http://www.theargus.co.u...eter_Hook_And_The_Light/Former Joy Division and New Order bass player Peter Hook has spoken about one of the great unanswered questions in rock music history.
Why did Ian Curtis take his own life?
“I wish I bloody knew. I really do,” he tells The Guide. “I was looking for the answer when I wrote the Hacienda [How Not To Run A Club] book. I thought everyone else was to blame for the cock-ups there that cost me my pension fund, but I realised when I wrote it that I was as much to blame as anybody.”
Buoyed by the success of that book, which has sold 85,000 copies, he penned another biography, Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division, which takes in his life from birth up until Joy Division and Curtis’s death.
Again Hooky found himself asking the elusive question.
“Unfortunately, I didn’t find the answer to that question. I never found out and I still have to suffer the guilt I felt first time round.”
And the searching had him looking inwards once more.
“I should have stopped him. I should have been able to step back. But I wasn’t the oldest there, I wasn’t the most experienced and I certainly wasn’t the wisest. So you realise it was a combination of us all being stupid and not being worldly enough to take his illness more seriously.”
Curtis was 23 when he hanged himself with a washing line. The singer was plagued by epilepsy and struggled to balance his musical ambitions after his marriage to Deborah Woodruff and subsequent fatherhood – especially after he had become close to journalist Annik Honoré.
That so much is written about Joy Division and they are so well-loved given they only released two studio albums (one of which, Closer, was released after Curtis’s death) is testament to the enduring appeal of the songs and story.
But Hooky reveals he became sick of reading the tale written by people who weren’t there.
“It’s got quite a rock and roll ending but it is a unique story. Joy Division only existed for two and a half years and we were only professional for six months – if you can call being professional being on seven quid a week.”
Hooky and Joy Division guitarist Bernard Sumner plus drummer Stephen Morris formed New Order from the band’s ashes to keep the Joy Division flame alive. Keyboardist Gillian Gilbert completed the line-up.
“Joy Division’s music has grown and grown in popularity and there are more Joy Division fans now, a million times more than when Ian died, and that enduring legacy and heritage needs celebrating.”
Another prompt to write his side of the story developed when a celebrity gig in Macclesfield to commemorate 30 years of Curtis’s death fell through.
“Before New Order split up it was alright to ignore Joy Division. But once I was outside of it I kept thinking, why did we ignore it? When the planned celebrity gig in Macclesfield came along I thought f*** it, I’ll do it myself.
“I got so frustrated that it fell through and we’d never done anything for Ian in Macclesfield. I thought right, I’m not going to let it go.”
The idea was to do one show and play Unknown Pleasures, Joy Division’s debut, in its entirety.
Hooky was inspired by Bobby Gillespie deciding to do a run of dates playing Primal Scream’s Screamadelica but was well aware it’s easy to become a tribute band to yourself, “which somehow seems distasteful”.
Other national treasures have gone down that road, including the biggest of them all, Paul McCartney.
“To me, New Order seem like a tribute band. Because you are playing a set of the greatest hits it seems a bit weird. Really, I was thankful when Bobby gave me the idea to play the LP in full because it feels a bit more artistic and diligent and exciting because you are taking a chance doing it.”
The rows with New Order’s Bernard Sumner continue and Hooky compares their relationship to a divorce.
“The friends always run about for a bit then decide who they are going to go to, and Stephen [Morris] went with Bernard. He stayed with the goose that laid the golden egg, if you like.”
The conflicts contrast with his experience in Joy Division.
“Joy Division was a fantastic group and we always played well and never had any problems playing as group. We only had problems being in New Order, it was like a table with a wonky leg.”
The reputation for being unpredictable was because they lost Curtis.
“Gillian tried to fill the gap but it took a long time before the three of us got used to being a group again.”
There were similar nerves when he decided to do Unknown Pleasures in full. But one show became two and the offers soon rolled in from abroad. Now, with his band The Light, there is an extensive UK tour.
Hooky is frontman and singer and his son plays bass.
“He’s the nearest anyone can get. There is a certain purity having him on bass and me singing – it keeps it in-house.”
The 56-year-old credits Mancunian super-producer Martin Hannett with turning him into a bass- playing version of a lead guitarist.
He encouraged Hooky to buy some decent amps once he’d decided on the bass, on the basis that Bernard already had a guitar and you didn’t have two guitars in a punk band.
Hannett also had the brainwave of sticking the bass upfront in the sound and used subtle tricks with delay to conjure Unknown Pleasures’ ominous atmosphere and ambience.
“I just wanted to sound like the f***ing Sex Pistols, I wanted to rip everybody’s head off ’cos that’s what I was. I was an angry young man. And Martin turned us into wonderful music – I suppose you’d have to call it AOR – but I just wanted to last for five minutes and rip your head off.”
Despite Hooky’s youthful attitude, the band wrote the songs and Hannett did the sound.
“He really did have a master plan but at the time I didn’t get it. Listening back to Unknown Pleasures in depth, I was blown away. He gave us a gift. He led that record and gave it the power to last for ever and we can’t thank him enough.”
