Showing posts with label Joy Division. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joy Division. Show all posts

Saturday 14 November 2020

Imperfect Memory

Two thirds of the way through "Coldheart Canyon" and I do not remember it going like this. Huge chunks of it are like a newish book to men. That's the benefit of my imperfect memory, I forget things which means I can reread books and enjoy them as I did the first time round.

I suppose the same can be said of films and TV series, I generally remember overall part of the narrative and major incidents and occurrences, but they can still surprise me , so I can revisit and enjoy time after time.

I wrote that my hard drive had died, but I couldn't find an ethernet connected disc and thought I would just have to link via the USB connection on my router and access my content via that. My Kindle wouldn't connect but I found that my phone would, which was useful. Today I discovered that the ES File Explorer app on my Amazon Kindle could not only see the drive but also play content from it , so as the only disks I have is a backup disc (1 Tb) and a second backup (500Gb) , I have now ordered an 8 Tb one. I can't connect my DVD player up yet , but that's hardly an issue as if I want to watch something I can put them on a stick and watch them

As I write this I am listing to "No Parlez" by Paul Young , which is a bit of a curates egg , good in parts. Joy Division's "Love Will Tear Us Apart" and Anthony Moore's "No Parlez" are week takes on th ethe originals , but Paul Young has an excellent voice and loved him with the Q-Tips (but not Streetband) , so I found a live take of "Some Kinda Wonderful" which is quite impressive.

It's always good to revisit the good stuff

Monday 18 May 2020

Ten Miles


On Friday I'd decided that hitting my 340K steps this May for the rolling Million Step Challenge was unlikely to happen , then yesterday due my local office not taking a Discogs order to go to the USA I walked into town to the Haymarket Post Office / M&M News who did allow me to post the item.

What this meant is , with other perambulations, I walked over ten and half miles yesterday , 23K steps , which now pots me about 2K steps behind schedule, so maybe I might actually make my target , though I'm just over half way through the month, and the reasons I thought I wouldn't make it still stand.

This is also continuing the #maywriteabit thing although I suppose all my May posts fall into that category.

Though this morning I have already covered 5K stepa and that is close to half my normal daily target.

I switched on 6Music and Chris Hawkins is playing "Isolation" by Joy Division (appropriate for these times) as it's the 40th anniversary of Ian Curtis' death. So as I need to get to work we will share that song and if you listen to 6Music today there will be a lot of related things on there for you to listen to.

I think the clip is from the film Control although has spanish subtitles , but wort a watch. Track down the film too.

Thursday 19 March 2020

Windows Media Player?


Yesterday I tried using the recommended Windows 10 Media player Groove which would not recognise the music library. For years I've been using iTunes , but that is just slow , cumbersome bloatware,  and Amazon Music is not much better.

I then went to Windows Media Player and accidentally pressed a small icon which changed the view and very shortly had logged all my network music in it's library (iTunes took about two days to do this) , the only slight problem being that it defaults to the 32 bit version , but I have put the 64 bit version on the quick access bar.

So today I have listed to a Joy Division boxed set, a best of Julian Cope and a best of Warren Zevon. While the sound quality is a bit imperfect , it's great to listen to my own music collection rather than my normal 6Music diet, not that there's anything wrong with 6Music.

The thing is I am very happy with my musical options around my computer.I'm now listening to "God Save Us" by The Oz Elastic band which was released on Apple Records (and featured John Lennon) to raise money for the Oz Magazine Obscenity case.


So we'll go with "Mr Bad Example" one of my many favorite Warren Zevon songs, I think it's a polka , the lyrics are just perfect. Just a thought he looks very like Heisenberg (Walter White) from "Breaking Bad" which would be very appropriate ......

Saturday 10 August 2019

Like A Ping Pong Ball In A Wind Tunnel


I was trying to think of an analogy for "The Illuminatus Trilogy" and that came to mind. It's a loosely noir canvas but this ranges from  American location , proisons, hotels , big cities , small towns with secret societies to submarines and sunken cities and lands such as Atlantis and wars and fights with gangs and armies and societies featuring every continent of the Earth and even some extra terrestrial locations. The whole thing can change between paragraph , one line you're in a seedy New York hotel next you're a Yellow Submarine the you are locked in a southern tale before ending up on a small island off the West African coast.

I am about halfway through the book and despite incredibly long unbroken chapters I am finding it incredibly readable, though maybe others would not.

I'm selling a lot of my CDs on Discogs  but sometimes I hear things on the radio by bands I thought I didn't really listen to then think , no I'm not selling that. That's recently happened with Kate Tempest and Fat White Family , both well worth a listen.

The weather is still absolutely mad  but we still have to venture out. Ever since the leak (temporarily fixed)  I am now constantly listening in case it comes through again , but any regular noise such as a tripping tap or the ticking of a clock or watch can trigger the worry mode , and when you think about various forms of mental illness related to OCD and just somethings taking all of your attention and triggering anxiety , something that is everyday for me can be absolute hell for others.

If you do suffer in this way Matt Haig's "Reasons To Stay Alive" id a book that should be in your position . A friend of mine told me it saved his life.

So it's Saturday and yesterday I bought two vinyl records, Bostons' eponymous first album with has one of the most perfect AOR  vinyl sides ever, and the "Substance" Joy Division compilation and leaving JG Windows met Jonathan Wells-Lee and Hedley Sugar Wells and their young charge who were watching a twenty grans self playing piano in the window. Lovely people, and lovely meeting them for a quick catch up.

So we'll go with a live take of "Foreplay / Long Time" by Boston , showing that they could play taking in in progressive bombast and euphoric AOR . Enjoy.


Thursday 1 August 2019

Realisation


Nothing deep, but due to my rate of posting from March this year , if I post twenty two times a month for the rest of the year then I will have another record year. I'm not expecting to do that though given this is my second post today you may not believe it.

The thing is the more you post , the more you feel like posting. I just wish I could get myself into gear with writing , and writing songs and recording them. I have all the tools so no excuse not to do it, just the extreme lack of discipline.

Today I found a couple more covers of Joy Division's "Love Will Tear Us Apart" by The Cure and "Ceremony" by Radiohead. I was completely unaware of these though the song has been covered by almost everyone but it still belongs to Ian Curtis.

These songs don't seem to have been officially released but they are on Youtube so you can listen fairly easily.

So enjoy them , I am off to my pit.


Closer


It's one of those English words that in isolation you cannot be sure of what it means or how it's pronounced. It can mean nearer (and this is probably how you actually normally read it) or the opposite of opener.

The reason I've chosen it it is because of a section in the Joy Division film where they talked of the title of their second album, which I always assumed was the former meaning, but give the tomb on the cover, the death of Ian Curtis and the fact that it was the final Joy Division album the latter meaning makes far more sense.

This is the first post of August and we had another downpour during the night but the sky is just a uniform grey as it was last November recorded in this post.

I watched a film "The Colony" last night which was a lot better that it's 5.3 IMDB rating although there was some Walking Dead grade horror, but my only problem was the extremely sudden ending when there was actually and decent chink of hope.

So we obviously go with "Colony" from "Closer" by Joy Division on this first day of August.


Wednesday 31 July 2019

Night Watch


I can hardly believe the extreme heat and extreme rain we've been having, and amazed the the people in power don't seem to see a problem. We've been lucky we haven't been hit by floods but I made the mistake of trying to walk to work without an umbrella today and got hit by two heavy showers. Looking out the window it's grey with some impressive cloud formations.

"The Illuminatus Trilogy" is going along but it's essentially stream of consciousness slipping between realities with long meaninglessly titled chapters / splits but I'm about two thirds through book one "The Eye In The Pyramid" coming across the detective Saul Goodman, Atlantis , gratuitous sex ., pyramids, giant submarines and right wing southern USA jail stays but you are never in the same place for long. I'm enjoying the read / ride but this will not be most people's cup of petrol.

I watched a couple of films on Amazon Prime including the remake of "Suspiria" which has a lot of touchpoints of "The Illuminatus Trilogy" and an experience to watch with a Thom Yorke soundtrack, I may have to watch the original now which is an hour shorter.

I also watched a documentary on Joy Division which again was excellent and to me their music sound as fresh and pertinent now as when it first came out. The thing is everything was generally analogue so the sounds and noises were actually made and not just something downloaded. A highly watchable film following on from Nico 1988 that I watched the other week.

So I am going to share the excellent video for Joy Division's "Atmosphere" always one of my favourites, as i get ready for bed.

Friday 14 June 2019

Forty Years Since Joy Division Gave Us Unknown Pleasures

Peter Saville Pulsar

It's forty years since Joy Division released their debut "Unknown Pleasures" which has been as influential in sound and design as the first Velvet Underground album.

The cover while being deceptively simple based on Pulsayr waves visualised by Peter Saville. There is further expansion here. Peter was themain Factory Records album cover designer and examples of his work can be found here

The album itself  was a Factory release produced by Martin Hannett and sounds as doomily fresh today as when it came out although then and now it still stands out as being like no other.

All the songs are being reimagined as videos for the fortirth anniversay and will appear on the Joy Division Youtube video channel , and start with "I Remember Nothing" ,

Full Credits here

Forty Years.

Friday 24 May 2019

I Played A DVD


I am definitely becoming lazier and lazier. Also while I have a large CD and digital music collection, there are big chunks of it I have never heard and probably never will. It's similar with DVD. This week I have actually taken the DVD from it's place on the shelf, switched on the DVD player and switched the channel on the TV and actually watched  the films. The two I watched were "The Golden Compass" which was excellent but has been on the shelf unplayed for ten years, and "Fight Club" (adapted from Chuck Palahniuk's novel) which has been there for even longer. Both these films are excellent, and I should have watched them years ago, but apathy and laziness has meant that despite knowing how good these are ("The Golden Compass" was the film of the first book in Philip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" series which is coming on TV from HBO and BBC).

I don't know if this is just a digital malaise, because my vinyl collection is always played when I purchase anything and I often share things on my Instagram Channel , but when you buy digitally it is so easy to put it on one side for later, and after a week or so it's forgotten about. If anthing gets put in a box or a drawer then thats usually it. I still listen to music digitally from my network and on my phone, but still eschew streaming services such as Spotify or Amazon as to use them without wifi means that your data gets consumed fairly quickly, so I load albums from my network to my Google Pixel which I may upgrade to a Pixel 3A in the future.

So one of the good things of being in the digital world is that I can share suitable music with you as I post entries on this blog, but I do think digital storage has turned us into magpies , buying things that we don't actually use or properlay appreciate. With that I will share "Digital" buy Joy Division with you with an excellent video taken from the equally excellent film "Control".

Sunday 19 May 2019

FactoryZoo


Just shoved together two of my most liked record labels Factory from Manchester and Zoo from Liverpool because I do  have a book called "Factory".

Factory was the imprint of Tony / Anthony Wilson and brought us among others Joy Division , Happy Mondays , New Order and lots more as well as lots of iconic design ideas. The Hacienda Club used the black and yellow warning stripes , now every time I see it I don't think WARNING I thing HACIENDA or FACTORY . A brilliant idea. The film "24 Hour Party People" is about Tony Wilson and the lasting enigma of Factory Records. It was also responsible for releasing "Reach For Love" by Marcel King, one of my favourite records ever. It's also Shaun Ryder's favourite Factory single.

Everything on Factory had a catalogue number (The Hacienda was FAC51)

Zoo Records from Liverpool was nowhere near as influential as Factory but I remember getting a compilation (Street To Street: A Liverpool Album - 1978) and loving "Match of The Day" by Big In Japan, who featured Holly Johnson, Ian Broudie , Bill Drummond and Budgie. The label also featured Echo and The Bunnymen , Teardrop Explodes and lots more so still very important.

It is quite surprising that Zoo Records are almost impossible to track down these days and a lot of the Factory compilations are similar. Discogs seems to be the best way of sourcing them.

So it's Sunday , the weather is gorgeous , so I may relax and enjoy it or possibly nip out for a walk, but either way I am going to have a relaxing day. Hope you do too.


Monday 25 July 2016

Atmosphere


I am quite surprised that I don't seem to have ever mentioned Joy Division in this blog. I have written about New Order and The Hacienda and I am sure a few other related bands, but for some reason Joy Division came to mind this morning , and particularly the song Atmosphere ,  then thanks to youtube I found this promotional video which amazingly I've never seen before.

I love it's rickety pretentious mystery and and the black and white graininess. I don't know if the black and white hooded plus and minus figures are stock footage or commissioned for this video but it certainly is a mind stimulating four minutes with and obviously excellent soundtrack.

Scariteletubbies


I first heard the song on John Peel and that's where I heard a lot of artists for the first time. Looking for image from the vide (I know I could have snipped it , the scary black and white Teletubbies image came up so thought it would be fun to include that.

Anyway , the sun is shining, it's the start of a new week , so everyone have a brilliant time today

Sunday 8 May 2016

Control and Football



A weird thing. I am not at home and am using my laptop on Windows 10 and the wallpaper is reflecting the slideshow on my home desktop PC. The only vague connection is that they are both connected to the internet and Windows 10 wanted my email address. This is slightly worrying as it's doing something that I never asked for and I don't actually want. I want control of my stuff and I don't want Google , Microsoft and Apple connecting everything I do and potentially sharing it with anyone who pays them.

It's like the iCloud situation where Apple delete personal files and put copies in "The Cloud" which you can access if you pay them money and have an internet connection (see here). The guys personal recordings were stolen by Apple and he was basically told "tough". It amazes me the arrogance of corporations who put things in very small print and then say it covers them for anything they want to do. Mobile phone companies are like that too.

One article says they wont delete your stuff (see here) , but I have had dealings with them and they will never ever admit there is a problem. Your iPhone could explode and burn your hand off and Apple would say it is performing as required.

I thought She's Lost Control by Joy Division is appropriate because our reliance on technology , sees technology doing more and more things we didn't expect.

Fog From Claybank
I still don't know what's happening with my laptop.

On a lighter note Leicester were crowned Premiership Champions and had a massive party. The media generally hate it because they would rather cover Arsenal , Chelsea, Manchester City and United, in fact anybody with money and no soul. Money is the new religion you would think. To me it's a necessary evil but not something to be worshiped and put on a pedestal. It negates the need for barter , that's all. The problem is when the big clubs win , it's just about collecting shekels , they don't give a damn about anybody else , they are perfect corporate material.



Leicester have provided The Premier League with a shot in the arm and a great deal of fun , and the combined technical genii of the "big clubs" still can't get near them, and anyone with any sense is loving it.

Anyway I am enjoying the sun and quiet and I don't have to get up tomorrow morning.

Enjoy your Sunday everybody


Monday 21 December 2015

Morning Morning 7am - Joy Division To The World


Well another work week has commenced and looking forward to lots of good things happening this week. Time seems to be at a premium although it always is whether you have anything planned or not. Christmas is one of those things where , you actually have advance notice that it's going to happen. I do find it quite amazing in the world of business especially and I suppose socially , the number of people who seem shocked that it is actually here and then have to implement emergency measures to deal with the situation.

Joy Division To The World
My biggest "worry" is remembering to record film's like Brave and specials like the new Sherlock and the Wallace and Gromit Christmas special.

One of the reasons for doing this post is to reshare the excellent Joy Division Christmas Tree and Holly Golightly's "Christmas Tree's On Fire.

So just calm down and you will have a great time , I certainly will

Have a great day , and week , and enjoy yourself.

Wednesday 29 July 2015

The Order Of Disorder


Last night I watched an episode on Odyssey on catch up TV. I'm also reading "A Brief History Of Time" by Stephen Hawking and today discovered what a quark is . I knew the name and know it's a vegetarian filler food but I didn't actually know what a quark was. This started me thinking and I recalled an incident from twenty years back after taking a psychometric test....

...after the test the guy told me I had a problem , but it could possibly be corrected. I asked him what the problem was. He told that my problem was that I always wanted to be right! I didn't see this as a problem, and asked him didn't everybody want to be right , as an example didn't he want to be right in his assessment assessment of me? His assessment was correct , but I didn't see it as a problem and still don't see it as a problem. I still want to always be right, but that statement unqualified does not show the full picture. I WANT to be always right BUT I am often WRONG, and when I am wrong I want to be told how I am wrong and to be shown how to get it right. I know that I'm not infallible , I would just like to be .... especially when I put a bet on the horses! At the time I was working with a manager who took me to one side after I's questioned a situation and told me "You might be right ... but I'm in charge" ....   though that was was true I knew he was wrong and I was right but there was nothing I could do about the situation. I was right but not in control.

And this sort of brings me to the next part , is that in general we want to be in control , but not be controlled although we may need and want direction. When I was watching the TV last night I was thinking before the option of recording we were very regimented by TV . You had to be at your set at a particular time or else you missed that program , and god forbid there were clashes , yet people still complained about repeats (yet most digital stations serve nothing but repeats these days), but now I very seldom watch live TV, I let my recorder build up what I think I want to watch and watch it in almost chaotic fashion. Whatever I want whenever I want and with apps like BBC iPlayer and my Samsung Note 4 Phone and my iPad and Laptop wherever I want. So is that disorder or the control I want ?  I think it's latter , I feel I have tools to manage my disorder and allow me to order my situation as I want.

Need Control
I do think it's good to be right , but you have to also be open to new ideas and the fact that you may be wrong. We are at our most vulnerable when we lose control and are reliant the power and ability of others to help us get it right. I always try to be there for others , and part of that is that I want others to be there for me if I need their help.

Given the tone of this post , what else could I choose but Joy Division's She's Lost Control.





Incidentally this is post 911 given my last post was about numbers.

Anyway I didn't think I would finish this , but I still want to be right , I still want to help people , I still want to be there for my friends and family , I sill want to be in control and I still want to have a wonderful time. So everyone have a fantastic day.




Sunday 18 May 2014

Sun Daze, Madchester and The Heed

A Corner Of The Garden
Well it's Sunday, eight ante meridian or thereabouts and its another gorgeous day. The garden has been done so today can be fairly relaxed , just to enjoy the weather. It's May and it looks like summer is here. Who knows it may even be party time.

Madchester
I always find that sunny weather does uplift you , although if it was like that all the time would I really appreciate it? May thats why my friends in New Zealand and Australia are always so upbeat generally, while people form Manchester (where always rains) tend to be miserable (only joking , though Oasis, Happy Mondays and Joy Division while producing some great music are not the sort of people you would want to spend any time with, although John Cooper Clarke is great fun but he's from Salford). Though it's funny how a simple thought on what a nice day it is can digress into thoughts on the Madchester phenomenon.

Oh the other good news is that Gateshead are in the Conference Play Off Final against Cambridge, so that's one team that the whole of the North East will be behind today, hopefully they will be back in the league after an absence of 50 years. Theres a big do on at The Black Bull and the scenes will be incredible when Gateshead do the business. OK so I now got sidetracked into football, as you may realise I can get easily led astray! But here's a song for The Heed from the magnificent Rezillos.



 
 
Anyway I hope everyone is having a great weekend and taking advantage of this lovely weather. Enjoy the rest of your weekend

Thursday 6 March 2014

Worcester Records, The Good and The Bad

The Rise Vinyl Racks
Well the bad news from Worcester is that Mann Audio and Phoenix are no more, or as far as my experience goes , never were. However the good news is that the Rise Records go from strength to strength , with a lot on offer in a small shop, and I ended up buying some books (well it is World Book Day today, though as far schools are concerned it's Dressing Up Day) , was talking to the guy in the shop who was very knowledgeable and let me take pictures and told about the record shops that had gone , but there was a great second hand shop called Market Hall Records.

While I was in there, there was something playing that made me think of The Cure and Joy Division , and turned out to be the Eagulls , so that went onto the purchase list as well, whuch can be seen on my Instagram Feed.


Market Hall Records
Market Hall Records has a big selection of stuff and the guy is really good to talk to, if you go to their website you can find out where they are, and they are sensible enough to use the web as just an advertising hoarding, which is a fine low maintenance approach. I also picked up a Julian Cope disc called Ambulance.

So all in all a successful day, Worcester has two excellent record shops (HMV doesnt count although they have one), so it's a good place if you want to improve your music collection and expand your horizons. I'd never heard The Eagulls before today but thatnks to the visit to Rise I now have their album and thingk that you might like them too.

I could post a video, but there are pictures and links so I will leave you to find the stuff. That's part of the fun of the internet , you can lose yourself for hours looking for stuff you didn't know that you wanted.

Monday 29 April 2013

There's Only One Tony Wilson



Well actually there's more than one , which we all knew. I grew up with Tony Wilson , So It Goes , Factory Records , Joy Division , Happy Mondays , The Hacienda. Sadly missed since he died a couple of years ago , but the guy revolutionised music ,and business , not financially successfully but his vision resulted in some amazing breakthroughs. The first peorgram to have the Sex Pistols performing live on TV and immortalised in the sureal but entertaining 24 Hour Party People.

Anyway a couple of years ago I bought several books pertaining to Factory Records and related groups and a few my the great man himself. One called The Universe on a Bicycle sounded like a Wilson title , but in fact is written by another Tony Wilson (an articled clerk turned artist who patented an origami table) about a bike ride round Ireland pondering the deep questions in life in a very entertaining manner. I only found this out today when I started reading the book and would recommend it to anyone. It's one of those pleasant mistakes in life that actually benfits all concerned . I have found a new author and he has a new fan so to speak.

While not in the same universe as the late Anthony Wilson my world has certainly been enriched by reading both authors.