So for most the past year I've been listening to a shitload of New Order. For a while I was even of the opinion that Ian Curtis' death was the best thing that could have happened to popular music. Yeah, it's extreme, I take it back. The past month, and maybe its circumstances, I've listened almost exclusively to Joy Division. That's quite an achievement considering their limited output. So I got around to wondering, who has had a greater impact on popular music, Joy Division or New Order? I honestly don't know.
Now may not be the best time to ask that question, considering the rebirth of hipster haircut bands who list Joy Division as one of the big influences. I think Joy Division has had more of an influence on specific bands, but New Order has certainly had more of an impact on popular music in general.
There seem to be hundreds of them around suddenly. Obviously I never saw Joy Division live, but from what I am lead to believe, the lives shows aren't even in the same league.
I'd have to say New Order's influence is far greater, especially since they've influenced many sub-genres of rock, pop, and dance, not to mention how the Blue Monday 12" revolutionized a piece of the record industry, and really introduced the "dance mix" to most of the world...they weren't the first to do it, but they made the biggest impact. Many of the bands that claim Joy Division as an influence usually sound more New Order-ish to me anyway...and the whole Interpol thing really is about the singer's voice/delivery, not so much the actual music, isn't it?
That's how I view Interpol as well. I wonder how many kids getting into Interpol have purchased some Joy Division and then just started scratching their heads. 655321, is that a concert video you speak of?
I can't say which has been more important in the long run, but I certainly prefer Joy Division. New Order was never my thing. The appeal of them escapes me. But the first three Wire records blow both bands away.
But ive never meet anyone quite like you before. My brother went to England 1985 and came back with all things that were New Order. Love em to bits. Had the honour of seeing a New Order gig three years back when they did the BDO tour. Blue Monday is the highest selling 12'' incher of all time (no pun intended) That song sits in Willemski's top 5 of all time. Maybe the death of Ian Curtis holds some emotional value which may swing the vote towards Joy Division. Willemski gives the vote to New Order..
Another confession here. I don't any stuff by either. If I were to go out and buy something tomorrow (seems very likely, actually), what cd by either would you recommend?
I used to love New Order when I was in HighSchool but I find that I can easily live without alot of it now (and some of it I can barely stand) - maybe just heard it way too many times. I still like Joy Division (and Wire).
I've always had an attraction to songs about fear, anger, loneliness, abandonment, and depression. Joy Division for me.
New Order had more influence on popular music because they were, well, more popular than Joy Division. I think that Joy Division had more influence on bands who eventually became popular though. New Orders popularity was helped by the fact that alternative music became mainstream, but the influence of Joy Division is one of the things that made alternative popular. Or something like that.
Both New Order & Joy Division titled their singles collections "Substance." I have both (somewhere) on cassette and they give a really good and pretty comprehensive introduction to both bands.
I like Joy Division, and selected tracks (the original Temptation, the album version of Sub-culture, and mot of all Everything's Gone Green) are outstanding dance records. But Joy Division is on an extremely short list of great bands of all time. If New Order produced anything as emotionally walloping as the second side of "Closer" ...... well, frankly, they didn't.
nancyb, like c pizzeria stated a few posts up I would say that both "substance" collections are good intyroductions to these bands. With New Order though, their substance collection definately was more slanted to their dance type music and they do have quite a bit of just plain good guitar driven pop as well.
I think I would suggest Joy Division's Permanant over Substance. Has most of the singles plus the better album tracks.
I'll second that. And as far as 24 Hour Party People goes...if you didn't like Madchester, don't bother. The movie goes like this...talk about Joy Divison for like 20-30 minutes, move onto New Order for a whole, oh I don't know, EIGHT ********ING MINUTES...then Happy Mondays for about the next four hours. Then it's over. I loved it, but I also consider Bummed to be one of my top five albums of the entire eighties. I just walked out feeling they seriously did the audience a disfavor by glossing over New Order's rise to greatness.
I think we had this discussion before, but being someone who never really got into Happy Monday's and at the same time LOVED New Order, the slight to new order in the movie really ruined it for me.
I am AndyMead, and I approve this post. Joy Division has sort of become the John Lennon to Bauhaus's Paul McCartney. Joy Division is the cool "artistic" goth band - but to be perfectly honest - their catalog is more potential than realization. New Order really redefined the leading edge of dance pop. They maintained their own appeal while becoming accessible to the masses.
I don't really agree that Joy Division helped to make alternative popular. Joy Division really appealed to its niche - of which I was a part - but it really was not accessible. If anything, it was Bauhaus/Love and Rockets/Tones on Tail that pushed goth into more of a mainstream audience. Joy Division didn't last long enough - at least not in the U.S. New Order's music is a rather strong departure from Joy Division, and I've had trouble convincing some folks that they're basically the same band. The whole 4AD Beggars Banquet push towards college mainstream was led by groups like the Cocteau Twins, Lush, Yaz, Siouxsee, and New Order - I'm not really sure what influence that Joy Division had other than the cool cachet of someone saying they were influenced by them. I really can't recall to many popular bands that have put out anything that evokes Joy Division. Maybe that's just me. If someone wanted a primer on the bounds of Goth Rock, I'd have them listen to Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart and the 9 minute live version of Bauhaus's Bela Legosi's Dead.
I don't really want to get into a whole thing here, but the idea that Joy Division has had less of an impact on alternative music than Bauhaus or Tones On Tail is pretty ridiculous to me. Perhaps more "real Goths" liked Bauhaus, but Joy Division has had more universal appeal and popularity (if that word can even be used here).
Answer: New Order on both counts, primarily because of "Blue Monday". It was a dance song that rock people could enjoy, a real revolutionary crossover. Even if you think that JD was a superior group they didn't open up new commercial channels in the way that New Order did.