How important was Gillian's role in New Order?

Originally posted by Biznotic Love Trapezoid > Originally posted by steve52> > > > Originally posted by Biznotic Love Trapezoid> > Bernard Sumner has butchered more songs live than Gillian. He's a disgrace. >

You`re not a big fan then?

I love Bernard Sumner's voice and even his stupid lyics most of the time but i do believe he is the main reason New Order are never more than mediocre live. Sure it's a rush to be in the crowd but after listening to a @175 live shows it's obvious that BS fucks up way more then the other 3. His guitar playing is very "punk" ie. SHIT, he can't remember the lyrics to anysong even if he's sung it hundreds of times before, he whoops, he whistles, he jumps around like a goon and generally diminishes the entire "atmosphere" of a New Order show. In short, if Sumner was half as reliable as Gillian, we'd probably have a couple more albums by New Order to enjoy, and the live bootlegs would be listenable without laughing or cringing. Unfortunately, there are multiple instances EACH show where Sumner totally destroys the vibe one way or another. It's typical LADDISH behaviour to single out the female for poor performance and insinuate all she did was keep Steve happy and make tea. Everyone hits bad notes but none so often as Bernard Sumner. New Order would be served well if they split their albums into one side Vocal tracks and one side Instrumentals. Sumner shouldn't be allowed to write lyrics for more than 6 songs per album. Any more than that and we suffer with childish, hideous lyrics like Slow Jam, Rock the Shack and plenty others. Stop f**king with Gillian. I'd rather listen to a record made by Steven Morris, Peter Hook and Gillian Gilbert than another half-assed album by the remaining members with SHITE lyrics by Sumner.

I get the feeling you feel strongly about this,you started off saying you love Barney-by the end you hate him!

Brian is right to a very large degree, most of the errors and certainly all of the dickhead behaviour comes from Barney. Unfortunately most of the really creative people seem to have an idiotic side, and this does come out at times, if it's not silly dancing it is potty-mouthed rhyming. There's no excuse for poor playing really, there's a difference between being underrehearsed and playing bum notes. Intoxication in varying forms probably has more to do with it.

Gillian isn't exactly absolved of bum note blame though, some of her errors are truly monumental - the NO debut of LWTUA was almost rendered unrecognisable by an ahem slightly different keyboard line. Guitar-wise she's more consistent than Barney.

Anyone who doubts all these criticisms Brian has made and which I have to a degree reinforced should seek out the Atlanta 85 show - I'm sure Julio will be able to help you out with a copy.

You're right, there is a difference between experiencing a gig (where half the time you can't hear what he says between songs, or really hear bum notes) and picking faults with a performance from the safety net of listening to the CD of it. Probably why they don't like releasing live performances.

Gig-wise, it does enhance the show (or at least to when all you got was terse comments every few numbers) - I'm still not so sure that I prefer the big intro spiel for most numbers we get these days, it's all a little too contrived. When you try and evoke the memories by listening to the recording though, it falls a bit flat and is a bit embarrassing.

Wembley 87 worse than NEC 89? Even Stephen I think. Bum notes , whoops etc are all part of the live thang for NO, that's why they still entertain us more than ever. The Rock Around The Clock thing was full of mistakes and this was in front of a TV audience of millions. Classic.

Originally posted by Al Jarvis > Originally posted by Casey Ryback> Wembley 87 worse than NEC 89? Even Stephen I think. Bum notes , whoops etc are all part of the live thang for NO, that's why they still entertain us more than ever. The Rock Around The Clock thing was full of mistakes and this was in front of a TV audience of millions. Classic.

And Bernard swore too!

At 5 o'clock on a Saturday afternoon as the whole nation sat down for tea!

Apart from those of us who were stuck in traffic in Fratton, and had to listen to it on the radio. Still, made sense to get to Portsmouth a day early, got a decent night's sleep for just about that only time in 12 days !

Originally posted by Al Jarvis > Originally posted by Casey Ryback> Wembley 87 worse than NEC 89? Even Stephen I think. Bum notes , whoops etc are all part of the live thang for NO, that's why they still entertain us more than ever. The Rock Around The Clock thing was full of mistakes and this was in front of a TV audience of millions. Classic.

And Bernard swore too!

At 5 o'clock on a Saturday afternoon as the whole nation sat down for tea!

and as for Steve's grinning or was it a grimace !!

The chin of concentration......

Originally posted by Casey Ryback Wembley 87 worse than NEC 89? Even Stephen I think. Bum notes , whoops etc are all part of the live thang for NO, that's why they still entertain us more than ever. The Rock Around The Clock thing was full of mistakes and this was in front of a TV audience of millions. Classic.

I can't make me mind up as to which was worse, Wembley or the NEC. I hated the NEC show, but for different reasons to most people there. I think I've only ever listened to the recording once. Wembley just wasn't them as they were at the time. Two years later the size of venue was more plausible.

Originally posted by Detweiler 3.63 > Originally posted by Casey Ryback> Wembley 87 worse than NEC 89? Even Stephen I think. Bum notes , whoops etc are all part of the live thang for NO, that's why they still entertain us more than ever. The Rock Around The Clock thing was full of mistakes and this was in front of a TV audience of millions. Classic.

I can't make me mind up as to which was worse, Wembley or the NEC. I hated the NEC show, but for different reasons to most people there. I think I've only ever listened to the recording once. Wembley just wasn't them as they were at the time. Two years later the size of venue was more plausible.

A lot of the gigs in '87 seem to lack something. The Reading Uni gig for example again seemed flat even though Let's Go was a pretty decent take.

Of the six gigs I saw in '87 ,brixton,glastonbury and sheffield roxy were absolute classics.Hazy on finsbury and the hacienda and well wembley was complete and utter shite.

Oh and I hated the NEC and SEC gigs.Great weekend though.

well if we are painting people with the bum note brush then the entire band should be dripping with paint. but wasnt that the whole thing about new order "the perfect sound played unperfect?". i digress. gillian was,is? imensely important to new order,i saw em play at the hac back in 83 and they was utterly amazing gillian included,then i watched em on the switch and the overhead cam passes over gillian and there is electrical tape on the keyboard to show her which keys to play. u would never had known it to hear them though. new order without her isnt the same and the fact that she is steves partner gives me hope that we will see her again one day,and i predict that when that day comes ,many on this site will smile and aplaud.

Originally posted by Al Jarvis > Originally posted by Detweiler> Brian is right to a very large degree, most of the errors and certainly all of the dickhead behaviour comes from Barney. ..

I can't agree that this in any way spoils a gig for me though, or detracts from the atmosphere. I've seen New Order in the US - there's little or no atmosphere whatsoever, and that's not as a result of the band in question it's down to the fact they don't have the 'ardcore following New Order boast on these shores. There just seems to be a 'vaguely interested' passing support and nothing more. Take New Order's very worst gigging nightmare in the UK - say, Wembley 87 or something of that sanitised stadium ilk - and that atmosphere is still thirty times what I've experienced abroad with New Order simply down to the nature of the audience. To pick-up a bootleg from 20 years previous and declare war against Barney for singing off-key or - heaven forbid - swearing, or whatever, and claiming that spoils a gig seems a tad untoward unless you were really there in the first instance to comment. Bum notes don't detract from an atmosphere. If anything, they might actually 'make' one.

This reminds me of a certain other newsgroup whereby most of the people slag New Order's recent output to the nth degree, hypothesise at length about the 'meaning of it all', then hark back to the good ol' days of New order when everything was So Much Better (although none of them actually experienced that ride). You'd just love to take one of these people back 20 years, stick 'em down the front of some dodgy nightclub gig and you know damn well that they would've sh@t themselves and be waxing lyrical about an entirely different band today.

I agree with you that his frequent mistakes do not really spoil the live experience. I don't have much personal experience to draw from but even amongst the sterile US crowd, the power and energy of the New Order live show has stayed with me for years and i don't even remember the excessive whooping and whistling. My point was about giving Gillian grief for not being a talented musician and making errors on stage when it's Sumner who is responsible for the lion's share of fuck ups. I also can't understand how people who obsess over their bootleg collection cannot come out and admit that their stash would be much more appreciated if 75% of the time Bernard Sumner didn't fuck up (Detweiller excluded). Imagine a gig you could actually listen to without cringing or wondering how much alcohol or cocaine Sumner had to consume to foget the words to Bizarre Love Triangle or True Faith. Most of the live show's i have are worthless except for the fact that i am slightly obsessed with New Order and crave any and all knowledge of the band including hurting my ears to listen to audience recordings of shows Sumner ruins with his lack of timing and inablilty to remember lyrics. I laugh when he changes the lyrics to swear words or funny inside jokes but it is appalling that he can't come in on the right measure and has to read his lyrics on a teleprompter. This isn't about enjoying the show while you're in the audience, it's about the enjoyment of the bootlegs after the fact. I absolutely do not agree that you had to be at the show to critisize the recording. That's a bunch of nonsense. It doesn't detract from the personal experience of being at the show but to those listening years later, it's pretty telling that it's Bernard Sumner who time and time again ruins the performance. Until you invent a time machine, the recordings are all most of us have and those are considerably marred by Mr. Sumner. I still enjoy listening but i'm not so blind and deaf that i can't see or hear who the worst offender is when it comes to live mistakes...and it ain't Gillian!

It is only in recent years that i have listened to much LIVE stuff.I couldn't TOLERATE the mainly bad sound recordings of the many i had heard.That said i know i like listening to how the songs have evolved.But a lot of the time i thought that if i did not attend the concert then it didn't mean much to me.Having seen lots of groups live although i don't NEW ORDER are at the best sometimes but still enjoy their concerts more than most.I can understand why the more MUSICAL of you may find them a tad unproffessional but because i have had a beer or two it doesn't really bother me.As for GILLIAN i miss her as much LIVE now because somehow it does not seem like NEW ORDER without her.As i don't really know every time she is actually playing something i cannot hope to know who fcuk's up what.I just go to enjoy myself.I hope that she one day comes back into the group.This is not to say PC is not doing a good job.IT JUST AIN'T NEW ORDER AS I REMEMBER. Regards ROCKET MICK

Gillian chilled Bernard's hot guitars out and that was nice and that's what kept New Order in shape of their unique sound in 1981-1993. Yeah!!:p

Originally posted by Biznotic Love Trapezoid > Originally posted by Al Jarvis > Originally posted by Detweiler> Brian is right to a very large degree, most of the errors and certainly all of the dickhead behaviour comes from Barney. ..

I can't agree that this in any way spoils a gig for me though, or detracts from the atmosphere. I've seen New Order in the US - there's little or no atmosphere whatsoever, and that's not as a result of the band in question it's down to the fact they don't have the 'ardcore following New Order boast on these shores. There just seems to be a 'vaguely interested' passing support and nothing more. Take New Order's very worst gigging nightmare in the UK - say, Wembley 87 or something of that sanitised stadium ilk - and that atmosphere is still thirty times what I've experienced abroad with New Order simply down to the nature of the audience. To pick-up a bootleg from 20 years previous and declare war against Barney for singing off-key or - heaven forbid - swearing, or whatever, and claiming that spoils a gig seems a tad untoward unless you were really there in the first instance to comment. Bum notes don't detract from an atmosphere. If anything, they might actually 'make' one.

This reminds me of a certain other newsgroup whereby most of the people slag New Order's recent output to the nth degree, hypothesise at length about the 'meaning of it all', then hark back to the good ol' days of New order when everything was So Much Better (although none of them actually experienced that ride). You'd just love to take one of these people back 20 years, stick 'em down the front of some dodgy nightclub gig and you know damn well that they would've sh@t themselves and be waxing lyrical about an entirely different band today.

I agree with you that his frequent mistakes do not really spoil the live experience. I don't have much personal experience to draw from but even amongst the sterile US crowd, the power and energy of the New Order live show has stayed with me for years and i don't even remember the excessive whooping and whistling. My point was about giving Gillian grief for not being a talented musician and making errors on stage when it's Sumner who is responsible for the lion's share of fuck ups. I also can't understand how people who obsess over their bootleg collection cannot come out and admit that their stash would be much more appreciated if 75% of the time Bernard Sumner didn't fuck up (Detweiller excluded). Imagine a gig you could actually listen to without cringing or wondering how much alcohol or cocaine Sumner had to consume to foget the words to Bizarre Love Triangle or True Faith. Most of the live show's i have are worthless except for the fact that i am slightly obsessed with New Order and crave any and all knowledge of the band including hurting my ears to listen to audience recordings of shows Sumner ruins with his lack of timing and inablilty to remember lyrics. I laugh when he changes the lyrics to swear words or funny inside jokes but it is appalling that he can't come in on the right measure and has to read his lyrics on a teleprompter. This isn't about enjoying the show while you're in the audience, it's about the enjoyment of the bootlegs after the fact. I absolutely do not agree that you had to be at the show to critisize the recording. That's a bunch of nonsense. It doesn't detract from the personal experience of being at the show but to those listening years later, it's pretty telling that it's Bernard Sumner who time and time again ruins the performance. Until you invent a time machine, the recordings are all most of us have and those are considerably marred by Mr. Sumner. I still enjoy listening but i'm not so blind and deaf that i can't see or hear who the worst offender is when it comes to live mistakes...and it ain't Gillian! Good words, Brian. I agree. Ban the Barney! (well, not really, but get him a real job)

Originally posted by Al Jarvis > Originally posted by Detweiler> Brian is right to a very large degree, most of the errors and certainly all of the dickhead behaviour comes from Barney. ..

I can't agree that this in any way spoils a gig for me though, or detracts from the atmosphere. I've seen New Order in the US - there's little or no atmosphere whatsoever, and that's not as a result of the band in question it's down to the fact they don't have the 'ardcore following New Order boast on these shores. There just seems to be a 'vaguely interested' passing support and nothing more. Take New Order's very worst gigging nightmare in the UK - say, Wembley 87 or something of that sanitised stadium ilk - and that atmosphere is still thirty times what I've experienced abroad with New Order simply down to the nature of the audience. To pick-up a bootleg from 20 years previous and declare war against Barney for singing off-key or - heaven forbid - swearing, or whatever, and claiming that spoils a gig seems a tad untoward unless you were really there in the first instance to comment. Bum notes don't detract from an atmosphere. If anything, they might actually 'make' one.

This reminds me of a certain other newsgroup whereby most of the people slag New Order's recent output to the nth degree, hypothesise at length about the 'meaning of it all', then hark back to the good ol' days of New order when everything was So Much Better (although none of them actually experienced that ride). You'd just love to take one of these people back 20 years, stick 'em down the front of some dodgy nightclub gig and you know damn well that they would've sh@t themselves and be waxing lyrical about an entirely different band today.

I'm curious which US shows you attended, Al. What you said above holds true for the abysmal 1993 shows and perhaps the 2001 tour and 2nd leg of 1989 could have been better.

I feel the US shows before those tours actually had a wonderful atmosphere (less rowdy that UK gigs, for better or worse) with a pretty good mix of people. They never had much radio airplay here and virtually none before True Faith so the audiences were fairly hardcore music fans if not hardcore New Order fans. Much better than the crowd in 2001 who were there mostly for Moby or Outkast.

her role in NO was she banged a guy in the band and got to play an instrument, end of story

Originally posted by Tristan Jayol her role in NO was she banged a guy in the band and got to play an instrument, end of story

yes, but unlike other instances of this, she was no yoko. and you have no proof as to any banging that may have occurred; she could've been saving herself for marriage.

Originally posted by His Holiness, The Pope > Originally posted by Tristan Jayol her role in NO was she banged a guy in the band and got to play an instrument, end of story

yes, but unlike other instances of this, she was no yoko. and you have no proof as to any banging that may have occurred; she could've been saving herself for marriage. no proof? hmm where did I put my Stevie and Gillian explicit sex tape...

Originally posted by Biznotic Love Trapezoid > Originally posted by Tristan Jayol her role in NO was she banged a guy in the band and got to play an instrument, end of story

typical obnoxious opinion from a Republican. clueless, insulting and oblivious. Just like a typical Democrat with his head halfway up his arse taking everything at face value not understanding sarcasm and humor.

there was need to delete your post Brian

Originally posted by Duckman there was need to delete your post Brian

sometimes i get all aggro and post stuff i don't really mean or stuff that's totally ridiculous. that post was something i just didn't want to get into thus the deletion. nice that you caught it though!

Originally posted by Biznotic Love Trapezoid > Originally posted by Duckman there was need to delete your post Brian

sometimes i get all aggro and post stuff i don't really mean or stuff that's totally ridiculous. that post was something i just didn't want to get into thus the deletion. nice that you caught it though! It was a good laugh, no hard feelings

Originally posted by Al Jarvis > Originally posted by Zachery Starkey> > The electronics are important, they are part of what set New Order apart from other bands.

Ask yourself this though - 'electronically' which was superior? The first Electronic album, or absolutely anything by the Other Two? I'd go with the former every day of the week.

It's a tad naive to assume, as a lot of people seem to do, that Gillian was the electronics whizz in the band just because she stood behind a keyboard on stage.

If your talking about the synths and not about guitars, or the songs as a whole, I happen to think the synth/keyboard work on The Other Two and You sounds much fresher, and far more melodic than most of the synth work on Electronic. Other than the clunky instrumentals in the middle of the album the four songs featuring vocals that started the album and the concluding sample heavy song to me are far, far more beautiful pieces of synthesizer work than the debut from Electronic. Electronic had some amazing moments, Some Distant Memory and Patience of a Saint being highlights for me, but the Other Two and You is definitely better when it comes to synth work, to me.

Than again we rarely seem to agree on anything (when I'm reading your posts), so this doesn't surprise me much.

Shes the 4Th Part fo New Order.She's Important.

In Germany we said she'S "UNROCKBAR"