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Unsung Forum » Joy Division and the uncanny in music |
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Fatalist 1123 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 14:27
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Like I'm guessing a few other people did here, I watched the Joy Division film on BBC4 on Friday night. Excellent piece of work which got some genuinely interesting responses from its interviewees. One of the things that came over most though was how, in the space of just a few months, JD went from being copycat punks to... something else, a band that even their friends suddenly became in awe of. There was also a sense from the members that they weren't quite sure how this had happened themselves (though clearly Ian Curtis was an exceptional talent). http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0543ytw I'm not a JD super-fan by any means, but they're one of those bands where there's something else going on in their music that you can't quite put your finger on, something that's extraordinarily compelling (I'm thinking in particular of the second side of Closer). It's not just that the music's good, it's almost disturbingly good, like there's something uncanny about it. Of course, the likes of Ghost Box and all the 'hauntological' groups have based their whole modus operandi on capturing the sense of the uncanny inherent in certain types of music, particularly pertaining to the often quite weird popular culture of the 1970s. But while I dig a lot of that stuff, I find it mostly evokes a facsimile of uncanniness rather than the real thing. What I'm talking about is something a bit different to that, about music where your appreciation extends beyond just great riff/melody/beat/voice/lyric etc, to where there's a persistent sense of transcendent spookiness, for want of a better term. In other words, there's an uncanny element to the listening experience. I guess another example for me would be Hawkwind's 'Golden Void', particularly the non-vocal sections - there's something about those passages that continues to slightly freak me out, so astonishing do they still seem to me. It could be a childhood-based imprinting thing, but it still sometimes happens. For instance, the reason I've gone on about English Heretic so much is because I get a similar vibe from some of his stuff too. Does any of this make sense? ;-) And if so, which music do you hear as uncannily good? |
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Lawrence 9547 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 16:00
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Well I have a theory that it might have something to do with Ian's state of mind. I think he was a bit mentally ill from the time his band changed to his death. I've read a collection of essays by, believe it or not, Anton LaVey, the infamous creator of the Church of Satan which I used to follow but drifted away from for obvious reasons. Anyways LaVey wrote about the magical power of odd shapes such as trapezoids and has mentioned that if one dwells in a room that somehow deviates from its rectangular shape he can be driven quite mad. Anyways if you've read Touching from a Distance, Ian's wife mentions a room at their house that was, in her words, 'almost triangular'. It was the room where Ian wrote many of his songs. Well make of that what you will, but whether you can believe such weird stuff or not, I think poor Ian Curtis had something in his psyche that made his band so dark. And I don't think music was the same since then. Even when you compare Joy Division to a band they were inspired by, like Pere Ubu or the Velvet Underground, the darker tracks of the latter groups still seem like a bowl of Count Chocula compared to much of JD's output...
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Eyesheikh 3 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 18:08
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I think a good deal of that mystery is in Martin Hannett's arid production. There seems to be some sort of bleed through from the vocal track onto the other tracks, and I'm guessing he had mics placed far away from the instruments on axis. I get the same transcendent quality from Pawn Hearts, especially on We Go Now. I imagine that's what it sounds like as your consciousness dissolves into death. It's unlike anything I've ever heard. I've listened hundreds of times, and I still get scared.
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Lawrence 9547 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 19:32
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Who are Pawn Hearts?
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wychburyman 951 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 19:33
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I understand. Whilst not a massive fan, it strikes me that something of what you say is even conveyed on the sleeve designs as well. Rather subjective but a certain something that adds to your point I feel
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Eyesheikh 3 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 19:38
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Van der Graaf Generator's 1971 meisterwerk - Pawn Hearts
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Fatalist 1123 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 20:23
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Eyesheikh wrote: Van der Graaf Generator's 1971 meisterwerk - Pawn Hearts That's an interesting call. It's the way that Fripp's guitar part spirals upwards, then it gets weirdly discordant, like Ligeti or something. The strange, almost incidental, ending to Lemmings is also quite uncanny.
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thesweetcheat 6210 posts |
Mar 02, 2015, 21:38
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Another Hannett track where this kind of thing comes through is Crispy Ambulance's "Concorde Square", where a fairly straight-ahead, propulsive song turns into an extended instrumental outro. http://youtu.be/4hAHj10yNfw But nothing tops the Joy Division records, especially Unknown Pleasures with the clanking of the lift, the broken glass, the digital delay on the drums, Hooky's teetering bass, all making a supremely atmospheric listen. Do other people hear records in colour, sometimes influenced by the artwork? UP is definitely as black as its beautiful sleeve, interspersed with neon. As for Joy Division more generally but less uncannily, I can't begin to explain how profoundly the music of New Order and Joy Division changed my life. Most people I meet don't think that music is the single most important thing there is, but I don't understand them at all. And that's because of those groups (and a couple of others).
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IanB 6761 posts |
Edited Mar 03, 2015, 07:27
Mar 03, 2015, 07:27
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I like the second side of Closer a lot the rest of their output not so much but I know exactly what you mean about their sound and as others have noted it's the production as I haven't heard any live recordings where they came close to that on stage. What has that effect on me is when non musical elements get introduced (someone else mentioned the clankings on Unknown Pleasures). Rock is littered with examples but looping back to a previous thread, the end of Porcupine Tree's "Even Less" (from Stupid Dream) when the woman starts to read a sting of numbers turns a fairly meat and potatoes modern prog track into something really quite chilling. And it did that to me before I knew anything about the numbers station phenomenon. Doubly so now I know the background. The sound of the ducks on John Martyn's "Small Hours" has that element but in a completely different way. You are placed in a very specific and different space. That kind of thing is the closest we get to time travel.At least unaided. That's pretty uncanny. When I was a teenager the "Sonic Attack" section of Space Ritual was that in spades. Seems a bit corny now though I have probably heard it too often.
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spencer 3070 posts |
Mar 03, 2015, 12:43
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Spirit of Eden
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