IAN CURTIS-Love… Will Tear Us Apart

While I listened to them in college, it wouldn’t be til my later years that I would appreciate what Joy Division brought in tyhe way of a legacy from their short lived history.

Tragically this band’s life was cut short after Curtis committed suicide by hanging himself on May 18, 1980. Curtis, the lead singer and lyricist of the British group Joy Division, hung himself in his Cheshire kitchen after receiving divorce papers from his wife. He was only 23 years old.

Curtis was known to struggle with depression and suffer physically from epilepsy

After Ian’s passing Peter Hook and Bernard Sumner would form the famous post-punk, synth pop band New Order.

HISTORY:

Joy Division were an English rock band formed in Salford in 1976. The group consisted of vocalist, guitarist and lyricist Ian Curtis, guitarist and keyboardist Bernard Sumner, bassist Peter Hook and drummer Stephen Morris.

Sumner and Hook formed the band after attending a June 1976 Sex Pistols concert. While Joy Division’s first recordings were heavily influenced by early punk rock, they soon developed a sparse sound and style that made them one of the pioneering groups of the post-punk genre and movement. Their self-released 1978 debut EP An Ideal for Living drew the attention of the Manchester television personality Tony Wilson, who signed them to his independent label Factory Records. Their debut album Unknown Pleasures, recorded with producer Martin Hannett, was released in 1979.

Curtis struggled with personal problems, including a failing marriage, depression, and epilepsy. As the band’s popularity grew, Curtis’s health condition made it increasingly difficult for him to perform; he occasionally experienced seizures on stage. He died by suicide on the eve of what would have been the band’s first North American tour in May 1980, aged 23. Joy Division’s second and final album, Closer, was released two months later; it and the single “Love Will Tear Us Apart” became their highest-charting releases.

Between July and October 1980, the remaining members, with the addition of keyboardist and guitarist Gillian Gilbert, regrouped under the name New Order. They were successful throughout the next decade, blending post-punk with electronic and dance music influences.^[3] In 2023, both Joy Division and New Order were nominated as one act for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.^[4]

ARTICLES:

From SPIN: “40 Years of Isolation: Musicians Reflect on Ian Curtis’ Legacy.“

Another great article on Ian Curtis “Joy Division and Ian Curtis: The Myhths”

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