Joy Division - Day by Day

I've already thought of that... transmission will not be covered when we do the RCA album... when we do the RCA album we'll cover just the tracks that didn't get a general release later (the drawback) we'll also cover the 2 versions of the ideal for living tracks against the RCA counterparts... leave it to me.... itll all work out fine

 

V All cool.

Thanks man, I’ll check it out tonight!!

 

For me both Unknown Pleasures and Closer are both perfectly coherent works start to finish, so I just can’t pick individual songs. Two of the finest rock albums ever produced IMHO.

 

^ I could easily have picked another 5 from this list

 

Amen to that.

And Substance imo the best (post)punk compilation ever alongside Staring At The Sea and Singles Going Steady.

 

Day 5......... At last!!

You're No Good for Me




Finally, we reach the end of Ideal beginning, and the song (Song I say loosely) You're No Go For Me. This piece of 70's punk is honestly awful in my opinion. I'm not surprised it wasn't released on the original Ideal Beginning EP, as it's really that bad. It eventually found release on the unofficial "baby face" CD Warsaw. I've listened to this song twice in my life..... Once when I first bought the CD, and the second time when i looked for the you Tube video for this post.

I hope I never have to listen to it again

Anyway, onwards and upwards....... Warsaw realised at this point in their career that the EP they just recorded wasn't going to get them a record deal.... Especially with this song on it. They then decamped to Pennine Sound Studios in Oldham on 14 December 1977 to record the EP that would change things for them, and us.............. forever. An ideal For Living.......... Bring it on!

 

I’ve only listened to it a couple of times too, other than the snippets on the Joy Division documentary. Watched it last night. Of all the song clips on the film, this is the only shockingly poor one. Here is Bernard Sumner on the early demos as You’re No Good For Me plays in background:

“The first set of material we wrote, was just us apeing punk really. Completely apeing it and doing it really badly. <mocks You’re No Good For Me>: Yeah yeah yeah yeah f*** off, f*** off! Yeah yeah yeah yeah b*llocks, b*llocks! . . . You know, just really dreadful. Dreadful, dreadful songs.” He is visibly cringing as he recalls those songs.

Which gives you a clue as to why these songs weren’t released properly at the time (they eventually came out on a 1981 bootleg) or even on the Heart & Soul box set! I won’t be playing these songs (apart from At A Later Date) again anytime soon. Next!

 

At A Later Date on the Short Circuit record is excellent, it really comes across as a powerful performance. However, my final judgement on the Ideal Beginning EP....... Dreadful apart from At A Later Date, which I think has a better version on the short Circuit record anyway. The other 4 songs should really be only listened to if you've had a frontal lobotomy or ECT. Oh, and did I mention that I think Peter Hook looks like an extra from a Village People video at this point... just check the picture...



Thankfully, we're over the sh*te and the good stuff happens from tomorrow. As I have said i'm using slight poetic licence going forward insofar as some releases will be doubled with their counterparts, and releases like the Komakino flexi will be discussed in its entirety on one day and not as individual songs..... We really can't have a meaningful discussion about As You Said or Incubation in *Isolation* (Pun intended), they're both also not worthy of a day of discussion. But the flexi as a whole and curio is worthy.

We will discuss the Ideal For Living EP in conjunction with the RCA album, the reason being all 4 tracks from AIFL have alternative versions on Warsaw. We'll then discuss the 1 track on RCA that was never properly released until the H&S boxset, The Drawback (All Of This For You) before moving onto A Factory Sample and then Unknown Pleasures. I hope this plan works for all, as it seems pointless discussing individual song versions on different days.

 

Day Of The Lords.

No contest for me.

 

Agreed..... That was one of my 2

 

You’re No Good For Me...

Aaaaahhhh yeah... well, that’s one pretty bad Clash rip-off. They must have made it up basically on the spot. ‘Okay guys, we’ve got some time left...’. Yeah, no good indeed!!

I do agree that At A Later Date is the one showing promise and it’s an honestly good-to-great song. I still think, however, that this material should have made the box set, only to put things in perspective.

I do agree with the RCA-vs-AIFL song approach. Not much of a time lapse inbetween all that anyway.

 

'Just wait for tomorrow'...I guess that's what they all say, just before they fall apart.

oops, wrong band. ...or is it?

 

Quick question on the Peel sessions: Does anyone have both the ‘The Complete BBC Recordings’ CD from 2000 and the 2008 Best Of which has BBC as a bonus disc?

Just asking because I’m curious if the 2008 bonus disc is different in terms of sound quality, ie is it overly compressed / brickwalled etc, compared to the 2000 release? I also ask because for some unknown reason iTunes will not import my 2008 BBC disc. Disc is as new, not scratched, it just won’t import. The CD itself plays fine but it’s really bugging me not having the BBC disc on my iPod as I listen to JD out and about quite a bit, not just at home. Looks like I’ll need to pick up the 2000 disc.

An odd compilation really that 2008 Best Of, really strange including Incubation, seems totally out of place. Also it comes in one of those weird SACD jewel cases that never really took off. Any input appreciated.

 

I've never had the BBC recordings on CD.... I only had the Peel sessions on vinyl when they were first released which have since been sold off.

I do however have them electronically on my PC as high quality 256kb mp3's and flac files

 

Just to add in a small curio before we move on from the Warsaw demos, I just found this. Middlesbrough Rock Garden, 14/9/1977. Three Warsaw songs I never knew existed after nearly 25 years of being a JD fan. These clearly didn’t even make it to demo stage. You can hear for yourself why!

 

2008... Tail end of the cursed ‘copy-protected’ discs..? Check the back inlay.

Just checked the dr database site, the DR ratings of The Complete BBC Sessions and Best Of cd 2 are exactly the same! You could check with foobar to verify, but both seem to be the same in terms of content and DR. I don’t have it, though.

 

An Ideal for living

An Ideal for Living is the first EP by the English post-punk band Joy Division. It was released in 1978 by the band's own label, Enigma, shortly after the group changed its name from Warsaw. All tracks were recorded at Pennine Sound Studios in Oldham on 14 December 1977. The recording sessions were self-financed by the band, on a budget of £400. The release reflects the band's early punk influences, as opposed to the post-punk style they later developed. The cover has a black-and-white picture of a blond Hitler Youth member beating a drum, which was drawn by guitarist Bernard Sumner (called "Bernard Albrecht" on the poster sleeve) and the words "Joy! Division" printed in a blackletter font. The cover design, coupled with the nature of the band's name, fuelled controversy over whether the band had Nazi sympathies. When the EP was re-released on 12-inch vinyl, the original cover was replaced by artwork featuring scaffolding.

A 7" version of An Ideal for Living was released in June on the band's own Enigma label, which was sold out by September and was subsequently followed by a 12" version on 10 October on the band's own Anonymous Records label. All four tracks were re-released on the 1988 singles compilation, Substance. A remastered version of the EP was reissued by Rhino Entertainment to coincide with Record Store Day 2014.

First track to discuss off this first "official" release is:

Day 6

Warsaw.



This track was first recorded late Dec 1977, but not released until 1978. Between these dates the band recorded a whole album for the RCA record company which also featured recordings af all the songs on the Ideal for Living EP.This album however was subsequently shelved and remains unissued officially till this day. The Warsaw album version of all these songs are more polished, and sounds better in my mind. However it was the Ideal for Living EP that started the band on their road proper to the band we know and love today.

The song is available on a number of compilations, including Substance. The song appears to be a somewhat fantastical biography of Rudolf Hess, a Nazi and Hitler's Deputy Führer, who flew to Great Britain in 1941 in an attempt to negotiate a peace between Germany and the UK, supposedly because of his disillusionment with Nazi ideology. At a performance of the song "At a Later Date" at the Electric Circus in Manchester, Guitarist Bernard Sumner shouts "You all forgot Rudolph Hess" before the song begins.

It starts with the mock-countoff "3 5 0 1 2 5 Go!"; "31G-350125" was Hess's prisoner of war serial number when he was captured after flying to Eaglesham, Scotland during World War II. The first verse describes Hess's involvement with Hitler in the Beer Hall Putsch and his infatuation with the Nazi Party. The second verse discusses his supposed disillusionment with it, and the last verse portrays his life in prison after being convicted at the Nuremberg Trials. The chorus is a simple repetition of "31G", the first three characters of his serial number. "31" signifies the European theatre of war and "G" German, the nationality of the prisoner. (From Wikipedia)

 

Here is the RCA version of this song

 

You're No Good For Me - The band still thrashing around trying to find themselves.
At A Later Date (Short Circuit version) - I have no memory of it from the night but I liked it right away when it appeared on the Short Circuit 10".

Warsaw - Great stuff. Joy Division arrive with this terrific song and E.P. I love the gritty, hard sound of the whole disc which is similar to Iggy Pop's I'm Sick Of You single which I also loved at the time.
Thanks for posting that neat scan of the original 7" sleeve. Love that back cover. Back in the day, I bought the 12" version of this which came out afterwards (with the scaffolding on the cover) with better sound.

 

I got the record store day 12" release, which is a remaster and sounds fantastic

 

This is where things start to get REALLY important.
Great kick-off to the AIFL EP as well as Substance with most of the elements in place. Classic stuff.
The RCA version is no slouch either, but the EP one is more powerful.

That said, where will The Drawback be discussed?
And is the SC-version of At A Later Date available on any official cd?

 

see below from earlier on this page (I doubt there will be a great deal to say about it on that day!)

Yes, but only on 'Short Circuit - Live at The Electric Circus', recorded in '78, released in '79. Well, the CD was released later than that obviously. My copy of it arrived just a couple of days ago from France. I've wanted it for so long and eventually caved in and ordered it from Discogs. Didn't really want to pay silly money for one song (the whole CD is quite good anyway as it happens), but it was the cheapest I've seen it for a long time (about £16). There is one on eBay now for £40 and I think around £25 upwards is normal. I'm glad I finally have it. I'd much rather it have been on H&S, perhaps instead of the Peel sessions songs which were already easy to pick up on another release. Electric Circus is a pain to get hold of, and AALD is the best of those early tracks, as it was credited to JD it could & should have made the box set.

Thanks for the input on the Complete BBC disc. Had a good look at the Best Of and there is no sign at all of it being copy protected, so why it won't upload is a total mystery. DR numbers are a totally new thing to me since joining this site. Don't really understand all the technical stuff. Never mind.

Warsaw is a great opener to An Ideal For Living. The whole EP really was a transition from the thrashy punk to what the band became with A Factory Sample and onto Unknown Pleasures. Clearly more effort went into these 4 songs than the early demos. Apparently, as per the JD documentary, the early pressing of the EP was awful until it was repressed. Some of these early releases must be a completist's nightmare, with the money they go for.

 

Thanks, must’ve misread it. The Drawback is charming in it’s own way, though. More about it this weekend.

Thanks for the info on SC!

 

I didn't know Short circuit was available on CD...... i'm going be getting an original vinyl copy soon. I did have it back in the day but alas sold it off 16 years ago for about £5!!!!

 

Day 7

No Love Lost



This track is a personal favourite of mine, I prefer the RCA version over the AIFL version as I feel it's more in keeping with where Joy Division were heading. I love the way it builds up, and the music is thought out.... not thrashed out. is this really the same band that only a year previously had churned out Gutz, etc. This is joy Division at last beginning to find their way.

The production on all the RCA tracks is obviously superior to the the AIFL versions... And this track is no exception. Joy Division hated it after they finished recording the album as they didn't like the synthesisers......... Little did they know that in only a few years time they would become New Order and make a living out of them... The irony!