Playground magazine

Something got twisted in the world of New Order, back in 2007. After the release of their last album to date - the somewhat discreet “Waiting For The Sirens’ Call” (2005) - a greatest hits compilation and a world tour, Peter Hook said in an interview that the band was to call it quits. His declarations were quickly denied in an official statement by the band, but the years of silence that followed had everyone fear the worse. Nevertheless, in September 2011, they announced they were to do two charity concerts in Brussels and Paris, which many thought would be the final chance to ever see the band play live again. But then, after the original bassist was replaced with Tom Chapman (who had worked with Bernard Sumner on his side-project Bad Lieutenant) and Gillian Gilbert joined the band, back after a ten-year break, they announced more gigs.

Among their 2012 concerts is the closing ceremony of the London Olympics on 12th August, alongside Blur and The Specials, a double appearance at Sónar 2012, and a performance at Festival Internacional de Benicàssim. We had a 15-minute chat in Benicàssim with Bernard Sumner, Phil Cunningham, and Tom Chapman, while Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert were talking to other journalists five metres away. Laid-back and quite tongue-in-cheek, they talked to us about Peter Hook, their new live show, the importance of Joy Division, football and the climate. New Order from up close.

Hi, Bernard.

Bernard: Hello, I’m sorry for being so late, we were in the middle of the pre-gig preparation. We want to make a great show tonight.

What was the preparation about?

B: Press-ups!

Phil: Health things!

Tom: Drinking!

So how was the whole dynamics of getting back together, touring and stuff?

B: We never split up really. It’s just that Peter Hook left the band and when he did he tried to say that we had split up - but we made a press announcement saying we didn’t split up, that we were still together. He’s left, so we had to get someone in to replace such a great figure as him. It was very difficult, of course. We eventually found Tom Chapman here, our new bass player. But… it was quite easy, really. We just got together in a room and started rehearsing.

T: They gave me three weeks to learn the bass guitar parts. I could do it in three weeks…

You could?!

T: I’m alright, I’m alright…

How was the whole thing about replacing such a great figure as Peter?

T: It was simple. They just said me: ‘We’ve got some gigs coming up, can you play bass?’ And I was, ‘Yeah, okay’. As I played with Bad Lieutenant and knew some of the New Order songs, I didn’t find it that daunting. They made me feel really at ease, there was no pressure.

So Bad Lieutenant was sort of a warm-up for this?

T: Yeah, well, when I was doing Bad Lieutenant I was doing Bad Lieutenant.

B: It was very important. Whatever you do is equally important.

Yeah, but I mean it could be seen as a preparation for what was coming…

P: We didn’t know it was gonna happen. But, I mean, when we got the set of songs together, we spent time in the rehearsal room. We knew we didn’t want to do the same thing; we didn’t want to do the same New Order set as in 2006. We wanted to freshen up some of the tracks. Bernard spent a lot of time reprogramming parts.

T: We worked with Stuart Price, as well. He got involved with the new live version of “586”.

B: We did the visuals as well. We didn’t want it to be the same as it was at the start of 2001 or 2005. We reprogrammed some of the musical material, we put a lot of new visuals together which you’ll see tonight…

I saw you back in Sónar and you played some of the more obscure and classic New Order material such as “586”. Had it something to do with not having to support a new album?

B: Because we didn’t want to play just the mainstream stuff, we wanted to play some obscure stuff as well. It was as simple as that. It was nice that we were not promoting a new album. That has been a very joyous experience because you are not selling anything. You are just here like ‘hey, guess what? We just want to play a gig!’ We are not selling you anything, you can’t buy anything. We are just here to play and that is refreshing.

P: You end up being in and around America, or in a studio for however long. You go out, promote the album, tour the album and then same again, same again…

B: It’s nice not to have an agenda. The thing about Joy Division and early New Order was that we never really had an agenda, we just played, we weren’t interested in selling units and taking over the world. We were just there because we wanted to be there. This new tour, that started last November and will end this November, has been very refreshing and pretty much as we did it in the old days.

How did you get Gillian back in the band?

B: Just ask her! [Everyone laughs.]

Yeah, right, but she’s there attending to other media…

B: She just said yes. When she left the band she had some health issues. I don’t want to go into this because it’s personal family issues which are private, so… She needed some time off to do that. But she loves doing it. She admires me very greatly really, she feels like it’s an honour for her to play with me as a singer. [Everyone laughs.]

Any plans for new material?

B: We don’t make plans really. We only plan if we have to play somewhere in a couple of weeks, three weeks or a month because we have to book a hotel or a flight. All I can say is ‘yeah, we’ll probably write some new material and that shit, but you never know what might happen’. We’ve got no concrete plans to do that. I think we are all getting the creative itch. When we get back home for three or four days after playing some festivals, we are all itching to write material so I can only guess that yes it will happen.

Peter Hook said that New Order isn’t New Order without him.

[Everyone laughs ironically.]