Tony Wilson, RIP.

source? FFS he was not old

Reunited with Factory nightclub opening act Bernard Manning in the afterlife.

weird to hear it here before bbc, nme or any of them

maybe New Order will reform...

All I found was this on wiki:
Anthony H. Wilson passed away on Friday 10th August 2007 at around 7pm. His children, partner and lifelong friend, Sean Boylan (Irish Football Coach) and his wife were with Tony when he passed away. May he rest in peace.

!! RIP if this is actually true

omg :(((

I heard he had cancer. RIP.

dammit i think of him and i can only see steve coogan

^this. RIP.

here, this should help us, LJ:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f5/So_It_Goes1.gif/400px-So_It_Goes1.gif

RIP, if true.

Up on the BBC:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/manchester/6941392.stm

Dang.

Afraid that it is true. Heard the news from a friend who knows some of the people involved with the forthcoming Joy Division biopic. He's been seriously ill for a number of weeks.

RI fucking P.

:(

fuck. very sad.

Oh, xpost with the BBC via Ned. Sorry to have been the bearer of such a sad scoop...

Aw, holy fuck. RIP.

Somehow appropriate that one of his final acts will be to 'print the legend' via the biopic.

RIP of course. Ultimately my view is he was a great fan but a bad businessman -- still, it understates to say: not a bad legacy to leave, not at all.

That was one of the problems, Ned. He didn't have much money and couldn't afford some of the treatment. People such as the Happy Mondays were rallying round and helping out financially.

fuck. rip.

Heart attack, apparently. I remember hearing that about the treatment that they couldn't provide him on the NHS.

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/s/1013/1013299_tony_wilsons_battle_is_over.html

RIP

oh shit. RIP.

This has upset me a great deal. A part of my youth has just disappeared. The smartarse off Granada Reports who looked like my brother who just happened to have a hand in some of the best records ever made. Good night, Tony. Martin and Rob are probably already making his (after)life hell.

RIP and respect

My spur-of-the-moment burbling.

A hero of mine.

Sad news. What a life, though.

sad.

they should give his death a fac number.

fucking hell. i've sort of been expecting this, but ... christ. fuck.

RIP, you fucking diamond.

way too upset to write more now.

Great piece from Jess on Idolator.

there's a lot more gritty swearing on this thread than most sleb death threads.

koogs OTM re Fac no.

I didn't realise how strapped the NHS was on these drugs. FFS, what an outrage.

Between this and Hazlewood I'm ready to phone the rest of the month in. Fuck fuck fuck

fac catalog # thirded. RIP.

:(((((

Fac ∞

zappi OTM.

i've raised a glass to him, and mrs fiendish and i have already had a bit of a laugh about our favourite wilson memories, etc. it's one of the few times this devout atheist wishes there was an afterlife -- just for the joy of imagining how gretton (and hannett) would greet him.

and because he'd be overjoyed to see ian curtis again, but that's just sentimental and silly.

he was the first person i ever interviewed properly -- on the phone in 1993 (or maybe early 1994). i'll cherish the memory of first time i met him in the flesh -- he was a friend of our then editor -- and then going along to his book-reading (24HPP) at borders and hijacking it totally :)

57. what a waste. still, as mrs F said: he'd have hated being an old man.

life goes on. the music, as he would no doubt have pointed out, goes on.

thanks, tony. you absolutely fucking rocked my world. thank you.

Damn, poor Tony. This just sucks.

RIP

RIP. nice pieces, ned & jess.

so sad. Just watching Newsnight - they've got Peter Saville, Paul Morley, Steven Morris and Richard Madely lined up to talk about him.

Gutted. Great piece Jess. RIP Tony.

Really wish I hadn't left my housemate's copy of Bummed in a club now. RIP.

No, no. Awful news. This has hit me as hard as Peel's death: the Scouser and the Manc each leaving a musical legacy that is unique, distinct, blah, blah. I'm too gutted to write more.

fuuuuuuuuck.

rip tony.

Fuck and fuck.

There's a bit in 24 hour party people when they're all in the car arguing about some crap and listening to Transmission (I think, I'm going to go and watch the extras in a bit and drink a large one for him...) and Coogan As Wilson says something like "this is a great great record". I don't know if this is what really happened but I know that that's what it was like for me listening to Peel and hearing that for the first time. And maybe it would have come about without Tony Wilson but maybe it wouldn't and even just for that he deserves our thanks. And he did so much more.

Awful, sad news. Nobody beats gravity.
RIP

What terrible news. Thanks for all of the many wonderful things that you did: RIP :(

Tony Wilson interviewed by the NME in 1986:

NME: There's a quote about being misconstrued: 'Irony is lost on pinheads'. I think Elvis Costello said it about The Clash, when all those, um, anti-violence songs caused the audiences to start slugging each other.

TW: The only way we can have peace in the world is by having lots more riots. There will be riots down the line before we get peace. A good old fashioned rock and roll riot is a movement towards truth; it's the forward motion of history.

NME: Even if the rioters aren't freedom fighters, but simply a bunch of assholes?

TW: Oh certainly. The urge to destroy is a creative urge. It's never static. You only get old when you decree 'all revolutions are over', when you say the dialectic is finished. That's why Russia is an old nation, because it has called a halt to change.

NME: What happens to pop when the rioting stops?

TW: I saw Malcolm McLaren last week in Los Angeles, and his theory at the moment is that it will never happen again. He's saying that there are now so many avenues open to music that there's just no chance. I said to him,'Just like fucking Lenin, right? There's a continuous dialectic going on until you've had your bit. As soon as you're in charge, that's the end; no more world revolutions'. Speaking of Malcolm, I'll have to tell you my How Malcolm McLaren Fucked Himself In The Ass Theory.

Speaking of Malcolm, I'll have to tell you my How Malcolm McLaren Fucked Himself In The Ass Theory.

HAHAHAHAHAHA

awesome quote, thanks.

RIP

):

What a loss. Wilson was a terrible businessman, but not to get too romantic, music has always been about more than pound signs or bottom lines. Wilson, as flawed as he was, and he was pretty flawed, just ask some of the bands he signed, always loved the music. He saw something in a half-formed group from Manchester that few others did and took a chance. He hired Hannett, a relative unknown, and let him produce them. The rest, as they say, is history. That's pretty good work for a guy, who as Gretton’s character in 24HPP affectionately called, “a c--t." I'm going to go play Atmosphere really loud now. Thanks Tony.

RIP you totally awesome bastard

Some random YouTube findings:

Tony meets Sonic Youth

Interviewed back in 1988 or so

'That Tony Wilson' from 2002

Tony, Richard Madeley and...Frank Sidebottom?

Tony introduces the Happy Mondays at Coachella

Tony interviewed backstage by Swedish Egil at Coachella

RIP Tony Wilson. You are one of my all time heroes.

Also:
Sonic Youth's disco comments are so hackneyed and rockist. I wonder if they would same the same thing today.

a good man, a great man

He really loved the music, didn't he? I'm a generation and an ocean apart from '80s Manchester, but that's the impression I get. I'll miss him most for that.

Fuck me, RIP. I don't need to tell you but I will: he was an amazing fellow.

What he did for music.

And what he did for his home city.

And, er, what he did on Granda Reports.

Also, he taught people like me the ability to crap on at random about a subject and call it situationism.

God bless.

"And what do you do?"
"How do you mean?"
"You know, your job?"
"Well, I'm Tony Wilson."

God almighty, that's sad. RIP

Yeah, I'm still shaken up. Tony was a wanker, and he was our wanker. And the thing that got him off the hook for all his bluster and condescension and bloodymindedness almost every... fucking... time...? He loved music. Just loved it. A lot of people will really miss his opinionated, enthusiastic presence in the world.

The Peter Saville/Tony hour-long design discussion on the 2 DVD edition of 24HPP is playing now.

Peter: "I got the yellow and black design from NCP Car Park."

*pause*

Tony: *utterly surprised/taken aback* "WHAT? You NEVER told me that!"

And yet of course you could tell he loved learning that as well.

Paul Morley remembers.

Roger Ames: Tony, you're fucking mad.
Tony Wilson: That's a point of view.

Haha. That Morley piece, btw, is the greatest minimalist obituary ever. Not a lot of words, but a lifetime of history, emotion, ranklement, etc.

Some more bits from that NME interview:

NME: Tom Wolfe used to say: why does America bother fighting at all? Why not just airlift in jeans and radios? The consumer revolution is quicker and easier. Look at Puerto Rico, and they weren't even at war. Or Canada.

TW: Canada is a small town.

NME: Full of New Order fans.

TW: Small countries are, you know, they always are. New Order have four gold albums, right. Three of them are from New Zealand, and the other one is from Ireland. You mustn't print that- no, print that, it deserves to be said.

ah fuck me. Rest in peace. I kinda hoped he would have lived thru the resurgence of post-punk again.

Lostandfound OTM re the Morley obit..

RIP AHW - one of last great music impresarios...

very sad. from the bbc:

Speaking before his death, Wilson reflected on life and death.

"I used to joke in my early 50s that I'd had such a fantastic life, I'd be happy to die," he said.

"And then suddenly, I find some other reasons for living and just like get excited again about life when it comes along. So that was slightly annoying. I think I was a lord of my own presumption for thinking I'd be happy to die".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/6941392.stm

lifelong friend, Sean Boylan (Irish Football Coach)

wtf, is this true or someone messing on wikipedia? Seán Boylan is a coach in Irish Gaelic football, he coached Meath for around 30 years and is also one of the most celebrated herbalists in Europe! Never knew he was mates with Tony Wilson tho.

This is really sad. RIP Tony, you totally fucking ruled.

Jeez-o. I woke up just before 6am today worrying about work, switched on the Radio and heard this in the headlines. And chastised myself for worrying about stupid stuff. My next thought was of Grimly, funnily enough, and then I had a wry smile to myself as I wondered how £3,500 per month compares with the Mondays' drug habit back in the day.

This is shit, isn't it?

Fac ∞

is a fucking brilliant idea.

RIP sir, i couldn't give a toss if you couldn't run a business for chips, the world needs more people like you.

57. what a waste.

so. 1994: wilson is my first proper interview.

2007: wilson is my first obit.

privileged to be doing this -- but enormously saddened, too.

i'll post a link to it once it's in (or, if it's hacked mercilessly by ... umm, my subs ... i'll stick the longer version on the electronic wilderness that laughingly claims to be my blog).

and madchen: i'm really touched by that. thank you.

also: i didn't say yesterday, but the first i heard of this was when i idly logged into facebook when i got home from work last night and saw ned's status update. which was actually quite a good way to find out. so thank you, ned, too.

Yer welcome. You, Spencer and Dr. C were the first folks I thought of as well.

Gutted - I didn't find out until the middle of the night. My dad just made a full recovery from the same cancer (but would have been in deep shit if discovered even a bit later) and at one stage he was also going to need Sutent, which you'll be pleased to know is $8000 per course in the US - and most insurers won't pay for it there. FUCK the MCR NHS for doing this to AHW after all he'd done for MCR.

About 10 years ago I wrote a piece about worshipping Manchester from afar, in a duffle coat etc, and was surprised (and completely disconcerted) to be phoned by him, because he really liked it. I'll miss him.

Well, this is a bit weird because I just told a friend last night about the fund Happy Mondays had set up to help pay for his pills.

But really it makes my stomach churn, this news. Goodbye, Tony. And thank you. Thank you so very much.

Good for you Grimly on the obit! I'm sure you'll do a fine job.

Also can anyone tell me what to do if you spill wine on your CD-R's? Can you just run them under the tap and still play fine?

V. sad about this, obviously. Tony Wilson was the centre of it all, wasn't he?

BBC Have Your Say, send us your tributes: someone took the trouble to log in and then managed to typed this:

Added: Saturday, 11 August, 2007, 09:20 GMT 10:20 UK

To be quite honest I can't say I've ever heard of him.

Ambriel

Yeah, cheers.

ah fuck me. Rest in peace. I kinda hoped he would have lived thru the resurgence of post-punk again.

-- kingfish, Saturday, 11 August 2007 09:04 (11 hours ago) Link

don't mean to be mean on the rip thread but, uh, he DID live through it.

anyway rip mr. wilson.

FACTORY RECORDS WILL NEVER DIE
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R.I.P. Released some great music obv.

great post, bimble.

oh god, RIP :(

They flew the Manchester Town Hall flag at half-mast. That seems very right.

terrible shame. RIP :(

he did what he did too well. the yasser arafat of manchester. he had to die for the manchester's music scene to move on.

He was turned down by the NHS, while patients being treated alongside him at The Christie Hospital and living just a few miles away in Cheshire are receiving funding for the therapy.
[...]
"I used to say some people make money and some make history - which is very funny until you find you can't afford to keep yourself alive.

"I've never paid for private healthcare because I'm a socialist. Now I find you can get tummy tucks and cosmetic surgery on the NHS but not the drugs I need to stay alive. It is a scandal."

He wasn't wrong.

It was nice to ba able to play loads of Manchester music at poptimism last night, as a sort of semi-tribute (although I'd mostly planned my playlist before I heard he'd died). The one which gave me wet eyes though was New Order's Here To Stay.

Damn I'm glad you reminded me of that one. I meant to pull out that CD single a few weeks back. I actually watched 24 Hour Party People again a few weeks ago, not having seen it since its release.

Also I figured out how to play the bass riff for Atmosphere last night with a friend who played his guitar along with me and he sang and we did the whole song and it was great.

Also my friend played me this interview Tony did with Kiss in 1976 on So It Goes or whatever it was and it was hilarious! Tony was just winding them up, basically, but they were so into their own rock stardom and egos and makeup that they didn't notice, and my friend thought that was funny even though he's a big Kiss fan.

Also: will the members of New Order now reconsider their differences and move themselves AWAY from court battles and record again?? Spare us the legal costs and drama please, lads!

i've raised a glass to him, and mrs fiendish and i have already had a bit of a laugh about our favourite wilson memories, etc. it's one of the few times this devout atheist wishes there was an afterlife -- just for the joy of imagining how gretton (and hannett) would greet him.

and because he'd be overjoyed to see ian curtis again, but that's just sentimental and silly.

Grimly, you're just plain dead on, here. Amen. Or "get in!" as you say sometimes. Haha. No seriously, this is about as OTM as it gets 'round these parts, in my humble opinion.

I was sad to hear this.

I poured one out in a lout-filled beer garden in Aston, but I think the gesture was wasted on the others present. I found it a bit frustrating.

Well you know, sometimes the people around us don't recognize when the most important figures in musical history die...John Peel is a good example of this. I've been there.

Doesn't anyone remember the greatness of the Wendys???

The NME had BETTER devote the entire issue to him!

(and if they do choose to call it FAC infinity, good on them!)

Of course, they'll call if "FAC forever" to keep the Doherty fans interested...

I'm going to call my boss tomorrow and tell him someone I knew died on Friday and I'm taking the day off but the only other day I'm taking off between now and the end of the year is the day after The Pogues play here, Oct. 18.

Also I recently got Half Man Half Biscuit on Old Grey Whistle Test "Prague Away Kit" and that. Good lord, I couldn't believe the singer's hair was like Jesus & Mary Chain's! :):)

i doubt conor mcnichols has even heard of him.

JOHN COOPER CLARKE RULES!

xpost

Yeah, but after the John Peel debacle, they're not going to be caught on the wrong foot again, surely?

Anyhow, also: Check the commentary audio on the 24HPP fillum DVD for an avuncular and informed (naturally) presence while you watch the film.

"I've never worn shirts with button down collars in my life!!"

I know, I know, it's all my fault. I still don't own that on DVD, though I've seen the extras you get with the Brit version. About the Closer sleeve and all.

the wilson commentary on that film is better than the film; or, it should have been released in cinemas with the commentary.

Some people don't know who he is, or that he died.

They'll find out now.

Haircut One Hundred were crap weren't they?

I've got video footage of Edwyn Collins doing Rip It Up & Start AGain with Orange Juice, it's actually very good. You can see where Momus got his hairstyle from.

Bimble, you need to pass out any minute now!

Yes, but did you know that Martin Hannett plays bass with John Cooper Clarke on the Old Grey Whistle Test vol. 3?

Longer Paul Morley obit http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2147112,00.html

strange coincidence but i see the Wheel Of Fortune creator Merv Griffin also passed away this weekend.

good: i'm glad morley's written a longer piece. i'll read it later (started my shift 57 minutes ago and haven't actually got very much done yet); i wasn't very taken with the shorter guardian one.

for what it's worth, here's my contribution, in the (glasgow) herald today. hope you lot like it, too.

(subbed, coincidentally, by none other than the mighty alba. thanks, dude.)

I like it a lot, grimly. thanks.

nice one grimly.

Indeed.

Do any tapes of "So It Goes" still exist? All I have ever seen is a few clips on Youtube. If they're still out there, Granada TV, LTM, someone/anyone, should put them out. Such an important cultural legacy shouldn't be left decaying on a dusty shelf.

Grimly, your piece sums up Wilson's legacy very well.

Apparently, all episodes are safe and well in Granada's vault.

Even longer Morley penned obit.

like art of noise mixes, none is the definitive version.

Wilson wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

probably would have liked a) it to happen a few decades later b) copy approval.

(maybe he'd spotted the missing open quote 8)

He was diagnosed with cancer of the kidney last year. "Everywhere I go in Manchester, it's You w***er!' That's how we are up here," he told the BBC. "Now they know I've got cancer, they're all being nice to me.")

hmm! it's there in the printed version. the internet's eaten it. how odd.

(thanks, as well, those who liked it.)

I live in the Hacienda apartments. Early yesterday morning someone threw a load of different coloured paint over the front of the building, I'm guessing as a Pollocky-type tribute to Wilson. There's a bunch of bouquets and posters and poems and single red roses all around the outside. We took some pictures of it and of the tributes.

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1048/1104605796_54bccae20d.jpg

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1422/1103675345_7f48550c1b.jpg

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1354/1104595314_49ebe70477.jpg

We filmed a bit of it too and literally 10 seconds after turning the camcorder off the heavens opened and a massive storm erupted, washing all the paint away. So thems probably the only pics you'll see of it looking like that.

Holy shit, are you kidding? Is that what it looks like now? Or is that somewhere else than the real Hacienda building?

That's a great story, NI -- wow. There, gone again. He probably would have liked it.

he would have fucking loved it, i'm sure. thank you, NI.

(also, woah, you live in the hacienda, etc.)

It kinda reminds you of the sleeve of Bummed doesn't it?

i doubt conor mcnichols has even heard of him.

To be fair, he wasn't born when 24hpp came out.

very sad. RIP.

I'm a latecomer to really understanding Tony Wilson's influence due to my relative youth, etc. and it's only in the past year or so after reading some interviews that I've started to see him as a person and not some larger than life character from 24hpp.

When I found out that not only had some friends seen the Happy Mondays at Coachella (and not really known what to make of it) but had seen Tony Wilson introduce them I was kind of at a loss of how to explain his importance. I really have less than a decade of listening to Factory releases with direct interest, how do I convey that to someone else?

but had seen Tony Wilson introduce them

as an aside: have you all stopped for a second to consider the irony that it's wilson who's in the fucking wooden box, not shaun ryder?

i bet he outlives the lot of them :)

Nah man, it'll be Bez who outlives them all.

Nobody has mentioned him being the first guy to put the Sex Pistols on the telly, so i will. RIP AHW.

Nah man, it'll be Bez who outlives them all

hah, i can see bez and ryder in the nursing home now. "fuckin' 'ell, X, man, i've had sixteen beta-blockers and a triple bypass this mornin' and i'm fuckin' feelin' nowt, man."

"that's 'cos yer brain's died, bez."

"mental!"

In the adjacent cot, MES with a plastic bag full of lyric scraps on his chest.

Or is that somewhere else than the real Hacienda building?

They knocked down the Hacienda to build the flats, didn't they? Whitworth Street looks a lot cleaner than when I was last there, in 1996 (leaving the Hacienda in the small hours of a Wednesday morning, I believe).

i thought part of the facade had been incorporated into the new thing? wishful thinking, i guess.

Everything you've written here and there has been a joy to read, Grimly.

OMG nursing home HA.

Doesn't look like it from the photo, though I can't really remember what the outside looked like it. My eyes were usually on the pavement (due to rain) or on the kebab shop along the road (due to bouze).

(x-p)

/imagesnohotlink.jpg :-(

suzy, thank you. that means a lot.

i'm surprised, in some ways, how well i've managed my emotions. it sounds daft -- i only met the dude once and spoke to him on the phone no more than two or three times, and i very much doubt he'd have remembered me without vigorous mental prodding -- but i'm not exaggerating when i say that he had an enormous, profound effect on my life, and i was absolutely fucking devastated when i saw ned's note on friday. devastated.

when i was 17, and working for the DSS (yes, "working for" ... i know, ever the contrarian) during the summer after leaving school in blackpool, a slightly older bloke in the office said -- less unkindly than he might, i should add -- something along the lines of: "i've worked out who you remind me of. it's that cunt tony wilson. you talk the same shit and do all that daft stuff with your hands."

and i was absolutely fucking delighted ;)

right now, i can't really think of anyone else i don't actually know who's shaped me quite as much. i guess he made me realise -- i think there's a wilsonism about this somewhere, and i should probably have worked it into the obit -- that being pretentious, even a pretentious twat, isn't necessarily a bad thing.

sometimes.

certainly, "factory cool", for want of a better phrase, was a very welcoming cultural umbrella for me and a few friends; a way of expressing ... i dunno, of taking the quotidian basics of north-western-english life (red bricks, drugs, uncommonly good music) and saying, look, this stuff actually matters. it might just be a record, or a club, or a night out, but in its own way it is art and it is as culturally valid as anything else you, or anyone else, might have to offer. so fuck off.

it's all the little things. it's not like i've spent my life modelling myself on tony wilson. (no, really.) and, obviously, in these few days after his death i'm going to find significance and resonance and "meaning" where perhaps it doesn't really exist. but what i said in the obit is absolutely true: without wilson, and without factory, i wouldn't have embraced anything -- music, art, journalism, the simple notion of going out and having fun -- nearly as hard.

some of it i might have missed altogether.

ach. enough. i have work to do. i am delighted, however, that so many people here care(d) so deeply; that, around the world, people miss the bastard deeply.

Sir, your words really say it all. And we all thank you. :-)

genius wilson quote -

"in the north west it rains and it rains and it rains and yet we managed to produce the industrial revolution, the trade union movement, the communist manifesto and even the goddam computer and down south where the sun never sets, you took all our money and what did you produce? chas and fucking dave."

so, tony wilson, keith allen, derrick may and marshall jefferson are sat in a room -

http://dewit.ca/archs/JD/New_York_Story.html

can ysi an episode of 'so it goes' from '76 if anyone wants it.

rip

Brilliant thread, this.

And it is gratifying to see his life appreciated by people from all over. I'm a Vancouverite through and through nowadays, but at heart I'm still a Manc, and Wilson (to me) personified that weird mix of self-regarding and self-deprecating shyness/swagger so typical of the good people of Grtr M/cr.

http://blog.fawny.org/2007/08/12/fac461/
'The foundation of graphic design at Factory Records had two parts: Tony Wilson’s belief that quality should almost never be compromised and the simple rigour of numbering everything. The original poster for the first “Factory club” show was FAC 1; the first record was FAC 2. And not the other way around, because the poster came first.'

Unfortunately most of my knowledge about Tony Wilson comes from 24 Hour Party People, which served as a great influence amidst my teenage hood, which, due to my relative lack of years, cemented my love for Joy Division, The Mondays and a brief infatuation rave era music. I feel at loss, because my knowledge of his life outside of 24HPP is rather limited (I will watch it with the TW commentary soon though) and almost all of that knowledge was about what an asshole he was, or how much people disliked him, heh. Nevertheless, I am furthermore at loss because in reflecting on his life I'm yet to really articulate in my mind the impact and grandeur accomplishments he held, I mean, look at the Factory back catalogue, the impact of the Hacienda, Madchester; he's carrying behind a legacy, to have such a wide reaching impact in such short time is inspiring, and so much of it just comes all back to him. RIP.

it was always northern irony/distance. No one actually hated TW. Well, some must have, but not the ones saying that.

Guess that sort of 'appreciation' doesn't cross waters.

As with the Peel tribute thread, this is also moving and full of some great stories, thanks all of you. I was very sad to hear about his cancer, and saddened further to hear of his passing.

I wonder if he's up there seeing god, and finding he looks like Tony Wilson? :D

I didn't think I was going to cry.

here is 15 minutes of a 1976 episode of tony's 'so it goes' featuring jerry lee lewis, clive james, peter cook and the first ever tv appearance by the sex pistols.

Newsnight story with Morley, Saville, and Morris

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rlFwScEjUk

Q: "Do you have any regrets?"

TW: "Yes. I never went to Barbados with the Mondays. It sounds like it was excellent."

Factually incorrect obitpile of wank from the Telegraph

RIP Tony. Every crane in Manchester wouldn't be there without you. Hell, you even got Man City a new stadium, in a roundabout way.

jesus. that is a really bad piece of writing, by someone who doesn't actually get what wilson, factory or the past 30 years were about at all.

that said, i do love the way the "signed in blood" thing is going to pass into history as fact :)

xpost to the factually incorrect..

Well, so much has been oft repeated, it's no wonder it's now taken as fact. Apart from the 'signed bands contracts in blood on napkins' like he has a special fountain pen for that reason, it's not that bad (although smacks of 'cribbed from everyone e;se's articles')

The "Blue Monday" losing 2p for every copy.. No, they changed the design of the sleeve for subsequent pressings. There's loads without the different inner sleeve colour and the cut-out hole.

and so on.. NME has a 2 page tribute 'put together at the last minute', I guess Mojo and Uncut will have bigger ones.

Well, so much has been oft repeated, it's no wonder it's now taken as fact

yeees ... and that was the point i made at the very start of mine, ie "some of this might not be 100% fact". even his degree result ... wikipedia says a third, 24HPP (which is hardly a statement of record) a 2.2. i went with the latter because it allowed me to use the "end of time" quote.

but i think the point about that telegraph obit is it just feels like it's missed the point: that it doesn't understand the whole blurring of man and myth, of businessman and bollocks.

i'm reading the rest morley's stuff now; first chance i've had.

what's struck me is the fact that two or three phrases -- eg the twinkle in eye stuff -- are exactly how i wrote it, too. okay, it's not much of a coincidence. but still. i'm a) proud and b) bothered that people will think i've ripped it off. i promise that the only morley thing i'd read before i wrote mine was the smaller of the two guardian pieces ;)

coo ur gosh, etc.

("mixing fact and fiction to produce the truth of history", morley calls it. this is dead on. this observer piece is also truly, truly fantastic.)

(although smacks of 'cribbed from everyone e;seGrimly's articles')

fixed.

I've hard Wilson complaining about his 2.2 elsewhere - I'm fairly sure I read it the summer I got my 2.2... Something along the lines of "a third at least suggests you were out partying for the duration or had better things to do than go to the lectures; a first says that you're brilliant, a 2.1 that you're brilliant but a bit lazy. A 2.2 is nothing."

A splendid and handy compilation of AHW YouTube clips here:

http://www.thetripwire.com/news/2007/8/13/video-all-things-tony-wilson

xpost I'm sure that's in his book at the end, about how he's getting his kids through uni.

basically you want a first or a third -- the rest is bullshit.

desmond.

Great to see that Newsnight clip at last, though I had the unalloyed pleasure of the Pinefox doing all the Morley bits word- and rhotacism-perfect in Highgate on Saturday.

[thoroughly enjoyable use of the word rhotacism, Michael]

marcello, brilliant as ever; http://cookham.blogspot.com/2007/08/liberation-doesnt-have-to-hurt-tony.html

I'd refer him to my comment re Blue Monday losing money above, if he were here, but hey.

and he'd probably tell you not to fucking try it.

happy days.

that's a fantastic piece by marcello. i've just skimmed it there; i shall read it properly anon. thank you for the link, acrobat.

i miss marcello round these parts. hey ho.

I don't.

LOL at him seeing the Sex Pistols on So It Goes while on a "childhood holiday" in the Granada broadcast region. Prepostrous Tales in the life of Marcello Carlin.

4 MARCELLO

http://img239.imageshack.us/img239/5162/eazy2ll7.jpg

Apparently the coffin was labeled FAC 501 - the last FAC number

So right.

And I love details like these:

Hooky pointed out that the invite-only memorial was "pretty boring" compared to Rob's free-for-all. Others bemoaned the use of 'Atmosphere' when Wilson had wanted 'Ceremony'.

Ha! Good lord, that's a good quote.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/essentialmix/

"In celebration of the late great Tony Wilson, Pete Tong and Mike Pickering present a special essential mix of Factory Records and Hacienda classics."

listenagain-able for the rest of the week

I keep clicking back here hoping for news on BBC4's comprehensive tribute.

Or something similar.

so who enjoyed the Factory documentary?

BBC Four, Friday 21st September 2007
http://www.bbc.co.uk/musictv/factory/

Oh tell us afterwards! Thanks a bunch!

Right: IT'S BEING REPEATED AT 02:20 UK TIME!!!!

re: Oh tell us afterwards! Thanks a bunch!

hang on ! I plugged it on my blog earlier this week !

blogs are nice, but they are not "this thread"

No worries anyway, there's hardly anyone here at the moment.

Sigh, I know I will lose with the goddamn time zone differences once again.

I can't bear to read all that right now. Can't I just see the documentary like so many others? So much to ask. Oh well, if anyone has a link directly to the damn thing, let me know. :)

Stephen Morris: the surprise star of the show! Esp the Rob Gretton impressions.

Shaun Ryder's 'London record label wanker poshboy' voice a close second.

OTM re: Stephen Morris and Shaun Ryder.

I thought the voice-over narration was a bit weak, though; I know they felt they needed a Manc to do it, but couldn't they have got someone who doesn't sound so, I dunno, cheery?

Thirded re. Stephen and Shaun! Shaun's hat-over-ears look was, um, yeah. Poor Tony's voice sounded awful weedy for a loudmouth. The whole programme made me *extremely* homesick for Manchester.

It also reminded me of those bloody posts around the dancefloo in the Hacienda, which were exactly at groin height.

Tony was overdoing the swearing a bit. In contrast, I think Stephen Morris said "bloody" once then look dead embarrassed about it. The New Order lads were all "top" and "sorted". Shaun Ryder's poshboy voice was ace. Also Paul Ryder's story about Shaun stealing chairs from Eddy Grant's studio to give the local crackheads something to sit on.

good to hear from tony that the happy mondays invented acid house.

You expect the truth from Tony Wilson!??!?!

I liked it when Vini Reilly called Hooky a cheeky bugger too.

good point tom.

vini looks like a middle aged lady.

What was John Robb doing on it? He's from Blackpool, isn't he? Why is John Robb on anything tho? I've never seen a more ill-at-ease person on telly ever... 'cept maybe John Tindall, the old NF/BNP guy

He also uttered the phrase "spokesperson for his generation".

Why is John Robb on anything tho alive?

What's John Robb doing on anything?

I watched it from 30 mins onwards. The bit I liked most ws when Ryder ws describing the battle of the bands event they had. The Mondays came last but Wilson announced that they came first.

"Who gives a fuck what they think?"

xp

haha I only read it from Tom's first question.

I missed this show but I need to see it over the weekend. Did they have Shaun and Paul in the same studio? I've been watching Youtube clips of pre-Pills'n'Thrills Mondays this morning and they're still completely thrilling and kinda sad to see them so young and (relatively) un-fucked-up.

No, they were almost all individual interviews.

No one ws in the same room, I think. That goes for any members of the Mondays as for members of New Order. (xp)

Another good one ws when Mike Pickering guy ws describing the end of the Hacienda as the all the helicopters flew over and just at that moment you heard the sound of a plane as he ws talking.

Shaun was fairly lucid and un-fucked-up in this.

Bernard Sumner slowly transmorgifying into Rowley Birkin w/ his drinker's red cheeks and nose.

Paul Ryder going on about how he liked going to a virtually dead Hacienda as a way of getting away from the crowds and "Balloon-heads".

cocks: i missed this. fuck. been overdosing a bit on factory stuff recently, mind -- the barney book and then re-watching 24HPP twice (second time with the wilson commentary) so ... heh, maybe just as well.

that said, i'm searching for a trrnt of it now ... if anyone knows of one and can link me up, that'd be great.

Just checked my DVD recorder..

Now, what I have to do is to programme my TV to come on at 02:20 am, off at 03:50 and get the recorder to do likewise.

Funnily enough, it worked!

Will watch it tonight.

fucking thing doesn't appear to be out there anywhere :(

ah, good ... two more repeats, both on BBC4 (again):

monday 24th 9pm
wednesday 25th 1.30am

hurrah.

also: madchen, i'm thinking about hoying back to MCR/the north-west for a weekend of japery at some point (including a visit to club clique). we should organise this PROPERLY. a convoy, or something.

Beware of repeats early in the morning on BBC4 - unless you like watching someone signing - and of course you may be deaf so fair-dos.

Agree to everything so far written. I was feeling pretty depressed when I sat down to it and thought this isn't going to do me any good at all - Curtis, Gretton, Hannett, Wilson all gone. Tony's condition reminding me of my dad in his last few days but it actually had the opposite effect (rather as watching 24hpp does) - it was great to see Wilson still being "Tony Wilson" and I could have watched Steve Morris all night.

And despite his dyed hair Vini Reilly actually looked better than when I last saw him when he looked very down on his luck sitting in a coffee shop. I nearly gave him some money.

Beware of repeats early in the morning on BBC4 - unless you like watching someone signing - and of course you may be deaf so fair-dos.

pardon? sorry, son, you'll have to speak up.

©1993 shit internet jokes inc

Mine seems OK

Just watched this - absolutely great. Quite sad to see Tony Wilson obviously on the way out.

Shaun Ryder's 'London record label wanker poshboy' voice - fantastic!

What was John Robb doing on it?...I've never seen a more ill-at-ease person on telly ever - never mind ill at ease, he just looks like a twat. That's got to be the worst haircut ever. I saw him at some service station near Bristol last month: there was this brief moment when we made eye-contact and I recognised him but couldn't remember who he was or why I knew him and I nearly said 'hello', but didn't. That's a great story that needs a bit of work on it.

John Robb "yeah, it was the pivotal moment in UK music history for us! (ok, I wasn't actually there but anyway..)

Tony came across like he'd been told yesterday he didn't have long.

Only thing wrong was that it could have been another hour long, and covered more bands (even if as footnotes).

Oh, I did see that Joy Division's "Love will tear us apart" has been reissued in "facsimile" 7" and "not the same" CD single, "For AHW" marked on the 7" a-side label.

so looking fwd to this.

except john robb. what is it with that guy? he has a book called, seriously, 'the nineties: what the fuck was all that about?'

i thought the docu was quite poor/half-arsed esp. the script narrated by Simm and didn't really tell you anything you wouldn't already have known from soaking up all the 24HPP hype and if u weren't 'there' at the time. no new insight really - don't suppose there could be any but i'm no expert meself

curious as to why Alan Erasmus remains such an elusive figure tho - not much info about him online even now from what i can tell

Oh, and that old "Blue Monday 12" single lost money on every copy:

IT IS NOT TRUE!!

They even showed a copy where the inner sleeve was black.

FYI: Black outer with diecuts and a silver inner = lost money copy.

Others had Black inner sleeve and/or no diecuts.

I sold my original on ebay, it fetched £40 folks!

Why are the scripts on pop docs always quite so dumb? It wasn't the case on eg the Folk Britannia series. There's this continuing sense in presenting any social/historical context that they're talking down for kids - "the 70s: it was shite! There were no trains, no planes, and they couldn't even bury dead people! Thank heavens for Tony Wilson we can all now live in steel and chrome city centre loft apartments!" Even Robb came over better than the voice over.

Also, apparently there were no women in Manchester in the 1980s! No wonder they were all so glum.

Thought Vini was looking well.

Why are the scripts on pop docs always quite so dumb? It wasn't the case on eg the Folk Britannia series.

my guess is they know and accept that only a tiny minority audience will listen to something about UK folk and there isn't much you can do with that. (also -- i don't know, but maybe you are less up on folk than on this topic?) but if there's a hint that a nonspecialist viewer might be drawn into the programme, they have to make it dumb.

same with the recent 'summer of british film'. and also imo those seven ages of rock docs.

I suppose there is a sense when BBC4 produce a doc like this that they see it as a potential crossover hit, and a way of opening up the channel to people who wouldn't normally watch. But it seems self-defeating to pitch it at such a basic level, much lower than some of their other shows. The FB series presumed you might want to know about the contexts of the folk revivals of the 50s and 60s, and it did this in a more interesting and thoughtful way than this Factory show, which was often simply "70/80s Britain: LOL" (Thatcher holding a creme egg!). It was more interested in wheeling out all the old Gloomchester/Madchester cliches and gossip than attempting any novel investigations. Even Ross's Steve Dikto doc felt like a more intrigued piece of programming!

Also, apparently there were no women in Manchester in the 1980s!

Perhaps surprisingly, Hook makes the point in one of the extras on 24hrpp, that they seem to ignore the women who worked for Factory. Even Gillian barely gets a mention (let alone Gonnie from Quango Quango.

Also, check out the extras on the website - some interesting unused Tony Wilson footage.

"We thought it was very clever to buy a half share in a pressing plant to protect the quality of our pressings - fucking stupid..."

gonnie from QQ gets quite a good showing in the barney sumner book (qv new order/sirens call thread on ILM) but she does have a tendency to talk a lot of pseudo-sociological shit about dance music :/

Oh, and that old "Blue Monday 12" single lost money on every copy:

IT IS NOT TRUE!!

i know! i've always known! hasn't everyone? that's the whole point: factory might have made a lot of mistakes, but EVEN THEY realised rather quickly that, y'know, a quick redesign job might save them a lot of fucking cash. HOWEVER: wilson was obviously happy to let it run, and between the truth and the legend etc :)

that was what i tried to get across in my obit: that these were stories that you could, if you so desired, choose to believe -- although you might want to think about why you were doing that. and when wilson was around, at least there was a sense that he was the ultimate keeper of the truth; that, with a nod and a wink, he knew. as soon as the fucker dies, however, all these crazy stories suddenly become enshrined in obits and features and so on as absolute fact ...

... which, i guess, is the way he'd have wanted it, isn't it? so maybe not such a bad thing after all.

curious as to why Alan Erasmus remains such an elusive figure tho - not much info about him online even now from what i can tell

OTMFM. I was just commenting about this after watching 24PP with a friend. It's really weird isn't it? The Hannett book mentions him a little bit, though. Says he just quietly went about getting things done, was usually the one to give rides when people needed them, etc.

Yeah, and when he goes (many years from now, etc.), there'll be a footnote for him I guess.

Still, IWANTMORETRIBUTES!!

OK, I just want to see more of thiss tuff, but hey!

(Bimb! Hav found WDE CD too!)

I could have watched Steve Morris all night

Haha, he's great, in't he?

also: madchen, i'm thinking about hoying back to MCR/the north-west for a weekend of japery at some point (including a visit to club clique). we should organise this PROPERLY. a convoy, or something.

This is an insane idea. And it might just work.

nice one! easy!

as mr ryder would have put it, nasally.

bangin

Mark G, thanks so very much for sharing this with me. I am indeed forever in your debt. One of my favourite bits so far is the shot of all those Factory cassette releases! I only ever had ACR's "Graveyard & Ballroom" and Durutti's "Another Setting" on cassette and I had no idea there was a whole gorgeous colour scheme of other cassette releases in the same vein as the design of those...I had to rewind a couple of times to make sure I read them all...Unknown Pleasures, Graveyard & Ballroom, Quando Quango, Happy Mondays first album (!! what was *that* doing on cassette???) Section 25's From the Hip and the most amazing thing was it was a whole colour scheme, no colour was chosen twice, you can even see the subtle difference between the blue of the Quando Quango sleeve and the blue of the ACR one. Fucking amazing. A Saville triumph, to be sure.

And Martin Hannett actually TALKING ON CAMERA will live with me to the day I die. Gosh, I was just amazed at the photos too of him here that I've never seen before. Thanks again, shoutout to Grout, etc.

I also very much like the coverage of the Hacienda...it brought it all back for me in a way 24HPP didn't quite do. I started having Deja Vu and stuff, remembering some of my own experiences of the Hac that I'd forgotten.

I agree Stephen Morris is great in this.

I haven't a clue who John Robb is, but his hairstyle is dire.

Also was amazed to see the actual, original Factory Sampler record sleeve. You know the one I mean. That was fucking amazing. Especially the back, that wavy line and the quote above Joy Division. I never even owned that record ever, and passed up on buying it later when it was expensive too. To see the design, the actual article, was top.

I may have more to say later, I had to stop it in the middle of the Happy Mondays bit as I quite simply felt overwhelmed.

Also that bit where Larry from Sec 25 is so young and talking to Wilson wigs me out.

i still haven't had a chance to watch this yet; bimble, i'm glad you have! it's sitting happily on my tivo thingy waiting for me to have SPARE TIME.

Aww, that's sweet, dude. Sweet.

Another big deal to me was to see footage of Vini circa first Durutti Column album with Martin in studio. Good lord. Vini was so young!

And yes he calls Hooky a "cheeky bastard" that was good, too.

this documentary sounds right up my alley.. does anyone know if a dvd issue is planned?

It would make a good bonus feature on the Control DVD

I haven't a clue who John Robb is, but his hairstyle is dire.

He was a music journalist for Melody Maker (or maybe Sounds or NME) circa 1990.

John Robb was in a post-punk band in the 1980s

The Membranes
http://www.myspace.com/themembranesuk

he was also in ... eh ... gold blade, were they called? he said they were the future of music. everyone else said: "who's the dick with the hair?"

er. is also in …

Goldblade are still going? Mein Gott.

£15 to see them at the Liquid Rooms in November.

Haha! Oh okay Membranes, yeah I know them. Never took a liking to them, though. I fear this Goldblade, but of course I'll have to listen to it out of sheer curiosity, which is likely to kill my cat, methinks.

Also I just want to add...and this never before came to my attention for some reason...isn't it a PAPER CLIP in Johnny Rotten's ear on So It Goes? Tell me I'm wrong if you will but I thought that was brilliant. I've got The Filth & the Fury and all, but I never noticed anything in his ear like that before.

Wow, I had no idea he'd died until I saw this thread today! I guess I've been kind of busy...

john robb = dreadful talking head, worse writer, even worser musician. and an awful human being by all accounts.

The Membranes were good tho...

John Robb wrote for Sounds, mostly about noisy US indie stuff, but he also covered the Northwest music scene too. I was living in Manchester in the late 80s and he was one of those blokes that you saw at virtually every single gig you went to (but maybe I just always noticed him cos he did tend to stand out from the crowd). Anyhow, you'd say hello to him and he always seemed like a decent bloke, dunno what all the hostility is about here.

'Cos he's crap and shouldn't be on television? The Membranes were a pretty good band however. So doff of the cap to him there.

john robb used to be a guest on mary anne hobbs show years ago, and he would laugh after every comment he made, whether it was funny or not.

he's more than crap, the guy is a moron and shouldn't be a spokesman for the northwest. we lose morley and this cunt replaces him, is there no justice in the world ;_;

Another reason JRobb might have been on this show of course was that terrible programme, he, Tony Wilson and Terry Christian did which consisted of them sitting around bitching about "that London" like a trio of embittered old hasbeens (what do I mean like?!??!)

I stumbled upon XFM Manchester's tribute podcasts presented by Clint Boon with excerpts from AHW's Sunday afternoon programme and tributes from various Manc luminaries. It's actually pretty touching in places, especially Hooky's segment. It should be fairly easy to find on itunes.

the idea of gold blade still existing is fucking with my head.

lol, gold blade played at some alerna-club night in liverpool a couple of years ago and a crowd of about 150 people dwindled to about ten as most people drifted off to the bar after the first two songs.

o god clint boon too, it's almost unfair to dredge this thread into the mire by mentioning these fuckwits

what's wrong with booney? he's a top keys player

Enough about John Robb and Clint Booney.

Indeed. Back to Tony!

if you lived in manchester you'd know. cunt boon bills himself as 'man of the ppl' but truth is no one gave a flying fuck about the carpets, let alone him. he's done a john robb in that he's not very good but has somehow managed a virulent and damaging backwards-looking career that is slowly killing manchester. boon must wake up each and every day and thank the lord for lazy journalists.

someone recently said, going to clint boon's clubnight is the equivalent of someone at the height of acid house saying "hey, the drummer from mott the hoople has a clubnight round the corner, lets go there!"

"hey, the drummer from mott the hoople has a clubnight round the corner, lets go there!"

Sounds good to me! Clubbin' With Buffin!

or "Hey, we got an ex-Bassplayer of Sad Cafe to produce!"

perspectives.

yeah, but the kids now love old crap don't they? loads of people probably would go to a club run by the drummer from mott the hoople, if he played "eclectic freakbeat classics" or something.

I would. Freakbeat's great!

most dj's were in a shit indie band at some point weren't they?

exactly.

xxxxpost. pls put more research into 'the kids now'. (btw hoople man would be playing aor only in this mythical late 80s club)

xxpost. uh no and that's missing the point anyway. boon's carpets past runs through everything he does like mud through a worm

the kids now use all kinds of hip slang like "totally tubular" and "gnarly". their fave bands are london boys and big fun.

most dj's were in a shit indie band at some point weren't they?

Oh, c'mon Hook's band was pretty good.

(trying desperately to get thread back to Tony Wilson somehow)

early post-punk factory? love it

later baggy phase? not so great

thanks for that.

[ring ring]

"no ... no, mr morley, i don't think you need worry too much about max r."

lol

i jest. but really: have you heard "my rising star" by northside? the glorious factory arc might begin to make a little more sense ... i know northside had more moments of grating than greatness but really, that song ...

"palatine" really is essential listening, too: it's not too hard to find if you know where to look :)

sorry, i even hate the roses, so all that stuff is a turn-off really. except perhaps the vince clarke mix of "wrote for luck", that's cool.

the oakenfold/osbourne one (it was them, wasn't it?) is better.

tchah, though. kids these days. etc. seriously: check out "palatine" anyway.

the "face the future" mix? not really into, that it sounds dashed off. vince clarke's is like him having a go at acid house and not doing such a bad job of it at all.

Original WFL : juggernaut
VC mix : compact, pulsing
Oakenfold : sprawling, stretched

All good.

Palatine - lovely, but should have had 'Smiling Monarchs' on it, and 'Presence' and a Swamp Children track.

grimly OTM about 'My Rising Star'

All good

all godlike, actually. but i'm a sucker for the propulsive bassline that kicks off the oakenfold one.

"palatine" doesn't have any crispy ambulance, either, does it? that's totally wrong. i listened to "the plateau phase" again the other week -- while raking up leaves very early in the morning -- and it sounds better, fresher and more intriguing than ever.

[as an aside: if anyone can tell me what time signature "the presence" is in, i'd be eternally grateful.]

oh, hang on. dur. you said presence, and i missed it. (at least, i assume that's what you mean.)

yes, that's what I mean. It's their best, I reckon. Plateau is pretty strange - I dunno what I think really, 'I'm glad it exists' probably sums it up.

Just had a listen to The Presence - 7/4 works for me - try counting along with drum machine/hi-hat/bass bit from about 0.30 and then keep going when the guitar and snare comes in.

Watching The Hydroplanes!

have you heard the longer demo version of hydroplanes, from the tunnelvision LTM CD? it is absolutely blinding: way more atmospheric than the (hannett?) production on FAC 39 (i'm guessing, but i think that's right).

hmm: given that the re-formed SXXV have bloke-from-tunnelvision on guitar, i wonder if there's any chance of them doing a cover? hmmm. hmmm!

try counting along with drum machine/hi-hat/bass bit from about 0.30 and then keep going when the guitar and snare comes in

heh, i have -- a couple of times -- and i end up getting confused somewhere. 7/4 sounds plausible. thank you!

Yes, I have heard it - very good IIRC, but I don't have the LTM CD myself. FAC39 was Hannett, wasn't it? Now you've got me wondering...

back o/t, did anyone see the photos of peter saville crying at the funeral? thought that was quite touching.

i didn't, but <suzy> my pal was out with saville's wife/partner in berlin </suzy> a week or so later and she was bemoaning the fact it became a bit of a media circus, and that his friends weren't necessarily given space to grieve. of course, that's probably true of every "celebrity" funeral -- and each individual deals with grief in their own way.

i mean, i was devastated and i didn't know the guy at all: met him once, spoke to him on the phone a couple of times. it's easy to forget that dudes like hooky, saville etc -- almost all the factory lot, plus many others -- would have forged genuine, deep, lengthy friendships with him; that, for them, he existed on a level the rest of us would never know, regardless of the aesthete-everyman image he put across.

i was listening to "interleukin 2" from the new durutti column album the other day, which is subtitled "for anthony", and became slightly choked up.

The new Durutti Column is really growing on me.

I only have one question. Where's Alan Erasmus? He was a key member of Factory, but never appears in programs and never does interviews. It's odd that he's so completely disappeared from public life. Is there some background story I've missed? Does anyone here know?

curious as to why Alan Erasmus remains such an elusive figure tho - not much info about him online even now from what i can tell

-- blueski, Monday, 24 September 2007 12:55 (1 week ago) Link

OTMFM. I was just commenting about this after watching 24PP with a friend. It's really weird isn't it? The Hannett book mentions him a little bit, though. Says he just quietly went about getting things done, was usually the one to give rides when people needed them, etc.

-- Bimble, Tuesday, 25 September 2007 04:14 (1 week ago) Link

Sorry, not trying to be an arse about it, I just don't know if you saw those posts, Leavethecapital. Hell, maybe requoting them again will lure someone who knows about Erasmus into the spotlight. You never know.

In the meantime, it's interesting Crispy Ambulance have come up on this thread. (one of those bands it's best not to get Bimble started about) I'll just say that the last time I tried to play Plateau Phase it really disappointed me, the sound of it and I became quite upset as it's long been one of my fave albums ever and they are one of my Top 3 fave bands ever. I was moved to forget the CD and pull it out on vinyl and see if I was any happier with the way it sounded but alas, I wasn't. It was very surprising and frankly, not a little upsetting. Perhaps I really have played it too many times. Maybe I just have to be in the right mood.

In the meantime, I'm filled with guilt that I don't yet have the new Durutti Column.

I'm sure this is the wrong place to say this, but hey.

The new "Voice of the Seven Woods" is my favourite guitar album since the first Durutti one.

Go see.

i'm a longtime fan of rick's stuff.. i'm yet to pick up the album but all the 45s/EPs so far have been great

I got a couple of singles, but the album was like "whoa!"

No, Bimble I didn't see those posts. My bad for being lazy. I thought if anyone knew where he went it might be someone here.

He obviously stays out of the limelight (Erasmus that is) for a reason, maybe we should just let him?

I'm sure this is the wrong place to say this, but hey.

The new "Voice of the Seven Woods" is my favourite guitar album since the first Durutti one.

Go see.

Such a recommendation and they are playing relatively nearby soon. So maybe I will.

http://www.cerysmaticfactory.info/2007_10_01_archive.html#7558059712547704499

The November edition of i-D magazine will be a Punk-themed issue and they are dedicating the back section of the magazine to the memory of Tony Wilson and Factory Records.

The i-D Punk issue is out on 10 October 2007.

i didn't, but <suzy> my pal was out with saville's wife/partner in berlin </suzy>

You evil man. ;-)

"He obviously stays out of the limelight (Erasmus that is) for a reason, maybe we should just let him?"

Fair enough. He doesn't own anyone an explanation. If he wants to tell his side of the Factory story I'm sure he'll do that when he's good and ready.

Is this where we talk about <i>Control</i>? I saw it yesterday, and blogged about it as follows:

Joy Division might have been a Manchester band, but there's a strong Nottingham link to the movie; lead actress Samantha Morton was born and bred here, a large chunk of the funding came from the East Midlands, and most of the film was shot in the city. The concert scenes were filmed inside the Ballroom of the Marcus Garvey Centre, with crowd extras recruited from the message boards of LeftLion magazine; the Derby Road council flats behind the Savoy Cinema are easily recognisable; and the supposedly Mancunian kids in the opening scene have suspiciously local accents.

The film marks the directorial debut of rock photographer Anton Corbijn, perhaps best known for his work with U2 and Depeche Mode, who also worked with Joy Division in the late 1970s, helping to define their oh-God-I-hate-using-this-word iconic (bleurgh) image. Not surprsingly, the visual aesthetic is closely aligned with Corbijn's signature style, all monochrome austerity and pared down moodiness. As such, it's completely in line with the band's existing iconography - almost to the degree of being an extension of their brand, were I minded to be cynical.

Which, to my relief, and despite niggling early doubts (with every shot exquisitely composed, was the art direction in danger of drowning in its own sumptuous "perfection"?), I'm not. For the tightly controlled visual aesthetic actually serves to preserve the band's mystique, even as the drama seeks to examine the circumstances which led to singer Ian Curtis's suicide, aged 23, in May 1980. Or, as I put it on Twitter earlier today, on my way back from the cinema, the film "illuminates the story without puncturing the legend". It's a tricky line to walk, and some slightly clunky initial wobbles notwithstanding (or maybe it's simply impossible not to giggle at the first sight of the earnest young actors playing Barney and Hooky, and at the sight of "Tony Wilson" in a daft wig), the balance is admirably struck.

(Thus, to give one example, you gain an almost literal insight as to how Curtis's emotional state inspired the lyrics of Love Will Tear Us Apart, without running the risk of permanently devaluing the personal experience that you might get from the song.)

Ah yes: Tony Wilson, whose serious illness was well known amongst the cast and crew, and whose death less than two months ago casts an extra shadow over what was already a distinctly murky drama. His character provides a couple of the film's rare comedic moments - the lack of which was also noted, with some measure of disappointment, by Curtis's widow Deborah. Control thus becomes something of a dual memorial, as well as making some of the links between Ian Curtis's and Kurt Cobain's respective states of suicidal despair all the more explicit (I'm thinking of one concert scene in particular, which shows Curtis no longer able to control the widening gap between what his audience expects and what he is capable of providing).

Highly recommended. Go see.

http://troubled-diva.com/2007_09_30_troubled-diva_archive.html#1159973526702731889

(Obviously not nearly flip/snarky/geeky enough for ILM, but I couldn't be @rsed to re-draft with added geek-snark.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loUtzLluGAQ

http://www.tonywilsonexperience.com/ streaming now

i'm assuming they're going to edit together the highlights?

Thanks to jed_ for the link on the Peter Saville thread:

http://creativereview.co.uk/cr-blog/2010/october/peter-saville-anthony-wilson-headstone

kinda pissed they didn't

give his death a fac number.

― koogs, Friday, August 10, 2007

but that is still lovely

oh wait:

@Daniel

His casket has the FAC number 501 and if I remember his estate vowed that would be the last thing catalogued

!!

That is disarmingly beautiful. Actually felt quite emotional looking at it.

http://www.toplessrobot.com/340x_monolith_action_figure_main_zoom.jpg

haha

Love the way it reflects the zantedeschias

And Saville was three years late. Kind of fitting really...

The boxed cassettes were the pinnacle for Saville's aesthetic. I still think it all died with Tony though. From there, and from here...it will be inelegant, typical recitation. He was the constant gardener, he aged the story so it wouldn't die.

Without whom.

http://www.zani.co.uk/userimages/Tony%20Wilson%20ZANI%203.jpg

I can hear him now, raving about Rothko or telling us about a burst water main in Chorley. Off to play Temptation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cYNI8s_vo4

http://louderthanwar.com/watch-this-mike-garrys-powerful-and-moving-video-for-classic-st-anthonytony-wilson-poem/

is Grimly's obit knocking around anywhere does anyone know? the link to it has long since gone it seems.

Video is awesome. Thanks, Mike.