Customer Reviews

Singles

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

It's obvious just how influential, and just how cutting edge New Order have always been. They are one of the very few who deserve their legendary status. What many people seem to forget is how many of their singles ( compiled herein ) are pure pop celebrations, probably because for years NO singles were kept strictly seperate from their albums. Often shy, ethereal, and indeed mopey on many of their album cuts, NO singles are more often than not cause for dancing, decadence and drugs. So why buy SINGLES and not SUBSTANCE, or THE BEST OF, or INTERNATIONAL?
For a few simple, but very important reasons. Obviously, every single NO 7" is represented here ( the original Blue Monday was only ever a 12" , but that is the sole exception ). The early tracks have been given a sonic upgrade that is frankly astonishing. Listen to the first minute or so of Ceremony and you'll see. The difference between this and the version on SUBSTANCE is like the proverbial night and day. The clarity and seperation of sound is amazing, and the bass drum kicks like never before. Also, SINGLES marks the US cd debut of the 7" single versions of Temptation and Confusion, two tracks that were re-recorded for the SUBSTANCE compilation. These two tracks are pure electro bliss, and are as forward thinking now as they were in the very early Eighties. Even when NO could be seen as treading water,when they settled into comfortable middle age ( anything after the singles from TECHNIQUE ) a second ( or third, or fourth ) listen will bring out musical and lyrical nuances that make these songs all stand out in their own way. This is a sterling collection, now my favourite NO compilation. I couldn't do without it.

This is, bar NONE, a must-buy...a must must MUST buy...one of the greatest hits/singles collections ever, by anybody, period!!!!

This set expands on 1987's "Substance", blows away "International" and "(The Best Of) New Order" by a mile...the only other collection you need besides this is the "Retro" boxset, preferably the 5-disc version...the thing is, you kinda need to burn/copy various tracks from each, in order to not need them...the 1994 import remix collection "(The Rest Of) New Order", I find for completists only, although I don't have a copy.

The difference between "Singles" and "Substance", besides it being up-to-date with all 31 singles, is that "Substance" has mainly 12" versions and 2 rerecordings (1987) of the first 12 singles, plus B-sides on disc 2, while here, "Singles" has mainly shorter 7" radio versions...but 2 tracks are kept intact from "Substance": "True Faith" and the original "Blue Monday" in it's full 7 minute glory...I like these versions just as much, except on 1 song, 1984's "Thieves Like Us"...the whole second verse is cut on this version, the one regarding pills, kinda ruins the song for me...plus, the 1st disc is only 69 minutes, there was ample room for the full-lengther, or at least left that verse in on this version...oh well, I'll live.

Back to the positive...this new US version sounds even better than the earlier UK one...the remastering is BEYOND BELIEF, woah!!!! Makes someone like me hope for the whole frikking catalogue to be done!!!! The packaging and liner notes are identical, but slightly refined on the US version...it looks a drop better for some reason...I know, I used to have the import but sold it...oh also, this US version has a cool new bonus track, a fresh remix of "Temptation" by Dallas-cum-Brooklyn experimental rockers The Secret Machines...I dig it, plus there was room for it, as the UK CD2 has only 63 minutes, now it's about 70...

Every song here is great (barring my issue with "Thieves Like Us"), from their new version of "Ceremony" from when they were Joy Division, through the 4 singles off "Waiting For The Sirens' Call", their new masterful 2005 album, including "Jetstream", their cool duet with Ana Matronic from Scissor Sisters...

Their unique brand of unpretentious, soulful dance/punk/rock/pop/electronic hybrid is as groundbreaking as ever, as timeless as ever, and is an immediate choice for desert-island discs...

New Order's music will never get old...and will always be cool...

Now, the songs you still need are 11 tracks on "Substance", which are..."Temptation" (1987 version), "Confusion" (1987 version)...yeah, this "Singles" set has the ORIGINAL versions of those 2 songs..."Thieves Like Us" (12" version), "The Perfect Kiss" (12" version), "State Of The Nation" (12" version), and the B-sides: "Hurt", "Confusion" (instrumental), "Murder", "Thieves Like Us" (instrumental), "Kiss Of Death" and "Shame Of The Nation"...if you still want them, that is...the other 12 inches and B-sides are on the box set "Retro". From "International", you need (if you want) the 12" version of "Touched By The Hand Of God"...the only place to find that on CD. And from "(The Best Of) New Order", you need "Age Of Consent", "Love Vigilantes", "Vanishing Point", "True Faith (1994)" and "Round & Round (1994)", if you want them...

Otherwise, if not, and you don't want the catalogue or the box, this 2CD jackpot will be all you need by the masters Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook, Gillian Gilbert and Stephen Morris...aka New Order!!!!

Buy this pronto...you may need it more than you realize...

2010 Update: The songs missing that are on "Substance", 12-inchers and B-sides, as well as exclusives from "International" and "(The Best Of) New Order", are now (mostly) on the recent 2CD remasters/reissues of their Factory-era catalogue, so those now render that 1987 collection utterly obsolete. For instance: there are only 3 tracks on "Substance" not carried over...the cool-but-not-essential 1987 versions of "Temptation" and "Confusion" and the instrumental B-side version of "The Perfect Kiss" called "The Kiss Of Death", that's it, same with the 1994 versions of "True Faith" and "Round & Round" from "(The Best Of) New Order"...

Here's where the rest of it is:
The "Thieves Like Us" 12" is on the deluxe "Power, Corruption & Lies"...
"The Perfect Kiss" 12" is on the deluxe "Low Life"...
The "State Of The Nation" 12" is on the deluxe "Brotherhood", slapped on the end of the album Disc 1, after "Every Little Counts"...
The B-side "Shame Of The Nation" is now on the deluxe "Low Life"...
The "Touched By The Hand Of God" 12" is now on the deluxe "Brotherhood"...
The B-side "Hurt" is on the deluxe "Movement"...
The B-side "Murder" is on the deluxe "Power, Corruption & Lies"...
The "Confusion" instrumental B-side is on the deluxe "Power, Corruption & Lies"...
The "Thieves Like Us" instrumental B-side is also on the deluxe "Power, Corruption & Lies"...
And lastly, album tracks/fan faves, now remastered:
"Age Of Consent" is on the deluxe "Power, Corruption & Lies"...
"Love Vigilantes" is on the deluxe "Low-Life"...
and "Vanishing Point" is on the deluxe "Technique"...

There ya go...and with those tracks not carried over, burn em and include the disc with the "Retro" boxset as Disc 6...those being:
"Temptation 1987"
"Confusion 1987"
"Kiss Of Death"
"True Faith '94"
"Round & Round '94"

Obviously if you didn't own any New Order, this would be an incredible purchase - 31 of the best tracks of all time in one package. However, it is probably safe to assume that most people who will buy this already own versions of all of these tracks (except the cool bonus remix) or at least the ones that are on previous collections (Substance, Best Of, International). But most reviews I have read of this collection totally miss this main point - this is the first time ever you can get the original 7" versions of all of these tracks on cd (except for the original Blue Monday, which is the 12" version). This is awesome! Complaining this is yet another New Order collection and why do we need another... totally misses the point. Complaining that you prefer some aspect of some other 12" version of a track totally misses the point - if you want the 12" versions, that is not the point of this collection. It is just so cool to be able to have the 7" version of Temptation, which is totally different then the 12" version. Though perhaps this is the most obvious example, almost all of the tracks here differ from the versions on albums and previous collections. Well worth the purchase price (which ironically, is higher than the import version if you order direct from the UK, but you do get the extra remix of Temptation by Secret Machines, which is actually pretty cool).

The remastering here is exceptional. You have never heard the older tracks the way they sound on this compilation. This has replaced Substance as my New Order quick fix album.

A great intro for beginners and must have for the collectors who only know these singles from the way they USED to sound. Amazing!

The sign of a really good band is when they have so many great songs that they don't need to put all of them on their albums. New Order's career has been so rich with great songs that they could afford to scatter them around as EPs, singles, B-sides, soundtrack appearances and so on. In fact, only four of the twelve songs on the first disc of the famed 1987 compilation Substance came from New Order's albums. Even those four songs were reworked from their album counterparts and presented in more danceable, often vastly superior form. For instance, "The Perfect Kiss" is much better on Substance than on Low-life.

In fact, I think that that was really the main reason why Substance became so successful (it remains New Order's best-selling release to this day). It is impossible to anthologize New Order's entire career. No matter what you choose, someone like me is going to pop up and gripe about how something got left out. But Substance approached the task from just the right angle -- it compiled brilliant songs that many listeners might not have had on record otherwise. So, on one hand it's one of the most enjoyable records of all time, and on the other hand it doesn't feel redundant at all.

This compilation clearly tries to improve on Substance. It essentially replicates Substance's first disc. But instead of staying to non-album tracks, the second disc mostly reduces to a selection of songs from New Order's four post-1987 albums -- the three singles from Technique, the four from Republic, and others from Get Ready and Waiting For The Sirens' Call. They are all good, but now the griping can begin, because, for instance, the compilation misses "Someone Like You" and "Guilt Is A Useless Emotion," the band's two best latter-day dance songs, as well as fine album tracks like "Mr. Disco," "Vanishing Point," "Primitive Notion," "Hey Now What You Doing" and "I Told You So." Yes, it's a "Singles" compilation, but that's not the best format for a New Order retrospective to begin with, since the singles from Waiting For The Sirens' Call were actually not as good as some of the album tracks. The compilation unintentionally sells the recent albums short, even though they're what provided the excuse for the compilation's existence.

The other problem with the whole approach is that Technique and Republic are superb albums, the peak of New Order's career, so it's better to just go and buy both of them, perhaps with Substance as an appetizer first, instead of trying to grab the highlights from all three. But then, since this compilation heavily relies on the singles from the albums, it becomes redundant much more quickly. Which, you'll recall, is exactly what Substance so masterfully avoids. And that means that, if you're really intent on just grabbing highlights, it's better to just go with Substance.

In order to cram as many songs as possible into two discs, Singles presents many of them as drastically shortened seven-inch edits. Fortunately, "Blue Monday," "True Faith," "Regret" and "World In Motion" are unaltered. But look, "The Perfect Kiss" needs the eight-minute Substance version with the deafening, ecstatic crescendo in the end, and "Bizarre Love Triangle" sounds better with Shep Pettibone's world-famous arrangement. "Temptation," "Fine Time," "Crystal" and "1963" need their full running time also. The one time when this policy accidentally succeeds is with "Ceremony," since the original single version might just sound fuller and more spacious than the twelve-inch version on Substance. At the very least, collectors will be interested. Although, what's the point of including the seven-inch version of "Ceremony" if it's not accompanied by "In A Lonely Place"?

Furthermore, some of the best songs from the second disc of Substance are missing. Only "Procession" and "1963" make it to this compilation. Granted, the second disc of Substance was rounded out with five largely unnecessary instrumental remixes of the famous singles, and their omission here is more of an advantage over Substance rather than a drawback. But how can one possibly overlook "In A Lonely Place," "Cries And Whispers" and "Lonesome Tonight"? And even with the omissions, the compilation still finds enough room for one unnecessary remix, "Blue Monday '88."

There is one way to improve on Substance: keep the first disc unchanged, remove the five instrumental remixes from the second disc, and replace them with unedited versions of original non-album songs. Those being "Mesh," which is the only song from the Everything's Gone Green EP that's missing from Substance, then the soundtrack appearances "Touched By The Hand Of God" (included here in edited form) and "Brutal," the non-album singles "World In Motion" (included) and "Here To Stay" (included, but edited), the rare song "Such A Good Thing" from the Retro box-set, and one or both of the original instrumentals "Best And Marsh" and "Vicious Circle," which are B-sides from Technique and Republic, respectively. If there's still space left, slap on a B-side like "Sabotage" or "Behind Closed Doors" from the Get Ready sessions, or "Player In The League" from the "Here To Stay" single, or another soundtrack appearance like "Let's Go," or their rendition of Jimmy Cliff's "Vietnam," to this day their only studio cover. Or, if you want to include something really super-rare instead, there's always "Homage" from the band's first demo as New Order, it would fit in well with the Everything's Gone Green B-sides. Until someone does that, Substance will remain the best New Order compilation.

The single versions of these tracks means that some of them are truncated quite a bit from the 12" versions that appeared on Substance. For example, I wanted a remastered Thieves Like Us, except that the intro is cut off...very disappointing. Same with Bizarre Love Triangle and several other tracks. If you know these songs primarily from the videos, you will be right at home; however, if you owned the records back in the day, you will not be happy...

Also, the mix on Ceremony is off-putting...the version on Retro is much better. And the version of 1963 used for this comp is not an improvement, in my estimation, on the Substance version.

The music is obviously brilliant and perhaps most people won't care about this, but diehards who own everything and are buying this anyway should know what they're getting.

The fourth compilation from the band might seem like a blatant effort to rip consumers off especially seeing how between 2002-2003, there were already two - a high-price boxset called Retro and a half-assed 14-track International.

Lo and Behold, this latest is also the most comprehensive and it really doesn't matter if we get some edits that weren't exactly the same as the 12". Compilations work like this, you'd either get less songs in full or more songs in edited format. The good thing is all the singles they have put out from the beginning until today are documented on this collection.

You'll get 80's new wave dance/rock anthems like the unforgettable Bizarre Love Triangle, True Faith, Blue Monday, Temptation and Regret to their recent comeback glory Crystal and the effervescent Krafty. There are the also the more underrated stuff like Round and Round, Shellshock, Thieves Like Us etc.

As a bonus for waiting much longer than the rest of the world, the US edition has a fantastic 7-min remix of Temptation by Secret Machines. It'd be good to add the 2001 remix of True Faith by Soft Pink Noise too.

Together with New Order: Item DVD (featuring their videos and A New Order Story), it's the best X'mas present any NO fan would want.

I bought Substance on cassette and then CD when I was younger. Then I bought the Best of New Order and the Rest of New Order when they came out. I never bothered with International. Today I bought this. My first thought was, "Ceremony seems much slower than usual." Turns out that the 7" single versions of these are much different from the 12" versions and album versions I was used to. Not bad different. Acutally pretty cool. It's like hearing the songs for the first time. Intros and tempos are very different. Sometimes it takes me a minute to realize what song I'm hearing. In some cases, the versions here are inferior to those on Substance (the album version of Bizarre Love Triangle is the best), but they're still pretty great.

Overall, this is an excellent collection and a very useful place to get all of New Order's 7" singles from the last 24 years. Every fan of indie rock, alternative, or dance music should have some New Order in his/her music collection, and this beats the hell out of buying any of the albums that came after Technique (no offense, diehard fans). I'd still recommend buying Brotherhood and Lowlife though for some of the great albums tracks that are not on this collection.

Though the classic two CD set "Substance" had some amazing mixes, it is a real treat to get the single versions of their many hits over the past quarter century in one place. Some of the mixes on "Substance" went on just a little too long, but here, it's all killer, no filler. Plus, we get their many excellent singles released after 1987, including "Regret" which gets my vote for best New Order song EVER!!

P.S. As of this writing, this two CD set is available on itunes for a whopping $9.90! That's right kids - 31 songs for less than 10 bucks.

I cannot say how influential New Order were, I was neither a musician, nor a sensible music journalist, but one thing I can tell about New Order: there was a mysterious aureole about them, especially for people who didn't see the band live. It was an intriguing, very fresh feeling to hear or read about New Order, so was their sound.

"Singles" is a great opportunity to show New Order's sonic development from post punk to disco dance to the mature guitar pop of the 2000s; it easily outshines the band's all previous compilations. "Substance" (1987) still performs its mission as a handy collection of 12" A- & B-sides, but it's very dated. "(the best of) New Order" (1994) always felt like a quick cash-in after London Records had acquired the Factory catalogue, and apart from the superior sound, there's nothing that isn't on "Singles". "International" (2002) was and now even more is an odd lifeless mix of "hits". In the late 90s New Order toyed with the idea of issuing a box of all singles they had released, but the "Recycle" project never materialized. Finally, as if having the presentiment of falling apart again, New Order released this brilliant collection. The concept is simple: to get together 30 or so singles in their shortest possible format (that is 7" and radio edits, save for "Blue Monday" for obvious reasons) and place it onto 2 CDs. With a little trickery this task is done greatly. The booklet includes a brief eulogy and eye-pleasing sleeve art of each single.

Few technical oddities for those who are interested:
1) "Singles" has several tracks and song versions that hadn't appeared officially on CD before. These are: "Ceremony" (7", 1981; original version recorded in late 1980, without Gilbert), "Everything's Gone Green" (7", 1981), "Temptation" (7", 1982), "Confusion" (7", 1983), "Thieves Like Us" (7", 1984), "Sub-Culture" (7", 1985), "State of the Nation" (7", 1986).
2) The edit of "Everything's Gone Green" presented here is the B-side of "Procession" (1981). The cover art for "Everything's Gone Green" singles shown in the booklet is wrong, it's merely the "1981-82" EP sleeve.
3) "1963" is listed as remixed by Arthur Baker; it's not, it's the original 1987 edited version from the "True Faith" B-side. Baker's remix of "1963" was made for the "Nineteen63" single in 1995 (sleeve art of which is shown).
4) "Blue Monday `88" is simply a remix of the original song. Only due to its historical significance for New Order's career (second US hit), it is included here. "Blue Monday '95" in a great remix by Hardfloor didn't get the same treat.
5) The miserable fate of "Run 2" is again perfectly shown here. It's not "Run 2" at all, but the album version of "Run". Because of the lawsuit with John Denver over the similarities with his "Leaving in Jet Plane", "Run 2" cannot be officially released. HOWEVER, you can find it in "A Collection", New Order video compilation DVD (2005).
6) "Turn" is just a wishful thinking. It was believed to be released as a single in the spring 2006 but this never happened.