When Ian Curtis hanged himself outside Manchester, England, the 23-year-old singer ended a short career but launched a second life as one of rock’s most enigmatic figures.
At the time, few people had heard of Curtis or his fledgling punk band, Joy Division, who were set to embark on a U.S. tour the day after his death on May 18, 1980. Since then, Curtis has become a touchstone for generations of alternative rockers from The Cure to Nine Inch Nails to Interpol. At the same time, those closest to him, including his band mates — who went on to form the successful pop group New Order — generally refused to discuss him in the press. So Curtis’ story remained cloudy.
Now Curtis and his Manchester, England, band are having a “moment.” Which is to say, after years as a cult phenomenon, Joy Division’s influence is suddenly turning up all over pop culture.
The feature film “Control,” directed by art photographer Anton Corbijn, depicts Curtis as a charismatic but troubled performer unable to cope with the onset of fame, much like Kurt Cobain after him. It opens in Chicago on Friday.
The upcoming documentary “Joy Division,” co-produced by Tom Atencio, New Order’s American manager, recalls Curtis as a young man whose cries for help — clearly audible in his despairing lyrics — went unheeded even by those closest to him.
To coincide with the films and the 30th anniversary of Joy Division’s formation, Rhino Records has released a vinyl box set of the band’s official recordings. Three double-disc CDs, combining original albums with unreleased live performances, are due later this month. And in an attempt to market Curtis’ dark persona to a new generation of fans, Rhino is offering two of Joy Division’s best-known songs, “Transmission” and “Love Will Tear Us Apart,” as ringtones.
Not all worshipers of Curtis will be happy to see their hero hit the mainstream.
Decades ago, his murky tale served as “oral tradition in the underground music scene,” said Chris Ott, author of a book on Joy Division’s music titled “Unknown Pleasures.” But as Curtis’ survivors have become more vocal and more willing to participate in projects like “Control,” the singer’s legacy may lose some of its mystery.
“I think it’s unfortunate,” Ott said. “It cheapens it a bit.”
Neither film paints Curtis as a romantic figure. The documentary explores his struggle with epilepsy. In “Control,” success exacerbates another of Curtis’ problems, his chronic marital infidelity. The film is based on “Touching From a Distance,” the 1995 memoir written by Curtis’ widow, Deborah.
“I definitely didn’t want to do more myth-making,” said Corbijn, who met Joy Division in November 1979 and shot the now-iconic photograph of the band walking forlornly through an underground tube station.
In “Control,” Curtis (played by Sam Riley) comes off as sensitive but ultimately selfish. As Joy Division’s success introduces him to vistas beyond Manchester, he drifts away from his wife, neglects his infant daughter and falls in love with a Belgian girl named Annik Honore, whom he met on tour. The affair destroyed Curtis’ marriage, but also inspired “Love Will Tear Us Apart,” the closest Joy Division ever came to a hit single.
Corbijn spoke to both women while making the film.
“I was trying to be very neutral,” he said. Though Honore initially was reluctant to participate, “she wanted people to know that Ian really loved her, and she was not trying to wreck his life,” he said. She even provided several letters Curtis wrote to her, which Corbijn pieced together as a kind of suicide note in the film. (Curtis’ real note has been kept private by his widow.)
Honore makes a rare appearance in the documentary.
“Fans were amazed to see her,” said Atencio, the producer. “She’s a reclusive figure who feels very awkward about her part in these events. It took me six months of e-mailing to arrange a meeting.”
Both films take pains to trace Joy Division’s ascent through the Manchester music scene that eventually birthed the Smiths, Happy Mondays and the Stone Roses. In its three-year career the band released only two albums, “Unknown Pleasures” and “Closer,” both marked by a stark, futuristic sound that had little precedent. Bassist Peter Hook drove the melodies, while guitarist Bernard Sumner provided rhythm and texture. Much of the chilled atmosphere came from the producer, Martin Hannett, who pioneered the use of digital delay and who seemed obsessed with percussion sounds.
The lyrics, however, belonged to Curtis. On “Isolation,” his despair is clear: “I’m ashamed of the things I’ve been put through/I’m ashamed of the person I am.”
Despite such signals, Curtis’ band mates seemed unconcerned, and in the documentary they admit as much. Even after Curtis attempted suicide with an overdose of pills, the band stuck to business as usual. Strangely, it appears few around Curtis bothered to read his lyrics.
“The thing that you had to reconcile about Ian, he’s telling you one thing but obviously suffering,” Hook said in a recent phone interview. “He was telling us he was all right, begging us to believe he was OK. But in hindsight, he blatantly wasn’t.”
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Divine Division
Here’s what some current artists had to say about Joy Division’s lasting hold on pop culture. [ L.A. TIMES ]
“Because Ian Curtis killed himself, people can project whatever they want onto his life and music. He’s not around to tell them otherwise.”
— Chris Ott, who wrote “Unknown Pleasures” about the making of Joy Division’s 1979 debut album
“Bands now, you know every biographical detail. With Joy Division, there was one audiotape and one major print interview — there are gaps around everything they did. If you’re discovering [the group] now, you have to work to fill in the gaps with your imagination. The image draws you in.”
— Grant Gee
“[There is) something in Ian Curtis’ deeply felt lyrics and delivery that’s unbelievably honest. It’s that dog whistle of instant recognition — in an era of branding, here’s a brand you can trust.”
— Tom Atencio, executive producer of “Joy Division”
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These days
The influence of Ian Curtis and Joy Division can be seen all over the pop culture landscape. [ L.A. TIMES ]
MOVIES
— “Control”: The film, opening Friday, traces Ian Curtis’ internal conflicts as a family man who struggled to reconcile his fragmented existence as a rock star and closet intellectual prone to devastating epileptic seizures.
— “Joy Division”: The upcoming documentary details the group’s fast rise and sudden end from the perspective of band members and those close to them.
— “24 Hour Party People”: In director Michael Winterbottom’s 2002 film that depicted Manchester’s “Madchester” alternative music scene, Curtis is portrayed as a brooding, erratic control freak.
MUSIC
— It has become almost impossible to turn on modern-rock radio without registering the sonic debt owed Joy Division by a who’s who of buzz bands including the Killers, She Wants Revenge, Interpol, Bloc Party, the National and Moving Units.
— Rhino Records is releasing deluxe editions of Joy Division’s two studio albums as a well as a compilation of rare recordings; Joy Division ringtones, a special vinyl box set and the soundtrack to “Control.”
FASHION
Look no further than the fashion runway for evidence that Joy Division’s military-inspired, minimalist “look” — buttoned-up shirts, trench coats, suit trousers and apparent contempt for anything casual or synthetic — is indisputably now.
FOOD
This year, the Japanese restaurant chain Yo! Sushi in Britain began offering a boxed meal named in honor of Joy Division’s most famous song. The Love Will Tear Us Apart salmon and tuna box set includes a selection of nigiri, maki and sashimi as well as a salad topped with a piquant sunomono dressing.
SPORTING GOODS
In April, the sportswear company New Balance commissioned artist Dylan Adair to design two pairs of limited edition Joy Division running shoes, one featuring the iconic pulsar wavelength artwork from the “Unknown Pleasures” album cover.
