Forty Five Minutes Of New Order- ish

I heard Your Silent Face on Friday night- not for the first time obviously- and it floored me once again. There's something about it that is very special- the rippling Kraftwerk inspired keys and synths, Hooky's bass and the mechanical drumming, Bernard's serious lyrics completely undercut by the 'why don't you piss off line', the way it gloriously skips between euphoria and melancholy. It's much more than all of that, one of those songs that is way more than the sum of the parts. It inspired me to start a New Order mix for my Sunday series but then I changed tack almost immediately. Rather than just sequence of load of my favourite New Order songs (almost all of which would be from the 1980s) I thought it might be more interesting or more fun to do a Your Silent Face/ New Order inspired mix and see where it took me. It took me here...

Forty Five Minutes Of New Order- ish

• New Order: Your Silent Face
• Galaxie 500: Ceremony
• Gorillaz ft. Peter Hook and Georgia: Aries
• The Liminanas and Peter Hook: Garden Of Love
• Ian McCulloch: Faith And Healing
• The Times: Manchester 5.32
• Ride: Last Frontier
• New Order: Isolation
• Mike Garry and Joe Duddell: St. Anthony: An Ode To Anthony H. Wilson (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

Your Silent Face opens side two of Power, Corruption And Lies, New Order's second album, released in May 1983. It's now seen as a New Order classic, a landmark album, the fusing of dance and rock, light and shade, a band stepping out of the shadows of Joy Division and the first NO album Movement. Your Silent Face had the working title KW1 (the Kraftwerk one). Funny story about New Order and Kraftwerk- the Dusseldorff robots visited New Order in their Cheetham Hill rehearsal space/ HQ and sat open mouthed as the band showed them the kit they used to make Blue Monday. 'You made that record using... this?' 

Galaxie 500's cover of Ceremony is a beauty, a slowed down, slow burning version, ringing feedback, the guitars gathering in intensity, and Dean's upper register voice smothered in echo. Ceremony was New Order's first single (and in a way, Joy Division's last). It was released as a 12" in 1981, twice, with different sleeves and slightly different versions. Galaxie 500's version came out as a B-side on their Blue Thunder 12" in 1990. At the time the nine year gap between 1981 and 1990 was an eon, the 1981 world and 1990 world two totally different eras- for New Order as much as anyone. 

Gorillaz got Hooky to play bass as part of their Song Machine project in 2020. Aries is I think the best 'New Order' song of the 21st century. Murdoc, Noodles, 2D and Russel Hobbs/ Damon Albarn together with Hooky's bass totally nailed what NO should be sounding like now. 

Four years before Gorillaz got Peter Hook to sling his four string guitar around he hooked up with French duo The Liminanas. Garden Of Love is (again) a great 21st century 'New Order' song, slightly fragile, slightly woozy, psychedelic garage rock, the bassline wending its way to the fore and staying there. 

Ian McCulloch's Faith And Healing is virtually a New Order cover- it sounds so much like a off cut from Technique he probably should have given them writing credits. It came out as a single in 1989, taken from Mac's solo debut Candleland. 

The Times was one of Creation mainstay Ed Ball's projects. In 1990 as The Times he released Manchester as a single, a hymn to a city at the centre of a youth explosion. Hooky's mentioned in the lyrics. It's also a tribute to the sound New Order had on 1985's Lowlife. It couldn't be more Lowlife unless it came wrapped in a tracing paper sleeve. I sometimes it think skirts the line between ridiculous and brilliant. I can imagine it making some people cringe but I think it has charm. Once, driving through France it came on the car stereo on one of the mix CDs I'd burned for the trip and made me briefly, stupidly homesick. I got over it- I mean we were on holiday in France for fuck's sake.  

Last Frontier was on last year's Ride album, Interplay. It's an Andy Bell song, soaring, chiming guitars and on the money drums. It sounds like a close cousin of Regret (the last truly great New Order single, released back in 1993. Although actually, I'm happy to listen to arguments for Crystal, released in August 2001). 

Isolation is a Joy Division song, from their second/ final album Closer. It's a stunning song, the collision of electronic drums and real ones genuinely thrilling, along with the synth and bass. Ian's words are bleak, a man at the end of his tether. This version is by New Order, recorded for a John Peel session in 1998. They still play it live- they did it at Wythenshawe Park last August. 

Mike Garry and Joe Duddell's St. Anthony: An Ode To Anthony H. Wilson is a song I come back to often, Mike's A to Z of Manchester music endlessly listenable and at times very moving. For his remix Andrew Weatherall, a huge fan of Factory, turned the song into a nine minute Weatherall tour de force, complete with a version of the Your Silent Face bassline. Which is where I came in. 

Twenty One

Eliza, our daughter, is twenty one today. We had the party last weekend at a venue in Altrincham because today she is at the Gottwood festival in Anglesey. Coincidentally Sean Johnston is playing Gottwood, doing A Love From Outer Space, the travelling cosmic disco he and Andrew Weatherall started in 2010. I've told Eliza she must attend ALFOS as part of her birthday celebrations, a cross generational handing on of the torch or something. A couple of her friends asked what ALFOS is. '110 BPM chuggy cosmic disco', I told them, which they seemed to find quite amusing in a 'what's the old man on about?' kind of way. 

A few weeks ago Eliza told me I had to do a speech at her twenty first. I gave it some thought and then, capitalising on her love of Mancunian poetry I decided to do it based on Mike Garry's St Anthony: An Ode To Anthony H. Wilson. Eliza loves Mancunian poetry, Mike Garry's poem and also Tony Walsh's This Is The Place. Despite Eliza's concerns that my poem would be 'cringe' I wrote and read it out anyway, an A- to Z of Eliza set to Mike Garry's structure, cadence and style. Apologies to Mike.

It finished, as Mike's does, with 'Talk to me of all these things and there's one thing that's for certain/ That I'll see the face and I'll hear the voice of Eliza Ramona Turner'. Not a dry eye in the house. Including mine. 

St. Anthony: An Ode To Tony Wilson (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

When she was born a nurse looked at her in her cot as travelled in a lift up to the next floor in Wythenshawe hospital. Eliza was wide awake and looking round. The nurse said to us, 'that is the most alert baby I have ever seen'. And that's kind of how she's been ever since. 

Happy birthday Eliza. You've been through more than any twenty one should have to in recent years and have come through it with your love of life intact. Enjoy Gottwood, enjoy ALFOS. Sean, if she turns up wrecked and harangues you endlessly, please accept my apologies. I don't know where she gets it from. 

Monday's Long Song

Tony Wilson, later on Anthony H. Wilson, died on this day in 2007. His gravestone in Southern Cemetery, Chorlton- cum- Hardy, as pictured above, reads-

Broadcaster
Cultural Catalyst

1950- 2007

It was designed by Peter Saville and Ben Kelly (of course) and stands out among the ones around it, all in black, in the same way Wilson did when he was alive. In the film 24 Hour Party People Wilson, played by Steve Coogan, says he suffers from 'an excess of civic pride' and there's no doubt Tony was utterly committed to improving Manchester and Salford, to changing things- a record label founded on revolutionary lines with equally revolutionary design principles, a nightclub, a long line of bands and artists who made art first and commerce second. All these things changed the city partly because he saw no reason to 'fuck off down to London', but to do it here, and partly because (eventually) the nightclub brought people to the city (as revellers, as students, as workers), who stayed and helped the city grow. The nightclub inspired the building of bars and flats and the regeneration of warehouses, new places for people, that have a look, a design aesthetic, a knowing modernism. And so on. Not all these things are solely due to Tony Wilson but they are at least partly due to him.

There's been a tendency since he died to lionise him. While he was alive, especially in the 80s and early 90s, he was sometimes a divisive figure. That twat off the telly. Smug. Too clever for his own good. By all accounts he was capable of falling out with people, his friends, easily and without warning. Tony I'm sure would be amused by the ascension to sainthood he has achieved after death and I think he'd love it as well. 'When you have to choose between the truth and the legend, print the legend', he is supposed to have said. This quote comes from 24 Hour Party People as well. The legend becomes the truth. So it goes.

In 2015 this stunning record was released, Mike Garry's poem about Tony, a figure he knew from growing up, from seeing him on the TV and from his works, set to music by Joe Duddell, based on New Order's Your Silent Face, and then remixed by Andrew Weatherall. It remains one of the best records of the last decade, a nine minute tribute, moving and uplifting and elegiac.

St. Anthony: An Ode To Anthony H. Wilson (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

Wilson

Tony Wilson died ten years ago today. His legacy is all over this city and (probably) in your record collections and on your hard drives. Manchester and pop culture is a poorer place without him. I've posted Mike Garry and Joe Duddell's tribute to Tony before but Mike Garry's words about him and the world he was part of are always worth hearing again.

This Is My List

Here is my list, self indulgent as Drew says, but fun to do. I've enjoyed more new music during 2015 than any in recent years. These are the albums and songs/singles that have struck a chord with me and that have stuck with me since their release.

Albums

12. Mbongwana Star 'From Kinshasa'
Traditional African forms coupled with electronics. Still startling.

11. Mick Jones 'Ex Libris'
Vinyl only, six track instrumental.

10. MonoLife 'Phrenology'
The skull from Hull with some cracking old school dance music.

9. The Orb 'Moonbuilding 2703AD'
A return to form, four very long pieces full of ambient buzz.

8. Le Volume Courbe 'I Wish Dee Dee Ramone Was Here With Me'
Contains two of my favourite songs of this year- The House and Rusty.

7. Steve Cobby 'Everliving'
It could have been 'Revolutions' as well. Both are full of sumptuous electronic tunes and ideas.

6. Gwenno 'Y Dyad Olaf'
Perfect psychedelic pop sung in Welsh (except for the one sung in Cornish).

5. Crocodiles 'Boys'
Dirty, sexy, brash guitars from San Diego. If you haven't heard Foolin' Around, click play now.



4. Moon Duo 'Shadows Of The Sun'
Loads of uptempo two chord motorik psyche but with In A Cloud they had one of the year's most beautiful, almost Balearic guitar moments.

3. Sexwitch 'Sexwitch'.
Six covers recorded by Natasha Khan, Toy and Dan Carey. The intense stomp of the Middle Eastern songs take some beating and Natasha's vocals are superbly focused while also slightly unhinged. Possessed and obsessive.

2. The Charlatans 'Modern Nature'.
Recorded after the death of drummer Jon Brookes, a band back on form and determined to celebrate life with some of the best, soaring songs of the year- So Oh and Come Home Baby especially.

1. Jamie Xx 'In Colour'
A history of dance music from house to grime, emotionally charged from start to finish, with moments of ecstasy, clarity and genuine beauty. I'm still playing it from start to finish.



Singles/Songs
The hand and influence of Mr Weatherall is all over this section. That's just the way it's been this year. Both lists show I've been veering far more towards dance/electronics this year. A top seventeen for no real reason.

17. Noel Gallagher 'In The Heat Of The Moment' Andrew Weatherall Remix
It came out last year online but was released on vinyl in April. Glorious remix.

16. Dubrobots 'Forever'
This Cardiff based producer sent me two versions of this massively dub influenced song. Still rattling my ribcage.

15. Public Service Broadcasting 'Gagarin' Richard Norris Remix
The album did nothing for me but this remix, full of Spanish acoustic guitars, sent Yuri to Ibiza.

14. jennylee 'Never'
Warpaint's foxy bassist with an early 80s single that pushed the right buttons.

13. Gwenno 'Chwyldro' Andrew Weatherall Remix
Further, stranger, slower.

12. Unloved 'Guilty Of Love'
David Holmes' new project taking in 60s/70s filmscores with a girl group vibe. Also had two long dubby Weatherall remixes.

11.  Vox Low 'Cast Upward Through the Waves, A Ruby Glow
Strange stuff from a French duo finding weird spaces between rock and dance.

10. Heretic 'Pollux' Andrew Weatherall Remix
I'm getting repetitive strain from typing those three words- this one took early New Order and merged it with some sparse electronics and a spooky vocal refrain.

9. Timothy J. Fairplay
Timothy J released several superb four track e.p.s this year, full of vintage synths- Stories Of Prison, Love And Columbium, No News From New York. Take your pick. Together they'd make a potential album of the year.

8. Paresse 'Rosita'.
Super smooth stuff from Scandinavia. Wraps your ears up all warm.

7. Haunted Doorbell 'Unconnected Thoughts On Jacking'
I'm cheating here- Fairplay again, this time with Matilda Tristam. Four outstanding instrumentals joining the various dots. The e.p. and title track gave us the song title of the year. Beautiful Sheffield is exactly as it sounds.

6. Patti Yang Group 'I'm Ready'
Chris Rotter, Matty Skylab and Patti Yang with a thumping piece of hymnal house. Do you want a free download?



5. Jamie Xx 'Loud Places' John Talabot's Higher Dub
I posted this last week. It's stunningly good, reworking an album highlight into something else with mesmerising, euphoric peaks.

4. C.A.R. 'Glock'd' Asphodells Remix
Super glam stomp, a massive wobbly bass, dirty guitars, French accented vocals; the sound of the future.

3. Sinkane x Peaking Lights 'Mean Dub'
This ten minute dub version of Yacha was the sound of my summer. All four tracks on the reworked dub e.p. were top quality stuff but Yacha is something else entirely and from somewhere else entirely too. Fast dub.



2. Pearl's Cab Ride 'Sunrise' (MonoLife Extended  Trip)
A Humberside funk and soul sixpiece taken on a long trip by MonoLife- trumpet, distorted vocal, two note bass, drifting but always moving forwards. Beautiful.



1. Mike Garry and Joe Duddell 'St Anthony: An Ode to Anthony H Wilson'
This came out in August, an emotional tribute to Mr Manchester set to Joe Duddell's Your Silent Face inspired strings, full of Mike Garry's poetic references to the city and its sounds. All proceeds go to The Christie so if you haven't bought it yet, there's another reason to do so. Almost inevitably, there's a Weatherall remix on the other side (which isn't too shabby either. In fact it's very, very good). Still prone to move me after umpteen listens.

Granada

I went to the launch event for the St Anthony single on Friday night- it was a ticketed event before you go imagining I'm some kind of mover or shaker. It was held in the old Granada TV studios, Wilson's place of work. After a screening of the video and some brief interview clips Mike Garry performs several of his distinctively Mancunian poems with Joe Duddell and a string quartet, finishing with St Anthony- An Ode To Anthony H Wilson. His poetry is hard edged, honest, human and real and often comes loaded with a punchline, making you both laugh and cry and his delivery is a performance- rapid fire rhymes and sudden stops. The Wilson tribute especially is moving, heartfelt without ever becoming sentimental- much like the man himself. At ten the doors to one of the filming studios opens and the thump of house music begins. Mike Pickering plays what turns out to be a blinding set followed at midnight by Bobby Langley who starts out with the Andrew Weatherall remix of St Anthony, this new version of Your Silent Face booming out with Mike Garry's voice. Manchester vibes are very much in the area.

You can buy the single in a variety of formats here with proceeds to The Christie and their continuing fight against cancer. Do you want to hear the Andrew Weatherall remix? Thought you might...


Mike Garry & Joe Duddell - St Anthony: An Ode to Anthony H Wilson - Andrew Weatherall Remix on MUZU.TV.

Anthony

This has appeared today on the eight anniversary of his death- a poetic tribute to Anthony H Wilson and the modern Manchester he was instrumental in creating. The poem was written by Mike Garry and then set to music by Joe Duddell (an orchestral version of New Order's Your Silent Face). The video has a variety of people you'll recognise lip-synching the words. I have to say, it pushes a lot of my buttons. New Order played it over the PA at their Jodrell Bank gig and Hooky played at his recent gig in Macclesfield. Several months ago a clip of Andrew Weatherall playing a dance version of this at the A Love From Outer Space festival at Carcasonne Castle was on Youtube (although I can't find it right now). That very Weatherall remix of this is on the B-side of the 12", out in a couple of weeks, with all proceeds to the Christie. How many more reasons do you need to buy it?