The November rain was beating down, when a soaking wet brother from way up North showed up on my doorstep clutching a double tape cassette of New Order’s ‘Substance’ and a block of hash. He was my partner in crime, a thief like us, and was ready to paint the Midlands streets the red and blue colours of the greatest compilation album in rock history.
He was fifteen years old, a fresh-faced Hibs casual from Leith, decked out in designer labels, with a new appetite and attitude for hooliganism, soft drugs, and cheap special brews.
I was in my curious teenage years with a conventional pop music palate and keen lazy eye for new uncharted experiences. ‘Substance’ was about to rock my dewy-eyed world – to corrupt, cavort and confuse musical parts other albums could never reach.
So, armed with New Order, a Walkman and ropey rolled spliffs, we hit the streets in search of highs and urban adventures. From the heavenly synths of ‘Temptation’, where the green eyes glowed, to the restless Manc scally charm and beats of ‘The Perfect Kiss’ – I was stone cold hooked.
As we beat a trippy path into the town centre, past a sea of shamelessly ropey pubs and empty Greek kebab shops – we found ourselves blissed-out, giggling and wide-eyed nursing two pints, in a humming and throbbing neon disco bar.
Excitedly surveying the male dominated landscape, the camp penny eventually dropped.
We were two lone underaged drinkers, propping up the bar, in the Town’s solitary gay disco hangout, surrounded by a vibrant sub-culture of muscled-ripped club queens, cackling drag artists and snogging queer hook-ups. A moment of hilarity on this otherwise Blue Monday on the grey winter streets of the Midlands.
And over the decades that followed, the memory remains etched in the deep archives of a sound-tracked musical journey. And of a lifelong love affair with the New Order sound and vision project.