Welcome back, Hi-Fiers!
This year, several albums from my favorite bands are turning 40. I kicked things off by writing about the Pet Shop Boys' Please; the response from you all gave me the confidence to keep revisiting them and other albums worth talking about.
Two bands I have been afraid to write about are New Order and The Church. Not because I don't have things to say; quite the opposite. The fanatical, obsessive nature of my love for both of them is exactly the problem. Each has an album turning 40 this year, and I must keep to my code: no fan-boying.
So. New Order. Brotherhood. Let's get into it.
Setting the Scene
To understand what was at stake with Brotherhood, you need to understand where the band stood going into it.
Factory Records deserves its own post entirely: a home-grown Manchester label, founded and built by the same people who had invested in making Joy Division a global force. New Order were its flagship band, and because their management was the label's management, they operated under a rare 50/50 profit arrangement. That kind of deal only works if the records actually sell.
The prior year, 1985, had been fortuitous. Low-Life made considerable waves in the US, performing strongly on dance and college charts, and the band made the intelligent decision to tour extensively and build a loyal base there. They were signed and distributed by Quincy Jones' Qwest Records; Jones himself was genuinely invested in the artists on his label. In interviews, he spoke about New Order's live shows and their tightness as a band; he famously coined "the human drum machine" for Stephen Morris, noting that in the studio, Morris' intricate rhythms were sometimes indistinguishable from the drum machine's output.
The band had also infiltrated American popular culture through a side door. Molly Ringwald, who had exceptional taste in British music, was playing New Order, Echo and the Bunnymen, and The Cure for the directors she was working with, directly influencing the soundtracks to Pretty in Pink and others. Jonathan Demme, who directed the "Perfect Kiss" video, also placed New Order tracks in Something Wild and Married to the Mob. Songs like "A Perfect Kiss" and "Shellshock" sold well as a result; a young American audience was hearing New Order through cinema before they ever heard them on the radio.
For those hunting down those placements: Something Wild uses the original 1980-81 mix of "Temptation," not the Substance version, and Married to the Mob features a Stephen Hague remix of "Bizarre Love Triangle," distinct from both the album and single versions.
By the time work began on Brotherhood, the band was not unknown in the US. They had momentum, an audience, a label with expectations, and a genuine cultural foothold. Brotherhood would be the first album Qwest participated in from the start; the pressure to build on Low-Life and surpass it was real.
Recording
Both Peter Hook and Stephen Morris have spoken fondly of the recording sessions: a democratic process, with everyone contributing their best ideas. For me, a consistent low point in New Order's catalog is any moment when session backing vocalists are brought in. At their heart, this was a punk band: post-punk, synth-punk, whatever label fits. Four artists building something from nothing, sometimes literally constructing their own instruments and samplers. That ethos shines through what I consider their holy trinity: Power, Corruption and Lies, Low-Life, and Brotherhood.
What I loved about Brotherhood specifically is the presence of Peter Hook's backing vocals; that call-and-response quality recalls the Strummer-Jones dynamic, and a lot of great post-punk bands used it to similar effect. This would be the final album in which that kind of collaboration would feature.
The democratic spirit extended to the writing. Stephen Morris, reportedly somewhat drunk, contributed the line "I feel I'm shot right through with a bolt of blue." The entirety of "Every Little Counts" was recorded in one take, with the whole band in high spirits and egging Bernard Sumner on; Gillian reportedly suggested the lyric "I think you are a pig, you should be in a zoo," and it went straight onto the record, unedited. There's a Lou Reed-meets-Sparks quality to it: deadpan, absurdist, committed.
One notable production choice: despite having no financial constraints at this point, Bernard insisted on cheap microphones for recording. For the trained audiophile, there is audible hiss on some bass tracks and an unpolished quality to certain guitar lines. Personally, I think it works in the album's favor; it gives the rockier songs a punkier, edgier feel, and the Joy Division contingent likely welcomed it.
The Album
The stated concept for Brotherhood was straightforward: Side 1 would be guitar-driven rock, with no synths or keyboards; Side 2 would be electronic, synth, and sequencer-led. It's a clean idea on paper. In practice, the album doesn't entirely stick to the script, and frankly, that's fine. For those of a younger generation, back in the Stone Age, we didn’t listen to albums on computers or phones. They were a tangible item, like a record (large vinyl disc) or a cassette tape. Side 1 and Side 2 refer to the tape or record sides.
Side 1
Side 1 is unambiguously the more guitar-heavy half: less dance, minimal keyboards, Bernard on lead guitar throughout. The opener, "Paradise," is a banger. Stephen Morris' drum intro, eighth notes on the snare and bass drum, lands the same way every time. I still remember lying on the floor of my sister's room, where we kept the shared record player, hearing the needle drop on that track for the first time. The band was listening to a lot of country music at the time, and the line “Jolene, I could have seen you there” was an explicit nod to Dolly Parton. The beautiful acoustic number “As it is When it Was” also reflects this influence.
I'm not going to go track by track; all of Side 1 holds up. But "Broken Promise" is worth singling out as an example of what Quincy Jones meant when he talked about the band being "in the pocket": everyone locked in, playing off each other. Hook's backing vocals are at their best here.
Side 2
The strongest structural decision on the album is how each side opens: both kick off with driving, uplifting songs before the mood shifts.
"Bizarre Love Triangle" opens Side 2, and it is easily one of New Order's top three or four songs; a strong argument could be made for it in any list of the greatest songs of the 1980s. It establishes the electronic half of the record immediately and without apology.
What's compelling about the album version is how it represents a mature evolution from the band that recorded "Temptation" in the immediate aftermath of losing Ian Curtis. For those of us who have followed both Joy Division and New Order closely, scrutinizing Bernard Sumner's lyrics for coded meaning is second nature. "Is 'Every time I see you falling' a reference to Ian's epilepsy, to the band watching him succumb to fits on stage?" Who can say? Perhaps it is; perhaps it isn't. That ambiguity is part of what makes New Order endure, in the same way that mystery clings to any band that has lost an iconic member too soon.
"Angel Dust" is built entirely on electronic instrumentation: synths, drum machines, and sequencers. The prominent lead sound, whether guitar or synthesizer, carries a distinctly punk or hard-rock feel. The song is dark and heavy; think "This Time of Night" from Low-Life, but leaning further in.
And then there is the album's most uncomfortable moment: a song about child abuse so unflinching that it makes Suzanne Vega's "Luka" and 10,000 Maniacs' "What's the Matter Here" sound like lullabies by comparison. No metaphor; no irony; just a direct, literal account. It does not fit the stated electronic-dance brief for Side 2; neither does much of the rest of it, honestly. Sometimes it is better not to announce what an album is going to be and let the music speak for itself.
Release, Marketing, and Reception
There's a single that tends to get bundled into the Brotherhood era simply by proximity: "State of the Nation," released just weeks before the album. It makes sense on the surface; the timing is close enough that they feel like siblings. But they're not quite the same story.
In 1986, New Order were quietly becoming royalty in the dance club scene, and "State of the Nation" reflected that. It hit #30 on the UK Singles Chart, topped the indie chart, and made serious noise on US dance floors. At that moment, it felt like the more significant release. The album single, "Bizarre Love Triangle," peaked lower on release at #56 in the UK, and didn't generate the commercial heat Qwest had been hoping for.
Here's the irony, and it's a good one: flip forward a few years, and the picture reverses completely. "Bizarre Love Triangle" became one of the defining songs of its decade: beloved by fans, critics, and a generation of producers who have covered or remixed it ever since. "State of the Nation," by contrast, quietly disappeared; it was dropped from setlists by 1987 and has rarely resurfaced. A song that looked like the bigger moment turned out to be the more forgettable one. These things have a way of sorting themselves out.
The album itself didn't help its own cause much. Peter Saville, who had been designing covers for the band since Joy Division, delivered something characteristically uncompromising for Brotherhood: a minimalist, textured image of a titanium-zinc alloy sheet. No band name; no album title; no faces. Just a cold, industrial surface. As a design object, it's genuinely striking, and as a fan, I'll admit I thought it was cool. As a piece of marketing in the US, where New Order was still building an audience, it's a problem. This is not David Bowie making an artistic statement that the world already knows how to receive. A casual record store browser had nothing to grab onto: no name, no image, no entry point. It rewards people who already know, and quietly baffles everyone else.
The album title didn't do much heavy lifting either. Brotherhood: nobody seems to know what it means or references, and the band isn’t much help. Gillian Gilbert has said she hates it; Peter Hook and Stephen Morris don't appear to have strong feelings either way; Bernard Sumner left no quotable opinion on the record. What's known is that the title survived not because anyone loved it, but because it was the least rejected option in the room: a deflating origin story for any album title, and a particularly odd one for a band with an integral female member. Brotherhood, intentional or not, is tone-deaf; it's one of those things that likely sailed past everyone at the time and reads differently now.
Commercially, the album reached #9 on the UK Albums Chart and topped the UK Independent Albums chart; in the US, it hit #117 on the Billboard 200 and performed solidly on college radio. Respectable, short of what Qwest had anticipated. The 12" remix of "Bizarre Love Triangle," loaded with vocoder vocals, heavy sequencers, and a synth architecture that sounds like a factory dreaming, made some waves in club circles but didn't translate to mainstream chart traction on release. It took a few more years for that version to find its moment.
Legacy
There's something fitting about an album designed to be flipped. In 2026, with a younger generation rediscovering vinyl and cassettes in the age of algorithms and curated playlists, that physical interaction means something again. Brotherhood is an album that asks something of you. It always was.
What nobody could have known at the time is that the album was on a slow burn: widely regarded now as the final chapter of New Order's golden era, the closing bracket on a run that began with Power, Corruption and Lies and continued through Low-Life. "Bizarre Love Triangle" alone makes the case; forty years on, it remains a fixture in DJ sets and consistently appears on definitive lists of the greatest dance songs of the 1980s.
Brotherhood: a title the band themselves never embraced, chosen because it was the least rejected option in the room.
But consider what it actually describes: three surviving members of Joy Division, still in a room together, still making music, six years after losing Ian Curtis. Three people who had shared something unrepeatable, carrying it forward under a different name. Viewed that way, Brotherhood isn't a lazy title. It might be the most honest thing on the record.
The cracks that would eventually split Peter Hook from the other three, acrimoniously, publicly, and in ways that are still unresolved, may already have been forming during these sessions. His bass playing was in top form, and complemented the beats and the synths. After this album, Bernard would assert more control in the production and even preside over remixes without other band members present. This would result in the bass being lower in the mix or being mixed out completely. The golden era was ending; the glue was beginning to loosen. Brotherhood was both a document of what the band was at their best, and an unwitting farewell to it.
They just didn't know it yet.
Before You Go...
Missed Last Week? Check out my post with Chris B. Writes and his beautiful poem, Alpenglow, and the song I made out of it.
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Nice piece - can it be 40 years!?! I’d include Technique in their golden period as well. From first time hearing State of the Nation at the Festival of the 10th Summer I’ve always thought it a weak song and glad it wasn’t on Brotherhood.
This is one of the best articles I have read since I joined Substack. I absolutely love it. I have mixed feelings about "Brotherhood." While I love "Bizarre Love Triangle," the rest of the album fails to deliver on the promise of "Power, Corruption & Lies" and "Low Life." Additionally, I had just seen the band live on a BAD night in Pittsburgh, and this concert held the distinction of being the worst concert I had seen (out of hundreds) until I saw Dylan and Bowie a decade later. Nevertheless, I still love this band, and I would travel anywhere to see them live, including to a show in L.A. last year. Thank you for such a wonderful piece.