Clark plus comparative newbies like MARSHEAUX, MAY 68, NOBLESSE OBLIGE and ELECTROBELLE.

Comprising of a deluxe DVD and 2CD package, the DVD is remastered in Dolby 5.1 surround sound to create a listening experience to enhance the depth and radiance of the original stereo mixes. What shines through particularly is Reeder’s intuitive approach which adds a developmental enhancement to proceedings while retaining the all important compositional essence of the originals.

Mark Reeder kindly spoke about ‘Five Point One’ and added a few thoughts about the welcome return of the song in modern electronic pop plus some stories about his days with Factory Records… “anything can happen in the next half hour…”

Photo by Katja Ruge

What was your inspiration particularly for this compilation?

I’ve always been a fan of surround technology and love the idea of multi-dimensional cinematic wrap-around sound. Although I’ve never owned a Quad system I have Quad versions from the 60s and 70s of ‘Switched-On Bach’ by Wendy Carlos (she was called Walter back then) and ‘Quadrophenia’ by THE WHO and I released a couple of B.A.S.E super spacial stereo and surround albums on my MFS label too.

So making my own 5.1 album was, I suppose, a natural process. I confess, I was definitely inspired by the 5.1 releases of PINK FLOYD, DAVID BOWIE and DEPECHE MODE, which I immediately snapped up.

However, making a 5.1 mix is a complex and expensive undertaking. I first made a 5.1 mix for my remix of ‘German Film Star’ for The PET SHOP BOYS and Sam Taylor-Wood and one for ‘Sink or Swim’ for BAD LIEUTENANT and then ‘Underpass’ for John FOxx, then followed MARSHEAUX and we just went from there. The idea that the album was to have some of my all-time fave bands and all my remixes for them together on one 5.1 surround album just started to happen. It was initially intended to be an audio only album, but when John Foxx said I could use his original 80s video, then we also had a visual element to the album too.

You’ve remixed the songs in DVD 5.1 Surround sound for one disc, how did you the motivate yourself for this endeavour?

The motivation was the challenge. Micha Adam, my studio partner and I wanted to see if we could do it. We wanted to push our own boundaries and test our abilities. Our aim was to re-remix our remixes in 5.1 surround and hopefully release them on one album. Most people, especially in the music industry, currently can’t see the reason behind making a 5.1 album, but that is because there is not that much 5.1 music about and nothing to really compare it with and therefore no visible market for it. That’s most probably because of the cost involved, not only in making a 5.1 mix, but for the consumer too.

It is early days still and just a matter of time. Once the technology gets cheaper and 5.1 becomes easier to make then more music will emerge. It took stereo over 30 years to reach the household in the late 60s and when 5.1 systems eventually become cheap and affordable, then people will also want something to play on them.

Also new and futuristic technological developments aim to make 5.1 available on every mobile phone too. That was another inspiration. Once we all have the 5.1 DolbyMobile chip in our smartphones then we will want to hear music in 5.1 too, which was a further driving force for us. This special chip means that you can listen to music in 5.1 on your phone, on normal stereo headphones, albeit in simulated 5.1, but if you connect your phone to a real 5.1 sound system, it will play back in true 5.1 surround. Fascinating!

Making the actual 5.1 remixes was the real challenge though, as it is all about getting the balance right so that the mix sounds like the original remix, but the music comes from all around you, just like in the cinema. That was the thrill. Yet, mixing an album in surround is not as easy as you might think and the end result will probably sound a bit different to everyone, especially considering that each home system is set up individually to taste. By the way, mixing a track in stereo is much easier too, as you can layer and hide things within the mix, whereas surround is much more revealing.

You are featuring several new acts on ‘Five Point One’ such as MARSHEAUX and NOBLESSE OBLIGE alongside established luminaries such as PET SHOP BOYS, DEPECHE MODE and John Foxx. I can see the newer artists being very co-operative but how straightforward was it to persuade the established acts to allow you to rework their material with your instrumentation and methods?

Yes, I’ve tried to create a balance between the more established acts and a crop of newer artists. Some of which have their debut on ‘Five Point One’. I thought this way I could bring them to a wider audience.

Generally, I think I’ve been very very lucky, as it wasn’t really all that difficult for me to obtain the clearances, as it might have been for other people. The artists that I have initially done the remixes for know who I am and obviously respect me and my work and my idea. They appreciate the amount of time, dedication and creativity that has gone into preparing this project. I guess they know I would also try and do my best and that I would take great care remixing their song. They also know the kind of music that I make.

Mind you, remixing a well-known and legendary song like ‘Underpass’ was still very nerve wracking. I’ve always loved this song and getting the chance to remix it for the first time after 30 years was such an honour. At first I was elated, then came the feeling of fear! Naturally, I wanted to do it justice without destroying it too much, as these days it seems so simple to take a great track, whack it into Ableton and strip it of all its atmosphere and identity, then add a techno beat and scatter a sprinkling of the original vocal over it, so it becomes totally unrecognisable and in most cases, disappointing.

I really don’t make my remixes like that. I’m old school. I like to still be able to hear the song, but give it my own signature and atmosphere, while at the same time use as many of the original elements as possible.

Luckily, John really liked my ‘Underpass’ remixes and he was very cooperative. In fact all the artists and labels were. Making a remix for a well-known song though is definitely much more daunting than making a remix for a new song. The obvious comparison aspect is overwhelming and the expectation is so great.

Obviously, I know I could never ever better the original and I don’t try to, I just make my interpretation. I also understand that my remixes won’t appeal to everyone, but I really only make a remix in the hope the artist themselves will like it and I suppose in the end, it’s for all those people who do actually like it. If you don’t like it then that’s fine too, just don’t listen to it. I always strive as much as I can to at least give the song I’m going to remix, the respect it deserves, regardless of its status.

Remixing ‘Sweetest Perfection’ was also very precarious. Daniel Miller gave me the chance to remix ‘Sweetest Perfection’ for the last DEPECHE MODE remixes album, but due to family problems I was unable to complete it on time. So I asked if I could use it on my own remixes album. My DEPECHE MODE remix actually took the longest to clear, simply because EMI / Mute were in the process of releasing their own DEPECHE MODE remixes album.

You also feature cult singer/songwriter Anne Clark who worked with John Foxx in 1985. For those who have not heard of her, how would describe her music and why do you like it?

It is quite interesting the threads between the artists on the album, in some obscure way they are all connected. I think Anne is very unique. She is a poet, who sets her poems to music. Although she is from England, she is probably more well-known outside of the UK. Her legendary status was formed in the early 80s and her brilliant song ‘Sleeper in Metropolis’ was huge in the new wave clubs across Europe at that time. It eventually became a Goth anthem and inspiration for many to follow. Its analogue synth sequencer sounds have never been bettered. Of course, her music today is very delicate but still powerful and anyone who has seen her perform live, knows exactly how beautiful her music is. I remixed two of her songs off ‘The Smallest Acts of Kindness’album which I really liked. I was inspired. They were intended for a remixes album, but that album hasnt yet materialised and so they are now on mine. I really like this spoken word matched with music idea.

You’re credited with introducing Bernard Sumner to Giorgio Moroder and Italo disco through the cassettes you used to send him from Berlin. How do you feel about his more rocky material with BAD LIEUTENANT? And is featuring remixes of them a way of you putting Bernard back into that electronic dance thing that he does so well but rarely touches now?

Well, I know Bernard is still very much into electronics and club music and he promised there will be more to be heard on the next BL album, but he wanted to show a different side with BAD LIEUTENANT and distance his band from NEW ORDER, which is understandable. I thought their album was really excellent. I’m not just saying that because Bernard is a friend, but because I really think it is. It is a bit of an unpolished jewel. Anyway, I played it to death. I think it was a very optimistic album and if you give it the chance, it gets better every time you play it.

Anyway, Bernard asked me to film some sequences for their ‘Sink Or Swim’ video and then I was asked if I wanted to do a remix for it too. I thought there are probably a few fans out there, like myself and Micha, who would also like to hear a more electronic, dancier type version of the song. So I made one. The same goes for my remix for the PET SHOP BOYS. They also wanted a more traditional PSB sounding remix without having to return to that style themselves.

Then Bernard asked me if I could do a quick remix for ‘Twist of Fate’, which was a track I also really liked and wanted to remix. I made two variations, one is a heavy-ish sounding half tempo mix with a pulsating bass and the other is a more uptempo dance mix variation. Both mixes are featured on ‘Five Point One’. I thought Steve Young made a truly brilliant sci-fi puppet video for that track too, with very scary looking puppets. You can see the love, care and dedication he has put into making this Gerry Anderson inspired video and I wanted to applaud his work and so we feature the video on the DVD too. He was kind enough to recut his video and add newly created footage just so that it would fit to my 5.1 remix.

Making these BAD LIEUTENANT remixes was much more difficult than we had imagined, as all the songs were played-in live by the band and there was lots of natural speeding up and slowing down within the track, which you don’t usually get with a precise timed 4/4 techno record. I had a great time with Micha making these two remixes, as we had to slice every single word and every note of every instrument and move them into position by hand to make them still sound organic, which took forever. It was good practise, as it turned out, because the BAD LIEUTENANT remixes were still easier than making the DEPECHE MODE or TOTEN HOSEN remixes.

Your Lange Hosen remix of DIE TOTEN HOSEN’s ‘Disco’ was very interesting. You go back a long way with them. They are known as being a punk band, but when did it occur to you that their material could be tailored for the dancefloor?

Actually, I realised that their music could be tailored for the dancefloor back in the 80s with ‘Hip Hop Bommi Bop’, which they made with legendary New York rapper Fab Five Freddy.

We used to listen to a lot of disco music on tour mixed in with AC/DC and plenty of punk classics. It just seemed natural to me that their track ‘Disco’ should have a real Italo-rock-disco-esque sounding remix.

As usual, I wanted to retain as much of their original song as possible though, so that it is still recognisable as a TOTEN HOSEN song. So the guitars and vocals are all in there. I’ve just changed the tempo and groove and added a straight driving bass guitar and pulsating synth so it can be played in a proper disco type of disco.

You’ve worked with MALARIA! in the past and there was a collaboration with CHICKS ON SPEED a few years back of 1981’s ‘Kaltes Klares Wasser’. Could their material work on the contemporary dancefloor and have you ever considered remixing them?

Yes, I did briefly consider it, but then again I didn’t just want to have a kind of oldies only album. I wanted a mixture of established artists and new ones. I wanted to give the unknown artists the opportunity to be on an album with some very well-known ones.

Was there any track that you really wanted on ‘Five Point One’ but were unable to use due to the usual contractual stuff?

Yes, there was. I really wanted to include my remix of ‘A Forest’ on ‘Five Point One’ that I made for the ‘Reordered’ album. In fact, I already made a 5.1 mix of it in the hope that I could use it, but unfortunately, BLANK & JONES said they couldn’t license it to me due to their strict contractual obligations with Robert Smith. So that particular remix remains exclusively available on ‘Reordered’ in normal stereo.

Are there any particular favourites for you on this compilation?

Yes, tracks 1-25.

Who do you hope ‘Five Point One’ will appeal to?

I guess it’s for all those people who like the artists featured on the album and wish they were all on one album. Now they are. Then it is also for those who enjoy this kind of retro sounding synthpop style of music and its especially for all those with a thirst for 5.1 Dolby digital surround sound. For the moment, it seems only major label artists like DEPECHE MODE, KING CRIMSON, DAVID BOWIE, PINK FLOYD or THE MOODY BLUES have been able to release surround albums.

I thought why can’t my favourite artists also have a 5.1 release too? I wanted to put all my own remixes for some of my favourite bands together on one 5.1 album. After all, who wouldn’t like an album that featured new mixes for legends like DEPECHE MODE and PET SHOP BOYS as well as John Foxx and Anne Clark all together on one album and all in 5.1? I certainly would.

How do you think electronic pop music has been developing over the years and where do you see it heading in the future?

After 20 years of electronically driven techno, trance and the many derivatives spawned from it, I feel that the current style of electronic pop music is quite refreshing. Of course, club music will always be there in one form or another and DJs and dancing will never go out of fashion. But for myself, I’m really enjoying hearing artists making songs again. Maybe in the future the synthpop sound will finally have its renaissance, one that it so rightly deserves. It seems more and more people are yearning for it. After all, the 80s appear to represent a time not only of political balance and security but of experimentation in fashion and music.

Back in the 80s, synth music was mainly European and futuristic sounding, but the overwhelming influence of major label funded American rock music was able to stamp synthpop into the ground. Also the synth technology sadly had its limitations too, I remember back then our Moog and Korg synths were terribly temperamental when it came to temperature or humidity change.

Today synth music is much easier to produce. We are living in that future, now. So why not make 80s sounding futuristic music? What I find interesting today is the current mixture of retro sounds of old synths being played in a contemporary way. I suppose the availability of new software for long forgotten analogue synths and the amazing technical plug-ins which have been getting better and better, all help to form the current sound of the music. All I know and care about really, is that there have been some great songs and cool new artists emerging recently and that is very inspiring.

Is there a favourite story you can tell from your days as Factory’s German representative?

Many. I remember Rob Gretton sent me a huge roll of posters to promote the first NEW ORDER album in Germany. To save on postage because the roll was so bloody big and heavy, he sent them by land and not airmail… well, they eventually arrived, three months later!

There are many funny stories and this interview would be longer than my Myspace page if I told them all. What many people don’t realise is that it was very difficult trying to promote Factory’s records in Germany back in the late 70s and early 80s. No one really wanted to know. This was due to the fact that Germany was rediscovering its own musical ability and creating its own new wave scene.

Early German punkbands like TEMPO, PVC or DAF had been fuelled by the UK punk movement, they in turn paved the way for the alternative avant-garde like MANIA-D, P1/E, DER PLAN or EINSTÜRZENDE NEUBAUTEN and later, the more commercial new wave pap like NINA HAGEN, SPLIFF or IDEAL. No one was particularly interested in a small indie label from Manchester and certainly not in a miserable sounding band called JOY DIVISION.

Sure, there was some interest from the dedicated anglophiles but it was very small and it appealed to a few. Of course, this attitude changed somewhat when Ian died.

Have you heard SECTION 25’s new single ‘Colour, Movement, Sex And Violence’ which is released on Peter Hook’s Fac51 The Haçienda label? What do you think of the spirit of Factory Records being kept alive and kicking?

Yes, I have heard it and I think it’s a great tune. Love it. Very Manchester. I’ve always enjoyed SECTION 25 and this song is one of their best in ages. The spirit of Factory will be kept alive by the numerous fans of the sound the label had and by the new fans who are discovering it for the first time. Without Factory, the Manchester music scene wouldn’t be what it became and is today and most boys would probably still not know how to dance. In Germany, Strut have just released a new ‘Factory Dance’ 12″ double CD compilation, which introduces some of the lesser known Factory dance artists together with a few better known ones. It has very striking looking artwork and is a must-have for any Factory fan.

What are your own upcoming plans after Five Point One?

I plan to release a remastered version of DIE UNBEKANNTEN’s ‘Don’t Tell Me Stories’ album finally on CD, this might include some SHARK VEGAS tracks too and also in 2012, I hope to release a deluxe version of DIE VISION’s ‘Torture’, the last album to be recorded in communist East Berlin that I produced there in 1989. As for my own projects, now that would be telling wouldn’t it?

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to Mark Reeder

‘Five Point One’ is released on 25th November 2011 by Kennan Limited and distributed in Germany by Rough Trade Deutschland.

For more information on Five Point One including the full tracklisting and how to order this deluxe 2CD/DVD set, please visit http://www.five-point-one.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/markreedermusic/

https://twitter.com/markreedermfs

Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
21st November 2011

WE HOPE YOU ENJOY OUR NEW DIRECTION

18 April 2011 / electricityclub

Some Not So Great Albums By Some Great Acts

While opinion is totally subjective and in the mind of the beholder, in the same way that a footballer can occasionally fluff a shot, then a musician can also score their equivalent of an own goal. The less than impressive albums on this list have generally been derided by both fans and critics. In most cases, these recordings were made by established acts with sure-fire reputations at the height of their career; or they were part of a much vaunted comeback.

But as can be expected with the highs and lows of the music industry, a number were produced during difficult periods in an artist’s creative dynamic following personnel changes or record company pressures. So in hindsight, poor results were often predictable and inevitable. However, based on the standards of their strongest work, most of the talents mentioned here should have known better.

But even in the face of informed criticism, some musicians can be terribly stubborn and unrepentant. Reacting to negativity surrounding his infamous ‘Metal Machine Music’ double album of feedback and electronic screeching, Lou Reed famously snorted: “if they don’t like it, they can go eat rat sh*t”! Oh well, would you like fries with your rat sh*t?

Inspired by the Q Magazine article ‘Can I Have My Money Back?’ from 1996, here are 20 of the better known creative blips, in alphabetical order. It should be noted that ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK actually bought all but 5 of these albums, so make of that what you will!

KARL BARTOS Electric Music (1998)

Proof that pioneering geniuses lose their way once in a while. Following his ‘Esperanto’ album in 1993 with Lothar Manteuffel of RHEINGOLD under the moniker ELEKTRIC MUSIC which many accepted as a KRAFTWERK record in all but name, Karl Bartos went to work with Bernard Sumner and Johnny Marr on ELECTRONIC’s ‘Raise The Pressure’. He found the experience liberating and on his return, adopted the guitar for his next ‘Electric Music’ album.

Speaking in 2005, he said that when he started playing music as a teenager, it was in his bedroom with his guitar pretending to be Chuck Berry and this album was him getting back to all that. ‘Young Urban Professional’ was actually a song originally written for KRAFTWERK, but is turned into THE SMITHS’ ‘Hand In Glove’ with vocoder! ‘Sunshine’ is typical of the clumpy rock that marred NEW ORDER’s 2001 comeback ‘Get Ready’ while the rest of the album is pretty much the same. Only ‘Call On Me’ possesses any kind of spark as a song. Bartos himself described ‘Electric Music’ as an “exploration of the sound of the sixties – guitar pop out of the computer” and thanks Johnny Marr in the credits! Luckily, Bartos returned to synths and was back on form with 2003’s ‘Communication’, delivering a collection that showed his former cycling partners over at Kling Klang a thing or two.

Best track: ‘Call On Me’

‘Electric Music’ was originally released by SPV Records

http://www.karlbartos.com/

DEPECHE MODE Sounds Of The Universe (2009)

Following a return to form with ‘Playing The Angel’, much was expected of ‘Sounds Of The Universe’ when the band’s biggest world tour to date was announced in 2008. Unfortunately, the lacklustre ‘Exciter’ from 2000 appeared to be the musical template and the tracks that leaked were not particularly promising. The resultant album lacked spark, dynamics and creative tension. It was dreary mid-paced electro blues that dominated on this turkey.

The outstanding track from the sessions ‘Oh Well’ was a spicy uptempo Moroder-esque collaboration between Martin Gore and Dave Gahan but only appeared in the 4CD deluxe box set while the fact that the two best tracks on the main feature were a ballad voiced by Gore and a short instrumental said it all! But this became rather trivial when Gahan was diagnosed with a life threatening illness while on out on the road in Athens!

Best tracks: ‘Jezebel’, ‘Spacewalker’, ‘Oh Well’ (deluxe box set only)

‘Sounds Of The Universe’ was originally released by Mute Records

http://www.depechemode.com

DURAN DURAN Thank You (1995)

This covers album was recorded at the behest of EMI Records who were strangely impressed by DURAN DURAN’s rather strained cover of THE VELVET UNDERGROUND’s ‘Femme Fatale’ from ‘Wedding Album’ and eager for a quick cash-in on their 1993 renaissance. Among the songs attempted were ironic takes on ‘White Lies (Don’t Do It)’ and another drug dependency tale ‘Perfect Day’, as well as songs by Bob Dylan, Elvis Costello and Sly Stone!

The covers of Iggy Pop’s ‘Success’ and THE DOORS’ ‘Crystal Ship’ were actually quite enjoyable but among all the ham reinterpretations of established standards, the band actually covered themselves in a new version of ‘The Chauffeur’ entitled ‘Drive By’! Often regarded as one of the worst albums ever recorded, this disaster was dubbed “No Thank You” by many fans! Worse was to come for DURAN DURAN though as John Taylor left the band and EMI UK then refused to release their 1997 album ‘Medazzaland’. It would take a reunion of the classic line-up in 2004 to get them back on track and it wasn’t until 2011’s ‘All You Need Is Now’ album that they fully recaptured their former artistic glories.

Best tracks: ‘Success’, ‘Crystal Ship’

‘Thank You’ was originally released by EMI Records

http://www.duranduran.com

ERASURE Loveboat (2000)

In a poor period for Andy and Vince, this was a close run thing with their covers album ‘Other People’s Songs’ but at least with the latter, there were quality songs on show even if some of the versions left a lot to be desired. The problem wasn’t just the emphasis on guitar driven dynamics, it was also severely lacking in the usual ERASURE charm. Andy Bell admitted how shocked he was when he heard how “weird and indie” Rob Kirwan’s final mix sounded.

Despite production by Flood, it was all very muddy. And even the album’s one potentially great song ‘Moon & The Sky’ was missing an uplifting chorus which was only later added to the Heaven Scent Radio Re-Work version that was released as a single. The redeeming consequence though was that despite these tough times creatively, ERASURE took to soft synths and made one of their best albums in 2005 with ‘Nightbird’.

Best tracks: ‘Freedom’, ‘Moon & The Sky’

‘Loveboat’ was originally released by Mute Records

http://www.erasureinfo.com

HEAVEN 17 Teddy Bear, Duke & Psycho (1988)

‘Teddy Bear, Duke & Psycho’ were the affectionate nicknames given by Terence Trent D’Arby respectively to HEAVEN 17’s Martyn Ware, Glenn Gregory and Ian Craig Marsh. The conventional sounding ‘Pleasure One’ released in 1986 had been given a lukewarm reception, while Martyn Ware’s success as a producer for artists such as Tina Turner and Mr D’Arby himself may have started to spread his creative energies just a little too thinly.

Whatever, when ‘The Ballad Of Go Go Brown’ was released as lead single and Glenn Gregory appeared on the album cover wearing a Stetson and cowboy boots, the writing was on the wall. A lot of the album features the blue eyed soul of the times but with younger acts like WET WET WET, AZTEC CAMERA, HUE & CRY and even PERFECT DAY (featuring a certain Mark Jones of Wall Of Sound fame!) gaining the public’s attention, HEAVEN 17 then went on hiatus for the next nine years before returning with the electronically driven triumph ‘Bigger Than America’.

Best tracks: ‘Big Square People’, ‘Train Of Love In Motion’

‘Teddy Bear, Duke & Psycho’ was originally released by Virgin Records

http://www.heaven17.com

THE HUMAN LEAGUE Crash (1986)

Work had started on ‘Crash’ in 1985 with producer Colin Thurston but the results were not deemed suitable for release by Virgin Records. To overcome the creative block, THE HUMAN LEAGUE were despatched to Minneapolis to record with top producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. Here, they became part of the manufactured R’n’B conveyor belt that had already seen success for Janet Jackson and Alexander O’Neal.

Ian Burden in particular was considered surplus to requirements by the producers. Disconcertingly, the album’s two strongest numbers ‘Human’ and ‘Love Is All That Matters’ had no songwriting input from any of THE HUMAN LEAGUE themselves… but then, they weren’t involved in the album’s two stinkers either! The David Eiland composed ‘Swang’ was horrible while ‘I Need Your Loving’ surely had to have been a Janet Jackson reject? Eventually, Oakey and co went home leaving Jam and Lewis to finish ‘Crash’. ‘Human’ was an American No1 and helped keep THE HUMAN LEAGUE’s profile up Stateside while the album’s end results sounded nothing like them with Phil Oakey’s voice left exposed as it was not really suited to the dynamics of soul. It would take almost ten years for them to regain momentum with 1995’s ‘Octopus’.

Best tracks: ‘Human’, ‘Love Is All That Matters’, ‘Money’

‘Crash’ was originally released by Virgin Records

http://www.thehumanleague.co.uk

JAPAN Rain Tree Crow (1991)

This was the much heralded reunion of David Sylvian, Mick Karn, Steve Jansen and Richard Barbieri aka JAPAN, a band who many considered had broken up before their time following the highly acclaimed ‘Tin Drum’ album in 1981. However, the split was due to personal rather than artistic differences when Karn’s girlfriend Yuka Fujii left him for Sylvian. Time eventually healed wounds and the quartet gathered together in France.

Under the Sylvian inspired Native American moniker RAIN TREE CROW, the idea had been to compose and record as a group through improvisation as opposed Sylvian being sole songwriter and studio dictator which had previously been the case during the JAPAN days. However, Sylvian’s stubborn imposing character led to a return to old ways. Supported by a huge budget from Virgin Records, unbelievably it was exceeded. So Virgin gave them an ultimatum where no more money would be forthcoming unless the project was presented under the name of JAPAN. The others agreed but Sylvian refused. Walking off with the tapes to mix the album under his own finance and supervision, he refused to let any of his bandmates in on the sessions! The result was an unfocussed set consisting of progressive avant jazz and self-indulgent ethnic instrumental pieces tha sounded unfinsihed. Only the magnificent single ‘Blackwater’ bore any kind of relation to JAPAN’s brilliant legacy. The quartet never worked together again and with Mick Karn’s sad passing, never will.

Best track: ‘Blackwater’

‘Rain Tree Crow’ was originally released by Virgin Records

http://www.nightporter.co.uk

JEAN MICHEL JARRE Sessions 2000 (2002)

It is always going to end in tears when an artist embarks on a jazz odyssey! And so it was when Jean-Michel Jarre came up with what appeared to be an attempt to break his then recording contract with Sony Music. ‘Sessions 2000’ contained six tracks named presumably after the days they were composed. Recorded by Jarre with collaborator Francis Rimbert, all had deliberate chill-out lounge jazz undertones and unfortunately, a distinct lack of melody.

‘June 21’ just plods along aimlessly for over six minutes while ‘September 14’ aims at the atmosphere of ‘Twin Peaks’ but does nothing in its excruciating nine! Haunting piano and detuned tones colour the Ryuichi Sakamoto influenced ‘May 1’ but any potential is unrealised. Only ‘March 23’ has any kind of musical shape with a distinct rhythmic pulse textured with synthetic brass and slide guitar samples but is far too long. Jarre eventually got back up to speed with the improved but still laid back ‘Geometry of Love’ and the dance driven ‘Teo & Tea’.

Best track: ‘March 23’

‘Sessions 2000’ was originally released by Sony Music

http://www.jeanmicheljarre.com

KRAFTWERK Tour De France Soundtracks (2004)

The first new material from KRAFTWERK since the disappointing ‘Expo 2000’, this was Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider’s opportunity to reconsolidate their position as electronic godfathers. However, it was also 14 years since the departures of percussionists Wolfgang Flür and Karl Bartos, and it showed. One of the weakest links in ‘Tour De France Soundtracks’ was the rhythm programming which lacked punch and neither encouraged excitement or dancing.

Ironically, for an album about cycling, ‘Tour De France Soundtracks’ was strangely pedestrian. Everything was tightly sequenced and structured but noticeably absent was the humanity and humour which were two of KRAFTWERK’s strongest suits, even on tracks like ‘Sex Object’ and ‘Boing Boom Tschak’ from 1986’s lacklustre predecessor ‘Electric Cafe’. The reworkings of the original 1983 ‘Tour De France’ track are the best things on here while Karl Bartos’ ‘Communication’ album, which happened to be released a few weeks later, was infinitely superior.

Best track: ‘Tour De France’, ‘Tour De France Etape 1’

‘Tour De France Soundtracks’ was originally released by EMI Records

http://www.kraftwerk.com

NEW ORDER Waiting For The Sirens’ Call (2004)

NEW ORDER’s musical strength was fusing the spirit of punk into electronics and dance. However, with keyboardist Gillian Gilbert leaving the band on their recorded return, Messrs Sumner, Hooky and Morris filled the void with a bunch of stodgy rock numbers on 2001’s ‘Get Ready’. For the next album, the trend towards rock continued although there were marginally more synths this time although the array of producers involved confused matters.

As possibly the worst song NEW ORDER have ever recorded, ‘Who’s Joe?’ had none of the spirit of their best guitar numbers. Even the lead single ‘Krafty’ was uninspiring NEW ORDER by numbers while its follow-up ‘Jetstream’ featuring SCISSOR SISTERS’ Ana Matronic was terribly lame despite being produced by Stuart Price. Only the title track and ‘Dracula’s Castle’ have any flashes of their classic brilliance. Legend has it that when Peter Saville was commissioned to design the sleeve, he was so unimpressed by the quality of the album that he decided to send an ironic message to warn any potential punters!

Best tracks: ‘Waiting For The Sirens’ Call’, ‘Dracula’s Castle’

‘Waiting For The Sirens’ Call’ was originally released by London Records

http://www.neworder.com

GARY NUMAN Warriors (1983)

Things had looked promising with Gary Numan returning to the live stage after retiring in 1981. Bill Nelson was slotted in to produce ‘Warriors’, but the pair fell out very early on in the sessions. Nelson then had his more trebly cutting mixes wiped by Numan so asked for his name to be taken off the credits! With the alien embracement of jazz and funk influences, ‘Warriors’ ended up a well played if confused, characterless body of work.

The use of some top flight session musicians was a major part of this mess. Dick Morrissey played saxophone solos whether they really ought to have been there or not, while Joe Hubbard’s slap bass was at times self-indulgent and wholly incongruous with the Numan sound. Although there were a couple of good tracks like the dreamy ‘The Iceman Comes’ and the synthetic THIN LIZZY of ‘My Centurion’, this was the start of a creative dip that Gary Numan wouldn’t truly recover from until 1994. In between, he appeared far more interested in flying than his music career.

Best tracks: ‘The Iceman Comes’, ‘My Centurion’

‘Warriors’ was originally released by Beggars Banquet Records

http://www.numan.co.uk

OMD Liberator (1993)

Following the success of ‘Sugar Tax’ in 1991, remaining sole OMD founder Andy McCluskey was on a commercial roll and decided to continue this well trodden poptastic path. As a result, ‘Liberator’ featured lots of busy modern dance effects. “It was an album for kids” lamented McCluskey later to Jens Lindell on Swedish radio in 1996. But by the time of its release in 1993, Da Kidz were worshipping acts such as TAKE THAT and EAST17 who were closer in age to the intended demographic.

An album of C-sides, ‘Stand Above Me’, ‘Everyday’, ‘Love And Hate You’ were all painfully poppy and not exactly the strongest songs in the OMD canon. Meanwhile, opinions are still divided about the synth MOR tune ‘Dream Of Me’, based on LOVE UNLIMITED ORCHESTRA’s ‘Love’s Theme’. The confused schizophrenic nature of the album’s concept was compounded by the pure genius of darker, more traditional OMD numbers like ‘King Of Stone’ and ‘Christine’. The muted reception to ‘Liberator’ led to the brave but conventional and ultimately doomed ‘Universal’ in 1996, before McCluskey retired the OMD brand. Bruised, he then set his sights on launching ATOMIC KITTEN! And that is a story in itself!

Best tracks: ‘King Of Stone’, ‘Christine’, ‘Best Years Of Our Lives’

‘Liberator’ was originally released by Virgin Records

http://www.omd.uk.com

PET SHOP BOYS Release (2002)

With pun totally intended, ‘Release’ was marred by the input of THE SMITHS’ famed guitarist Johnny Marr who had already used his influence to fill the last ELECTRONIC album ‘Twisted Tenderness’ with harmonica, getting Bernard Sumner rock out again in the process and even inspiring Karl Bartos to use guitar on every track of his ‘Electric Music’ album… note the irony with both band monikers!

Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe meanwhile attempted a collection of understated songs which were not only free of club derived beats but also of hooks and melodies! ‘Release’ certainly had none of the quality of their other understated album ‘Behaviour’. ‘I Get Along’ comes over like a camp version of Oasis while the worthiness of ‘Here’ wasn’t revealed until PET SHOP BOYS’ own dance remix for ‘Disco Vol3’. ‘The Night I Fell In Love’ is a lyrically amusing narrative about Eminem having a gay fling with a fan, but apart from the uptempo ‘The Samurai In Autumn’, this album is mostly plodding six-string led numbers devoid of any of the mastery that made them great. They were wearing someone else’s clothes and they didn’t fit. Ironically, ‘Release’really was PET SHOP BOYS ‘Being Boring’! And did you know that Johnny Marr in French (J’en Ai Marre) means “I am fed up”?

Best track: ‘The Samurai In Autumn’

‘Release’ was originally released by EMI Records

http://www.petshopboys.co.uk

SIMPLE MINDS Street Fighting Years (1989)

Lambasted for embracing stadium rock, one thing though about 1986’s ‘Once Upon A Time’ was that it was an enjoyable uptempo synthetic rock record that successfully exploited its commercial possibilities with its sharp radio friendly outlook. However, when they took the album out on the road, Jim Kerr and co persisted with overlong, pompous arrangements and hectored the audience with tiresome repeated shouts of “show me your hands” and “higher”!

For the ‘Street Fighting Years’ album, the band retreated to the tranquillity of rural Scotland to inspire a more earnest, political direction… unfortunately, the overlong, pompous arrangements remained! Instrumentally, the bombast and synths were replaced by brushes, rootsy bottleneck guitar and Hammond organ flourishes that were ubiquitous of the period. But the songs meandered along formlessly at over six minutes at a time. Their only UK No1 single ‘Belfast Child’ outstayed its welcome by at least four and a half minutes! Even the production skills of Trevor Horn and Stephen J Lipson, who were recruited because Jim Kerr was a fan of PROPAGANDA’s ‘A Secret Wish’, couldn’t save this one!

Best track: ‘Wall Of Love’

‘Street Fighting Years’ was originally released by Virgin Records

https://www.simpleminds.com/

SPARKS Terminal Jive (1980)

Following the success of the singles ‘The No1 Song In Heaven’, ‘Beat The Clock’ and ‘Tryouts For The Human Race’ from the Giorgio Moroder steered album ‘No1 In Heaven’, SPARKS were despatched by Virgin Records to record a swift follow-up. Although Moroder was still nominally at the helm, ‘Terminal Jive’ was more ‘Hot Stuff’ than ‘I Feel Love’. Harold Faltermeyer of ‘Axel F’ fame took up a large part of the production duties as Moroder started to lose interest.

The songs were mostly lethargic synth assisted FM rock numbers. ‘Rock ‘N’ Roll People In A Disco World’ seemed to reflect the confused direction both lyrically and musically. Ironically, despite featuring more guitars and therefore a more American friendly sound, ‘Terminal Jive’ was the only SPARKS album that wasn’t issued in the US on its original release. The highlights were ‘When I’m With You’ which was a massive hit single in France and the satirically pervy ‘Young Girls’. However, the lack of quality material, as summed up by the inclusion of the instrumental version of ‘When I’m With You’, was the real problem. Disillusioned, SPARKS left Europe and returned to the States where they attained some varied domestic success having been previously ignored by their compatriots. They wouldn’t be seen much in Europe again until 1994 when the brilliant ‘When Do I Get To Sing My Way’ became as smash and gave them an unexpected career renaissance.

Best tracks: ‘When I’m With You’, ‘Young Girls’, ‘The Greatest Show On Earth’

‘Terminal Jive’ was originally released by Virgin Records

http://allsparks.com

TANGERINE DREAM Cyclone (1978)

So this was a great idea, a TANGERINE DREAM album with vocals and flute! Featuring Steve Jolliffe on those said two colours, the first 13 minute track ‘Bent Cold Sidewalk’ came over like GENESIS and JETHRO TULL with its mystical lyrics and Hobbit vocal delivery. The uptempo ‘Rising Runner Missed By Endless Sender’ actually sounded like ULTRAVOX, but unfortunately in their Foxx-less and Ure-less ‘Ingenuity’ guise fronted by the best forgotten Sam Blue!

The progressive rock overtones took a breather on the more traditionally cosmic instrumental ‘Madrigal Meridian’ which saved the show, but most TD fans had probably headed down to the second hand stores by the end of side one. Although not well received, such was Messrs Froese and Franke standing at the time, ‘Cyclone’ was TANGERINE DREAM’s sixth best-selling album in the UK.

Best Track: ‘Madrigal Meridian’

‘Cyclone’ was originally released by Virgin Records

http://www.tangerinedream.org

TEARS FOR FEARS Everybody Loves A Happy Ending (2004)

‘Everybody Loves A Happy Ending’ saw TEARS FOR FEARS’ original nucleus of Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith reunited for the first time since the tedious ‘The Seeds Of Love’ album from 1989. Friends since childhood, Orzabal’s domination of those sessions proved too much for Smith and it would be many years before they would even speak again. However, the reunion was already in trouble when Arista Records, who had signed the duo, pulled the comeback album.

But it was easy to see why… the album consisted of dull derivative compositions with little flair. The title track was another attempt at THE BEATLES pastiches from the last time Orzabal and Smith recorded together. Americana was one of the main templates with ‘Call Me Mellow’ basically a retread of THE LAs’ similarly influenced ‘There She Goes’. Eventually released on Gut Records after a year’s delay, only the original closing track ‘Last Days On Earth’ had any redeeming features but even that sounded like The Isley Brothers. As further a sign of their lack of creative juice, the duo even took to using Gary Jules’ arrangement of ‘Mad World’ from the ‘Donnie Darko’ soundtrack when performing the song live! Anyone who expected the sixth form synth angst of ‘The Hurting’ or even the MTV friendly rock of ‘Songs From The Big Chair’ was going to be disappointed.

Best track: ‘Last Days On Earth’

‘Everybody Loves A Happy Ending’ was originally released by Gut Records

http://www.tearsforfears.net

ULTRAVOX U-Vox (1986)

Also known by fans as “The Dreaded Pink Thing”, the signs had not been good when drummer Warren Cann was booted out of the band for preferring to use computer generated percussion while in the wake of his successful solo career, Midge Ure was dictating a more back-to-basics approach. Paradoxically though, soulful backing vocalists, funk bass, orchestras, brass sections and sax solos all entered into the equation, resulting in a totally unfocused sound.

‘Sweet Surrender’ was frankly a bit of a mess while ‘Moon Madness’ didn’t know whether it should have been rock or jazz. Backed by The Chieftains and featuring no synthesizers at all, ‘All Fall Down’ polarised listeners with its Celtic folk roots and anti-war message. But the poor title ‘U-Vox’ summed it all up… a band with something missing! However, ‘The Prize’ was as good as anything TEARS FOR FEARS or SIMPLE MINDS did in their stadium phase, ‘Time To Kill’ retained some European cool despite the acoustic guitars and the epic ‘All In One Day’ was the best thing Scott Walker never recorded.

Best tracks: ‘The Prize’, ‘Time To Kill’, ‘All In One Day’

‘U-Vox’ was originally released by Chrysalis Records

http://www.ultravox.org.uk

VISAGE Beat Boy (1984)

Midge Ure and Billy Currie had both left VISAGE in 1982, leaving Steve Strange and Rusty Egan with the VISAGE name and ownership of a very expensive Synclavier computer synthesizer. Despite the promising edgy electro-disco of interim single ‘Pleasure Boys’, the direction chosen for ‘Beat Boy’ was an ill-advised sojourn into rock with a group of session musicians filling in slots vacated by the former members of ULTRAVOX and MAGAZINE.

Without Ure’s production guidance, Steve Strange’s singing was all over the place. Neither ‘Only The Good Die Young’ nor the dreadful title track knew when to finish, while ‘Can You Hear Me?’ didn’t know when to actually start. And the backing vocals by guitarist Andy Barnett on the gross heavy metal of ‘Casualty’ were truly appalling! The eight tracks that made up ‘Beat Boy’ were all far too long although ‘Questions’ possessed a funky energy while ‘Love Glove’ could have easily come off ‘The Anvil’. However, this poor album led to the end of VISAGE. Rusty Egan went to work for U2 while Strange formed the unsuccessful STRANGE CRUISE and sadly later experienced some well documented personal difficulties.

Best tracks: ‘Love Glove’, ‘Questions’

‘Beat Boy’ was originally released by Polydor Records

http://therealvisage.com/

NEIL YOUNG Trans (1982)

Many of the albums mentioned have had the disaster of synth based acts adopting more conventional colours. This was one which where it happened the other way round. ‘Trans’ was Neil Young’s 1982 excursion into synthesizers, Linn Drum computers and vocoders. Despite the noble gesture of wishing to artistically express the difficulties of communicating with his son Ben who had cerebral palsy, ‘Trans’ didn’t work.

‘We R In Control’ and ‘Computer Cowboy’ both sounded like Metal Mickey fronting THE EAGLES while ‘Sample And Hold’ was an excessively long robotic march. However, there was an almost ethereal ‘Neon Lights’-like beauty in ‘Transformer Man’. Although there were still enough essential elements for ‘Trans’ to be nothing but a Neil Young album, it baffled his fans and was lambasted by the real music brigade. “I could never get anybody to believe that the f***ing idea was any good” said Young looking back, perhaps because it wasn’t in Young’s instinctive musical DNA to effectively use electronics. Indeed, he was later sued by his label Geffen Records for producing “deliberately uncommercial and unrepresentative work”!

Best Track: ‘Transformer Man’

‘Trans’ was originally released by Geffen Records

http://www.neilyoung.com

Text by Chi Ming Lai
18th April 2011

STEPHEN MORRIS Interview

15 March 2011 / electricityclub

Photo by Trevor Key

In 1977, Stephen Morris answered a small ad for a drummer placed by a punk band named WARSAW. The story goes that when he met Ian Curtis, Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook outside Strangeways Prison, he thought Hooky was Sumner’s dad!

They soon changed their name to JOY DIVISION and influenced by THE VELVET UNDERGROUND, Iggy Pop and David Bowie, refined their sound into a more intense industrial art rock that all but invented Goth. Under the management guidance of Rob Gretton, they soon came to the attention of Tony Wilson, TV personality and impresario of Factory Records after Curtis called him a c*** before one of their gigs!

JOY DIVISION’s first album ‘Unknown Pleasures’ was released in 1979 and gained plaudits the world over with many hailing it as one of the best debut albums of all time. Although largely a guitar based record produced by the wayward genius of Martin Hannett and seasoned with his AMS Digital Delay, it was also notable for Morris’ use of electronic percussion effects on tracks such as ‘Insight’ and ‘She’s Lost Control’. “I’d always wanted to be a drum machine” said Morris, commenting on his very clean and precise drumming style.

Developing at a ferocious rate and adding further layered grandeur, the glorious ‘Atmosphere’ showcased an increasing interest in synthesizers and technology which then deeply coloured their 1980 follow-up ‘Closer’. However, the world knows what happened next and the haunting delivery of Ian Curtis matched with the beautiful sonic architecture of ‘Closer’ only substantiated the eventual myth and legacy of JOY DIVISION. Reconvening in late 1980, Morris, Hook and Sumner chose the name NEW ORDER as a symbol of their fresh start

After deciding against recruiting a new vocalist, they took turns at singing in rehearsals. Interestingly, it was Morris’ voice that was considered the best but with his distaste for singing drummers like “Phil Collins and him out of The Eagles”, duties initially fell to both Sumner and Hook. To complete the line-up, Morris’ girlfriend and later wife, Gillian Gilbert was recruited on keyboards and guitar. Around this time, Morris also took to playing synths himself.

Although already fans of electronic music through Ian Curtis’ love of KRAFTWERK’s ‘Trans-Europe Express’, horizons were expanding in many ways for NEW ORDER with exposure to the New York dance scene, Giorgio Moroder and Italo disco. Morris purchased his first drum machine and used it to pulse the sequencer-like patterns that dominated their transitional singles ‘Everything’s Gone Green’ and ‘Temptation’.

But it was the necessitated replacement of all their original equipment after it was stolen in 1982 during a tour of America that the technical dance revolution began. Into the synthesizer arsenal came the Prophet5, its corresponding Polysequencer with its mini cassette data dump and the Emulator sampler while most crucially on the percussion side came the Oberheim DMX digital drum computer.

It was while they were getting to grips with this incumbent technology and driven by the need to compose a track which could play itself for encores that ‘Blue Monday’ came about. Based on an earlier 20 minute composition entitled ‘Prime 586’ (later released as ‘Video 586’) which was used on the opening night of Factory’s iconic club The Hacienda, its rhythmical stutter was the accidental result of Morris trying to recreate the drum patterns of Donna Summer’s ‘Our Love’ on the DMX! The resultant seven and a half minute track which John Peel dubbed “Pink Floyd go disco” was housed in a stark Peter Saville designed sleeve based on the 5 inch floppy disc used by the Emulator. It became the biggest selling 12 inch single of all time.

The rest as they say is history and NEW ORDER’s contribution to electronic dance music continued with singles such as ‘Confusion’, ‘Thieves Like Us’, ‘The Perfect Kiss’, ‘Bizarre Love Triangle’ and ‘Round & Round’. The ‘England’s Dreaming’ writer Jon Savage said “it was incredible that this very dark gloomy gothic rock group became disco divas”.

However, during a hiatus between the ‘Technique’ and ‘Republic’ albums, Morris and Gilbert embarked on their own project, ironically named THE OTHER TWO in response to Sumner’s ELECTRONIC and Hooky’s REVENGE. Their 1991 debut single ‘Tasty Fish’ was a wonderful slice of female fronted electropop but the failure of Factory Records to get the CD single into the shops despite radio airplay contributed to the song stalling at No41. What was not known at the time though was that Factory was on the brink of collapse so THE OTHER TWO’s first long player ‘And You’ wasn’t released until late 1993 as part of the deal which saw NEW ORDER sign to London Records.

Morris and Gilbert married in 1994 but there was a long break before NEW ORDER got back together in 1998 for some triumphant comeback shows at Manchester Apollo and the Reading Festival which also featured JOY DIVISION numbers such as ‘Heart & Soul’, ‘Atmosphere’ and ‘Isolation’. THE OTHER TWO released a second album called ‘Superhighways’ in 1999 but not long after, Gillian Gilbert formally left NEW ORDER for family reasons. The remaining trio continued but after two primarily rock based albums ‘Get Ready’ and ‘Waiting For The Sirens’ Call’, NEW ORDER appeared to have called it a day for good.

Hooky has since taken ‘Unknown Pleasures’ out on a live tour of the world while Sumner has formed BAD LIEUTENANT with Morris joining him on the drum stool. Meanwhile, following all the renewed interest in JOY DIVISION from the Anton Corbijn directed biopic ‘Control’, Morris has also been involved in the remastering process for the lavish vinyl boxed set ‘+- : Singles 1976-1980’.

Continuing ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK’s series of interviews with drummers involved in the development of electronic pop music, Stephen Morris gives a fascinating and amusing insight into how he harnessed new technology with not just one but two of the most important bands from the post punk era. He also adds his thoughts on the disastrous NEW ORDER deluxe remasters, the state of the music industry and the possibility of Susan Boyle covering JOY DIVISION!

What inspired you to get your first synth drum?

Getting the first synth drum, it was a bit of confusion actually! *laughs*

On the cover of the British version of CAN’s ‘Tago Mago’, behind the drummer there’s this thing which I now know is an amplifier! But when I was young, we used to wonder what this was before we knew how groups worked and what gear was. We thought about it and we came up with the conclusion that it must be a drum synthesizer because that must be how Jaki Liebezeit got those sounds. That’s what convinced me that I must have one.

When I actually saw one, I think it was a Synare I in a music shop in Manchester. What I really liked about it was that it had a handle… it was like a suitcase and the fact that it had a handle, I thought that was cool because you could carry this thing about. When I actually got a drum synthesizer, it was the Synare III.

Is that the one in Kevin Cummins’ book?

Yes, and it just made disco sounds… y’know “booo-booooo”! *laughs*

I used that sound on ‘Insight’ and spent a lot of time trying to find other sounds that you could get out of it! It was alright but it was quite difficult to twiddle the knobs and play drums at the same time. And also, I didn’t quite understand how a Moog ladder filter worked which is why when you listen to bootlegs of ‘Insight’… basically you’d krank the resonance up and it would turn into tweeting birds for these weird freak out breaks but of because of this filter, the volume went up by 10!

So yeah, in a lot of bootlegs, that’s all you can hear! I cringe nowadays but I could only turn one knob. I couldn’t turn up the resonance and turn down the volume so I was hoping someone else would turn it down!

Photo by Kevin Cummins

Was it your synth drum that made those quite vicious Native American attacks on tracks like ‘Interzone’ and ‘The Sound Of Music’?

No! That’s Ian making those noises! They were Ian’s vocal techniques! The unusual noise that I like the best is on ‘Atrocity Exhibition’. By then, I had a Synare III and a Simmons SDSVI so we got the Synare out and put it through this horrible fuzz box… we used to do a track of stuff and not listen to the music. There’s noises like a pig being slaughtered… that was me!

The two versions of ‘She’s Lost Control’ are quite different, but both their rhythmical templates were quite significant in the development of the JOY DIVISION sound. So how did your percussion parts on the ‘Unknown Pleasures’ version come about?

That was using the Synare to do the “tschak-tschak” noises and it was supposed to be like a Phil Spector thing, not playing a snare drum like a snare drum. That’s what the idea of that one was.

Are those electronic toms or was that your acoustic ones being put through one of producer Martin Hannett’s boxes?

The idea with Martin with drums was he just wanted complete separation because he wanted to process every bit of the drum kit separately. That’s why he made you play every drum one at a time. The Marshall Time Modulator was what we used a lot to make them not really sound like toms, it kind of sounded really dead like “plomp-plomp-plomp” noises!

How did you find working with Martin Hannett? Did he really ask you to play “faster but slower”?

Yes! You just get used to it, you have to be in a kind of ‘Zen’ frame of mind! *laughs*

With our stuff, it was ok because I knew what I was doing and that was alright. But I did a session with him for John Cooper-Clarke and it was the same sort of deal.

Because I didn’t know what the hell I was supposed to be doing, I just got really frustrated… I just kept breaking sticks, drumheads and everything because it was “what the hell does he want me to do now?”, I just got really angry! Not with Martin, but you start hitting things very hard and vent your spleen! He wasn’t impressed!

Why did you record a second version of ‘She’s Lost Control’?

Why did we re-record it? Because the thing at the time was the 12 inch disco single, which sounds daft when you say it now. But it was a thing in itself and you could make the record really loud and dynamic. That was what we wanted to do with ‘She’s Lost Control’, but we had ‘Atmosphere’ on the other side which spoiled it because that has to be the most un-disco song going! But that was the idea of doing a 12 inch. It was kind of a really big drum fest thing and it’s all real drums as in the Synare did most of it. And the aerosol…

So the clip in ‘Control’ depicting you and the aerosol can during the recording of that is true?

Yes, that was a true story… that one actually happened! *laughs*

It was absolutely stupid like, because it’s just playing one of those “tschak-tschak” Synare parts and Martin made me go into a vocal booth with a can of tape head cleaner which is highly flammable and poisonous! So I’m in this confined space that’s slowly filling up and I come out of it in completely dazed… if I’d had lit a cigarette, that whole place would have gone up!

The influence of CAN’s Jaki Liebezeit is quite apparent in JOY DIVISION but on ‘Closer’, things like ‘Isolation, ‘Decades’ and ‘The Eternal’ had quite electronically derived rhythms. How did the shift take place and how involved were you in creating those sounds?

‘Closer’ is the album where I think I’m probably most proud of the drumming because it’s really good, that is what I wanted to do. On ‘Unknown Pleasures’, it was a bit of a punky crossover thing on it. When we did ‘Closer’, I found my niche… it was kind of a disco tribal thing, really happy with the drumming on that. I would have loved to have done more of it because when we got to NEW ORDER, I made a conscious decision not to do that anymore! *laughs*

We had Martin’s ARP2600 and the sequencer that goes with it on ‘The Eternal’, there’s a f*** up in the middle of it and you couldn’t drop in so we left it and it sounds like I’ve done it but was a machine!

And there was our CR78 nightmare… have you ever tried programming one? Me and Martin, we were very keen on smoking pot and we hired one in for ‘Decades’. There was this very small black rubber pad, you put that into the programming thing, “press programme switch while holding… “, it’s just a mad Roland thing and it doesn’t make any sense! We spent the best part of a day trying to programme this bloody thing… I couldn’t do it and he couldn’t do it. In the end we just used the bossa nova thing on it. It wasn’t fun, but I think it was the only time I’ve seen Martin as baffled as me! *laughs*

Photo by Anton Corbijn

Do you think JOY DIVISION would have ended up sounding how NEW ORDER eventually sounded?

To a certain extent, yes. We were going down that road with ‘Closer’ because we were using a lot more synthesizers and using them in a more rhythmic way. It would have been like that, but possibly not quite as disco!

Was that Bernard with his Italo disco records?

It was all of us. The NEW ORDER Italian disco thing, it was a friend of Bernard’s, because everybody did cassettes. We’d drive in the car listening to these cassettes and it was either Kiss FM from New York or these bloody Italian disco things! We thought it would be great to do something like this, but we’d no idea how to go about it. *laughs*

What was your first drum machine?

It was just after ‘Closer’ that I got the first affordable programmable drum machine, the Boss Dr Rhythm DR55 and that was on the early NEW ORDER stuff like ‘Truth’… I think there’s even a version of ‘In A Lonely Place’ we did with the drum machine, it didn’t work out too well *laughs*

I really liked the sound of drum boxes like the Minipops, the CR78 and the old Wurlitzer ones. They make you think of a weird place; it’s not quite science fiction, it’s not disco, they’re old but new! It’s a bit like a 1950s film, the vibe I get off them. I love the ones that don’t sound like drums, I like their crude attempts at Latin percussion.

You started playing keyboards around this time. What inspired you to do this, were you getting bored of drums at this point?

I wasn’t bored, it was that we had to be different. The hardest thing in the world is to be different, it’s not easy! The thing about NEW ORDER is we never know what we’re doing, but we know what we don’t want to do. It’s by avoiding other things you don’t want to do, that you end up at what you do want to do!

Did I want play keyboards? I’m the world’s most reluctant keyboard player, I didn’t really want to but it happened early on because there was just the three of us. It just happened that Bernard can’t sing and play guitar at the same time, Hooky can’t sing and play bass, and I just can’t sing playing anything!

So I ended up playing keyboards. We got the ARP Omni towards the end of JOY DIVISION for ‘Closer’ after using an ARP Solina earlier. So I ended up playing that with the drum machine on top. So there was me playing keyboards and switching patterns on the Dr Rhythm and they laughed at me for saying I should write down these patterns on a piece of paper… they didn’t know what was coming a few years down the line!

Was it this drum machine that clocked into the ARP to get the pulsing thing you had on ‘Everything’s Gone Green’?

That’s right, although there wasn’t much potential of that with the Omni, it was when we got the ARP Quadra that you could do that. It was taking the trigger out of the drum machine and bunging it into the ‘trigger in’.

Did you design a circuit box to step up the pulse in order to do that?

No, it was just plugging a lead in! Eventually we did with other equipment and a lot of that stuff. We were lucky because Martin had a friend, Martin Usher who was an electronics genius, he was absolutely fantastic. Whenever he was around, nothing would ever break down.

At one point, we took him to Australia just in case the gear broke down and it never did. But as soon as you sent him away, it broke down again! He helped a lot. He sorted out the box to step it up when we moved on after the Dr Rhythm. There was a home organ company called Clef in Bramhall down the road who had a thing called a Master Rhythm which was a rip-off of the Dr Rhythm! We got that modified so you could get a separate audio out of each sound and we needed that box to step it up to trigger. It had loads of switches on it so you could switch the triggers on and off.

Everyone talks about ‘Everything’s Gone Green’ being a sequencer number but it wasn’t really?

No, 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.

So the track that eventually became ‘Video 586’ was your turning point into actually using a sequencer?That’s right, Bernard and Martin Usher built a Powertran 1024 Sequencer. The Powertran Transcendent 2000 was the first JOY DIVISION synth; fantastic kit synth, there’s a guy in Australia started doing a rack mount of them, but he’s never finished it.

I’d love to get one of them, I keep checking on his website… it’s Chris Huggett, the guy who went on and did EDP who made Wasps and had some vague EMS connection in the dawn of cheap British synthesizers! Have you ever seen the sequencer? You’ve got two rows of knobs which have got numbers on which come up in a numeric display.

You used the knobs to put in the start / stop addresses and they’re all in kind of decimal. And then you’ve this LED thermometer-like display which I eventually worked out was actually showing what the pitch was, but in hexadecimal… we used to have these stoned conversations about what hexadecimal meant!! The thing was you had to be very precise about what you put in the start / stop addresses because if you got it wrong, you got a completely different tune! And we got a few tunes that way! *laughs*

It was absolute murder to use live, you couldn’t see! It was like cracking a safe! God knows how Gillian and Bernard did it but it was clocked off the Master Rhythm. We went through a few synths; there was the Powertran, we used a Pro-One for a bit and then later got the Moog Source which was the ‘Blue Monday’ bass.

The acquisition of your first digital drum machine in the beloved Oberheim DMX of course gave you ‘Blue Monday’. It must have been like night and day compared with your Boss Dr Rhythm but how was it trying to synch up this state of the art technology with the Polysequencers in those pre-MIDI days.

It was fine, I never had a problem with syncing it up because it was just a clock really. I have honestly come full circle and getting back into it again now. I’m just rediscovering the joys of sending a 1/16th pulse from here, you can’t go wrong with a 1/16th pulse; a nice little square wave… that just drove everything. It’s hard to explain to people but roadies used to get it wrong: “all you’ve got to do is take this lead here, plug it into that hole there and I press this button and it all just works”… never did!

So DMX versus the LinnDrum, why did you go for the DMX?

It was cheaper! LinnDrums were a couple of thousand pounds!

I’ve just been going on about how great old drum machines that don’t sound like drums were, but the thing that sold me on the digital drum machine was a thing on ‘Old Grey Whistle Test’ when it was Stevie Wonder, I can’t remember what he was doing… the double album?

It was him in the studio programming the LinnDrum and it was fantastic, really funky! I thought “bloody hell, I have to get one of those!” There were two; the LinnDrum was more expensive and you couldn’t tune the bass drum on it. Whereas the DMX was less reliable in every respect, but you could tune the bass drum! And that was my justification! It was absolutely a nightmare the first DMX! *laughs*

It got you that stutter on ‘Blue Monday’…

… oh yeah, that was another accident because you’ve just got the 3 levels of velocity and I programmed it. I just hung this riff and programmed it in using the same dynamics as I heard it. In the end, I got so frustrated and put everything in on the loudest one, and they all went “That’s it! That’s it!”… I didn’t think it would turn into a trademark.

You once tried to sell your drum kit during a Radio1 interview in 1983 and declared drums “a bit redundant”. What was your mindset then towards how electronic instrumentation was developing at that time?

I was probably very paranoid, I think I was fearing for my job but I might have been joking as well *laughs*

From what you’ve been telling me about the amount of kit you were getting through, technology was moving at a phenomenal pace. Then early 1985 in ‘Electronics & Music Maker’ magazine, NEW ORDER said they hoped to get either a Fairlight or Synclavier to get round the issues of having to actually connect equipment together for live work?

Yes, that’s right.

Are you glad didn’t get either of those two white elephants? What circumstances allowed you to by-pass the Fairlight / Synclavier thing which your contemporaries were later stuck with?

I think basically they let Bernard and Hooky try it out! *laughs*

There used to be this synthesizer place in London called Syco Systems. I used to go there and ogle at technology. What we used to do was take the Pro-One, because you could get a fantastic bass sound out of it. We’d go to the poor guy with the PPG Wave 2.3 and get him to make it sound like a Pro-One!

I’d go “that sounds nothing like it” and they’d keep putting reverb on it because everything sounds better with reverb… I’d be going “Turn the reverb off! Turn the reverb off!” *laughs*

Why did we never get a Fairlight or Synclavier? They were far too expensive to really justify it plus of course, we had The Hacienda! *laughs*

That was the big thing at the end of the day that was one of Martin Hannett’s disagreements. He wanted to buy a Fairlight, everyone else wanted a club so there you go, you can’t have both!

As NEW ORDER became more successful, you and Gillian started getting involved in soundtrack work?

How we got involved was NEW ORDER had agreed to do the music to this programme ‘Making Out’ which was when we were doing ‘Technique’. While we were still doing the album, what would happen was the programme makers would go “we need the music”, so me and Gillian set up in a little room at Real World and started cutting up bits of ‘Technique’, taking bits off the sequencers and locking it up to the pictures and all that. We decided that ‘Vanishing Point’ had to be the theme. We’d never done it before and really enjoyed it.

I did find working with pictures very liberating. It’s fantastic how you can write a piece to music to pictures, and then when you take the pictures away and listen to the music again, it turns into something else. So NEW ORDER were too busy and you just couldn’t do it with four people. When you do music for TV, it’s all tight deadlines which is like, not the way NEW ORDER work! *laughs*

We got into the habit of writing stuff, even though they were just like a load of riffs. You’d spot where you wanted the bits and slot them in, then watch it back, think that its great, record it and add a little production. Eventually it became obvious it wasn’t NEW ORDER doing it and it took a while to persuade people to have our name on it and not NEW ORDER’s… not because we were blowing our own trumpet, but it was Trade Descriptions Act.

And the ‘Reportage’ Theme turned into ‘World In Motion’?

Yes, the opening music for ‘Reportage’ became ‘World In Motion’. I really enjoy doing soundtrack stuff, but now it’s become very overpopulated because everyone realises it’s quite a good thing to do and now, there’s no money in it!

Did it inadvertently make it more difficult to get back together as NEW ORDER after ‘Technique’ for what became ‘Republic’?

There was never any question of the soundtrack work being a reason for us not getting back together, because the number of things I turned down because I had to do NEW ORDER… to the detriment of myself.

The soundtrack stuff mutated into THE OTHER TWO?

Yeah, we’re doing another one now… they’re all got this same gestation process in that they start off as these things for TV, you get really attached to them and you twist one or two of them into being songs. Some of them never turn into songs, but you get persuaded by the record company or someone that you have to get a singer! So we tried to get a singer and then Gillian ended up doing it which is great, she’s really good at it.

THE OTHER TWO’s ‘Tasty Fish’ and ‘Selfish’ are two of the greatest lost pop singles? Discuss…

I think so… the ‘Selfish’ remix on YouTube, I was astounded at the number of hits that got! And I’m thinking “Bloody hell, did we do this?” *laughs*

‘Tasty Fish’… we were terribly sh*t at titles!

I loved the title… it was really funny and I remember seeing the fish ‘n’ chip shop in Stockport that you got it from. I thought it was going to be a hit, but you couldn’t find the CD single in the shops!!

No, you couldn’t! But there you go!

Was it a Factory thing?

Yes, it was a bit. I’m not bitter about Factory at all and I’m not going to moan about it, because it was fantastic. But at that particular time, the money wasn’t going in the right way!

Do you think if you and Gillian had done THE OTHER TWO full time, you could have been as successful as say SAINT ETIENNE or DUBSTAR?

No, we’re completely the wrong kind of people! I’ve tried but it never works! *roars of laughter*

We’ve got a track on THE OTHER TWO’s website called ‘Sawdust’ which is ‘Movin’ On’ remixed by Moby. I was talking to him and I said “imagine if KRAFTWERK had been a country and western band, think about that” and he did this remix of it which was only half finished. I thought it was fantastic and the record company said “it needs a bit more work”, smelling a hit. We went and did a bit more work on it, thinking “fantastic, it could be a hit” and Gillian just said “No way! I’m not going on ‘Top Of The Pops’ with a pig under my arm!” So there you go, we’d never be popstars *laughs*

You know how tapes disintegrate? I thought DATs would last forever, they’re the worst! So I’ve got this on / off project transferring all the old DATs and TV stuff that we did. When you go through it, it has to be from beginning to end. And you have to get the tracking right and hope it stays in… there goes 2 hours of your life! Some of the stuff that never came out, I’m just using it as a vehicle to put on this website and I’ve got to put some more on.

So there’s a new EP from THE OTHER TWO?

Yes, we’re doing the EP at the minute, but there’s three things going. The first, how the hell this has happened I don’t know but it’s a typical cart before the horse thing… we have a sleeve but no record! Peter Saville and his partner Anna did this exhibition in France and wanted some music. He wanted it to sound like a club in the next room! So we did this track and he had a sleeve, but they were only on sale at the exhibition. Now that’s over, I can finish it. When you put it on your record player, you’ll think there’s something really wrong with your stereo! *laughs*

That’s turning into EP No1 and it’s called ‘Swing’. That should be out in the next couple of months. Then there’s THE OTHER TWO album, but I don’t really like saying that I’m doing an album as it takes a year out of your life.

I think artists are put under too much pressure to do albums…

Yes, I do… CDs didn’t help because when you did CDs, you had to do like, 15 tracks! And it’s just too much. So this is probably going to be in blocks of 4s or 5s, that’s the plan at the minute.

You played your comeback show at Manchester Apollo in 1998, I made the journey from down south specially and it was all quite emotional…

…you must have been the only person there we didn’t know then!

The return of NEW ORDER saw the band head back into a more guitar dominated rock sound with ‘Get Ready’. What drove that and did you ever miss working with the computers and the synths?

That’s the bloody odd thing, there’s probably more computers on that!

It’s crazy but I’m getting into doing electronic music again, but not on computers. Because nowadays, it’s just chopping up, using the computer to record live drums on and getting them to sound fantastic. They’re a great tool, I’m not knocking computers but there’s not much room for serendipity, for something to happen immediately.

It’s not impossible, it does happen occasionally but you just get locked into that looking at a screen thing and not listening to it. There’s too much information, too many ways of doing stuff. They’re not inspirational although I find Ableton Live software quite inspirational because of the stuff you can do with that. It’s nearly the exception to the rule. Most things are linear and you get into that way of writing with beginning-middle-end and you want it all to look nice and neat. I never used to, but I do get quite obsessive now. It’s not a great way of doing music. But that’s what everyone does.

Were you quite happy with the more guitar driven sound?

It was something different because we’d been away for a bit. It was really working with Steve Osborne, he did a really great job on that because he twisted it so it was more guitary but it wasn’t kind of a rawk thing… he did something really clever with it. It was a bit difficult because it’s like what I was saying about being different… it’s very hard to know.

I honestly think it’s not a good idea to say “Right, I’m going to be different”, but it’s just the NEW ORDER way… “we can’t do that again”!

Are you sad NEW ORDER ended the way it did? Did it finish on a satisfactory note for you?

I never say never really. I personally after ‘Republic’, I thought that was it, I really did. And then something happens and all of a sudden, you’re back doing it again for another 10 years! *laughs*

I had all that in the 90s about when people asked whether NEW ORDER would get back together again. I said “No, that’s it” and you just feel bloody stupid when you do! It’s something I don’t really like in bands, it makes me think they’re terribly indecisive when they can’t decide whether they’re alive or dead. Maybe we should call the next album ‘Schrödinger’s Cat’! *laughs*

I’ve heard that NEW ORDER have got an album’s worth of material in the can, is that true?

Not an album’s worth but we’ve got 7 songs left in various states of assembly. And they’re pretty good. Doing an EP of them will be a great thing to do. It will happen one day, I’m sure it will. It’ll keep the record company going on…

Another boxed set? *laughs*

Yeah, I love boxed sets… I’ve just bought a Robert Wyatt one. It’s a terrible addiction! All my money’s going on boxed sets!

Did you get the KRAFTWERK one?

Yes, that’s over there… I smell it frequently! *chuckles*

NEW ORDER’s back catalogue was reissued as deluxe editions by Warners, but many fans were unhappy about the quality of the remastering, particularly the bonus material. What are your thoughts on that?

Oh Christ! *sighs*

How many cock-ups can a record company make? And you thought Factory were bad? It’s not just the record company, it was a recession led cock-up, the remasters. Originally, the record company wanted to remaster certain recordings, I think they wanted to do 2 or 3 and we said “NO, DO THEM ALL!” but they said no. So we said “DO THE FACTORY ONES!” and they begrudgingly said yes.

Basically, it was just as the recession hit and what happened was the albums got done by John Davies at Alchemy but they folded. All the mastering rooms in London went, I think there’s only Metropolis left. They were halfway through and had done the albums, but not the bonus discs. We were trying to put the bonus discs together and the record company ended up finding any old studio, I think it was somebody’s shed! They did it off really old Sony 1610 digital tapes on badly maintained 1610 players. Unless they are properly maintained, they just kick and add noise etc and that’s what happened.

It was just terrible which is a shame, I wasn’t happy with the whole thing! It was just a f***ing disaster! And we’d been told the tape library was a nightmare and tapes didn’t exist so we went down and had a look. Sure enough, there are all the bloody tapes! “So why didn’t you use the proper analogue tapes?”

Anyway, no use crying over spilt milk. But when we got in, got our hands dirty and started sorting it out, it was perfectly straightforward. It’s the old thing of “if you want something doing, do it yourself”! Somebody else wouldn’t know what the ‘spaghetti western’ version was, because the titles don’t make sense to the untrained observer. So you’ve got to know a bit and be able to decipher the code! *laughs*

But it was a really good experience. We went through loads of tapes, started sorting it out and we kind of fixed all the bonus discs, but then they cocked up sending people the fixed bonus discs, so that was a waste of time! *laughs*

It wasn’t really, because it gave me an idea of what was where, plus what you could do and what you couldn’t do.

Photo by Anton Corbijn

Was your direct involvement in remastering the ‘+-‘ JOY DIVISION box set prompted by this sorry episode?

Yes, I quite enjoyed doing it, but it was more of a nostalgia thing. I’m sure people think it’s us wanting to do these bloody JOY DIVISION boxed sets, because I thought ‘Still’ was enough.

All this “oh, we want to do a JOY DIVISION singles boxed set” and there’s me going “RIGHT! WE’LL DO THIS ONE!”

How do you feel about the music industry in general?

I find it a bit depressing really because of the state that the record companies are in. The internet is great and it’s probably going to be its saving grace, but they’ve just let the boat sail.

I had late night rants with people from Warner Brothers and asked them what they were going to do about the internet and they said “oh, we’ve got the best copy protection money can buy!”… THERE IS NO COPY PROTECTION, what are you on about?

I hated copy protection; it made your CDs jump which cheesed me off!

It was just boll*cks! How do you think copy protection is going to help you? It will hinder you and people will just get round it anyway! You’re thinking about it the wrong way!

You’re part of BAD LIEUTENANT with Bernard Sumner but appear to have a lower profile involvement. Is that a deliberate strategy?

BAD LIEUTENANT? I have a job explaining this to people! At the start, it was Bernard, Jake Evans and Phil Cunningham. They did a bit of writing early on, but I couldn’t do it so they went off and did the record. Then when they came to do some gigs, they asked if I’d do some drumming. So I said I’d do it, I’ve only turned down the odd TV thing. Fortunately, they seem to think because I keep turning up for these things, I’m part of the act now… speak to BAD LIEUTENANT!! *laughs*

What are you up to at the moment?

As well as THE OTHER TWO album, we’re writing the BAD LIEUTENANT album at the same time.

What are your favourite pieces of work from your career?

‘Closer’! On that to be specific, ‘Colony’ and probably ‘Atrocity Exhibition’. Of THE OTHER TWO, ‘Tasty Fish’ because it should have been a hit. And NEW ORDER, I really like the B-side of ‘Temptation’ which was called ‘Hurt’ but because I’ve got all these live videos of us… we used to do it and it went on for ages. After ‘Video 586’, ‘Hurt’ was when we got into the extended electro jam thing and some of the versions of that are fantastic. The single doesn’t really do it justice!

Now, I read this in your interview with GQ… so is it true that Susan Boyle is going to do a JOY DIVISION cover?

That’ll be ‘Atrocity Exhibition’!

IS THAT FOR REAL?!?

IS IT? OF COURSE IT ISN’T TRUE!! IT’S BOLL*CKS! *laughs*

It’s a nice idea, it’s because her album’s called ‘The Gift’ and I thought “bloody hell, Susan Boyle’s done ‘The Gift ‘by THE VELVET UNDERGROUND! That’s pretty wild, I wonder if she’d be interested in doing ‘Atrocity Exhibition’”… obviously it’s not THE VELVET UNDERGROUND’s ‘The Gift’, it’s another one! *laughs*

… although she did ‘Perfect Day’!

Yeah, I’ve not heard that! *laughs*

Are you still collecting tanks?

I would if I had any more room, I’ve got 4, I can’t squeeze anymore in. I’ve got loads of outstanding tank jobs to do and time’s running out!

Is that for those re-enactments?

Oh, those things are wild. Those re-enactment people? Oh no, I’m not one of those… I’ve seen it and observed it from the periphery. Historical re-enactment societies, it’s a bit like The Sealed Knot where you do the English Civil War. It’s great that some people like that; I’m not going to knock it. What’s different makes the world go round but I can’t see it myself. And I just worry about the mindset you’ve got to have to start dressing up as the Waffen SS, it’s not good!

I’ve heard all sorts of stories about things like that. They sent it up on ‘Peep Show’…

… yes, that’s what it’s like!

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to Stephen Morris

Special thanks to Rebecca Boulton at Prime Management and John Saunders

JOY DIVISION ‘+- : Singles 1976-1980’ is still available as a 10 x 7 inch boxed set or as a download album

Kevin Cummins’ photobooks ‘Joy Division’ and ‘New Order’ are available through a variety of retail outlets

http://www.neworder.com/

http://theothertwo.co.uk

https://twitter.com/stephenpdmorris

https://soundcloud.com/the-other-two

http://www.neworderonline.com/

http://www.worldinmotion.net

http://www.kevincummins.co.uk/

Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
15th March 2011

IS THAT THE TWELVE INCH MIX?

8 January 2011 / electricityclub

‘Is That The Twelve Inch Mix?’ is a new book about the history of remix culture by author Rob Grillo whose previous publications have included the best seller ‘Anoraknophobia’.

Featuring a foreword by Martyn Ware, Rob affectionately traces the development of record collecting and describes it as “A light-hearted look at the 1980s, the rise and rise of the remix and the twelve inch single… and The Human League”.

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK is pleased to be able to publish three extracts from this excellent book…

From the past until completion…

Of course, the record that is synonymous with the twelve inch single is ‘Blue Monday’ by New Order. Initially released only in twelve inch format in 1983, there was no regular seven inch pressing available to the public.

This was nothing new: twelve months earlier Motown’s Gary Byrd & The GB Experience had hit the top ten in the UK with ‘The Crown’, in twelve inch and cassingle only. And ABBA, of all acts, achieved a similar feat in 1981 with ‘Lay All Your Love On Me’: that didn’t even have a cassingle to help it reach number seven.

However, ‘Blue Monday’ captured the record buying public’s imagination, and it became the biggest selling twelve inch single ever, eventually selling over a million copies in the UK alone. The single initially reached number twelve, before climbing again to number nine later in the year.

The first pressings, in a floppy disc sleeve designed by Peter Saville, proved far more expensive to manufacture than at first envisaged, although claims that each copy sold lost the record company money are a little wide of the mark. Later pressings did see a slightly simpler sleeve used, but one which still did not display too obviously either the title of the song or the name of the band.

Unless you also owned a copy of the band’s subsequent album ‘Power Corruption and Lies’, the coloured blocks on the ‘Blue Monday’ sleeve meant nothing: as only the album sleeve contained the key to deciphering this series of blocks, you were none the wiser. Many people who bought the album were still none the wiser. This hardly affected sales, though: most record buyers knew exactly what they were looking for when they went into their local store to purchase the single, and most record store assistants would have known exactly what do should they have been met with any enquiries.

To confuse matters, some pressings of the single came with the centre labels placed on the wrong sides, thus confusing some purchasers about which track was ‘Blue Monday’ and which was the B-side, a dub version of the track called ‘The Beach’. The song itself is rumoured to have been recorded initially to test out some new technology (a drum machine in layman’s terms), but also to satisfy audiences who criticised the band for not performing encores at their concerts. New Order could perform an extra part of their set with minimal effort – walk on stage, press a button, and, hey presto, ‘Blue Monday’!

Of the tracks that are reputed to have influenced the track itself, Sylvester’s disco classic ‘You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)’ is probably the best known. Ironically, as Factory Records were not members of the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) – in other words they were an indie label – ‘Blue Monday’ never attained its initial gold status (awarded for 400,000 units for singles in the UK).

The track eventually appeared as a regular seven inch single in 1988, when it was reissued in a remixed format. There was a further UK reissue, featuring various new mixes, in 1995, and the track has been sampled and covered by a number of acts in recent years.

More notoriously, and mentioned elsewhere, Bobby Orlando and Divine ripped off the track for their HI-NRG monster ‘Love Reaction’. New Order didn’t bother taking legal action – the success of’ ‘Love Reaction’ no doubt contributed to further sales for ‘Blue Monday’ itself.

In more recent times a mash up with Kylie Minogue’s ‘Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’ has been given official licence as ‘Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’. The Factory story, and the almost anarchic way in which business was done, has been told many times, but at least New Order themselves were able to make a little money from the new twelve inch format. This was not always the case. George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley were originally handed a golden spoon by Mark Dean’s CBS subsidiary Innervision in 1981. Their hastily signed deal allowed them little in the way of proceeds from regular single and album sales, and even less from twelve inch sales – where they earned not a penny from each copy sold to the public.

It took a while for recording deals to recognise and catch up with the phenomenon. As the late ’80s brought important changes to the release of singles in general – the twelve inch single at the forefront of these – it was inevitable that in order to keep pace, the way in which singles charts were compiled would also have to change. The twelve inch single was of course not the only format alongside the traditional seven inch vinyl pressing. As mentioned previously, record companies dabbled with different variations of the cassette single – or cassingle as it was often known. There were early trends towards releasing a ‘cassingle’ with two tracks, basically the A- and B-sides, an identical alternative to the seven inch.

Later a cassette of twelve inch tracks was preferred, selling for roughly the same price as twelve inch vinyl. There were coloured vinyl twelve inch discs and picture disc twelve inch singles too. Neither of these was an original idea, having been around for over a decade in their seven inch guises. There was also the occasional far more obscure ten inch record. OMD with ‘Souvenir’ and the Pet Shop Boys with ‘West End Girls’ offered mixes on their ten inch pressings that were at the time unavailable elsewhere, but generally the ten inch was a rare commodity, and certainly a pain in the arse to play if your old-style turntable had automatic settings for seven or twelve inch vinyl only!

For those with an eye to detail we salute you…

Take 12ZTAS1 for example. Or rather, one of the most controversial yet brilliant singles of the ’80s – Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s ‘Relax’.

Now many readers will own, or will have owned in the past, a twelve inch copy of this track – the Sex Mix is indicated on the sleeve and label. Except that the chances are this was not actually the Sex mix at all. It was most probably the US mix. Unless you’re a real collector or a huge fan of Frankie Goes To Hollywood, you’ll never have known the difference. Ignore the label: it probably isn’t the Sex mix. Well, this is the story.

Producer Trevor Horn recorded several variations of this track (including an unreleased Warp mix, which was a seven inch white vinyl promo-only release). When it was initially released we were given the seven inch mix (actually the Move or Suck It mix) and a sixteen minute Sex mix on twelve inch, with initial pressings at 33rpm and later ones at 45rpm – all with the catalogue number 12ZTAS1. This Sex mix actually contained none of the song itself, but was a rather peculiar track that featured Holly Johnson rambling on to himself together with several rather odd noises created in the studio by Trevor Horn, all overlaid by a tribal beat and culminating in what was supposed to be a fulfilling climax (in the literal sense!). It didn’t go down too well in the clubs.

One of the criticisms was that it was far too long and never actually managed to get out of second gear, so it was difficult to dance to. An alternative mix was produced, therefore – an eight-minute edit of the Sex mix called the New York mix. It had the same catalogue number, and the only way you can tell the difference between this and the 45rpm Sex mix is by looking at the matrix number etched onto the inner vinyl (12ISZTAS1 to be precise). There was no indication anywhere that this wasn’t the Sex mix.

Unfortunately this new mix did little to stem criticism of the track. Horn got it right third time around, though, when he recreated the popular seven inch version, added a long instrumental build-up and created the US mix which we all know so well. Nobody thought that the original sleeve or label should be changed, however, so all the US mixes were pressed as the Sex mix. It then got that bit more muddled when new commercial pressings of the Sex mix were labelled as the Original mix.

Confused? Well, in recent years things have got that little bit more complicated. At least one Frankie Goes To Hollywood CD release refers to the US mix as the New York mix – further confusing themselves as well as a whole host of Frankie Goes To Hollywood fans worldwide. There is also a separate disco mix that until recently had only ever been released in Greece!

When the brilliant and long-awaited follow-up to ‘Relax’ was issued, the band and Trevor Horn didn’t disappoint . . . or confuse themselves/us/everybody else. In truly creative style they merely put out a number of different twelve inch versions of the new song, ‘Two Tribes’, luckily with different catalogue numbers and contrasting picture sleeves, so kick-starting the trend for multiple twelve inch issues in order to further record sales.

First up was the Annihilation mix, a nine minute epic that featured the voices of Patrick Allen and Ronald Reagan (actually Reagan was voiced by Chris Barry, who was behind the same character on ITV’s Spitting Image). Next up was the Carnage mix, which featured the unforgettable and rather disturbing line, “mine is the last voice you will ever hear”. These chilling messages were recorded by Allen for the British government as part of their ‘Protect and Survive’ programme of the late ’70s and early ’80s, which aimed to give the general population information on what to do should nuclear war ever break out.

Trevor Horn then decided to remix the B-side, ‘War’ (a cover of Edwin Starr’s 1970 hit), so a third twelve inch pressing contained ‘War’ (Hidden Mix) backed with ‘Two Tribes’ (Carnage mix). ‘War’ was re-categorised as the AA-side rather than the B-side. Finally a limited supposedly DJ-only Hibakusha Mix was pressed, this being the same version used on the extended video soundtrack which received many airings on national TV. There was a shorter video that featured the seven inch version, and there were alternative videos for ‘Relax’ too – all this well before any of the tracks were later remixed and re-released for later generations. Lost yet? I won’t bother explaining how some of the seven inch versions of Frankie Goes To Hollywood singles differed slightly.

Re-make/Re-model…

The record companies soon cottoned onto the fact that remixes could even be recycled. ‘Why not put them on an album?’ they said. The Human League and Soft Cell were leaders in this field.

Flush with the immense worldwide success of their third album, ‘Dare’, the former put out ‘Love and Dancing’ in 1982 under the pseudonym League Unlimited Orchestra. This was a mini-album containing dub versions from ‘Dare’ (as well as ‘Hard Times’, the flip side to the single ‘Love Action’), all loving recreated by producer Martin Rushent.

The public went for it, the album reached number three in the UK album chart and went platinum. Earlier the same year Soft Cell followed up their debut album ‘Non Stop Erotic Cabaret’ with the remix album ‘Non Stop Ecstatic Dancing’. This is considered to be the first ever remix album.

Other artists followed suit, with variable degrees of success. The Pet Shop Boys took the idea even further, and have continued to release a series of remix albums – their ‘Disco’ series and Introspective adorning the shelves of hundreds of thousands of fans across the globe. And then came the idea of a compilation album that contained only twelve inch mixes (for example, Now Dance being one of the ‘Now That’s What I Call Music’ series). There may have only been three or four mixes each side, but labels such as Morgan Khan’s Streetsounds created a niche market for themselves. With the advent of the CD this has proved much easier to exploit, as there aren’t the running time and sound limitations that vinyl had.

So the best remix of all time? Well, that’s an entirely subjective question. I will, however, touch on two tracks that I regard as prime examples of (a) how bloody great it can feel to get your hands on a really great twelve inch single, and (b) how, occasionally, a remix can breathe new life into an already great tune and send it into dance-floor hyperspace. The first isn’t a remix at all: it’s a full length mix. In their early years New Order didn’t bother to put their singles on albums; they were released separately – but when they finally started doing so one of their finest moments was edited right down for the release of their third album, 1985’s ‘Low-Life’.

There was no commercially released seven inch format for ‘The Perfect Kiss’, but in its twelve inch glory it was unsurpassed by anything else that was released that year. In just short of nine minutes the listener journeys through Bernard Sumner’s insistent lyrics before there’s a beautifully crafted four and a half minute instrumental outro that takes the listener higher and higher and yet higher, before climaxing in a dramatically disorganised crescendo. Sheer beauty. The full length mix has never appeared on CD: the closest you’ll get is the mix on their unmissable compilation ‘Substance’, which is some eighteen seconds short of the original. Eighteen seconds! That’s nothing, I hear you exclaim. It is if you’re a music geek.

TALK TALK It's My Life US Mix The second example brought new life to a track that even in its regular seven inch format remains one of the most endearing tunes from the ’80s. And yet it took three official releases before Talk Talk’s ‘It’s My Life’ hit the higher reaches of the singles chart in the UK. The fact that the extended version issued on twelve inch in the UK was pretty limp and lifeless didn’t help the song’s cause. Things were very different in the States, however. The now legendary DJ Steve Thompson was commissioned to create a mix that was more appropriate for an American audience, and what he came up with proved to be undoubtedly his finest moment in a large repertoire of remixes.

Rebuilding the track with a much more upfront beat, and yet never straying far from the original, he created another tune that simply builds and builds before another long outro that takes the dancer – or listener – to heaven and back. It’s sheer brilliance. But remember, it’s the US remix. Don’t be tempted to go for the extended version that appears on far too many compilations; you won’t go places listening to that.

And finally . . . Heaven 17. Messrs Marsh, Ware and Gregory had already had a worldwide smash in ’83 with their first top ten UK hit, ‘Temptation’, on which Carol Kenyon added a fantastic female accompaniment to Glenn Gregory’s vocal. There was no need for their label, Virgin Records, to commission a remix, as the original was so strong that no new mix could ever do it justice. That is, until remixers Steve Anderson and Dave Seaman, better known collectively as Brothers in Rhythm, came along and blew everyone away with their new seven minute reworking, which first surfaced in Ibiza clubland. The band themselves initially knew nothing about the new mix, but they and their record company had no hesitation in having the single reissued in its new form.

The result? Nine years after the original, ‘Temptation’ smashed its way back into the UK top five singles and was again a worldwide smash, the new mix teasing the listener – and the dancer – for a full three minutes with its infectious beats until the track cascades into life with Gregory’s famous vocal opening. It’s a perfect example of a radical reworking that manages to stay true to the original. Simply bliss. And make sure you purchase tickets for Heaven 17’s next gig: a highlight of this fantastic experience will be their rendition of ‘Temptation’ that takes in the best of both versions, accompanied by a phenomenal vocal performance from current guest vocalist Billie Godfrey.

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to Rob Grillo

‘Is That The Twelve Inch Mix?’ by Rob Grillo is published by Bank House Books

http://www.robgrillo.co.uk/

https://twitter.com/robgrillo

Text by Rob Grillo
8th January 2011, updated 26th July 2013

SYNTH BRITANNIA

27 March 2010 / electricityclub

Photo by Chi Ming Lai

Synth You’ve Been Gone…

BBC4’s marvellous ‘Synth Britannia’ celebrated the rise of the synthesizer and how it changed popular music forever, particularly in the UK. Superbly produced and directed by Ben Whalley with interlinking cultural commentary provided by ‘Rip It Up And Start Again’ author Simon Reynolds, it was an empathetic documentary that captured the spirit of a golden era.

The contributors to the programme read like a ‘Who’s Who?’ of electronic music: Wolfgang Flür; Daniel Miller; Richard H Kirk; John Foxx; Gary Numan; Phil Oakey; Martyn Ware; Andy McCluskey; Paul Humphreys, Martin Gore; Vince Clarke; Andy Fletcher; Midge Ure; Dave Ball; Alison Moyet; Susanne Sulley; Joanne Catherall; Bernard Sumner; Neil Tennant; Chris Lowe.

They were to become the heroes of the revolution, rebels with a cause, poster boys and girls of the VCO! Although there were a few errors, especially with regards dates like when OMD signed to Factory and the single of ULTRAVOX’s ‘Vienna’ was released, this was an entertaining 90 minutes.

The new attitude brought about by punk in 1977 was still a bit too rock’n’roll for some like the young Daniel Miller, learning three chords was still three too many! But armed with newly affordable silicon-chipped technology by Korg and Roland from Japan, the true DIY spirit encouraged by the new wave would be fully exploited. Wonderful and weird sounds could be made using just one finger, knob twiddling would become the new art! Daniel Miller and Martyn Ware gleefully tell of their first synth purchase, in both cases it was the Korg 700s. The accessibility of the budget priced synthesizer offered the ultimate challenge to musical convention. It was electric dreams over acoustic nightmares!

Like some on this programme, my first introduction to the sound of the synthesizer came via KRAFTWERK and Walter (now Wendy) Carlos. In the summer of 1976, my junior school teacher was the young and pretty Miss Neilson.

She’d already shown her Bohemian colours by naming our pet guinea pig ‘Bilbo’!! But one day in PE, she made Class4 interpret movement to ‘Autobahn’ and the soundtrack to ‘A Clockwork Orange’!!!

Although too young to really appreciate what was going on, my aural palette was being shaped by this fantastic cacophony of electronics. Novelty instrumental hits like Jean Michel Jarre’s ‘Oxygene Part VI’ and SPACE’s ‘Magic Fly’ soon followed and caught my pre-teen futuristic mind as I eagerly waited for the next episode of ‘Space 1999’! The importance of science fiction in the development and imagination of electronic music cannot be underestimated with ‘Dr Who’ and the writings of JG Ballard being particularly important influences.

Donna Summer’s ‘I Feel Love’ was Year Zero for modern electronic pop music as we know it. Producer Giorgio Moroder‘s throbbing sequencers and dance beats were “the future of the future”.

But Gary Numan’s first appearance in May 1979 on ‘Top Of The Pops’ was for many including myself, their ‘Ziggy Stardust’ moment in the birth of synthpop, ‘Are ‘Friends’ Electric?’ was cold and detached, the discordant Moog machinery and the haunted vocal sneer connected with many during this gloomy period in Britain. It seems unbelievable now, but it was the talk of school the following morning. Electronic music had just found its first pop star!

Unemployment in the UK was at an all time high. Margaret Thatcher was now in power while across the Atlantic, Ronald Reagan was “President Elect”! With fascist gods in motion, the Cold War had heightened to the point where no-one’s future on this earth could be guaranteed. Whilst OMD’s ‘Enola Gay’ related to the nuclear holocaust paranoia of the time via some incongruous melodic warmth, there were a number of other pop-orientated bands just around the corner.

The new Mk2 version of THE HUMAN LEAGUE, SOFT CELL and DEPECHE MODE all possessed a defiant spirit of optimism in the face of adversity because ultimately “everybody needs love and affection”! The music was emotive and avant, all at the same time! “We never wanted to be KRAFTWERK” says Phil Oakey, “we wanted to be a pop band!”

Photo by Chi Ming Lai

The use of synthesizers was a statement of intent, like an act of artistic subversion. But as Marc Almond once said, you can only truly subvert when you have access to the mainstream. How can you change the world if no-one hears you? Musically, the best way to achieve this was going to be through pop songs! Whilst owing a debt to KRAFTWERK and taking advantage of the door opened by Gary Numan, these acts managed to appeal to people who didn’t necessarily know what a Linn Drum Computer was! Joanne Catherall and Susanne Sulley amusingly recalled when the UK’s first Linn LM-1 was delivered to Martin Rushent’s Genetic Studios for the making of ‘Dare’: “They were all very excited… OK boys!”

There are several technology driven insights like Paul Humphreys playing ‘Enola Gay’ on the Korg Micro-Preset, John Foxx demonstrating the ARP Odyssey and Daniel Miller operating the ARP 2600 which was used on all the early DEPECHE MODE albums. There were often misconceptions about how this stuff worked though. “The number of people who thought that the equipment wrote the song for you: ‘well anybody can do it with the equipment you’ve got!'” remembers Andy McCluskey, “F*** OFF!!”

“You’ve got to remember it was the first time ever that someone could sit and make a record on their own” says Midge Ure, stating the recording of EURYTHMICS ‘Sweet Dreams’ in a basement on an 8 track tape machine as an example! But as the success of synthesizer continued, the backlash set in. Numan was particularly the victim of some venomous media attacks; not only was he doing electronic music but he had none of the anti-hero stance of punk… he wanted to be a popstar: “I don’t speak for the people because I don’t know them!” he exclaimed!

Andy Fletcher tells of the Battle Royale that DEPECHE MODE were always having with the press. People insisted it wasn’t proper music. The Musicians Union even tried to ban the use of synths in studios and live performance! I remember fellow classmates unceremoniously smashed up and burned a copy of ‘Cars’… AND THEN presented me with the remains! If I wasn’t already feeling isolated, then this sort of intimidation was certainly going to seal it!

Martin Gore quotes a disgruntled rock journalist who described the genre as being for “alienated youth everywhere, and Germans!” As an outsider with a typical post-war ‘Boys Own’ fascination for Airfix kits and Messerschmitts, this music would define me! What did these narrow-minded hooligans know?

Worshipping America was not what I wanted! To me, soul and jazz funk (much like R’n’B today) was the horrid soundtrack of the school bully! SYNTHPOP and its Mittel Europa romanticism appealed to my sense of elitism. I could wear my intelligence on my sleeve, it would become my badge of honour! Pretentious… MOI?

Photo courtesy of Alex Machairas

The move towards today’s electronic based dance music as pioneered by Giorgio Moroder is symbolised by the success of NEW ORDER and PET SHOP BOYS. Legend has it that KRAFTWERK were so impressed by the sound of ‘Blue Monday’, they sent an engineer down to Britannia Row Studios to check out the equipment only to find out it was comparatively unsophisticated! But ‘Synth Britannia’ actually goes on to suggest that the success of the third generation acts like Howard Jones and THOMPSON TWINS was the death of this fantastic period. “There was too much synthpop around, it was all very well being on a synth but actually the melodies and how some of the songs were structured was quite traditional and trite…” sighs Simon Reynolds, “it wasn’t that inventive as electronic music!” – he was right!

Unfortunately by the mid-80s, most of our heroes had given up the fight and went conventional. “We were all a bit lost by then” says Phil Oakey, “like we didn’t have anything to prove!” After declaring in 1980 that ‘Travelogue’ contained “synthesizers and vocals only”, THE HUMAN LEAGUE had by the disappointing ‘Hysteria’ credited Jo Callis with “guitars, keyboards, vocals”, sadly in that order!

Meanwhile OMD went from listing all their equipment on their ‘Dazzle Ships’ and ‘Junk Culture’ albums to Paul Humphreys simply being on “vocals, electronic keyboards, piano” for ‘Crush’! The lure of dollars to water down the synthesized sound for synthobic America just couldn’t be resisted anymore! This classic era of quality synthpop was sadly now over!

However, while the others fragmented, DEPECHE MODE got darker and stuck to their electronic blueprint, eventually achieving massive success in the US from 1988. So it would seem these pioneering acts’ original Eurocentric electronic manifestos had been right after all.

Their legacy is evident today: LITTLE BOOTS and LA ROUX have hit the Top 10, and collaborated on the marvellous BBC6 Music ‘Back To The Phuture’ live sessions with Gary Numan and HEAVEN 17 respectively; rock band MUSE credit “synths and programming” on their new album while featuring a song that sounds like ‘Vienna’; and a girl group cover of ‘Just Can’t Get Enough’ is a ‘Comic Relief’ charity single!

Meanwhile, the synthpop era’s big international No1s ‘Don’t You Want Me?’ and ‘Tainted Love’ are still being played at weddings and night clubs, ironically often being sung along to by the same bully boys who were setting fire to Gary Numan records years earlier!! “It was exciting to be part of a musical movement that had never been done before, it was a fine time” smiles Vince Clarke.

‘Synth Britannia’ ends appropriately enough with ‘Together in Electric Dreams’ and this final quote from Andy McCluskey: “We were trying to do something new, that is specifically why we chose electronics, we wanted to sweep away all of the rock clichés! And then what happens towards the end of the 80s and even worse, the mid 90s? Everybody decides guitars are back, synthesizers are somehow old fashioned AND, we get Oasis!!”

McCluskey holds his hand to his head in despair but today, most of the acts featured in ‘Synth Britannia’ are still playing to packed audiences around the world. What was originally an electric dream is now a full blown reality. JUSTICE and a job well done 🙂

Ohm Sweet Ohm! The ‘Synth Britannia’ Soundtrack

DEPECHE MODE New Life
WENDY CARLOS William Tell Overture
WENDY CARLOS Title Music from ‘A Clockwork Orange’
KRAFTWERK Autobahn
THE CLASH White Riot
THE NORMAL TVOD
THE NORMAL Warm Leatherette
THE FUTURE 4JG
THE HUMAN LEAGUE Being Boiled
DONNA SUMMER I Feel Love
CABARET VOLTAIRE Seconds Too Late
CABARET VOLTAIRE Nag Nag Nag
OMD Messages
OMD Enola Gay
JOY DIVISION Atmosphere
JOHN FOXX Underpass
THROBBING GRISTLE Still Walking
THROBBING GRISTLE Hot on the Heels of Love
FAD GADGET Back to Nature
SILICON TEENS Memphis Tennessee
TUBEWAY ARMY Are ‘Friends’ Electric?
GARY NUMAN Cars
VISAGE Fade to Grey
THE FLYING LIZARDS Money
DEPECHE MODE New Life
DEPECHE MODE Just Can’t Get Enough
DEPECHE MODE Sometimes I Wish I Was Dead
THE HUMAN LEAGUE Don’t You Want Me
HEAVEN 17 – Penthouse & Pavement
CABARET VOLTAIRE Landslide
SOFT CELL Tainted Love
YAZOO Only You
YAZOO Don’t Go
OMD Maid of Orleans
EURYTHMICS Sweet Dreams
ULTRAVOX Vienna
KRAFTWERK The Model
DEPECHE MODE Everything Counts
DEPECHE MODE Master and Servant
PET SHOP BOYS West End Girls
NEW ORDER Ceremony
NEW ORDER Blue Monday
PHILIP OAKEY & GIORGIO MORODER Together in Electric Dreams

Text by Chi Ming Lai
27th March 2010

Tag: New Order (Page 20 of 20)

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