33d. New Order - Blue Monday (88) (Factory)

Three more weeks at number one from 21st May 1988

Well, this is an interesting case for chart pedants (and possibly nobody else). It might be tempting to treat “Blue Monday ‘88” as a new release, but it shared its catalogue number (FAC73) with the original single, so was treated by all chart compilers as a simple re-entry. Whether you went out and bought the original twelve-inch of this, or the new 7 inch version, or the CD Video single, or any other permeation of it, it was logged towards the same total. Some national charts even showed “Blue Monday” leaping up from the lower reaches of the Top 200 into the Sunday teatime rundown as a result.

This means it’s the fourth run at the top for the 33rd NME Indie Number One, but the circumstances this time are more interesting than before, and worth at least a bit of exploration. The original version was available as a twelve inch single only, a position the band and Factory Records refused to budge on. It made a jolly old mess of the chart display in my local Woolworths, so in the week “Blue Monday” was in the top ten somebody had scrawled “AVAILABLE ON TWELVE INCH ONLY!” in permanent marker on a piece of cardboard, right next to all the other carefully designed single sleeves. Peter Savile couldn't have wanted that – Tony Wilson might have considered it ‘found art’ and designated a special catalogue number for it, though.

Besides the memory of the horrible brown gap in the otherwise perfect row of Woolworths display teeth, there were other reasons a seven inch version might have been desirable at the time; radio stations wanted an edit of the song, for example, and pub landlords requested something that could fit into their jukeboxes (“Our customers have been asking for it”). I doubt either the band or Factory Records gave a cuss for these reasons, but over in the USA, Quincy Jones – whose Qwest label the band were signed to – had other ideas the group were unusually easy-going about.

Quincy, a man who was once rumoured to have kicked Michael Jackson around the studio floor ranting “Stop squeaking motherfucker!” in protest at his vocal tics, appeared to believe that “Blue Monday” could be remixed and edited afresh. New York mixer John Potoker, who had previously worked with Diana Ross, Ashford & Simpson, Scritti Politti and Candi Staton, was hired and ‘supervised’ by Quincy Jones, and ‘Project “No seven minute singles, motherfuckers”’* began.

The band’s reluctance to put up a fight about their classic single does seem absurd in retrospect. Had anyone tried to remix The Beatles “Strawberry Fields Forever” in 1972 to make it briefer and sprightlier, placards would have been seen outside EMI’s base in Hayes, and no doubt Lennon and McCartney would have led the way. It’s hard not to get the impression that New Order still didn’t understand what they’d achieved, though – at the time, they appeared baffled by the record’s success, and by 1988 they seemed to be suggesting it had become dated. “It’s become our Birdie Song,” they scoffed.

Critical opinions of the subsequent “Blue Monday ‘88” single seem to have become harsher in the present century than I remember them being at the time. For most listeners, there is only one “Blue Monday” – the original twelve inch single which came out in 1983, and any other remix or rewrite of it is either sacrilege or at best ‘interesting’. None have really endured.

Thanks to its appearance on one of New Order’s “Best Ofs”, though, this one has probably lasted the course better than most. What’s most striking about it on first play is the sheer urgency of it all. Quincy and John brandish scissors and where they hear repetition, they cut it down to single phrases. They also dial the speed up a couple of notches, throw in incongruous samples of “radar”(?) and “Get down!” - New Order had never, ever asked anyone to “get down” before, even ironically, nor referred to Marconi tracking devices – and create a natural-sounding four minute single almost effortlessly. The most impressive aspect is the final minute or so, which twitches with digital propulsion, adding in some wonderfully simple chopping guitar lines, creating the kind of ecstatic, rushed climax the single never had before (although whether it needed one might be a question purists would ask).

While it shouldn’t be the focus of our attention, the video was remarkable too; not exactly another “True Faith”, but a chaotic, hyperactive, semi-animated rush through the adventures of the well-trained dog Fay Ray, who is asked to balance herself on disordered piles of rickety backroom chairs while the group also stand about one-legged on planks of wood. What did this have to do with the price of tea in China? Ask the video director, but even if you can’t extract sense from it, it is visually striking and at least communicates the new, twittering rush of the remix very well.

I personally happen to play this version quite a lot. You could argue that the riddle “What would a polished American version of Blue Monday sound like?” didn’t actually need a reply, but the answer is fascinating. Not a second is wasted, to the extent that while the original twelve inch is a moody sprawl, the seven inch feels like four singles worth of ideas compressed into one easy-to-swallow pill. It pushes each wonderful phrase, rhythm and hiccup into your face until you’re dizzy, and finally in the end elated. Was this what “Blue Monday” was supposed to do? A good question, but the 1988 remix proved it could do it if pushed.

Quincy’s fiddlings also ensured the single reached its highest national chart peak yet, entering the top three for the first time. It remains the biggest selling British twelve inch single of all time, and also the biggest selling single never to reach the number one or number two position; its popularity would endure long after Blue Monday ‘88 completed its chart run, and it would continue to hover around the lower reaches of the indie charts as if it had no home to go to. New Order could think whatever they wanted about any version of it – the public weren’t going to let it go.

(*To note - no such conversation is likely to have occurred, nor was this remix ever referred to as such). 

New Entries Elsewhere In The Charts

Week One


8. The Cure - The Peel Sessions (Strange Fruit)

Peak position: 4


21. I, Ludicrous ‎– Quite Extraordinary (Kaleidoscope)

Peak position: 13

Debut entry for one of Mark E Smith’s favourite bands of the year. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I Ludicrous often sound like early Fall with a ring-bound notebook filled with stand-up comedy observations.

“Quite Extraordinary” takes the catchphrase and habits of the comically disorganised commentator David Coleman (a man who would cause everyone’s Dad to yell “When are they going to fire him?” at the television on Saturday afternoons) and puts them to a lo-fi indie marching beat. If some felt that I, Ludicrous were South London’s lesser, perkier version of Half Man Half Biscuit, they did offer a wider worldview and more fantastical situations, from the terrible brags of pub liars (“Preposterous Tales”) to appropriately ludicrous bullshit of their own, such as “Sunday Lunch With The Geldofs”, which even managed to get daytime airplay on Virgin Radio (perhaps thanks to Geldof’s early involvement with that station, the vain man).

23. ​ Diamanda Galás - Double-Barrel Prayer (Mute)

Peak position: 23


25. The Wild Flowers - Take Me for a Ride (Chapter 22)

Peak position: 25

28. Test Department - Natura Victus (Sub Rosa)

Peak position: 25
 
Test Department’s forbearance in an alternative scene rife with change is as admirable as it is baffling – while 1988 would see the old-school minimal industrialists tumbling out of the indie charts, they hung around; true innovators being afforded the respect they were due.

“Natura Victus” doesn’t have the impact of some of their earliest work, though; its reverberating, operatic howling mixing with train-track rhythms end up sounding like something out of a rejected British Rail advert. It may have been the age of the train, but this kind of primitive arts lab experiment sounded more like a moment that had passed a few years before.

29. The Jack Rubies - Foolish Boy (Lush)

Peak position: 29

If “Blue Monday” was making its first appearance on seven inch single, so too was “Foolish Boy”, which was originally given a twelve-inch only release in 1986.

Thanks to the new format and renewed push, it entered the NME Indie Top 30, and helped to establish The Jack Rubies as one of London’s keener, poppier indie draws of the year. They would shortly sign to the US independent label TVT, creating the slightly absurd situation of some of their subsequent work only being available on import in their home country. 

30. Stiff Little Fingers - No Sleep Til Belfast (Live) (Link)

Peak position: 30

Stiff Little Fingers were one of the few first-wave punk banks to keep on chugging right through the eighties as if nothing had really changed, but they were only traditionalists to a point – on hearing The Beastie Boys “No Sleep Til Brooklyn”, they appear to have been struck by an amusing idea, and this satirical version seems to have been the end result.

If a bunch of Northern Irish punks rapping like Def Jam’s hottest property seemed quite funny in 1988, it’s not a joke that’s aged especially well, and it’s probably best regarded as a novelty curiosity only. 

Week Two


14. Depeche Mode - Little 15 (Mute)

Peak position: 7

“Little 15” didn’t really arrive in 1988 so much as slip out. The original idea was that it would be released in Germany and France only, with an employee at Mute believing that it would be just the kind of slow, sleazy track those markets would lap up. It wasn’t, but they also rolled its release out to other nations besides, and it slowly made reluctant and barely advertised or promoted appearances elsewhere.

The end result is that an uneasy, warped, slowed-down carousel of a song about a woman having an affair with a fifteen year old boy just about charted in the lower reaches of the UK’s Top 75, where it was given the false impression of being an under-the-radar import. If “Behind The Wheel” was an odd single, this pushed the bizarre boat out further still, half-heartedly giving a moody album track some dim promotional light which was almost entirely absorbed by its starkness and blackness. Radio didn’t care for its Ebophiliac kitchen sink drama, and even on the group’s “Singles 86-98” compilation, it’s stuffed carelessly at the end as a bonus track. “This also happened, and we have no explanation for it,” they seem to be telling us.

This was also one of the few promotional videos of the era Anton Corbijn stood aside for, the group’s budget possibly not stretching to him in this instance. Instead, the designer Martyn Atkins was used to essentially do an impersonation of Anton Corbijn, which he manages with barely a slip – although it’s clearly not shot on Super 8 film, and the shots of Fletch laughing at a poorly fitting wristwatch are perhaps a goof too far. 

16. Swans - Love Will Tear Us Apart (Product Inc.)

Peak position: 3

Two versions of this song were doing the rounds at the time – a fairly straight, sombre alt-pop reading with M. Gira on gruff vocals, and a more minimal yearning acoustic version with dramatic vocals by Jarboe. The former is a faithful and cautious reading, the latter a deconstruction.

At the time I liked both versions, but in recent years I’ve gone cold on them; both are oddly clinical in their execution, like cathedral-bound prayers to Ian Curtis which would be likely to evoke hushed appreciation from the worst of the BBC 6Music DJs. The song was also near-perfect and clear in its intentions to begin with, and no amount of shining torches around its darker, more pained corners reveals anything fresh – whatever it set out to do originally, it succeeded, with all the measures and emphasis that were required. 

21. Napalm Death - The Peel Sessions (Strange Fruit)

Peak position: 21

22. The Fuzztones - Nine Months Later (Music Mania)

Peak position: 22

The Fuzztones were (and remain!) a New York garage revival act, by this point making headway in a scene which was undergoing yet another revival. When you consider the fact that The Inspiral Carpets were also just popping through the undergrowth with what sounded like psych-garage revival noises, and other such acts were generating serious IPC press, you have to wonder if some people were hedging their bets not on "Indie-Dance" but a full-blown fuzzed up R&B throwback sound.

That said, "Nine Months Later" has a fairly mean, almost Animals styled chorus and some neat spiralling guitar and organ work throughout, but is hardly the cream of the revival crop. It's a self-consciously swaggering single with a small dose of irony in its execution, and lead singer Rudi Protrudi pulls some very Rik-Mayall-as-Colin-Gregson pouts and poses in the video as if to remind us of the fact. Careful boy, those lips will lead to cradles on your doorstep.

23. Wolfhounds - Son Of Nothing (September)

Peak position: 23

While they were featured on the C86 compilation, Romford's The Wolfhounds were among the more abrasive acts on the cassette. "Son of Nothing" is evidence of that, containing one of the few examples of a furious sounding wah-wah pedal.

Heavily politicised and often somewhat marginalised as a result of their ferocity, The Wolfhounds work nonetheless retained an underground punk ethic whilst also containing interesting and mature songwriting. While their travelling companions thrashed and bashed their way through the issues of the day, The Wolfhounds surprised with their often dextrous way with a melody. This single howls the blues one minute, whispers in spite the next, then suddenly and unexpectedly soars. A good one.

24. M-D-Emm – Get Busy (It's Partytime!) (Republic)

Peak position: 16


29. Extreme Noise Terror – The Peel Sessions (Strange Fruit)​

Peak position: 20


Week Three

10. The Darling Buds - It's All Up To You (Native)

Peak position: 3

I always felt that this was probably The Darling Buds' strongest moment. Released prior to signing to a major label and becoming steadily smoothed over, "It's All Up To You" still has a hard, abrasive edge beneath Andrea's double-tracked choirgirl vocals. It also contains a killer rumbling bassline and a lovely Ramones styled guitar solo from Harley Farr, and ends up feeling as if Spector was somewhere in the studio with them, showing them the ropes.

This would be their final indie single, and while it was impossible not to wish the best for the band, the Epic years delivered little of the success the music press felt they were due. Later on in the nineties, I witnessed them in the corner of my local HMV waiting for people to turn up so they could sign copies of their latest single. I had two overpowering urges – one to buy it and save them from their Spinal Tap-esque embarrassment, the other to hold back my money for another record I’d entered the store with the actual intention of buying. The latter impulse won out, I’m sorry to say, and the checkout was far enough from them that I could slope towards it without guilt or shame.

By then, their direction had lost me. In 1988, however, “It’s All Up To You” sounded raw, sassy, clipped back and vivid sounding; hundreds of indie bands were trying to make records like this, but so few succeeded.

13. Cud - Under My Hat (Ediesta)

Peak position: 13
 
Debut entry for Cud, a Leeds group whose lead singer Carl Puttnam was nonetheless born in Ilford (something I, as a fellow Ilfordian, feel duty-bound to point out. We’re not exactly drowning in famous names).

Their debut 1987 single “Mind The Gap” appeared on the Wedding Present’s Reception label but didn’t bother the indie listings. “Under My Hat” sees the group not quite fully-formed, a choppy post-punk grumble dominating the proceedings which would eventually be replaced with an oily, funky swagger.

It’s threadbare and angular, and only Carl’s wannabe sex God vocals inject the junkyard rattle and roll with something unique.

17. Bob - Kirsty (Sombrero)

Peak position: 15

Debut entry for Peel favourites Bob, who eventually produced a couple of huge sounding singles which sounded like hits in any other sensible universe. “Kirsty” isn’t quite there yet, however, with its jolly pub rock boogie feeling slightly too hemmed in and under-produced to achieve its objectives.

 

21. The Flatmates – The Janice Long Session (Strange Fruit)​

Peak position: 16


25. Gaye Bykers On Acid – The Janice Long Session (Strange Fruit)

Peak position: 17


28. The Todd Terry Project - Bango (To the Batmobile) (Westside)

Peak position: 28

House Music meets daytime television repeats again – whatever would Half Man Half Biscuit say? - and “Bango” sees Batman acquainting himself with Art of Noise’s “Beatbox”, choppy rhythms and a minimalist dance ethic meeting with slowly creeping progressions. A bit of a dancefloor winner on the whole.





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Number One In The Official Charts

Wet Wet Wet/ Billy Bragg/ Cara Tivey - "With A Little Help From My Friends/ She's Leaving Home" (Phonogram)