New Order #7 1985 10 25 University of London Union
A massive earthquake hit Mexico City on 19 September 1985, prompting this benefit gig at ULU. I only actually found out about it on the Tuesday (22 October) of the same week of the gig, so we didn't have advance tickets and it was a case of chancing it on the night.
The car breaking down twice, once in Trafalgar Square, the second in Shaftesbury Avenue, didn't exactly help our chances, but we did it just - with one of us being the last but one admitted.
Support were James, who performed a slow version of "Fire So Close" and a song about earwigs (amongst others).
New Order were on top form this night, borne out by the reviews in Melody Maker and NME below.
State of the Nation featured some additional lyrics and interesting use of echo on the drums towards the end. Echo also featured on guitar parts in Everything's Gone Green, embellishing it nicely.
Hooky introduced Age of Consent as a tribute to Gary Holton, who'd died earlier that day, and was probably best known for his role in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet.
This Time of Night was followed by As It Is When It Was - introduced as a brand new song, although it had been played before. Next was Sub-culture, only three days before its dreadful remix was released, but this was the more traditional album version.
Broken Promise (which was played to show "we don't need synthesisers to sound good") was also described as new, which it nearly as - this was its second airing after Preston on 22 October. Featured some nice guitar effects in the instrumental break. This was the delight of seeing New Order trial new songs live, as you'd really see how they evolve over time.
The highlight of the night for me (and up there with highlights from any of their gigs) was the merging of Face Up (a blinding version) into an equally good Temptation. The disappointment is that the original taper couldn't have foreseen that happening, meaning the tape had to be turned over before Temptation had finished. So I've never been able to listen back to the way it was that night.
The Perfect Kiss was prefaced by Barney referring to his Uncle Bill and "it's nice to be nice" (referred to in the Melody Maker review) and featured some nice guitar improvisation in the middle section.
The encore was delayed because "Pernod before people" was Barney's motto. Love Vigilantes featured an outburst of "Motherfucker" for no apparent reason, and then the final verse was changed to his wife lying on the floor "sucking cocks, she had four in her mouth". To which of course the response from the song's narrator is "You dirty bastard, what are you doing on the floor sucking big fat cocks you whore'. Oh, fucking hell!"
From there it was straight into Blue Monday courtesy of a Hooky bass intro, featuring lots of additional cowbell and guitar feedback in the close.
Overall, one of their best.
Melody Maker
NEW ORDER/JAMES
London University
JAMES ARE an EP made up of ‘This Night Has Opened My Eyes'. ‘Wand'rin' Star‘ and 'Ocean'. Their song about earwigs is not as good as The Dyeletics’ '79 classic. Tense, nervous James.
Football crowd, students, higher truths? New Order, the perfect group? I would have mocked the idea, but in a way they really are (and they still make plenty of mistakes). I know it when Bernard belches a line or two of porn for the third verse of 'Love Vigilantes' and concerned faces emerge from the emotional stew the audience has become.
But first things first. “The state of the nation/Is causing degradation"? New Order - brilliant new songs and all - are deceptive but revolutionary. Sometimes by stating the obvious, so nonchalant as to superficially belittle their own perception; other times (‘Age Of Consent'. ‘Face Up', 'Temptation') just hitting some crucial hidden buttons . . . into the psyche, and let's define a few all-pervasive but hitherto undefined truths before bedtime.
Steve is the only one who loses his composure. He gets perplexed by faulty machines — perhaps it's ironic that something as human as New Order tends to rely on machinery. Peter (arrogant) and Gillian unflappable) carry the sound. and Bernard sings - offhand and frail, but just positive - because someone has to. A classic set: New Order are massive like this because they deserve to be and yet they never, ever become stars. They're funny, intense and multi-dimensional. Sometimes they’re out of tune; but in the end it‘s nice to be nice, and New Order are very nice indeed.
ROBIN GIBSON
NME
THE ORDER OF THE DAY
NEW ORDER
JAMES
London University Union:
Mexican Earthquake Benefit
THERE IS something not quite right about James which may, paradoxically, account for their growing popularity. A rough edge and an endearing eccentricity have always found a welcoming audience in merrie England; a lineage through Barrett, Hamill, sundry TV Personalities and even America‘s assorted fruitcakes like Jonathan Richman. And James who sang weird, occasionally wonderful, little songs concerning “black holes", “armour plated suits", “preying insects" and metaphorical "morticians“. Perhaps they should see a shrink and get these vague, mildly interesting ideas developed into sharper focus, then their hazy imagery might fit together with their post-Postcard guitar-jangly pop. James are quite fascinating but tonight we had to look elsewhere for inspiration, for uplift.New Order have often left me unconvinced by their live outings, particularly their uncomfortable shift into bigger venues where a cold calculated sound replaced their erstwhile captivating melancholy. Tonight, in an intimate, relatively small venue, they soared immaculate and burned with an intensity that often took my breath away. They were a group recharged not to say relieved, enjoying themselves and feeding off the total audience response.
Such is the mammoth nature of New Order's shimmering cathedral noise, that it is easy to overlook how crafted their musical rapport is, each individual component gelling to construct this towering music. The awesome rhythmic propulsion that emanates from Hook and Morris creates a shuddering backdrop for the melodic keyboard signatures yet tonight it was the sound of fractured, jagged guitars that lent the whole a fearsome cutting edge.
New Order are adept at musical architecture, constructing each piece slowly and surely, unfolding great shards of sound in rich, textured crescendoes. But it is their consummate grasp of drama that instils a dynamic power into their best songs. 'SubCulture', 'Temptation‘ and 'Everything’s Gone Green‘ all had a breath taking momentum that built and mesmerised, whilst both 'The Perfect Kiss' and 'Love Vigilantes' made the recorded versions seem like mere blueprints for these live explorations.
At the centre of all this power rests Bernard Sumner's voice. A flawed but engagingly emotional instrument that adds an emphatically human element of insecurity to the proceedings. As Gillian leaves the keyboard console to strap on a guitar, Sumner quips: "This is just to prove we don't need synthesisers to sound good".
Tonight, with or without their technological hardware, New Order were dangerous.
SEAN O'HAGAN
| Set and song timings | |
| 1 State Of The Nation | 7:01 |
| 2 Everything's Gone Green | 3:46 |
| 3 Age Of Consent | 5:28 |
| 4 This Time Of Night | 4:56 |
| 5 As It Is When It Was | 3:53 |
| 6 Subculture | 4:51 |
| 7 Broken Promise | 4:15 |
| 8 Face Up | 5:19 |
| 9 Temptation | 7:07 |
| 10 The Perfect Kiss | 9:42 |
| 11 Love Vigilantes | 4:56 |
| 12 Blue Monday | 8:11 |
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Footnotes
Two concerts between WOMAD and ULU - the International Youth Year Festival in Manchester, and Lloyd Cole and the Commotions in London.
The Manchester show was on Friday 2 August in Platt Fields, south Manchester. As I'd discovered at WOMAD, A Certain Ratio were not going to be playing at this festival. I went via Whitworth Street so I could take a couple of photos of the Hacienda.
The only band I can remember seeing was Marc Riley and the Creepers. As I knew nothing of their stuff, it kind of washed over me.
Lloyd Cole and the Commotions was at Hammersmith Odeon on Sunday 1 September, supported by Jazzeteers, who apparently I liked but have no recollection of. John Gordon Sinclair was sat in the row in front of me.
To my mind, Rattlesnakes is the second best debut album ever (after Unknown Pleasures of course) and this was my first time seeing the band live. They played:
- Charlotte Street
- Down On Mission Street
- Patience
- Why I Love Country Music
- Rattlesnakes
- Minor Character
- Brand New Friend
- Grace
- Are You Ready To Be Heartbroken?
- Four Flights Up
- Speedboat (an odd and not very good version)
- 2CV
- Forest Fire
- Pretty Gone (introduced as "one to waltz to")
- Perfect Skin
From my notes at the time, I also wrote that they played James, introduced as a song "to make us weep". It doesn't appear on the bootleg, nor on Setlist.fm. I'm sure I didn't imagine it though.
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