Critical Writings -> Articles & Reviews

Articles and Reviews: MUSIC

Unknown Pleasures

Closer

Still

by Joy Division (Factory/Warners)

No such second-guessing is necessary when considering the small but significant oeuvre of Joy Division: it was great then, and it’s great now. Listen again, and weep, as Warners have just reissued collectors’ editions of Unknown Pleasures, Closer and Still, each coupled with a dementedly intense straight-from-the-mixing-desk live album, the totality reiterating just how strangely angular but disturbingly beautiful was the music crafted by these four young Mancunian males – sounding like nothing you’d ever heard before, or (despite the legions of pale imitators) have heard since.

First published in Magill, December/January 2007/8