JOY DIVISION: STILL (1981)
1) Exercise One; 2) Ice Age;
3) The Sound Of Music; 4) Glass; 5) The Only Mistake; 6) Walked In Line; 7) The
Kill; 8) Something Must Break; 9) Dead Souls; 10) Sister Ray; 11) Ceremony; 12)
Shadow Play; 13) Means To An End; 14) Passover; 15) New Dawn Fades; 16)
Transmission; 17) Disorder; 18) Isolation; 19) Decades; 20) Digital.
General verdict: Somewhat mediocre
outtakes, but hey, it's Joy Division! It's treasurable by default!
This somewhat sprawling coda to Joy Division's
short career may be called the last «proper» JD album, largely because all of
its first disc consists of previously unreleased outtakes, but it is also the
first in a lengthy series of posthumous releases that, frankly, do a better job
of confirming the enormity of the legend than of enriching the legend with truly
valuable content. Joy Division were not a collective Bob Dylan, their
productivity even in peak years was rather modest, and when they left something
behind, there was usually a good reason for this.
The nine original songs on the first disc (the
tenth is a live cover of The Velvet Underground's ʽSister Rayʼ) date from
October '78 to January '80, but the majority of them date from the Unknown Pleasures period, so what you
would expect to find is a bunch of mid- to fast-tempo rockers, not very heavy
on atmospheric subtleties and, since they are outtakes, not too polished
production-wise. The briefest assessment of them all that can be made is: they
add nothing to what we already know, think,
or feel about Joy Division. And why should they? They represent shelved,
abandoned, or temporarily frozen ideas that would later be reworked and perfected
into the shape of those Joy Division songs that we already know and love. But
if you state it clearly and openly that you are here for subtle nuances — that
you simply cherish that sound and that mood too much to deny yourself the
pleasure of reliving the same dream on a new pillowsheet — then welcome to the
club.
Proceeding in chronological order, the earliest
inclusion is ʽGlassʼ, the only track here that had been previously released —
on an early Factory Records sampler EP, originally released in late 1978 and
featuring tracks from Joy Division, Cabaret Voltaire, and some minor acts. It
still has very little of classic JD gloom and plays more like a regular
post-punk rocker, all choppy chords and pulsating energy and an
industrial-sounding distorted bassline that commands most of the attention. Ian
sounds angry and pissed, with a bark in his voice that would rarely be heard
again, but the song does not work well as a whole, because it is not dark
enough to be spooky and not angry enough to make your blood boil.
The four April '79 outtakes from the Unknown Pleasures sessions are
interesting, but I can feel pity only for ʽExercise Oneʼ — its sonic structure,
with siren-like and tornado-like guitars swirling around a monotonous bassline,
rather reminds me of Closer, and
with better production the song might have occupied a respectable position on
that album, bypassing the still-too-pop values of Unknown Pleasures. ʽWalked In Lineʼ and ʽThe Killʼ are frantic
rockers, and both seem inspired by the likes of Brian Eno's ʽThird Uncleʼ —
but, once again, lacking the depth and occasional scariness of the fast-paced material
that did make it onto the album. And ʽThe Only Mistakeʼ is curious because of
its waltzing tempo, but the song's chorus ("strain, take the strain, these
days we love") sounds a bit silly, and whatever they wanted to say with
the song, it does not look like they managed to say it distinctly.
As time went by and dark clouds became ever
darker, the song titles began to reflect that, as well: the two outtakes from
late '79 are named ʽIce Ageʼ and ʽDead Soulsʼ, respectively. The former has a
beat so lively it would rather fit New Order than Joy Division, and the level
of energy is so surprisingly high that I am tempted to regard Ian's prophetic exclamations
of "living in an ice age, living in an ice age!" as more fit for Bad
Religion. ʽDead Soulsʼ, having more to do with the cult of ancestors than
Gogol's novel, is slower and more stately and might have fit better on Closer, but the heavy guitars are
just... too heavy for this band. Plus, they sort of rip off the bridge section
of ʽJumpin' Jack Flashʼ without knowing it.
Chronologically the last song to be included
here is ʽThe Sound Of Musicʼ, recorded during the same session as ʽLove Will
Tear Us Apartʼ — some lovely scratch guitar sounds here, every now and then
breaking off into tortured melodic howls, but no proper vocal hook to speak
of... all in all, listening to all these outtakes really makes you respect the
band all the more, because lesser outfits (like the abovementioned Cabaret
Voltaire, for instance) would have absolutely no problem populating their
numerous records with this mediocre production. Joy Division, on the other
hand, made sure that only those songs make it to the final line that actually
tell a gripping story — these ones mostly don't.
Leaving aside the cover of ʽSister Rayʼ, which
is mostly interesting just for the very fact of its existence, we should
briefly cover the second disc — of tremendous historical importance, since that
was the very last live show the band ever played, at Birmingham University on
May 2, 1980. It is notable for containing a rare live version of the soon-to-be
New Order song ʽCeremonyʼ, and for closing the concert with ʽDigitalʼ, an old
song from the same EP that also contained ʽGlassʼ. It is also notable for
featuring highly out-of-tune synths (particularly audible on ʽDecadesʼ), but
otherwise the sound quality is tolerable — and, oh joy, they do ʽShadow Playʼ,
with Sumner playing all the guitar solos... well, not perfectly, but as close
to live perfection as possible. Other than that, well, it was just your average
Joy Division live show; if you are interested in whether Ian Curtis gives any
signs of sounding like a goner, then no, he does not. It's not like he'd been
planning his suicide for months, anyway.
Overall, I would only recommend the album for very serious fans. Sometimes a collection
of outtakes such as this, when arranged in chronological order, can very
explicitly trace the creative evolution of a band and take you on a journey
whose individual moments might not be very exciting, but whose overall arc
drops you off at a point from which you can hardly see the beginning of the
trip. This is not the case here, and not because Joy Division did not develop
(on the contrary, their evolution from 1977 to 1980 was almost phenomenal by
contemporary standards), but because, as it turns out, «mediocre Joy Division»
tend to have a far more monotonous sound than «outstanding Joy Division». You
are going to get a lot of inferior relatives of ʽInterzoneʼ and ʽShe's Lost
Controlʼ, but you are not going to get any
relatives of ʽDecadesʼ or ʽThe Eternalʼ or even ʽDay Of The Lordsʼ. But you are going to get some nifty bass grooves
and a few nice guitar chords, and spend an additional 40 minutes (or 80, if you
throw in the live album) in the company of the world's most sympathetic 23-year
old martyr.
I mostly agree with your review but I think that "Dead Souls" is one of their best songs. What's wrong with heavy guitars? Also, I think it is a shame that you can't hear the vocals on "Ceremony". There is a studio version you can find on YouTube.
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