Search and Destroy : New Order

Some of the stuff in there is utterly daft, and some of it is super awesome.

One of his last auctions had a bass amp, the same as the one in my garage.

Allowing for the "yeah, but that one was owned by Peter Hook", the opening bid price was surprisingly high.

i enjoyed looking at what was in "hooky's post-punk record collection(s)"

Destroy these imo.

+1 to "State of the Nation"

whoah, The Village? No way.

"Music Complete" is possibly top five, and easily my fav 'reunion' album. (ie "Get Ready" onwards)

whoah, The Village? No way.

― dan selzer,

too dopey

Vicious Streak is a great song. I really like Draculas Castle as well, but that ones harder to defend than Vicious Streak. You're mostly right, but also wrong. I'd also place the blame for Subculture remix on John Robie, so if you want to start calling out which New Order remixes are shit, that's going to be a very long list. I suppose the entire point of posting a list like this is so people will argue with you or tell you how smart you are. I hope you generate sufficient engagement with your blog post.

I hope you generate sufficient engagement with your blog post.

New Borad Description?

How could you not include Slow Jam?

The afternoon was very clear
The sun was beating down on me
I got thirsty for a beer
That I had to go to sea
The sea was very rough
It made me feel sick
But I like that kind of stuff
It beats arithmetic

I suppose the entire point of posting a list like this is so people will argue with you or tell you how smart you are. I hope you generate sufficient engagement with your blog post.

Thanks?

But I'm sorry, I guess you're the only passionate New Order fan.

How could you not include Slow Jam?

If bad lyrics is the threshold for landing on the destroy list, there's not much of the New Order catalog that survives. The miracle of this band is that they're still somehow completely essential despite the lyrics. And the singing.

I agree in part but also feel this doesn’t give Bernard enough credit for his many memorable and (sorry) hooky lyrics. He can conjure up some unique images and tap into powerful sentiment - especially (but not limited to) his absolute peak of (let’s say) True Faith -> Regret

You are so wrong about The Village it’s painful.

Well, I went from finding "Guilty Partner" meh to considering it bloody essential. Hope is the thing with feathers!

"The Village" is one of my favorite New Order songs!

The Regret lyrics seem promising at first. But I can't imagine that he laboured too long over the chorus lyrics:

I would like a place I could call my own /
Have a conversation on the telephone

Also, The Village might be in my top 10 New Order songs, so successful challop there.

Vicious Streak is tranced-out magic to me. I was expecting the entirety of Republic after the first three tracks.

i <3 the village, that little switch up in the drums and the synths for the third verse is pure joy

The Village for me is not in the top drawer - but certainly not in the bottom. Chorus couplet is pretty awful, but I guess only averagely bad by Bernard's lyric standards.

I find The Village affecting. Lyrically and musically it captures a goofy / giddy new love feeling, and the sense that the entire world confirms your special thing, before re-framing it at the end with "their love died three years ago." Like he was looking at a happy photograph of his now-divorced parents the whole time, trying to imagine how it must have once been. Out of the context of the song it's doggerel but so what.

well put

I would like a place I could call my own /
Have a conversation on the telephone

To me this is kind of genius? Catchy rhyme, rhythmically perfect for the song but also conveys some kind of yearning for normalcy in the face of an unspecified emotional devastation

I just read the lyrics and yep they read terribly, but when they sit on top of the glorious rush of the music those random couplets can hit (me) profoundly. That messy blend of banality and romanticism is kind of how my brain actually thinks, I think.

Speaking about a lot of NO songs there, not just Regret.

otm. Can't do them at karaoke.

The Internet seems to think every single song they ever wrote is about Ian Curtis

you're so right emsworth - I mean, the song is called "Regret" and ends "just wait till tomorrow / I guess that's what they all say / just before they fall apart". That and "Waiting for the Siren's Call" can bring me to tears if they hit at the right moment. That indefinable mix of banality and genius is what keeps them so fresh in my heart.

oh fuck I didn't mean to plagiarise you while praising your take!

Not relevant to Alfred’s list but the live version of “Waiting for the Siren’s Call” crushes the original.

Hard disagree, I mean it's a cool reworking but it loses all the poignancy, and it's not New Order without the acid sting of guitar lines and that bass melody.
I guess I will be shouted down but Sirens' Call is the last NO album for me, as irritating a shit as Hooky undoubtedly is, the band is the four of them or GTFO.
Amid all the rancour and sniping, to pull out a song like that - in which all four absolutely shine at their best - is almost miraculous. Everything after that is spare change, to me.

what a fucking idiot I am for forgetting that Gillian bowed out for that album, there's no defence for self-clowning like that.
Great song though. I will now retire from saying anything online ever.

I like State of the Nation and The Village. From the 80s I think the only song I really can't bear is 1963, mostly because I can't fathom how those lyrics ever made it to a finished song. So many painful turns of phrase.

Vicious Streak is Top 5 for me and I would also put I Told You So in the top tier.
You could easily populate the worst 10 with all of Lost Sirens + Liar and Chemical + State of the Nation and Shellshock

State of the Nation and The Village are great, as is 1963. If there's a NO track from the 80s that I can see an argument for being on the list it's Touched by the Hand of God, but that's redeemed by its video

Weird, thought I posted, but I like "Touched" and don't like "1963," which is kind of like "Love Vigilantes" if that song was bad.

Where the heck is the rando Jimmy Cliff cover from?

A 2003 War Child album

SUNKIST IS THE ONE
― adam (adam), Sunday, October 2, 2005 8:49 PM (sixteen years ago)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2g9UJdH4MM

The setlist to the first show of theirs I ever saw, in 1985, is a pretty good "Search" list, at least up through Low-Life. Makes a great playlist.

Sunrise
This Time of Night
Hurt
Thieves Like Us
5 8 6
Everything's Gone Green
The Village
Subculture
Denial
Confusion
The Perfect Kiss

Encore:
Ceremony
Blue Monday

Encore 2:
Temptation

As for "Destroy," Alfred's list is good with the obvious exception of "The Village."

SUNKIST IS THE ONE
― adam (adam), Sunday, October 2, 2005 8:49 PM (sixteen years ago)

📹

I didn't see a post, but I guess Low-Life is getting the box set treatment. Old news that I completely missed, it was delayed due to COVID, but the newish news is that it's out in January with a pre-Christmas announcement.

Nice!

I had no idea they were doing a tour with the Pet Shop Boys.

Search: World In Motion Caribinieri Mix

Destroy: World In Motion single

I think it was the Caribinieri mix, anyway. You lose the catchier piano riff but you're also spared the footballer rapping, and the chorus declared that "we've got the world in motion", and not "love" which is stupid.

Search: Republic! I know its a bit past their most iconic era, but I think its their most solid album. The only stinker is "Chemical" (I think, going off memory---the one that starts with "I wake up every night on the stair").

Destroy: Shellshock, State of the Nation, Subculture. Each of these is tedious its own, but to release three songs so close together that suck in the same way, until they all blur together, was unfortunate.

Search: the Substance versions of Ceremony, Temptation, and Confusion.

Destroy: the original versions of these songs.

Search: Kiss of Death, Thieves Like Us instrumental

Destroy: Perfect Kiss, Thieves Like Us vocal

I’ll be going through your bins.

I disagree with most of that, but agree that the instrumental Thieves Like Us is 5-6 min of pure bliss

You’re describing the No Alla Violenza mix, not the Carabinieri mix (which still has the footballers in it)

I had no idea they were doing a tour with the Pet Shop Boys.

You missed out. (And there were various thread revivals!)

*looks at search/destroy post*

Stephen? Stephen Hague? Glad to have you with us.