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#910: Joy Division – New Dawn Fades

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Some may say this track is the quintessential Joy Division moment. The one that summed up everything the band was about and stood for. They have their popular ones, the songs that everyone know like ‘She’s Lost Control’ and ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ goes without saying. But for those senses of insecurity, intensity, ambience, sadness with a sudden power, it’s ‘New Dawn Fades’ that tops the bill.

It slowly lures the listener in bit by bit, starting with Stephen Morris’ drum pattern that’s then joined by Peter Hook’s descending four-note bassline that barely changes throughout the entire duration. Bernard Sumner comes in with a sharp introductory guitar solo, very grimy in its tone as it moves amidst Hook’s bass and Morris’s drum fills. It’s all so sparse, everything reverberates in the spaces. And after a minute and 20 seconds, Ian Curtis creeps into frame with his vocals. Now, before listening to Unknown Pleasures for the first time, would have been years ago at this point, I’m fairly certain the only song I’d ever heard by the band was ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’. Going into it, I was expecting tracks that more or less followed the same formula of mid-tempo guitar rock where the lead vocals were barely above a murmur or whisper. Curtis yelling on ‘Disorder’ and ‘Day of the Lords’ were mindblowing to me because they were so unexpected. So when he really lets it out in his final verse completely wiped out. It’s such a climactic ending, and a powerful way to close out the album’s first half.

As for the song’s meaning, well, sort of knowing from far away what Curtis was going through in the Joy Division times, I think he’s writing from a point of view where he’s essentially a spirit looking at him living his life from a distance and not being immensely disappointed with what he sees. The dissociation allows him to enjoy some things just that little bit more, change of speed, style and all that, but then he sees himself and everything closes in again. It’s a bit basic to say, but it is depressing. Just thinking about how it all ended for Ian Curtis, it just brings in a lot of sadness. But his words and the music always provide that powerful light.

#777: Joy Division – Love Will Tear Us Apart

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Surely, this is a song that everyone knows. I was tempted to just write ‘classic’ on this post and call it a day, leaving some sort of poignant message by doing so. Then I realised that would be a bit lame. A bit pretentious too. This’ll probably be a short one, though. As much as I like ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’, it is a fantastic song and gone through the ages as one of the best of all time, I don’t think it’s had the greatest effect on me personally than it probably has for millions of people out there. I do appreciate it a lot, though. There’s a lot of greatness in its subtlety and weariness.

The track was released as a single in June 1980, a month after Joy Division’s frontman Ian Curtis committed suicide. The music video is the only official one they did, and was filmed just a few weeks before the tragic event. This song is the first of the band’s I’d ever heard; its music video played on a channel somewhere (maybe Q TV, most likely MTV2), and for a while was the only one I listened to. Maybe it was because Curtis looked so despondent on the microphone. I also didn’t know that Joy Division were held in such high regard. I was a young boy at that time.

I think the only major point in my enjoyment of the track is that the ‘Permanent Mix’ that was released on a compilation in 1995 is my go-to version. That’s just the one I’ve been accustomed to for all this time. It’s the version that’s played in the video above. A lot of people prefer the original 1980 release. That’s fine. The main difference between the two is that the mix is a lot fuller in the ’90s reissue. There’s also a nice acoustic guitar outro added in there too. It’s the same song at the end of the day.