Words: Max Falvey // Photos: Ian McDonnell
On his mammoth journeyman-like tour of taking the songs of Joy Division around the globe one last time, legendary bassist Peter Hook made a stop at Dublin’s 3Olympia last Friday night for Peter Hook & The Light’s ‘Joy Division: A Celebration’. For audiences new and old, this was a dazzling spectacle of the past, as some of the most iconic songs (and albums) in history were performed by a man who was there for their inception, and along with a little New Order thrown in on top, it made for one hell of a show.
Peter Hook and his band have no opening act for their tour, well you could say they do, but it’s themselves. The show began with the band performing a beautiful 6-song set of New Order material, beginning with the stunningly ethereal, lyric-less ‘Elegia’, with its surrealistic vibe setting the tone for the evening. Brilliant New Order tracks filled the warm up set, such as ‘The Him’ and ‘Regret’, along with the New Order side-project Monaco getting a run out, as the band performed ‘What Do You Want From Me?’. The all time classic, nostalgic tear jerker that is ‘True Faith’ ended the opening set, as the band closed one part of the past in preparation to go even further.
After a short intermission where beautiful ambient music floated throughout the venue, Peter Hook and his band returned to the stage to raucous applause, as if they hadn’t been out only 10 minutes beforehand. As the ovation died down, Hook valiantly shouted ‘Disorder!’ into the mic, and exploded into the bass riff of Unknown Pleasures’ opening track. What followed was the entire 1979 album played in full, with highlights being ‘She’s Lost Control’ and my personal favourite, ‘Shadowplay’. Once the closing riff of ‘I Remember Nothing’ fizzed out, the band once again briefly left the stage to prepare to fire off a whole new set – ‘Closer’ in its entirety was up next.
Throughout the show, Hook would constantly gesture to the crowd and flaunt his ever-changing basses all across the stage, but on the mic, aside from singing of course, he was relatively reserved. The band had little interaction with the crowd, aside from the occasional ‘thank you’, which only added to the mysticism and spectacle of them as a whole. ‘Isolation’ and ‘Twenty Four Hours’ were highlights of the Closer set, and as it ended with the beautiful ‘Decades’, the best was still yet to come. For the encore, the big four of ‘These Days’, ‘Ceremony’, ‘Transmission’, and the one everyone was waiting for, ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ ended the show in phenomenal fashion. One final thank you came from a now shirtless Peter Hook, and as crowd members fought over his sweaty t-shirt, he walked off stage as cool as ever. For a 29-song set within a two and a half hour show, it couldn’t have been more perfect. Thank you for reading.
New Order: Set List
Elegia
The Him
Dreams Never End
What Do You Want From Me?
Regret
True Faith
Joy Division: Set List
Disorder
Day of the Lords
Candidate
Insight
New Dawn Fades
She’s Lost Control
Shadowplay
Wilderness
Interzone
I Remember Nothing
Atrocity Exhibition
Isolation
Passover
Colony
A Means to an End
Heart And Soul
Twenty Four Hours
The Eternal
Decades
__________________________
These Days
Ceremony
Transmission
Love Will Tear Us Apart
