Martin Hannett

well, i'm split on this. Closer has a great sound, while some of the other tracks seem marred or poorly mixed. even Atmosphere has always seemed marred in production and mix. These Days sounds crappy, Unknown Pleasure seems full of bizarre sounding drum and bass experiments that have not held up very well over the years. while that said, Love Will Tear Us Apart (2nd version) sounds fantastic, Closer is full of great moments, brilliant.

Then with New Order, Everything's Gone Green sounds great, but Movement seems marred, hardly brings the best out of the songs.

I think he's helped New Order, but that it was good that their collaboration ended before PCL.

I don't think any of us would have heard of them without Hannett.

what a stupid question... Atmosphere is Martin Hannett.

yeah yeah yeah, blah blah blah....

fucks sake grrrrrrrrrr

JD owed a lot to martin cuz of his vision and the way he could influence them into doing more atmospheric and eerie stuff that JD is known for. who knows, the guys in JD were still young, so they probably had to have someone take control a bit.

but by the time new order came around, i think they had a different vision of what they wanted their band to be and had enough experience to trust their own judgement a bit more. it's just speculation...but i think it worked both ways.

Originally posted by shaun carruthers yeah yeah yeah, blah blah blah....fucks sake grrrrrrrrrr

Is this the only thing you can say?

actually I don't understand the blah blah blah stuff either...

come on then shaun explain yourself?

There are times to be creative in the studio, and times to be traditional. A majority of the time Hannett and JD/NO got it right, but there are a few instances of going overboard. But if Hannett did not allow/push the bands to stretch their sound, where would they have ended up? just another brit pop band of the 80's? Possibly, but luckily we will never have to know.

Originally posted by Tout est devenu vert > Originally posted by shaun carruthers> yeah yeah yeah, blah blah blah....> > fucks sake grrrrrrrrrr

Is this the only thing you can say?

He's like Muttley, ain't he?

Anyway, back on topic, yeah a lot of the distictive sound of JD was due to Hannett's input. While some of Closer can sound indistinct and murky (I'm mainly thinking AE here) that was cos they recorded some of it being played back through the studio monitors for a more "live" sounding result. I think he held back NO though, and IIRC Hannet himself felt all along that NO were better off producing themselves. So I picked the "sit on the fence" option.

PS: Yer getting near 1000 here EGG...!!!

Originally posted by tooth ache actually I don't understand the blah blah blah stuff either...come on then shaun explain yourself?

OK, here's the explanation of Mr. Carruthers:

Try here and here and finally here

He did a better job producing JD's Closer than he did New Order's first album Movement. That one was a bit too flat in my opinion.

I also have "Bummed" by Happy Mondays which he also produced, but I heard a rumour that he tends to record the drum kits in toilet cubicles - hence all the reverb. Is this true?

I hope not...I loved "Bummed" until you said that.

i say he helped them greatly , yes some of their experimental stuff didnt turn out so good, but they learned how to be efficient in the studio and it helped them in years to come and in some ways he taught them to refuse to be like everybody else and to look at things from different angles

Compare the lack of quality of the production for the unreleased RCA album, including tracks such as "Transmission", "Novelty" and "Shadowplay" with the later re-recorded versions under the production and direction of Martin Hannett. Bear in mind that these recordings were barely a year apart. I admit that the songs might also sound better as the band got better musically, but I think that MH deserves maximum credit for his contribution.

Then also compare the RCA album with A Factory Sample, although obviously the songs themselves were different, "Digital" and "Glass" which were recorded and produced by Hannett six months after the RCA sessions have a far superior sound quality.

In my opinion Martin Hannett was crucial to the success of Joy Division, as he introduced the band to synths, which they had previously rejected a year earlier when they thought they were (just) a punk band. Had he not done this JD could have fallen by the wayside by the end of 1979, and its doubtful whether New Order would ever have existed.

As regards his work with New Order, both sides of their first two singles, and the extended "Everything's Gone Green" are absolutely fantastic songs with an equally excellent production.

Apparantly stories abound from the group that Martin made Bernard sing "Procession" or "Chosen Time" or whichever version of the story you've heard, MANY times before he was happy with it. This was in the days when Mr Sumner wasn't so much of a diva concerning his singing voice.

The major disappointment for me concerning "Movement" is that Peter Hook's voice is so poor on "Dreams Never End", now this is because either;

Peter can't sing; or

Peter deliberately sang that badly to avoid comparison with Ian; or

Bernard didn't want to sing the first track on the album.

Its not down to Hannett as had the band or Factory been unhappy with the production on the album or any one song on it, they could have rerecorded it (like "Ceremony"). I think Hannett gets wrongly accused regarding "Movement". The album is not an easy going one, it never was going to be in the circumstances but it is an important document as it marks most of the songs written in the immediate aftermath of Ian's death.

For me though Hannets work with New Order in 1981 was when the band were at their consistent peak, although there were other returns to form in the intervening 20 years.

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I don´t know,but every band he has woked with had the drums mixed in the same style.If you hear the durutti column´s albums like LC,you`ll realize It souds just like joy division.

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Originally posted by Dave_Barrie He did a better job producing JD's Closer than he did New Order's first album Movement. That one was a bit too flat in my opinion.I also have "Bummed" by Happy Mondays which he also produced, but I heard a rumour that he tends to record the drum kits in toilet cubicles - hence all the reverb. Is this true?

I thought I heard that about Steve Albini. I dunno, all the talk about production goes over my head. What exactly does a producer do thats distinct from mixing? I ticked the third option to sound as if I knew about this stuff, but really I haven't a clue. Except even I can tell there's something not quite right about Republic (what have you done with Hooky!)

I don´t know,but every band he has worked with had the drums mixed in the same way.If you hear a durutti column album like LC,you`ll realize It sounds just like joy division

a pretty good martin hannett story was told by the new fast automatic daffodils - when they worked with him he'd become that fat that when he leaned over the mixing desk his gut pushed all the faders etc up in the shape of his stomach. Apparantly rather than admit he's fucked up he said he'd just invented the 'martin hannett sound curve'!!

top man.

on the subject of the thread if it wasn't for him then unknown pleasures would have been a rock album. can't imagine it any other way.

404 error wrote "What exactly does a producer do thats distinct from mixing?"

An awful lot. It does depend on the project and the producer's style and what the artist wants, but typically it is along these lines:

1. listening to pre production demos and identifying problems and assigning 'homework' to the band to fix problems before recording starts, also suggesting changes to the arrangements, more radical rewrites, or cutting songs altogether may happen at this point
2. when basic tracks are recorded, the producer has the final say in everything regarding equipment selection (instruments and amps, mics, mic preamps, etc), microphone placement, which is critical, and other technical matters related to how many tracks are to be recorded and in what order, etc
3. during the recording, the producer will usually call the shots as to whether a take is good enough to keep in the 'keeper' or 'maybe' category and sort of coach the whole group along, like 'that was great but the bass slows down in the second verse, and we need less low end in the guitar'
4. the producer is responsible for the various settings as the tracks are recorded; usually an engineer is actually rolling the tape or running the software while the producer takes care of the signal levels for everything that is being recorded (very important); some engineers take care of that instead of the producer though. An assistant takes care of labeling everything and documenting what was done in case a redo is needed later
5. the producer does more of the same kind of thing as overdubs are completed on single instruments or vocal tracks, and might decide which parts need overdubs or what additional sounds or parts need to be added after listening to the basic tracks and trying a rough mix
6. effects and processing of various kinds may take place before mixing; Hannett did a lot of stuff like making multiple copies of drum tracks and sending them through different effects, back into other, new tracks which would be the only ones to be used in the final mix; at this point, Ian's voice would have been processed heavily, with tape speed change and reverb and probably EQ, which would have taken time to get right; also small problems like little extraneous noises in individual tracks are taken care of
7. the final mix is done, which can take a long time; not only are the individual tracks from the tape passed through faders to control volume, but also effects (compression, EQ, reverb, delays, etc) are added both to individual tracks and to the whole mix; edits are made, using a razor blade on the actual working 2 track master tape, until each song is finished; then the complete album master (well, usually two, one for each side of the LP in those days) is compiled on a 2 track tape. The producer has input on the order of songs for the album (along with the band) and usually does the fade ins and outs.

the above would mainly apply to UP and the singles other than Atmosphere and LWTUA on the technical matters; Atmosphere and IIRC Closer were done on an early generation of digital recorders, so there would have been no tape to splice and a more limited number of tracks due to the limitations of the Sony PCM machines. I'd love to see the original working 24 and 2 track master tapes for Unknown Pleasures just to see how many splices there are. From the sound of it, there must have been at least a couple hundred cuts.

On UP Martin added the analog synth and weird sound effects, for example the sounds at the beginning of 'New Dawn Fades' and the end of 'I Remember Nothing'. The 'guitar' on Candidate is also really more Martin than Barney because it is so heavily processed.

Hannett's drum sounds are legendary and widely admired and imitated in the industry to this day. He probably spent about as much time on them as he did on everything else in the pre mix editing/processing stage.

Ok, thanks to telly (may I call you telly?) for the explanation. While I'm on the subject of my crass ignorance, what exactly is an 'arrangement' (in this context)?

When Movement was recorded, it was time to radically move on to something new because of Ian's death, and I don't think Martin handled the situation well. Apart from that, he did miracles.

The arrangement is basically the way the individual parts are designed so that they add up to the complete song, and the structure of the song, which generally means the order in which the various sections of the song are played for the final version that you are working toward. You might change an arrangement by adding, taking away or changing a part, an instrument playing that part, or rearranging the order of section or adding or taking away a section.

Martins jd stuff is great but lost it with MOVEMENT .He was back to form on the Happy mondays BUMMED. R.I.P

Why with Movement? It's not him. Listen to the 1981 Peel sessions. There's another sound producer. Would it be better? But all Joy Division tracks are superb, thanks to Hannett.

Martin Hannett is the man! Everything he put his hands sounded good for me. Joy Division, New Order, Happy Mondays, Stone Roses, Section 25, etc.: when he produced these bands, those recordings are very better. His "hobbled" way of mixing (mainly the drums) is remarkable and unconfoundable! About Section 25 w/ Hannett, some people used to say that he was repeating, in "Always Now", the "Joy Division formula". They really don't know that formula is about his own person, not along the bands he produced. He was great, and, so, I think Joy Division helped him, allowing his production, while he helped them, making them sound brilliant!

Martin Hannett was absolutely fucking essential to the JD/NO sound (and I'm really pissed off that my much longer post was destroyed! )