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It was only after we recorded Unknown Pleasures that I could hear and begin to take notice of the words, and it was quite startling then to see how they changed between that album, where they were still quite detached and aggressive, to Closer, which is even darker and not detached at all but really introspective and quite frightening—especially of course when you listen to it in light of what later happened.
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It is true that the record company are always thinking of new ways to flog New Order to people.
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I'm surprised how many people are into vinyl.
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If someone throws you in a pool and you can't swim, you're going to struggle.
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Nobody sells records any more, and the only way you can actually do anything is to go out and play live.
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I suppose it was karma that Substance would then turn out to be our biggest-selling album ever; we gave away our biggest-selling record to the record company at a reduced cost – for no reason other than they couldn’t pay us for the other ones at the full rate because of bad management.
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I'm terrible with decisions. And I can't make myself do something I don't like. I can't knuckle under.
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If I work on music, it'll be for 10 hours a day, so sometimes I'll feel stressed, and I'll go for a two-hour walk. That sorts me out.
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Movement came out while we were away. The reviews were OK, and though I grew to like it more and more as the years went by, we weren’t especially happy with it at the time. When we listened to the finished product what we heard was the sound of a band whose producer had lost faith. You could hear it. The album had ended up sounding like a Joy Division album with New Order vocals.
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You can never tell with New Order. Just when you think the band is coming to an end, it takes off again.
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Like the time I threw out Pete Murphy of Bauhaus for saying those six immortal words to Slim when he'd forgotten his backstage pass: 'Don't you know who I am?
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When I joined New Order, I was made to feel equal to everyone else in the band so I didn't feel like an outsider. I was treated equally, I was paid equally, and my opinion was sought after.
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Decisions are going to have to be made before we know about the state money.
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I remember that Martin Hannett once had an idea of making a record and burying it in his garden so that one day someone would dig it up, like a time capsule.
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The fact is that you don't want to be away forever, but you want to lead a normal life.
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I just sat on the bed and cried. I couldn't go to sleep. I was just sitting there thinking 'This poor guy,'
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Then came a rather surreal exchange about Joy Division T-shirts, with us proudly proclaiming we did not sell merchandise because we didn’t believe in self-promotion of any kind, preferring to let the music speak for itself. ‘Rubbish,’ boomed Scotty. ‘How come wherever I go I see Joy Division and New Order T-shirts, worn and for sale, eh?’ Now, we had no idea where he was going to see these things, but we were all speechless anyway. He continued, ‘I don’t believe you, and will be fining you accordingly.’ So we would get fined £10,000 for not doing our own T-shirts.
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On ‘Bizarre Love Triangle’ we’d had one of our first arguments about the level of the bass guitar. Our engineer Mike Johnson had insisted to the others they were wrong to suggest turning it down. ‘It’s a great counterpoint,’ he’d said. ‘That’s what New Order is all about.
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There's nothing wrong with wanting to be in a disco band.
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Adidas produced a limited-edition pair of Haçienda trainers, designed by Yohji Yamamoto (Saville has worked with Yohji since the late 1980s, creating his catalogues and advertisements). They retailed for £345 but people queued up from midnight just to be first through the doors to buy a pair. The shoes disappeared in twenty minutes - all soled out.
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I was a fan when Cracker was last on TV so it's great to be doing the music for the new series.
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...if you're going to waste an opportunity, there are a few important things to remember. Do it in style. Do it in public. And, above all, do it in Manchester.
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When you get in a band, you never consider the day it'll all just stop.
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We need to talk about what we are going to do and see and decide. We'll have to wait and see.