Earlier this year Joy Division and New Order were announced as 2026 inductees into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. And earlier this month Peter Hook, bassist and founding member of the post-punk legends, made an appearance at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame itself for an interview and book signing ahead of the induction this November. The event coincided with the commencement of Peter Hook & The Light’s (Hooky’s live band who have been performing Joy Division and New Order albums in full around the globe since 2010) current North American leg of the Get Ready tour, which has taken the group across the world since April of last year [This June Peter Hook & The Light dropped Get Ready (Live At Victoria Warehouse Manchester), documenting the third night of the jaunt.] and will have them returning to Union Transfer on September 7th, Labor Day! Here are Three Reasons why you should get tickets before they sell out, in addition to these reasons provided by Hook himself.
“Get Ready was a honeymoon record. Looking back now it was very enjoyable to make, and I think is massively underrated. It did sort the wheat from the chaff and led to a New Order mk2 which played better but had lost a naivety whilst gaining a maturity. Barney and I became a ‘power couple’ in Manchester during the making of the record but, sadly, the old problems recurred when we came to play live. The writing was on the wall from then on. The two of us worked very hard to make this a great record and I think we succeeded. I am looking forward to playing all the tracks, many of which had never been played live before these Get Ready dates. The Light will shine through …”
1. IT’S ALWAYS GREAT
Peter Hook & The Light’s upcoming stop in the 215 will be the band’s fifth time at Union Transfer performing Joy Division and New Order classic albums in their entirety (2018 and 2024 doing Joy Division and New Order’s Substance compilations, 2019 doing New Order’s Technique and Republic, and 2022 doing both Joy Division LPs, in addition to a plethora of the best of the rest) and ninth time overall doing similar album celebration tours in Philly, with three at The Trocadero and an early gig at Voyeur doing Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures. In addition to reinforcing that these songs need to be experienced in nightclubs (and not seated theatres or outdoor amphitheaters), the shows have also proven that New Order needs Hooky a lot more than he needs them.
2. GET READY HAS A LOT OF BANGERS
Although often eclipsed by their earlier work (like any legends on their third decade), New Order’s 2001 seventh studio album, and first in eight years, contains the band’s best work in about twice as many years. And for those elder millennials, like myself, who discovered that post-punk was the sound of their soul, possibly through the cinema of Gregg Araki or Danny Boyle’s adaptation of Trainspotting, this album remains near and dear as the first new music from a band that we had thus far been celebrating as a brilliant act of years gone by. And, considering that the group never did a proper US tour of Get Ready, this will be the first time most audiences get to hear any of the songs from the album live, save opening track and lead single “Crystal.”
3. IT’S THE LOOSEST SETLIST YET
If you’re anything like me, you definitely enjoyed the fact that on 2024’s Substance Tour, Peter Hook & The Light went a little off-script, not performing both New Order and Joy Division compilation albums straight through in the exact order the songs appear on the albums, as on the band’s previous tours (which were great, but there is something to the element of surprise.) And while on previous tours opening sets and encores provided for some setlist spontaneity, this run features “a selection of Joy Division and New Order’s greatest hits,” a 15+-song set following Get Ready, and the particular greatest hits have varied from night-to-night, but have included some of New Order’s biggest nightclub bangers (“Age of Consent,” “Bizarre Love Triangle,” “Temptation”), along with Joy Division’s most gloriously gloomy (“Dead Souls,” “Isolation,” “These Days”).
*Get your tickets here.
