One is definitely not Paul Morley, as I'm sure yer all aware! But as one of the lucky 100 (Number 67) who bought the book I felt somebody better cover this.....
New Order "From Heaven To Heaven" 1981-1984Author Dec Hickey.
For people who were there or wished they were there. This is no ordinary book on New Order, this is the ultimate take on the band's early years, a period which is often glossed over. It's New Order in their infancy and covering the period where they slowly but surely start to gain their own unique identity.
Between author Dec Hickey and his band of merry men/women from Bedford, they managed to take in almost all of New Order's gig appearances in the years that this book covers. After catching the band for the first time at Heaven in London on February 9th 1981, the power and influence of the music took hold (some of the Bedford crew had already caught Joy Division live) and Dec decided to chance his arm and try and put on a New Order show of his own. Through speaking to Hooky after Heaven, he managed to get Rob (Gretton)'s phone number and after a week or so and having spoken to Rob, Dec secured the Bedford Boys' Club, March 21st gig.
In these long forgotten times, without emails and mobiles and hardly any announcements in the press for upcoming gigs, much seems to have been agreed and arranged over the phone. A contract was drawn up for Bedford, but never signed by Rob, so it was all word of mouth and right up until the last minute, there was worry of a no-show. Even today there are still discussions as to whether New Order did play certain gigs during these bygone days and in between Heaven and Bedford, the date of a Middlesborough Rock Garden gig is still questioned.
Luckily for Dec, Rob did keep to his word, the band duly arrived in Bedford and the show was a sell out. Dec has reproduced many of his photos for the book and also the recollections of people in attendance. On top of this and thanks to the close bond Dec formed with Rob, he and some of the Bedford crew were always treated to soundchecks and backstage passes. Close contact was also had with all of the band and luckily Dec had his trusty tape recorder on a lot of the time. The book gives many insights into the way things were planned by fans, for instance the opening section of the book has a page devoted to the discussions on which batteries, tape recorders and cassette tapes were to be used, fascinating stuff for those who have collected these tapes over the years.
Most of the people who cropped up during the band's transition from Joy Division to those early New Order years get a mention, including the likes of Duncan Haysom and Jon Wozencroft who, along with Dec, have helped to preserve some of the history and if you lived for the trading (or buying in my case) of the live tapes, some of those characters also get mentioned and you may well be aware of them already.
The highlights of the book (for myself) have to be the amount of unseen pictures and tape transcripts of soundcheck and dressing chat that have been included. The transcripts are a joy and include, for instance, a story of Rob offering to "double or quits" the bands appearance fee on the toss of a coin, much to the amusement/annoyance of the band. Also, there are proper fan questions to the band after gigs about Joy Division sessions and the existence of the full version of In A Lonely Place (something I myself asked Hooky about after a DJ set in Glasgow back in 2004, but was so drunk I couldn't remember his answer the next day). Luckily, Dec had this on tape and according to Barney in one of the transcripts IALP was only properly rehearsed three days before Ian died.
Having just finished the book I am gutted there is nothing left to feast on. Over the last couple of weeks I have been re-energised on all things New Order, thanks Dec! I have revisited several of the gigs reviewed in the book that haven't been played for a while, Kentish Town, Manchester Ritz, Bristol Trinity, Futurama Four, Kilkenny and so on. The really early gigs hold an intensity that's hard to imagine when listening to New Order of the last 20 years, with all the ad libs and "Come on" shouts during Joy Division songs (again something near unimaginable during the early years). To use the old cliche, it's a band struggling to come to terms after the death of Ian and Joy Division, trying to create their own sound in amongst constant equipment malfunctions as well as developing new on stage personas, very rarely a word spoken to the audience from any of the band, sets that were lucky to last 45 minutes and no encores unless you were very lucky.
There is in depth detail of following the band, especially through the first three years the book covers, but as the book comes to an end you can tell the author was on the last leg of his own New Order journey and the obsession was lessening. Having said that, Dec still managed to take in a helluva lot of gigs between 1985 and 2005. The book in the main is about the camaraderie between a group of pals going to extreme lengths following the band round the country, days off work, traveling straight from work, drinking too much beer, having a terrible memory and relying on your pals to fill in the gaps, nearly crashing cars, lack of sleep and - this is a mirror image of my own life (I have a Viking tattoo to prove it!) For the Bedford crew, several years later see also the London Order, Corby Order, Aberdeen Order, Manchester Order etc... or put us all together and you have The Vikings, a group of people going to the extreme to follow the band around the globe, including the Americas and most of mainland Europe, the story of drinking too much beer, what goes on tour... and the joy of being with your pals and seeing the best band on the planet.
If you are a fan(atic), which I have been since the late eighties myself, this book is an absolute joy. It's all perfectly packaged and it's great that someone (especially so close to the band via Rob) has taken the time and effort to document this most important of times. The band's warmth (and humour) shines through, no more so than with Rob, who has his own wee chapter towards the end of the book, very fitting it was too. It would be nice to think that From Heaven to Heaven (if widely released) would spur on the next generation of fans to cover 1985 onwards, or even better the band themselves to put something together. The book gets a 9.5/10 and if Dec sends me some of those gigs and soundchecks it'll be the perfect score. If you don't ask....
Shug Sludden. March 2010.
Side note from Dec :
There were a couple of publishers already interested in the book before it even went to this limited edition print run and in the next few weeks I'll have a clearer idea of what the possibilities may be but I'm obviously aware that there are a huge amount of fans who'd like to be able to get hold of a copy so to that end I hope it can happen and I'll update as and when.
