As soon as Lucy clapped eyes on this, she said, "I didn't know you had that. Can I borrow it after you're done?" She wants us to go and see Control at the weekend, and I'm happy to do that as long as this cold that I've caught isn't making me feel too rotten (it was getting drunk on Monday that did for me, I reckon). I missed the recent Factory Records documentary on TV. Well, I would: it was on TV. But I watched some of the Tony Wilson clips today. So this is all very topical.
I bought this very soon after it came out, ten years ago. It may have been one of my first boxed sets.
Never having owned Unknown Pleasures, I thought this would give me an overview of the band that I completely missed when they were a going concern.
And there's no doubt that it's a good overview. The booklet makes a clear case for Joy Division's work not having been well compiled up to that point, and this brings together all the material they originally released together with radio sessions and live tracks selected by Jons Savage and Wozencroft together with half of the original band. The booklet also features essays by Jon Savage, Jean-Pierre Turmel and Paul Morley (an inevitable choice, but surprisingly not as his best in my opinion).
But if I thought this would be a gateway to me properly getting to grips with the band, I was wrong. At least so far. As I implied earlier (1, 2) my interest extends from Closer through Love Will Tear Us Apart, Atmosphere, Ceremony (though that's mainly because of the Galaxie 500 cover, and the version on this collection is terrible) and possibly New Dawn Fades, and then stops fairly abruptly.
Especially with this cold, I found most of the all-live fourth disc a very tough listen indeed.
I've got no problem with Atmosphere being top of John Peel's all-time millennium chart, but much of the rest you're welcome to keep.
 MusicBrainz entry for this album
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