New Order - Brighton Centre 28 March 1986

This is the first cutting I've posted for a show I attended. This was on Good Friday 1986. The setlist was:

STATE OF THE NATION
LOVE VIGILANTES
SUBCULTURE
SHELLSHOCK
CONFUSION
LET'S GO
5-8-6
TEMPTATION
AGE OF CONSENT
SUNRISE
THE PERFECT KISS

This is the cassette bootleg I subsequently got:

On leaving, there were bins near the exits filled with tickets. No idea why, but we used to try and find the lowest numbered ticket. I won:

NME - SUPERGROUP!

NEW ORDER
Brighton Centre

NEW Order are just another smooth supergroup chasing the Sminds, U2, The Cure. and The Banshees into clinical complacency, acceptable harmlessness. So it goes.

Slick, bland, empty, their stance for challenge, atmosphere, and emotional meaning is now drowned in Vangelis sound effects, air-raid spotlights and Albrecht’s disturbing penchant for guitar solos. New Order - an artist, a worker, a lad and a lampshade. The beautiful Steven Morris shines as ever. The smartly spruced-up Peter Hook is roused into sporadic action only by the disgusting shoes thrown at him, while the cute, Pernod-soaked Albrecht still can‘t sing and play the-guitar at the some time. Such boyish naivety is touching, but even though he has made New Order lyrically backward, there is at least a twinkle in his eye, which is more than can be said for the hapless Gillian.

Their flock of followers barely care. Increasingly violent and thoughtless, they are the least discerning, demanding audience since the days of The Jam. They get what they want, take what they are given - an abrupt heartless set of singles and "Low Life" highlights. "Confusion", “Subculture", “Perfect Kiss", perfect beats padded out with hi-tech nonsense, "586" by-the-numbers, music for car-stereos, discos, compact discs and burger bars.

Besides the exceptionally ordinary "Shellshock" - Depeche with brains - the only new moments are "State of the Nation", the next single, and a speeding instrumental exercise. The former - the Human League with grace, with genius — is their most brilliant, mindless, perfect pop song since "Temptation". The latter simply shows us, along with “Murder” and "Elegia", that the only New Order music to move us will be speechless.

Technically superb - like Supertramp - the swift power, the flow and thrust of New Order’s music remains. But they have stopped taking chances, they have nothing to say. This show was merely professional, proficient, perfunctory. Live at least, they've made their choice and they have chosen Entertainment. On this evidence, I'll make mine and leave them to it.

JIM SHELLEY