New Order at the O2

In my last entry I extolled the pleasures of seeing Heaven 17 at Shepherds Bush Empire. In contrast I might say with the trials of seeing New Order at the O2. Obviously it is just a huge building but one cannot really hold that against them. But the ticketing was a major pain. You need to download their app, it didn't work, you look it up on the internet and it's full of complaints about said app. You need to have internet axis to use it, but if you arrive when the crowds build up you can't get internet access. And if you can find a number to call for assistance, you just get a warning that calls are likely to be over half an hour waiting time. And given the extortionate amount of money I had been charged as a booking fee you would have thought you might get a modicum of service with it. But no.

I had arranged to meet one of my companions in a very nice pub, the Gun, in Canary Wharf, one stop away on the Jubilee Line. Of course the O2 has masses of places to eat, but all of them awful, but expensive, chains which are just overflowing on gig nights.

Getting a drink from the bars at all but the beginning of the evening takes for ever. And then I "lost" one of my companions who went to the loo and then wasn't allowed top rejoin us near the front. 

But what about the music?

Both Graham (my first gig with this young man, just about to qualify as a lawyer) and myself felt the same about the support act the very Japanese sounding (but not looking) Fujiya & Miyagi. They are actually an indie band from Brighton and have been around a long time. We liked them a quite a lot to begin with, but rather doubted we could cope with an entire album of their brand of electronica. Most songs sounded like they could have continued into perpetuity.

But what about the legendary New Order.Well the consensus ( mainly from Andy!) was that the sound wasn't great. And they were a bit flat as a live act. And that might be fair. Bernard is now 65, and he never could sing. So while Heaven 17 actually sound better as a live act, New Order probably have an inferior sound to on record. And they have a wonderful back catalogue of the sort of songs that you can remix and play about the arrangements with, as they do, but that is not always an improvement.

But for all that I certainly enjoyed the experience, yet again. Love their songs and their last album, Music Complete, is far from their worst. They don't rely on just bashing out their eighties material. And you do get an ever engaging set of high quality backing visuals to make up for a pretty static stage act.