As Tim says waaaaaaay back up this thread, the 'laddish' thing is certainly not reflected in the music. How they gained such a blokey following is probably too complicated and long-drawn-out a phenomenon to accurately chart (were gigs in 1980/1981 "laddish"?), but is probably has a lot to do with the very purist Factory "integrity" thing: Factory was obsessive and somewhat anal (albeit in a good way), and (for whatever reasons) young straight men who get into pop music tend to be similarly obsessive and anal. I know I certainly was (and, er, probably still am.....)
That said, now everyone's knocking on a bit the gigs are a lot less laddy, especially with wives and children now along for the ride, though I do remember being in the pub with a group of lads from Leeds before one of the Brixton shows and we were laughing about how you can always tell when there's a New Order gig nearby by the Barney cuts ordering pints of lager eight-deep at the bar (and the pubs prior to the Olympia show were a virtually ovary-free zone). Looking further back, just about my only clear recollection from GMEX '88 (my first gig ever) was that I'd never seen so many wildly drunk young women in my life before. If I didn't have a bootleg tape, I swear I wouldn't be able to remember anything about the music, but the sight of a very pretty student-type with smudged make up and vomit on her shirt screaming "show us yer cock!" at my uncle in the queue beforehand will live with me forever....
