“Day of the Lords ” by Joy Division
(Words/Music: Joy Division, Album: Unknown Pleasures, Factory Records 1979)

By late in 1977, a lot of bands were taking the basic idea of punk and re-interpreting it for themselves. One of those bands was Joy Division who took the bleakness of the message of punk and applied it to the music as well. Combined with the “art rock” movement coming out of CBGB’s (Talking Heads, et al.) and earlier proto-punk influences like Roxy Music and David Bowie’s German phase, Joy Division refocused the nihilistic view away from British society and into the human soul. Their music would be a major force on the burgeoning Goth scene and 1979’s Unknown Pleasures would be considered by most one of the finest recordings of the era.

“Ian Curtis had ‘Hate’ written on the back of his jacket…He stood out in the crowd. Our first concert was supporting Buzzcocks in May: playing wasn’t important, getting up and making noise was. The playing would just come. It was incredibly naive, but that is what you gathered from the Pistols. The air you gave off was an important thing: how you had the cheek to get up onstage I don’t know, but everybody was in the same boat, so they weren’t bothered.” - Peter Hook (bassist of Joy Division), England’s Dreaming: Anarchy, Sex Pistols, Punk Rock, and Beyond

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