Unknown Pleasures

...

I think, with mixtapes, and, and, uh, I've spent a lot of time thinking about this, can you get it right? And, um, so yeah, opening song, what I've gone for is, um, Joy Division, Disorder, track one, side one, Unknown Pleasures.

That is a very, very good choice.

Very good track, yeah.

Um, Pete Hook went, after seeing the Pistols in the Free Trade Hall, went into, I think, um, some music shop on Piccadilly Approach in Manchester and said, "I want a bass guitar." He didn't even know what a bass guitar was.

He said, "I j- I'll have that one," and, and he, and he bought it.

Didn't have the faintest idea how, how to do it, and within the space of three years they'd made Unknown Pleasures, and then they made Closer, which is even more astonishing.

I just ...

In 1979, Factory Records released Joy Division's debut single, Transmission.

Originally recorded in 1978 for a scrapped ci-- self-titled debut, the song was re-recorded at a faster tempo and released as a non-album single months after their debut album, Unknown Pleasures, landed in stores.

In 2007, the frenetic track was ranked among NME's 50 Greatest Indie Anthems Ever.

In 1982, the musical Cats opened on Broadway in New York City, running for nearly eighteen years and willing, winning several awards.

Mm-hmm.

So I'm convinced that if this record were sung in English, that it would be propped up on the level of Wire's Pink Flag or Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures or Gang of Four's Entertainment, all albums that do bear a little similarity.

But as is, it's considered a masterpiece of German alternative music.

It's smart.

For, uh, for 1979, um, pretty, like again, another one that I had saved 'cause I know a lot of bands and a lot of albums that came out in this year had that pretty, but knew I would be able to come back to this one and cover something pretty easily.

Now it worked out that, um, J for the band was available in 1979, so I went with Joy Division, uh, from their album Unknown Pleasures, and the song is Shadowplay.

So this is a late one 'cause S is obviously one that you're gonna save for pretty late, um, one of the easiest ones to, to cover.

So that covered 1979, uh, Joy Division with Shadowplay.

Wow.

Martin Hallett, particularly famous in the UK for producing Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures and the De Rossi column and everything like that.

Which mix got played in Chicago, Marshall? Was it the short original or was it that longer spaced out mix? Or was it

both? Well, it was a short original mix.

That's a whole crazy-ass story.

Joy Division put out their first album, Unknown Pleasures, in June of 79.

And then their singer, Ian Curtis, of course, hung himself and took his life in May of 1980, a couple months before their second record was released.

Closer came out in July of 1980.

For a while there, I saw a lot of Blondie.

And the other one that I see consistently is Unknown Pleasures, Joy Division.

That's pretty close.

But I would agree with you that Ramones is it.

I got you.

But yeah, Unknown Pleasures is pretty fucking great.

And I get...

So many of my friends are like, Larry, you need to buy it.

And I used to sit there with my tape recorder, my hands on record and play, hitting record and play at the beginning of a song, and then if I didn't like it, I just rewinded it and then start over.

But as soon as I heard, I think she played Heart and Soul first, which is on Closer, and I hit record and play, and it's just like...

Which is not on Unknown Pleasures.

But so I was like, oh my, what is this? And I already love like Tears for Fears and Bauhaus and stuff like that.