Garage Punk Jay Reatard’s Entire Band Quits; Jay Responds With “Band quit ! Fuck them ! They are boring rich kids who can’t play for ahit anyways .. Say hello to your ugly and boring wifes opps I mean …” – Jay Joins Billy Corgan As Musicians Most Unwilling To Admit Their Own Douchey-ness, In Light of Most Obviously Being Douche [Brooklyn Vegan]
Watch San Francisco’s Girls’ Frontman Christopher Owens Cover Daniel Johnston’s “True Love Will Find You In The End” – Match Made In Neurotically Depressed Heaven (Which I’d Imagine Looks a Lot Like An American Apparel) [Gorilla vs. Bear]
Stream Brooklyn’s The Antlers Covering Dark Side of the Moon Track “Breathe” With Holly Miranda; Can You Get More Haunting Than The Original? (No, You Can’t…Not Even You, Peter Silberman) [NYC Taper]
Joy Division/New Order Bassist Peter Hook Confuses Himself With More Sinister Hook; Admits To Faking Legendary Joy Division Frontman Ian Curtis’s Signature On Memorabilia [Pitchfork]
Fox News’s Glenn Beck Did Not Get Contacted By Muse to Retract His Praise; Elsewhere, This Story Irritates Me [NME]
German Electro Artist Ulrich Schnauss Sues Axl Rose For Ripping Off Two of His Compositions – I Somehow Feel Bad For Rose, Like a Lost Puppy, How Could He Know Any Better? [Idolator]
Stream an Unreleased Jackson 5 Track “That’s How Love Is;” I Want You Back! Unreleased Masters, A Collection of Unreleased J5 Cuts, Released November 12 [NME]
Brooklyn Self Proclaimed “Poet Laureat of Generation Y” Tao Lin, And Hipster Runoff Blogger Carles Release First Single As “Jesus Christ The Indie Band” – Stream It, Feel Ironic, Feel Self Aware, Feel Nothing, Realize That’s About As Deep As Mr. Lin Goes, Chuckle At Their Website [Gorilla vs. Bear]
compiled by Max Sebela
Roadtrip, Anyone? Initial Pop Montreal Lineup Announced [Brooklyn Vegan]
Santigold Working on New Album With Pharrell Williams [NME]
Prefuse 73 Organizes Super-Group [Pitchfork]
The White Stripes Making Documentary of Canadian Tour [Rolling Stone]
De La Soul Touring in Celebration of 20 Years of 3 Feet High and Rising [Brooklyn Vegan]
Mos Def’s New Album Available in T-Shirt Format [Pitchfork]
BAM Announces Schedule for Next Wave Festival 2009 [Brooklyn Vegan]
The Ventures’ Bob Bogle Dies [Rolling Stone]
Members of Blur and New Order Team Up to Form Bad Lieutenant [The Tripwire]
Coldplay Off The Hook In Cat Stevens’ Book [The Tripwire]
compiled by Erin Sheehy
September 4, 2008
Record Review: Technique
Hidden Gem:
New Order
Technique
1989 | London Records Ltd.
Pop quiz: name three bands that lost their lead singer and songwriter, yet rose to fabulous heights of fame and fortune. I know what you’re thinking – Pink Floyd, right? But there are others. Depeche Mode lost Vince Clark. The Buzzcocks lost Howard Devoto. Joy Division lost Ian Curtis. In each case, the band reaped compensatory benefits from the absence of their most important member. Roger Waters began to channel Syd Barrett’s psychotic yet strangely lucid perspective. Instead of trying to reproduce Vince Clark’s perky synth-pop, Martin L. Gore revealed a penchant for lyrics filled with sadomasochism and other blasphemous rumors, and sweetened the deal with crafty pop hooks. Joy Division? In a state of confusion after Curtis’ suicide, they promoted the world’s least likely singer and lyricist, Barney Sumner, to center stage.
Of course, the band’s most flamboyant member, Peter Hook, remained the musical star. His melodic bass lines filled in for the absent rhythm guitar, climbing high on the fingerboard, a style that helped define the alternative sound of the ’80s. Onstage Hooky showed off his duck walk and Barney stood at the microphone like a nervous kid at a spelling bee. The polar opposite of a Rod Stewart-type, Sumner emerged as a brilliantly underachieving frontman with a distinctive, childlike vocal style. He deserves much of the credit for New Order’s lasting appeal.
By the time of Technique, the band once considered elusive and intellectual (an image these heavy-drinking Mancunians laughed off) abandoned alternative club music for quirky pop. Sounding as always as if he were improvising on the spot, Sumner sang about finding himself: “It takes years to find the nerve/ To be apart from what you’ve done/ To find the truth inside yourself/ And not depend on anyone.” Almost like a Bon Jovi rocker, right? In fact, Technique’s prickly spirit of independence veered closer to the mainstream than the whimsy of albums like Low-Life, and could have offended New Order’s college radio audience. Instead, it became their biggest album to date.
The time for dirges in the style of Ian Curtis was definitely over. Having mastered their craft, New Order was actually in key with its aging hipster fans. Their message in this luminous album, driven home by Barney’s boyish persona and Hook’s aggressive riffing, was that you can grow up and still keep your individuality.
All it takes is a little technique.
by Robin Mookerjee
