New Order - Technique

because it would sound murky and forlorn and awesome?

("Guilty Partner" is one of my faves off of the album)

but it already sounds murky, forlorn, and awesome!

it sounds crisp, forlorn and awesome

well, it's my least favorite song: the chorus is meh. But that massive synth wash at the end (and more thrusting Hook bass).

'Guilty Partner' is one of my favourites from the album as well, the moments where the chorus kicks in are so powerful for me.

I'm unsure about 'best band of all time'

They're in a toss-up with two other bands for me. Lean towards them, mostly.

yeah Guilty Partner was always my least fave track; sticks out too much. oddly enough i was present when they played it live for the first time ever! didn't like it any more after that though either.

xpost

What are the two other bands?

When my roommate first played this for me in high school, I absolutely hated it. I couldn't stand the synths and could barely get past the first track. It was only about twenty years later that I realized how unbelievable the songwriting is and that the balance between the synth stuff like Vanishing Point and Hooky acoustic songs like All the Way is just about perfect. My favorite LP of theirs by some distance.

I find a lot of New Order's charm stems from the fact that it orbits "best band of all time" almost entirely by accident, and certainly barely by design.

Yeah. Well put.

What are the two other bands?

My Bloody Valentine and Roxy Music (and sometimes also The Jesus and Mary Chain and Pulp)

crikey yeah Electronic wipes the floor with Republic or Brotherhood IMO.

oh hell no

"got plenty of love for Republic but anyway - "Some Distant Memory" is the true hidden gem on that first Electronic album (the oboe part!)"

was just going to say this; my favorite song on the album, beats several NO songs for me as well. I think the first Electronic album certainly beats Brotherhood/Republic/Get Ready/Sirens.

I knew ILE was home when I discovered six years ago the "Some Distant Memory" love.

some distant memory is also a favorite of mine. the electronic album is the best thing sumner was ever involved in, in my opinion. absolute masterpiece.

I found a sealed LP copy of Technique at an antique store last week!

I played Technique on LP over the Christmas Break. It's still my favorite album.

RE: Electronic, did those who would be interested get the great Greg Wilson edit of Getting Away With It? it's 11mins long!

never heard of that Greg Wilson edit, where can I hear it?

?

There's a .wav on Wilson's Soundcloud, along with extensive sleevenotes: http://soundcloud.com/gregwilson/electronic-getting-away-with

Friend of mine just got this vanity plate (Technique's catalogue #)

http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/541319_10100638086042477_1700186350_n.jpg

Bummed I didn't think of it first.

some distant memory is also a favorite of mine. the electronic album is the best thing sumner was ever involved in, in my opinion. absolute masterpiece.

― zingzing, Sunday, January 1, 2012 6:30 PM (9 months ago)

Can't agree with the second and third sentences but otm x 1000 on the second.

?

*the FIRST that is

Spotted a one-line mention in this months Mojo that New Order are about to go back into the studio to work on an "electronic" album. I assume the style, not the side project.

Bernard has most of an album written with Stuart Price producing. Wonder if any of that will turn up on this as New Order rather than the solo project.

why did my mind briefly think you'd said 'stuart murdoch' and actually start wondering what that would be like

still have very distinct memories of buying this on cassette at a strip-mall record store in 1989.

in los angeles IIRC

I remember buying this on cassette from the local indie shop and not even realising it was released. To this day I still don't know if I got it early.

And then I proceeded to play it at least once a day for months.

Repurposing a post above in part, plus other stuff, and...

http://thequietus.com/articles/14359-new-order-technique-review

I have probably said this upthread somewhere, but this album coincided with the height of my New Order obsession (& drugs intake) and I even had a dalmation named Barney at this point and I used to sing "you got class, you got style, you got... SPOT technique!" at him.

(lovely dog but he was totally vicious and there was p much no one in the local scene he hadn't bitten, in the end)

Will read yr take when I'm on a laptop again, Ned.

Thanks. I figured loading in a specific bunch of SoCal context/content was the way to go to give this an anchor, especially for a UK-based publication.

Very nice. Technique was the first NO album I ever got. I've heard the ones before it but haven't yet ventured past that point. But right now I feel like Technique was where they were able to at least minimize the band's weak points (the singing and the production) for long enough to make the classic album they'd always been capable of. I noticed the same thing as you, it is a surprisingly brisk listen - I don't think the album is too short by their standards (about 40 minutes isn't it?) but it does play very much like a "greatest hits".

I already new before I read Ned's piece that it was going to be one of my favourite pieces of writing about music ever, but it exceeded expectations and made me feel 25 years younger. Thanks!

Well, thanks very kindly for that indeed!

It also made me realise that it was 25 years ago today that I walked into my local indie shop and saw it on the shelves, not realising it was out - in fact thinking it was out the following week - and buying it in cassette and taking it home to listen to on repeat. The following months I listened to it at least once daily, not really knowing anything about the band, trying to construct an idea if them from the Saville artwork and what I'd decoded from Substance. Every button was pushed. I wanted 12" singles for all 9 tracks. This music is in my DNA

25 years.

*wibbles*

*gibbers*

*quakes*

*is unable to cope*

But yeah, I accidentally image-bombed myself with this, this morning, so I'm just going to leave this here and pretend we're both still that young.

http://24.media.tumblr.com/8b5fd149acfc8a058ddede50527868b1/tumblr_n06iv6oPkk1rjw8sqo1_1280.jpg

Turning point album for me. Personal Top 10 4eva.

Then Play Long reaches New Order at long last: http://nobilliards.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/new-order-technique.html

Loved that write up, thanks.

It also made me listen to Bummed again

Random New Order question that doesn't seem appropriate for any particular thread or worthy of creating its own so I'll use this one dedicated to this remarkable album.

Does anyone know who the person was who actually did the inscribing of hidden messages on the New Order vinyls in the 80's?

I'm surprised, I must admit, that Sumner didn't write lyrics by himself before this album. Guess this explains why they're so much sharper here than usual.

Is this the one that seemed from ... self-medication?

Every album was.

Maybe I'm thinking of "Republic?" There's one album where Sumner supposedly set a regiment of maybe ecstasy to help him break his lyric writer's block (which lol lyric's block with this guy), not recreationally but almost medicinally. Maybe it was the second Electronic record? I can't remember.

In the 1990s, he took part in some BBC documentary about the effect of Prozac on creativity. I remember him talking about how it cured his writer's block. Maybe that's what you're thinking of?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RDCHhULhN0