Joy Division: In the Studio with Martin Hannett

Has anyone heard this yet?

N.B. LOOK AT THE POSTS BELOW BEFORE YOU EVEN THINK ABOUT BUYING THIS. SUFFICE TO SAY THAT THE BOOMKAT AND SPIN CDs SALES BLURBS DON'T TELL THE FULL STORY.

Text, from Boomkat:

JOY DIVISION - In The Studio With Martin Hannett INTERSTATE CD // £13.99 INDIE Catalogue Number: INTERSTATE10798

There's probably a reasonably good case to be made that the billing of this album should be Martin Hannett - In The Studio With Joy Division, such is the dominance of the producer's presence on these recordings. In truth, this is less an album and more like a series of indispensible studio offcuts and engineering experiments by Hannett, using Joy Division as his source material. Largely taken from sessions at Cargo Studios in Rochdale recorded between 1978 and 1979, these tracks are based around Joy Division classics like 'Atmosphere', 'Digital', 'Dead Souls', 'Glass' and 'Ice Age', though not always recognisably so. There's a lot of material based on ambience, warm-ups and equipment tests in addition to full mixes, all of which provides a precious insight into the working methods of Hannett and the band, one of the most iconic creative partnerships of the post-punk era. Essential purchase.

Text, from Spin CDs:

Joy Division - In The Studio With Martin Hannett (2 CD) Our price: £12.99 Release Date: 16 Jun 2008 Catalogue No: Label: Interstate Format: CD (two) Volumes: 1

This item is due to be released on 16 Jun 2008 and will be dispatched when we receive stock.

One of the most important Joy Division discoveries ever- with the approval of Martin Hannett's family- Martin Hannett's own mix tapes of the 1978 and 1979 Cargo Studios,Rochdale sessions plus Hannett's other mixes of songs and sound effects probably from Strawberry and Britannia Row - Martin Hannett had a habit of running quarter inch tape machines throughout all Joy Division recording sessions and had an agreement with the band and Rob Gretton and Tony Wilson to create his own versions of the recording sessions and would often go into the various studios without the band and continually remix what he had recorded on those tapes and experiment feeding what he had recorded through his AMS delays and play around with synthesisers. It is Martin's use of these wierd and wonderful sound effects and synth sounds on Joy Division recordings that made Joy Division studio recordings stand out above any other punk or post punk band from that time and this cd gives an insight into the sounds Martin Hannett had in his head and what he fed into the Joy Division sound. A double cd album from Interstate / Dandelion CD no 10798 with 10 page biographical booklet about the tracks on the cd. Tracks included many with multiple versions are : Digital, Glass, Atmosphere, Dead souls, Ice age, N4 (Decades), Eternal. Also features interviews and many of the original sound samples.

Someone has posted a detailed track by track synopsis on the Joy Division forum (and it has also been posted as a review on Amazon.co.uk) - essentially it's a pile of cr@p somewhere between the pointless, the unlistenable and the exploitative.

Hooky's latest MySpace post makes it clear that this is a bootleg, unauthorised and that the so called "agreement" is a faked document.

So more of the same from Chris Hewitt and his empire of poor bootlegs

It is also likely that some of the sounds and effects used on these recordings may not be as authentic as we are led to believe (allegedly)

Hi,

here is the review i posted on JDC and Amazon.co.uk.

All is based on the mp3 complete preview of the album available here :

http://www.boomkat.com/item.cfm?id=101142&highlight=101168

Anyone can listen for free and make his OWN CONCLUSION.

i finally listened to the whole "In The Studio With Martin Hannett" recent Interstate release.

Please be gentle with my average English, I may have done some mistakes.

Here is my review, comparing the original studio tracks with the ones on the Interstate compilation.

• : "real" musical track.

***The 2CD release***

CD1 : 01 Digital Ambience 1.00 02 Digital

• 2.35 03 Noise Drums 2.13 04 Square Heat Ambience 1.42 05 Glass (Breakout)
• 3.13 06 Synth Ambience 5.18 07 Atmosphere Ambience 16.14 08 Atmosphere Setting Up 5.21 09 Atmosphere Drums & Bass Warm Up 1.10 10 Atmosphere (Metronome Intro)
• 3.59 11 Metronome Adjustements #1 0.53 12 Metronome Adjustements #2 0.42 13 Dead Souls sound check 0.06 14 Dead Souls (Metronome Intro)
• 5.40 15 Cups Smash 10.20 16 Hannett Interview 0.39 17 Ice Age Bass Warm Up 0.56

TOTAL TIME : 62.01 Total Time (musical tracks *) : 4 tracks / 15.27

CD2 : 01 Ice Age

• 2.21 02 Bass Intro Ambience 8.37 03 Decades (Clapping Intro)
• 5.55 04 Decades Bass Guitar Programming #1 5.18 05 The Eternal
• 6.00 06 Decades Bass Guitar Programming #2 3.58 07 Decades Industrial 2.50 08 Decades Warm Up 1.19

TOTAL TIME : 36.18 Total Time (musical tracks *) : 3 tracks / 14.16

********************

GRAND TOTAL : 98.19 Grand Total (musical tracks *) : 7 tracks / 29.43

********************

NOTA 1 : possible source of the songs

Digital, Glass : Cargo studios, Rochdale, 11-10-1978 Atmosphere, Dead Souls, Ice Age : Cargo Studios, Rochdale, XX-10>11-1979 Decades, The Eternal : Britannia Row Studios, London, 18>30-03-1980

NOTA 2 : about the content

Without listening to the release, it is easy to see that less than one third of it is including actual songs. More than 1 hour is only experimental sounds, and various warm ups.

********************

***Review of the content***

CD1

01 Digital Ambience 1.00

The opening track is including strange analogic synthesizer sounds, with some clappings, that are listed as being related to Digital. It was hard to me to see any relation with that track, and that rehearsal seemed to go nowhere as none of those sounds seemed to have been used in any demos/releases of the band. Please note that there is no tape noise, and that the volume is heavier than on the next track.

02 Digital

• 2.35

The end of track 01 is crossfaded with Digital. The sound difference is obvious, and track 01 seemed to be not linked with Digital. Digital is speeded up, and has tape noise. This is faked stereo, this is a mono recording with one channel a bit more late. This is the same version as the one recorded during "A Factory Sample" session. The Digital track is 2.17 minutes long, instead of 2.42. The 5 seconds bass intro is missing. The end of the song is including added synthesizer sound, that have nothing to do with the original track. When I modified the Digital track to its original length, I found an heavily distorted track. At 1.06 I found a duplicated part of 1.1 second (maybe it is not present of the original release). Both the speeded up version and the reworked version are not listenable. Despite the bad sound quality, I did not found any different sound on that version.

03 Noise Drums 2.13

Synthesizer & organ sounds, with some drums in it. Again no tape noise. Not really interesting, again I was unable to find any link with a Joy Division track.

04 Square Heat Ambience 1.42

Synthesiser sound, reminded me of some Death In June ambience collages. Again, It seemed to be someone discovering the amazing sound created by analog synthesizer.

05 Glass (Breakout)

• 3.13

The voice of someone counting before the track is crossfaded. The sound is different from the Glass track. The original track is 3.45, there the length is 3.13. Again the track is heavily speeded up (not exactly like Digital, but almost) and is in perfect mono (no delay between each channel). The 6 seconds intro to the original track is missing. Like for Digital, I did not made a comparison with the "Genetic Demo" as I'm almost sure that this is really taken from the 1978 session in Rochdale. Maybe someone can do that ? Some tape noise can be heard.

06 Synth Ambience 5.18

I can be described as a mix between the tracks 03 and 04, the same synthesiser & organ sounds, with some drumming. No tape noise.

07 Atmosphere Ambience 16.14

Probably the most boring track... 16 minutes of synthesizer sounds, like I said before, it seemed to be someone discovering the "strange" sound that can be done with such instrument. Nothing related to Joy Division in my opinion. Most Joy Division fans will stop the listening after that. And this is only the half of CD1.

08 Atmosphere Setting Up 5.21

Synthesiser, drums, metronome, metallic sounds. No tape noise.

09 Atmosphere Drums & Bass Warm Up 1.10

Again the same sounds, but more related to me to Atmosphere. No tape noise.

10 Atmosphere (Metronome Intro)

• 3.59

This seemed to be the studio version with tape noise and a metronome during the first minute. Mono again.

11 Metronome Adjustements #1 0.53

Heavy tape noise, with a metronome playing, and some vocals that can be heard.

12 Metronome Adjustements #2 0.42

A more metallic metronome. Heavy noise during the whole minute. A few different takes.

13 Dead Souls sound check 0.06

Very interesting track... Only joking !

14 Dead Souls (Metronome Intro)

• 5.40

The original Dead Souls track, with a metronome during the first 30 seconds. Mono with a little delay between each channel. I was unable to find tape noise on that track. The speed seemed to be good. A metronome and some drums are added at the end of the track during more than 30 seconds.

15 Cups Smash 10.20

10 minutes of synthesizer and glasses crashing. Almost the more interesting track to me, very oppressive one. Could have been the soundtrack of some parts of "De Nuremberg A Nuremberg", the French film about the WWII (original soundtrack by Vangelis). But again, not very related to Joy Division. No tape noise. Reminded me of some Death In June ambience collage.

16 Hannett Interview 0.39

Martin Hannett (?) like it was taken from an old 1930's 78rpm LP...

17 Ice Age Bass Warm Up 0.56

Someone playing bass. Some tape noise, may be related to Ice Age more easily than the other "tracks".

CD2 :

01 Ice Age

• 2.21

My reviews are shorter, track after track... The original Ice Age track, mono with a little delay between each channel. I was unable to find some tape noise.

02 Bass Intro Ambience 8.37

Decades improvisation, drums, synthesiser, bass, clapping. No tape noise.

03 Decades (Clapping Intro)

• 5.55

Official track in mono with a little delay between each channel, with a voice counting at the start, that seemed to be crossfaded. Someone is clapping during most of the song, adding... nothing to it.

04 Decades Bass Guitar Programming #1 5.18

No tape noise, drums, bass, synthesiser. Again Decades improvisation.

05 The Eternal

• 6.00

No tape noise, official track in mono with a little delay between each channel. Around 40 extra seconds at the end of the track. Maybe one of the takes that was present in the previous release of Interstate ?

06 Decades Bass Guitar Programming #2 3.58 07 Decades Industrial 2.50 08 Decades Warm Up 1.19

This may have been a long a single improvisation. The "industrial" part has a more metallic sound. Experimentations around Decades. Same as tracks 02 and 04. No very interesting by the way. SO we have more than 20 minutes of Decades jams.

*************************

To Conclude in a word : PAINFUL.

The listening of that release was really painful. The various sounds included seemed to have nothing related with any Joy Division tracks included here, with the exception of Decades and Ice Age.

Legit or not, all those so-called "sound artifacts" add NOTHING to the understanding of Joy Division music, and I even doubt that any "music concrete"/noise"/"power noise" fan can listen to that release without being bored. The musical tracks included are all downgrades of official ones. No different take, no interesting mix. This release is pure nonsense. Must be avoided.

The previous release "Martin Hannett's Personal Mixes" was interesting and included 6 different (non-faked to me) mixes of Auto-suggestion, From Safety To Where ?, Decades and The Eternal. But this 2CD is pure C-R-A-P.

See You

Vince

PS : I may have forgotten some infos, but after the first 30 minutes I was so bored that I barely found the energy to comment the last tracks... Sorry for that.

Thanks for that, folks - saved me wasting any money.

I'm a little disappointed, though, because I really rather enjoyed the full songs on the recent Martin Hannett's Personal Mixes CD.

Another dodgy Chris Hewitt release - don't waste your cash...

Vince mentioned Death in June twice, and made reference to noise and power electronics. This guy has the same taste in music as me, so I'll trust him.

The cover art is pretty disturbing. It's like the evil face of Satan staring down at the band.

I'm so tempted... $$$

Having now heard this in it's entirety - I'm even more astonished at what a complete joke it is. An utter waste of time.

As the earlier posters detailed review says - most of the tracks are "ambient noise" (otherwise known as "unlistenable") and those that are actually listed as songs tend to be the released mixes played through a delay unit. And what that metronome is all about is beyond me!

There is a free mp3 download of it circulating - in some ways it has to be heard to be believed! Just don't waste your money on the physical product!

It is the same release…if I'd paid £45 for it I would be completely gutted

I'll eventually get it through eMusic or Napster. Wonderful addition to my collection.

heard it on an mp3 site. doesnt sound like much of anything. parts of sounds just put to songs. whoring.

Check out Hooky's new blog on Myspace...a transcript of the conversations he's having with the monkeyts behind this godawful CD...

Interesting that Hewitt claims there is some New Order stuff on the tapes too.

I actually saw this at a used cd shop this past weekend. I took at look at the thing and just tchtchtch'ed at it. I asked the manager why they let crap be sold off like legitimate merchandise and he wanted proof that it was dodgy.

Good thing NOOL was on the case, all I had to do was load up the forums and give him his proof. Nice one. Pulled it off the shelf. One down, how many to go?

Another way is to slyly transfer the CD to a completely unrelated section in the shop - Johnny Mathis, Spice Girls, Film Soundtracks, etc.....

It'll be languishing there forever!