regret
I'm drowning in nostalgia. (best of) New Order is playing on my stereo, and I could almost cry. It's been so long, and crikey, Peter Hook is fucking amazing. I know all bass players say he's the reason they picked up their instruments in the first place (he and Fred Erskine, of course), but damn if it ain't true for me. I figured out while driving home today that the music we play is not post-punk, progressive, rock, or what have you. It's post-New Order. I called Claudine up immediately to tell her about my epiphany….I don't know if she was as impressed with my cleverness as I was.
Anyway, I know that most people who consider themselves old school New Order aficionados poo-poo the (best of) selection (to a large extent, so do I), and as a matter of course poo-poo their later albums (as it's always more hip to say that so-and-so's earlier works are really where the magic happened and bemoan the fact that so-and-so have sold out/become stale/etc./etc. later in their careers), but when I stumbled onto "Regret," I couldn't help but get dizzy with delight. It's almost more fitting to listen to that song now, more than ten years later. "It may be I've forgotten the name and the address of everyone I've ever known, it's nothing I regret" and "I was a short fuse, burning all the time; you were a complete stranger; now you are mine" are the perfect tip of the hat/farewell to the pining, angst ridden adolescence this song came to define in retrospect.
And now "World in Motion" is playing, quite fitting as the World Cup starts tomorrow. Ah, footy madness….Be the Reds!…Korea Fighting! I'll have to train myself again to wake up at odd times to catch the games with my dad. On a side note, if anyone wants to watch the matches with me, get in touch.
So if you need me, I'll be sprawled out on the floor, studying the ceiling and listening to New Order as a tribute to the good old (god awful?) days of my youth.
Eltonito said,
June 28, 2006 at 1:39 pm
Funny, my first real band started off with an odd mix of Minor Threat and Joy Division covers. We were very confused.
Did you ever listen to Peter Hook’s side project, Revenge? Completely unmemorable and unoriginal… arguably terrible, but a must for any Peter Hook fan.
My secret bassplayer shame is (was?) Living Color. Muzz Skillings is (was) a god.
meanteacherlady said,
July 3, 2006 at 4:58 am
Yeah, actually I’ve always wanted to cover Atmosphere with female vocals….but now that you mention it, maybe Salad Days as well?
I do remember checking out Revenge at one point, but don’t recall much about them. At this point, though, I think I’m with you in that I’d rather revisit Living Color instead!
Are you playing music now?
Eltonito said,
July 3, 2006 at 7:20 pm
I think the best way to cover a song is take a song that isn’t overly covered or hasn’t been nailed by someone else and run with it. Or take a fairly unknown song by a fairly known band and make it your own, stumping the audience so deftly that they don’t know it wasn’t yours. Give those criteria, the bar is impossibly high for “Atmosphere” - everyone knows it and Codiene pretty well nailed their version of it.
IMHO a great, great Joy Division song to cover would be “Sound of Music” - particularly for a pair of female vocalists. It has a deathmarch of a drum beat, a trademark Peter Hook bass lead and some subtle but aggressive guitar work. The possibilities of interplay between two female vocalists on this song are endless. Check out the Peel Session of “Sound of Music” - the song is huge, wide open and empty. If you don’t have a copy of it handy I can ftp it to Brian.
I am not really playing anything right now. I have a hard time reconciling what I actively listen to with what I like to play and what I can play. I futz around about once a week on the guitar and that’s about it. My bass is still in about 30 pieces, begging to be reassembled and restored.