1981.06.20 Glastonbury Festival SBD (2012 Remaster)

New Order

Glastonbury CND Festival

Worthy Farm, Pilton, Somerset

20 June 1981

source: soundboard

lineage: low (first?) generation dub of cassette master

analogloyalist mastering August 2012

This gig was one of the earliest New Order soundboards to be "released" - longtime fans say it was available in Camden stalls in summer 1981, and became the source for many a vinyl bootleg over the years.

Because it's been available so many places, and sources, contrary to belief this makes it that much more difficult to track down an early, low-generation source.  Seems like *everyone* has a copy, but it's always an Nth generation noisy and muffled dub, or mono, or what-have-you.

So when this version was provided, it was a revelation.  The originator of the source cassette, that I've mastered this from, says he purchased it at the festival and it arrived by post several weeks later.  The question is if it was a dub from the master reel, or a dub of a dub from the master reel.  We'll never know.  It seemed just "better" than any other I'd heard, and I'd heard a LOT of versions over the years.

It took wonderfully to my patented procedures for mastering.  I haven't much else to say, the results will certainly speak for themselves.  It is a bit bass heavy in the drums/drones on "In A Lonely Place" but it is what it is.  "Everything's Gone Green" is a brilliant, seductive workup of what actually became "EGG" - the lyrics are nascent, the performance spellbinding.  It's a 13-minute sequenced jam.

Bernard, on the other hand... It's pretty well known that he was well out of it here.  Oh he starts out OK, his outbursts in "In A Lonely Place" actually enhance the overall forbodingness of the track, but as the show progresses he, shall we say, regresses.  In one sense it's embarrassing, but it's New Order.  It certainly makes for an interesting gig, one that is a favorite of many.

Retro took "In A Lonely Place" from this gig.  Ours is far better (as usual).  Though why a version completely sans Hooky (amp/instrument problems that didn't repair themselves until a bit into the following track) was chosen, when the bass is part of the allure of this song, is beyond my ken.  I suppose I could ask...

Again, you should bin all previous copies of this (unless you've sat on the master reel for 31 years...).

01 - In A Lonely Place [Removed, Retro Box Set, check http://archive.new-order.net to get it] (I dont have this)

02 - Dreams Never End

03 - Truth

04 - The Him

05 - Procession

06 - Senses

07 - Denial

08 - Everything's Gone Green