Cuttings

We left Bradford and spent some time in Liverpool before making our way to Birchwood for the Spectrum Arena. Continuing on an earlier theme, it appears this has also now disappeared . This time we did arrive in time to see Life , whose set included " Tell Me ", " Better " and " Optimism ". New Order were far superior to the previous night, even though they kicked off with State of the Nation again. Then it was The Village , featuring some really nice guitar work. Broken Promise included some bizarre lyrics, and was followed by As It Is When It Was . Lyrics were a little erratic on Your Silent Face , and Confusion had an awful lot of whoops. Age of Consent also had some good guitar additions, and the start of Temptation in particular was great. Sunrise preceded Blue Monday that also included some lovely extra guitar and added cowbell at the close. Finally, Shellshock (its live debut) was introduced as being an instrumental version, but then in

Time for another double header, my third. Three of us got a lift to Bradford with a work colleague of mine who'd been to university there and at whose girlfriend's house we would be staying. We went to Italia Cafe to eat first (my colleague said "It's not Italian, but it is cheap") and it does seem to have some musical history (it's not there any more). A subsequent pub visit and a slip in the icy conditions meant that by the time we arrived at St George's Hall (which *is* still there, unlike some of the other venues where I've seen New Order) we'd already missed Life. I was at the stage for this gig, which was fairly quiet, but I don't recall much about the show itself. State of the Nation opened, which seemed to be quite common in this spate of gigs, and was followed by 586 and Broken Promise . Bizarre Love Triangle, Lonesome Tonight, Sooner Than You Think and Love Vigilantes all followed, with good solid renditions of each. Next were

As with the show the night before, this was another where an attempt to get tickets in advance (in this case by calling the Fulcrum Centre on November 28) proved fruitless, so again it was a case of chancing it on the night.   It was a chance that paid off. Three of us got in for £28 (strange amount), which as can be seen from below, was not massively above face value in £ terms.   Support was Quando Quango. They played Genius and Love Tempo at least, but I'm not sure of the rest of their set.   For New Order, State of the Nation was followed by Blue Monday , which included some nice guitar improvisation at the end.    An excellent version of The Village preceded Hooky complaining about someone touching his mic stand, before launching into Sub-culture.   After This Time of Night , Barney asked the audience to " Please be quiet I'm trying to concentrate ".   Thieves Like Us had added cowbell in the opening section, as well as Barney starting a verse to

News of this gig emerged in NME on 20 November, and in those days of ringing box offices and sending cheques, it was always in doubt whether tickets would be obtained. So it proved, with the cheque returned on December 2nd with a note that the gig had sold out.  Chanced it anyway, and got in via a tout for the princely sum of £6.50 (the 50p part is odd). Support were Quando Quango , who I enjoyed, though I don't recall any of the songs they played. New Order came on around 11pm. The set was being filmed, but I've never seen any sign of footage. At my second New Order gig , they played a sub hour (quite a lot sub) set, with no encore. At CLP they similarly played no encore, and the set was about 50 minutes long. The resemblances end there though - this was a magnificent show. I seem to recall there was an almost audible gasp from the audience when they opened with Atmosphere , but in all honesty the setlist this night was pretty much perfect. Not a single duff song, and som

Close, but not quite close enough, to being my second New Order double-header, Hammersmith was only two nights after Hemel Hempstead. I'd ordered the tickets before the ULU gig, but two more mates decided later on that they would come along, and managed to get tickets from touts for £10. I noted that drinks were expensive at £1.40 (roughly £4.50 in 2022 prices, so it looks like I wasn't far off the mark). This was my only ever visit to the Hammersmith Palais, yet another venue that is no more. I seem to recall that in a rectangular space, the stage was on one of the longer sides, which is a bit unusual. A Certain Ratio were the support - the third time I saw them this year. Although they performed a very good set, the crowd were incredibly indifferent to them.  The bootleg I have (which, during the first song - Seems Like Something Dirty - features me telling one of my mates that the show was being taped ) has Jez Kerr after that song saying that New Order audiences d

A trip to Manchester for this. The content was largely the same as Bored In The City , with the notable addition of Ian Curtis's guitar.