Joy Division
Photo: Warner Bros. Records

British post-punk legends Joy Division will receive the box-set treatment in August with a collection that includes both of their albums as well as singles, B-sides and rarities from the gloom-rockers' short but illustrious career.

The four-disc set, Heartandsoul, appeared in the United Kingdom in 1998. This marks its first U.S. release. Disc one contains the band's 1979 debut Unknown Pleasures and singles including "Digital." Disc two features Closer, which Joy Division finished recording shortly before lead singer Ian Curtis hung himself in 1980, and the band's signature song "Love Will Tear Us Apart." Disc three contains the band's first EP, An Ideal for Living, and radio sessions previously unreleased in the United States. The final disc culls previously unavailable live material from four concerts.

Following Curtis' death, surviving members Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook and Stephen Morris went on to form New Order. All three musicians helped select the contents of Heartandsoul, according to their U.S. manager. New Order will release their first album in eight years, Getready, on October 16 (see "Primal Scream, Billy Corgan Getready To Help Out New Order").

The band will also make four appearances with Moby's Area:One festival tour. They'll be joined by former Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan, who guests on the Getready track "Turn My Way." Area:One dates featuring New Order:

7/31 - Mountain View, CA @ Shoreline Amphitheatre
• 8/2 - Vancouver, BC @ Thunderbird Stadium
• 8/3 - George, WA @ The Gorge
• 8/5 - Devore, CA @ G.H. Blockbuster Pavilion

• Joy Division
• New Order

A survey of British music fans has proclaimed veteran Leonard Cohen's decades old "Greatest Hits" as the most depressing album of all time, according to England's PA News. Second place went to Lou Reed's "Berlin," while third was Nick Drake's "Way To Blue," a 1994 retrospective of Drake's short career. Drake died of an overdose of anti-depressant medication at his parents home in 1974. Shockingly, The Cure doesn't hit the list until 13th place.

For that matter, three, possibly four, of the Top 20 artists committed suicide. Aside from Drake, Joy Division's Ian Curtis died shortly before the band released "Closer," which came 4th in the poll. Richie James of the Manic Street Preachers, whose album, "The Holy Bible," came 6th on the list, disappeared three years ago after abandoning his car on a bridge, leading to a suspicion of suicide. And of course Kurt Cobain offed himself in 1994. Nirvana's "Unplugged" was ranked 19th.

The survey appears to indicate that while morose lyrics may be the more obvious element, the tone of voice may well be a key factor. Droner Cohen's best known hits are songs about his rather pleasant, introspective experiences with women ("Suzanne," "Sisters of Mercy," "So Long Marianne"). The same can't be said lyrically for the romantically morose Drake or Reed's darkly depressed "Berlin," however.

Many of the albums chosen were surprisingly old, which is likely at least partially due to the age group of the respondents. The PA News reports that roughly 800 people filled out the survey, which was taken via Britain's The Band magazine's website.

Here's the Top 20 um... winners.

1. Leonard Cohen - Greatest Hits
2. Lou Reed - Berlin
3. Nick Drake - Way To Blue
4. Joy Division - Closer
5. Tindersticks - Second Album
6. Manic Street Preachers - The Holy Bible
7. Red House Painters - Double Album
8. Baby Bird - Dying Happy
9. Tricky - Pre-Millennium Tension
10. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Murder Ballads
11. American Music Club - Mercury
12. Pink Floyd - The Wall
13. The Cure - Disintegration
14. Bob Dylan - Blood On The Tracks
15. Japan - Tin Drum
16. Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska
17. Depeche Mode - Black Celebration
18. R.E.M. - Automatic For The People
19. Nirvana - Unplugged
20. David Bowie - Low

• Joy Division
• Lou Reed
• The Velvet Underground

October 17 [12:00 EDT] -- Joy Division will live again next month in a four-CD box set called "Heart And Soul" featuring previously unreleased studio tracks and live performances.

Highlights include alternate versions of 'Love Will Tear Us Apart' and 'Transmission' plus rare live recordings from 1979 and 1980. Not featured in the set, though, is the last show performed by Joy Division in Birmingham, England, a week prior to singer Ian Curtis's suicide in May of 1980, though it was recorded.

According to an interview with former member Bernard Sumner in Britain's New Musical Express, a sound technician working for the band at the time had tried to sell tapes of that performance at a price of 35,000 pounds a week after the tragedy.

The compilation has done nothing to sooth over the previously ruffled feathers of the band members, in particular Sumner and Peter Hook who both went on to form New Order. Sumner took more than one shot at his former colleague during the interview and revealed he hadn't spoken to any of his New Order mates since the band's performance at Reading Festival in August '93.

Sumner bitterly accuses Hook of copying his style with his new band Monaco. "They sound like me!" Sumner told the magazine. "Not just the vocals, either, but the guitars, synthesizers, everything. I don't know whether to be flattered or annoyed."

According to Sumner, the box set will show that Joy Division was rockier and raunchier than most people think. He noted that producer Martin Hannet had changed the sound of the group to the atmospheric style most closely associated with the name.

Here's an unofficial track list courtesy of the Factory mailing list:

CD 1:

• Digital, Glass (FAC 2)
• All of 'Unknown Pleasures'
• Transmission, Novelty,
• The Kill
• Walked In Line
• Ice Age, Exercise One
• Sound Of Music
• Autosuggesion
• From Safety To Where?

CD2:

• Atmosphere
• Dead Souls
• Something Must Break
• Komakino
• Incubation
• She's Lost Control (12")
• All of 'Closer'
• Love Will Tear Us Apart
• These Days

CD3:

• Guts
• At A Later Date
• The Kill (Warsaw)
• Warsaw
• No Love Lost
• All of 'An Ideal For Living'
• The Drawback (Warsaw)
• Interzone (Warsaw)
• Shadowplay (Warsaw)
• Exercise One (Peel)
• Insight (GENETIC)
• Glass (GENETIC)
• Digital (GENETIC)
• Ice Age (GENETIC)
• Transmission (GENETIC)
• Walked In LIne (6/79)
• Transmission (7/79 Central Sound Transmission sessions)
• These Days (Piccadilly)
• Candidate (Piccadilly)
• The Only One (Piccadilly)
• Chance [=Atmosphere] (Piccadilly)
• Atrocity Exhibition (Piccadilly)
• Love Will Tear Us Apart (Peel)
• Twenty Hours (Peel)
• Ceremony (Rehearsal)
• In A Lonely Place (Rehearsal)

CD4:

• 10 tracks live at The Factory 13/7/79
• Autosuggestion (YMCA '79)
• I Remember Nothing (Bournmouth, Buzzcocks tour)
• Colony (Bournmouth, Buzzcocks tour)
• These Days (Bournmouth, Buzzcocks tour)
• Incubation (Lyceum '80)
• The Eternal (Lyceum '80)
• Heart & Soul (Lyceum '80)
• She's Lost Control (Lyceum '80)
• Isolation (Lyceum '80).

• Joy Division