Joy Division Day By Day - Part 2

There should be some writing on the other side too

 

Someone at the mastering lab.... has to be scratched into the acetate before the metalwork has been made.... could have been George Peckham if he mastered it. A lot of JD stuff was a porky prime cut

 

That wasn't porky though as it's a US pressing.... They got the words wrong as well.. Should be "I've been waiting for a guide"

 

The cursive message is on side 2. No written message on side 1, but there are some strange arrow like symbols and another which looks like the outline of a London Underground station sign. Will try to take a pic later.

 

Exactly. They wrote it incorrectly. That guy obviously wasn't much of a fan.

 

Wilderness - Another favourite of mine from Unknown Pleasures. "

"I saw the tears as they cried,
They had tears in their eyes,
Tears in their eyes,

Tears in their eyes,
Tears in their eyes!"

Such a powerful lyrical moment. Historic.

 

There's many of those moments dotted throughout Joy Divisions material.....

 

Wilderness - Never been a particular fave of mine though it has grown on me a bit over the years, and there are some great live versions. Can't say a lot about it personally

 

It depends. Sometimes they're in a different hand to the catalogue no. inscriptions, sometimes it's the same - check out some differences up here.

 

Basically looking forward to everything else.
Some classic single sides coming up soon, Closer and I also think Still might spawn some interesting reactions. Some really underrated stuff on there, imo.

Are we also gonna discuss Sister Ray and the live Ceremony?

I think with all those singles coming up I might wanna post the AllMusic review on Substance over the weekend.

 

It might help to zone in on that guitar riff and then picture yourself being in the studio.

 

It’s interesting; Shadowplay comes off as quite layered with Hook’s intro (forgot to mention how friggin’ awesome THAT intro is!!), inventive guitar fills and Ian’s performance. They know how to dress up fairly basic ideas and do something magnificent with them.

JD could build up a world of light and shade with their talents, minimal arrangements and imaginative, dark songwriting.

 

Sister ray can be discussed at the end if we feel the need, It's not particularly good. Ceremony could have it's own day, as it's a stand alone track...... I don't think Sister Ray warrants a day on its own.

 

Day 21

Interzone



Interzone is another song that hails from the earlier Warsaw days, originally sang by Ian Curtis this version is sang by Peter Hook with counter lyrics sang by Ian Curtis. A great straight ahead rock/punk song. This became afailry popular song live, with Curtis sometimes taking the vocals and sometimes Peter singing lead. I think it depended how they felt that night as to who sang.
Not much I can say about this song, the lyrics i have found on the Internet are questionable, if i get a chance I'll copy them out from my "So this Is Permanence" book.... They should be correct as they're taken from Ians note books.

 

Interzone - Live at Paradiso

This has Hooky singing lead, with Curtis singing counter lyrics

 

Interzone - Yes. Another doozy.

 

Another fantastic tune. When I was getting into this album I was a fan of alternative rock and punk, so the post-punk sounds of Unknown Pleasures were a bit foreign to me. As a result I kind of enjoyed the more straight ahead rock songs like Shadowplay, Wilderness and particularly Interzone. Great song and I love the live versions with Peter singing the high line.

 

It's weird, when I first bought Unknown Pleasures I loved this song and played it all the time. In the intervening years since however I tend to skip it, preferring the more darker songs on the album. I think out of all the songs on UP this was the weakest. In hindsight maybe The Only Mistake might have been a better choice for the album instead..... Only my opinion.

 

one of the greatest things the Punk era offered was a Do It Yourself attitude. Virtuosity has its place but it's hardly 'of the people' since only the most agile could even cope with the complex billion-notes-in-two-milliseconds of the masters. The return to basics attitude is essential for Joy Division, as it's clear, at least to me, that great songwriting and performance is detailed in the writing itself, and that need not be terribly complex to be extremely effective.

Sometimes it's great to think, why use 1000 notes to say what you can say better with only 2?
Also, there were some very educated and talented musicians in this era who could be seen as better musicians perhaps than the members of JD, but how many of them are still of interest 40 years later? Again, it's all in the writing.

 

I'd much rather listen to Joy Division than Satriani or Steve Vai... A 1000,000 notes a bar doesn't do it for me

 

I remember about a thousand years ago when I started formally studying sound recording, people were encouraged to bring in recordings they admired the production of to play and share. I brought Shadowplay, because I loved (and still love) what's achieved with the space around the music. Sparse productions can be really hard to get right but Unknown Pleasures does it so well. Listen to the solo on Shadowplay, there's no rhythm guitar chugging away filling the space, the single notes are enough.

 

Yeah, lots of space on that song, and it works..... The flip side of that is the production on Transmission which as good as it is, could have been better. There are 2 guitars on that song and the one important guitar which comes in at the "Well I could call out when the going gets tough" section at the end is so far down in the mix that you can barely hear it. It's a muddle. The guitar part in question was played all the time by Barney back in the day live, but even now when NO play Transmission he misses it out completely...... He's became a very lazy guitarist.

 

haha...I was just thinking, Thank God nobody was there saying 'NO! Hooky! You're supposed to play the rhythm! not the melody on the Bass!
Them feeling their way and not following rules is what makes it so very special even today.

 

To see Ian smiling for a change, is nice.... It's a shame footage of Joy Division is so rare. There's just very little out there. This was filmed at TJ Davidsons Rehearsal studios in Manchester

 

I've never been a big fan of Interzone. The first few times I played UP, Shadowplay was the last song I really enjoyed on the album, just couldn't get into the final trio. Whilst I Remember Nothing & Wilderness have grown on me over time, particularly live versions, Interzone hasn't really, its the weakest song on the album for me (yes, perhaps The Only Mistake would have been a better fit), along with my other least favourite, Insight. Last night I played the Nashville rooms (Sept) gig in my car for the first time ever, and when the rave-up 'hamster noises' leapt out of the speakers on Insight I almost jumped out of the sunroof in terror, and I don't even have a sunroof! Absolutely scared me silly, the sheer volume of them. Not sure I can ever listen to a live version of that again