New Order - Gloucester 19 August 1984
NEW ORDER - TO CATCH A THIEF Gloucester I FEEL like a detective if I try to look deeply into the secret world of New Order (and their devotees). For the cultists. it would be true to say that, for them, listening to New Order should be a private and intimate experience. A Leisure Centre is, therefore, hardly the most suitable venue in which to absorb and accept. For one thing, it's redolent of sweat and socks rather than sustaining an appreciation of the moods in the ‘anonymous functionalism' that New Order purvey. It‘s been said before but, like it or not, there are disconcerting parallels between New Order's current status and that of '70s era Pink Floyd. A part of them shares the Floyd's love of carefully constructed, quasi-symphonic music, full of thunder crashes and grandeur, but then the rest mixes the ingredients in a manner more attuned to the Beat than the Brain. They're all too familiar. The energetic kit or machine rhythms of Steve Mor...