Would the boys go synth pop in the 80s had Ian stayed alive?

It's always curious thinking about the direction the band would have taken if Ian didn't kill himself.....Would they still go in the groundbreaking dance direction they went in or would they stay dark, poetic, and brooding......

Listening to Isolation, Heart and Soul, Eternal, and Decades from Closer shows a shift towards electronics/keys....and even LWTUA, Komakino, and These Days sound like a foreshadowing of New Order of some sorts.....I don't know if Ian would have let the guys do a record like Fine Time or even The Perfect Kiss......I don't know what do you guys think?

J

Probably would have gone the goth New Kids on the Block direction and would have invented a new style called emo by 1984

Well, you never will know, that is sad. Certainly the guys were showing interest in electronics and the German styles with songs like "Isolation", "Heart and Soul", "The Eternal", "Decades" and even more leftfield non-pop stuff like "Atrocity Exhibition" and the "Incubation" 7". Ian was interested in anti pop stuff like Throbbing Gristle, who knows what directions he may have helped the band go. As for being dark, they couldn't have stayed so low for a career, they would have changed if they had stayed together.

Most of the English post punk bands ending up going in a dance direction or a synth pop direction in the 80s, at least at times. The Cure, Bauhaus members, Wire, Public Image ltd, Killing Joke, Throbbing Gristle members, Cabaret Voltaire, Gang of Four, Buzzcock singer, I'm sure there is more...

0_o wrote: Most of the English post punk bands ending up going in a dance direction or a synth pop direction in the 80s, at least at times. The Cure, Bauhaus members, Wire, Public Image ltd, Killing Joke, Throbbing Gristle members, Cabaret Voltaire, Gang of Four, Buzzcock singer, I'm sure there is more...

But New Order was the very first to do it....And Depeche Mode doesn't count they were always synthpop.

J

The members of New Order and Toney Wilson have always maintained that they would have gone in the exact same direction if Ian were still alive. There is an interview somewhere where Tony Wilson mentions that Ian Curtis would have surely put his own voice and lyrics on Blue Monday.

Bernards synth playing skills and synth melodies are very prominent on Closer and would have probably continues to grow if Ian had survived.

Zachery Starkey wrote: The members of New Order and Toney Wilson have always maintained that they would have gone in the exact same direction if Ian were still alive. There is an interview somewhere where Tony Wilson mentions that Ian Curtis would have surely put his own voice and lyrics on Blue Monday.

Bernards synth playing skills and synth melodies are very prominent on Closer and would have probably continues to grow if Ian had survived.

I second that notion, besides I once heard tony say "If Ian we're still alive, we'd be hearing different lyrics to blue monday". It's not an exact quote, but somewhere close to it.

steve morris is quoted as saying something like,, "same town different street" so yup.

two ways to choose,

which way to go, had thoughts for one,

designs for both.

...yes, but I suspect tracks like Face Up would have had a darker side to them with Ian.

It would have been fascinating.

Ian got them on to Kraftwerks TEE, so possibly.

Zachery Starkey wrote: The members of New Order and Toney Wilson have always maintained that they would have gone in the exact same direction if Ian were still alive. There is an interview somewhere where Tony Wilson mentions that Ian Curtis would have surely put his own voice and lyrics on Blue Monday.

Bernards synth playing skills and synth melodies are very prominent on Closer and would have probably continues to grow if Ian had survived.

I did indeed ask Steve this question at the Q&A at Manchesters' Cornerhouse for the JD film screening,basically what the direction the next album would have taken considering the difference between UP & Closer inside of 12 months,& he said exactly that,dance-y direction.Which I thought was quite odd given the 2 newest songs were Ceremony & IALP,hardly dance-y at all.Or maybe it wasn't the answer I wanted

this old chestnut again? fucking americans....

0_o wrote: Ian was interested in anti pop stuff like Throbbing Gristle, who knows what directions he may have helped the band go.

Genesis P-Orridge did say that Ian had had enough of Joy Division, and wanted to join him in a new band. Who knows, he might have been the lead singer of Psychic TV!

I think it would have been darker, I can imagine Ian singing on Movement, and on Blue Monday but I just cannot see him jumping about on a football pitch with John Barnes on the World Cup song.

Ian's voice wouldent fit some songs of new orders, it just wouldent seem right to me, or maybe even the fact he wouldent even step up to the song, like, imagine him singing krafty, or anything off the new albums, i doubt it would fit.

I'd loved to have seen Ian's performance of "Fine Time" on Top of the Pops.

See i'm confused

Some posts confirm that NO would have went in the same musical direction with or without Ian, but wasn't Blue Monday and PCL an attempt to distance themselves from the Ian Curtis ghost and do something different? They dropped Martin Hannett, and started singing lyrics which at that point were still good, but not nearly as dark and brooding or poetic as Ian's. Besides, could you hear Ian on "The Village", "586", or even "Age Of Consent"!

Wasn't New Order's love of the New York city dance scene the biggest reason they got into their form of new wave disco- that and drugs that they were probably taking to get a creative flow and forget about Ian.

Following the trend of post punk bands going "dance" in the 80s, I think we would have seen SOME of this had Ian had hung around (terrible pun- not intended), but it would have been much more schizophrenic, psychedelic, and probably deeper than New Order. New Order was about forgetting your problems. Ian was about getting absorbed in them.

J

galgo23 wrote: I'd loved to have seen Ian's performance of "Fine Time" on Top of the Pops.

I second that notion, and I would've loved Ian's version of The Village, while on some fabulous dish soap snort fest. Hell, even seeing Ian dance on Blue Monday would be intense. AH, and his vocals on every little counts, they would stand the test of time.

you do realize if Ian was alive Barney would not be writing lyrics? .

Barney would still be writing the music....Could you imagine Ian singing over The Village or All The Way, no matter what the lyrics were?

J

kel wrote:

Zachery Starkey wrote: The members of New Order and Toney Wilson have always maintained that they would have gone in the exact same direction if Ian were still alive. There is an interview somewhere where Tony Wilson mentions that Ian Curtis would have surely put his own voice and lyrics on Blue Monday.

Bernards synth playing skills and synth melodies are very prominent on Closer and would have probably continues to grow if Ian had survived.

I did indeed ask Steve this question at the Q&A at Manchesters' Cornerhouse for the JD film screening,basically what the direction the next album would have taken considering the difference between UP & Closer inside of 12 months,& he said exactly that,dance-y direction.Which I thought was quite odd given the 2 newest songs were Ceremony & IALP,hardly dance-y at all.Or maybe it wasn't the answer I wanted

I think that the original Martin Hannett produced version of Ceremony is really really danceable.....its got a very strong 4/4 beat and it grooves really well. Its a great combo of indie guitars with a dance rythm....I played it when DJ-ing once and it got the crowd moving.

Plus....Isolation on Closer is a total dance track. LWTUA is a great dance track, Heart and Soul is nearly proto drum and bass.....

I think Joy Division would have gone brighter and more dancey as Barney would have been writing the music and he was getting into dance music....

But the lyrics and subject matter would have still been a bit darker, with Ians vocals and lyrics.

For me....its easy to imagine Ian singing over Blue Monday. Blue Monday, muscially, is actually a pretty dark song.

coney island baby wrote: you do realize if Ian was alive Barney would not be writing lyrics? .

which would take the massive pressure off barney, according to all the interviews and that prozac video diary thing, he gets very stressed with the lyrics, so it could have kept them together even now.

if he'd not hung himself and toured the us and as hooky excellently put it "shagged his was across the states" he'd probably have cheered up considerably himself.

Debbie Curtis has stated that Ian typically isolated himself in a room and worked on lyrics alone, then New Order has gone on record saying they didn't even pay much attention to what he was singing about. I get the impression that Ian didn't contribute much to the actual song structures and melody of Joy Division's songs and that his main role was to fill out what the band were already working on with his vocals.

Listening to Movement, the band is basically continuing exactly where Closer left off, so it's easy to picture them going the same direction seeing how the change wasn't immediate. Many people say they changed their sound to "escape the shadows of Joy Division", but I think that's playing into the myth of things. My theory is that they wanted more commercial attention since their main producer left them and all their money was being dumped into the Hacienda, then maybe they also wanted to evolve their sound due to the constant wave of JD sound-a-likes that were popping up after Ian's demise.

As for not picturing Ian singing some of New Order's extreme pop tunes, well, listen to Barney singing "Truth", then jump ahead a decade later and listen to "World in Motion". Same vocalist, entirely different singing style and music. People evolve and that could have easily been Ian.

El Jarvo wrote: I really hate the phrase 'synthpop'.

Sounds so twee and boybandish.

New Order is more alternative dance than synthpop. If you compare New Order to let's say Erasure, it's apparent that there's quite a big difference in the sound. Despite having synthesizers, New Order is much edgier than the typical synthpop. Plus, let's not forget that New Order always had a mix of alternative dance songs and alternative rock or indie. Other synthpop bands are strickly synthpop.

As for Ian, we'll never know for sure, but it's obvious that the band was evolving into something with more accessible melody. I don't think Joy Division would have done a song like Jetstream because the sound is often based on the leader and face it, Ian will never be a cheerful individual, but they wouldn't stay with the same sound for sure. Heck in two or three years, they changed a lot musically, so there's no doubt that they'd continue to change.

Why were they so pissed off when the record company added synthesizers to their first release? Can you believe this is the same band!

J

No Holiday wrote: Why were they so pissed off when the record company added synthesizers to their first release? Can you believe this is the same band!

J

I think Hannett was able to get them more into the synths because of his way of working them(along with smashing glass and elevator noises) into the overall soundscape as opposed to something just bolted on as an afterthought.

El Jarvo wrote:

Canuck21 wrote:

El Jarvo wrote: I really hate the phrase 'synthpop'.

Sounds so twee and boybandish.

New Order is more alternative dance than synthpop.

Eh? What the fcuk is 'alternative dance'?

I wouldn't dare listen to something which has been labelled 'alternative dance'. I have visions of the Sisters of Mercy with a breakbeat behind 'em.

Why do our Norf American cousins so insist on pigeonholing every'ting?

New Order are simply 'New Order'.

I also hate the phrase 'Indie' too, just for the record.

The Sisters always had a "dance" element to their music, Al.

[NB - try not to post on here too much. It's tantamount to outing yourself as a nonce.]

El Jarvo wrote: Eh? What the fcuk is 'alternative dance'?

I wouldn't dare listen to something which has been labelled 'alternative dance'. I have visions of the Sisters of Mercy with a breakbeat behind 'em.

Why do our Norf American cousins so insist on pigeonholing every'ting?

New Order are simply 'New Order'.

I also hate the phrase 'Indie' too, just for the record.

And yet you were fine with labelling New Order synthpop even though you didn't like the name. Get a grip of yourself. We categorize animal species to plastic, everything in the universe is categorized and given a label, so New Order can surely be labelled. New Order is New Order . Yeah, they can ago along with the Backstreet Boys since the Backstreet Boys is the Backstreet Boys because everyone is by themselves. Tell me something, what the heck do you call music like The Cure and Echo & the Bunnymen? Do you have to list the band names every time? If I ask you if you liked classical music, do I have to list examples of composers? Calling classical music is pigeonholing eh?

Why do Brits always have to be so moody all the time? Is your country that awful to live in? Breath a little and be more open-minded to others for crying out loud. Not everything you say and think is necessary right. Just because you've never heard of alternative dance doesn't mean you have to piss on the term. BTW, many North Americans don't like labelling too, not just you. I call that insecurity, like you're afraid of the label you're listening to. It's just being more precise. Since synthpop sounds too twee and boybandish, I give you another label which I find more accurate for New Order, but no, be childish about it and whine like an immature kid.

Canuck21 wrote:

El Jarvo wrote: Eh? What the fcuk is 'alternative dance'?

I wouldn't dare listen to something which has been labelled 'alternative dance'. I have visions of the Sisters of Mercy with a breakbeat behind 'em.

Why do our Norf American cousins so insist on pigeonholing every'ting?

New Order are simply 'New Order'.

I also hate the phrase 'Indie' too, just for the record.

And yet you were fine with labelling New Order synthpop even though you didn't like the name. Get a grip of yourself. We categorize animal species to plastic, everything in the universe is categorized and given a label, so New Order can surely be labelled. New Order is New Order . Yeah, they can ago along with the Backstreet Boys since the Backstreet Boys is the Backstreet Boys because everyone is by themselves. Tell me something, what the heck do you call music like The Cure and Echo & the Bunnymen? Do you have to list the band names every time? If I ask you if you liked classical music, do I have to list examples of composers? Calling classical music is pigeonholing eh?

Why do Brits always have to be so moody all the time? Is your country that awful to live in? Breath a little and be more open-minded to others for crying out loud. Not everything you say and think is necessary right. Just because you've never heard of alternative dance doesn't mean you have to piss on the term. BTW, many North Americans don't like labelling too, not just you. I call that insecurity, like you're afraid of the label you're listening to. It's just being more precise. Since synthpop sounds too twee and boybandish, I give you another label which I find more accurate for New Order, but no, be childish about it and whine like an immature kid.

It is fucking awful here, and it's even worse up north, but I still manage a smile every now and then, when I'm not being bitter and snide that is.

I really couldn't give a monkeys if you or anyone else from anywhere else wants to label anything, not bothered, open minded, complacent and stoic!

back to the thread though, It's widely known the IC was into kraftwerk and given the music they made was influenced by the clubs they were going to in the states and the substances they were taking, they'd have still gone the same way, maybe sooner as they would have been in the us earlier, but if IC hadn't killed himself, maybe the mixture of prescription and non prescription drugs, alcohol and seizures would have.