Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. Age of Consent
2. We All Stand
3. Village
4. 586
5. Your Silent Face
6. Ultraviolence
7. Ecstacy
8. Leave Me Alone

Disc 2:

1. Blue Monday [*]
2. Beach [*]
3. Confusion [Alternate Version][*]
4. Thieves Like Us [*]
5. Lonesome Tonight [*]
6. Murder [*]
7. Thieves Like Us [*][Instrumental]
8. Confusion [*][Instrumental]

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #46496 in Music
• Released on: 2008-11-11
• Number of discs: 2
• Formats: Collector's Edition, Original recording remastered

Album Description
Digitally remastered and expanded two CD edition of this 1983 album from the Manchester quartet, one of the most successful and consistent bands of the '80s and beyond. After the suicide of vocalist, Ian Curtis, the three surviving members of Joy Division regrouped under the band name New Order, adding Gillian Gilbert on keyboards. The rest, as they say, is history. Disc One in this package contains the original album in its digitally remastered glory. Disc Two is filled with eight non-album singles, B-sides and remixes. This is as great as it gets! Rhino UK. 2008.

Amazon.com essential recording
Power, Corruption & Lies established New Order's identity separate from its previous incarnation as Joy Division. Containing "Blue Monday," one of the most sacredly important dance songs of all time, this album truly stands not only as New Order's most defining moment but perhaps as the most standard-setting moment in alternative dance. Yet as definitive as they may be, New Order have outsmarted any copycats. Owing in substantial part to Peter Hook's prominent and melodic bass lines, New Order's songs have always aspired to a complexity that maintains the band's timelessness. Rarely formulaic, New Order's songs are seldom overwhelmed by a four-on-the-floor throb. But interesting rhythms are just one facet of this musical diamond. Their foreboding, grim, and often just plain heartbreaking lyrics present a contradiction to most dance-pop songs, whose lyrics are almost always uplifting or even evangelical. With this album, New Order cut a path for themselves that was rarely, if ever, explored by other artists. --Beth Bessmer

Customer Reviews

Loaded with errors
The MUSIC on these New Order reissues get a 5/5, easily. However, there were far too many egregious mistakes made in the creation of the discs themselves to give them a pass. Only the first discs were re-mastered though they still have some problems, it is the bonus discs that are an absolute mess.

Warner Music/Rhino know about these problems, but there is yet no word on any forthcoming fixes. So I'd hold off until these issues are addressed.

Noted below are the specific problems with the PC&L reissue:

1, Age of consent
2, We all stand
3, The village
4, 586 ("abrupt ending", "drops the last 4 bass notes")
5, Your silent face
6, Ultraviolence
7, Ecstasy
8, Leave me alone

Power, Corruption and Lies - bonus disc:
1, Blue Monday (L/R pans 0:07[sudden], and between 0:19 and 2:24. At 2:24 it pans back again. Unconfirmed whether this is on the original 12 inch)
2, The Beach
3, Confusion - Clicks at 4:04 and 6:00 (Left channel click at 8:06)
4, Thieves like us
5, Lonesome Tonight (clicks at 0:40 and 0:59)
6, Murder - "Clicks" at 0:35, 1:08, 1:29, 1:43, 2:03, 2:31, 2:43, 2:50, 3:00, 3:19, 3:26
7, Thieves like us (instrumental) (click at 1:03 )
8, Confusion (instrumental)

the perfect mix
Whenever someone complains that electronic music is totally void of warmth or realism, I just point to this album. New Order play electronic music with the urgent and manic shifts of rock. Bernards vocals are earnest yet detatched, with guitar work that is jagged, random and sparse; Gillian and Stephen's percussion and synth sequences are both lively and rigid, an up-beat/down-march; Peter's basslines are fluid yet kinetic. This is a work of ironic friction. The warmth and humanity flow thru the restrained and urgent detatchment. The whole album sounds like a friend that wants to say something but can't, hiding it behind his/her eyes.
I would consider Power, Corruption & Lies an artistic/pop masterpiece in the true sense. The electronic and post-punk meanderings are only the charms that envelope the wonderfully angular pop sense that Bernard brings to his lyrics. Everything is so vague and pretty; it's like the album cover...just a random slice of still-life, full of colour and restraint. Tracks like 'Your Silent Face' or '5-8-6' explode with edgy, manic shades of light, sorta like impressionism via expressionism.
You won't be let down by this album. With the band themselves producing it, it's a natural workout of rock and electronics, perfectly blended together to make a classic.

blows all their peers away
Let me just clear something up: New Order are not, nor have they ever been, a new wave synth-pop band. Their music inspired a lot of it, yes, and their most famous songs ('Bizarre Love Triangle', 'Blue Monday') were synth pop but the timelessness, power, emotion and innovation of their music has them being recognized now as easily one of the most respected, influential and popular bands of all time. Too much to be lumped in with some trendy garbage of the era. Their albums are modern classics.

It's too bad the sleeve for this album lost its magic in translation to cd format. The vinyl version of this album is stunning.

The music catches them wanting to ditch the heavy, stylized gloom of their Joy Division work and 'Movement'. Yet, they hadn't fully committed to making flat-out pop music like on every subsequent release. So every song bubbles with the sound of a psychedelic post-punk band with subtle programming echoing the New York City hip-hop and electro at the time. The lyrics are borderline incomprehensible, but they work because against the odds they evoke strong emotions, more so then on any other New Order album. The music is still overwhelmingly sad and joyous at the same time, a New Order trademark.

There are two very different versions of this album. The U.S. Warner release includes 'Blue Monday' and 'The Beach'. My problem with this version is that after the song 'Leave Me Alone' the album should just end, it's a natural and beautiful ending for the album, instead it jumps into a bouncy 7-minute electro workout 'The Beach'. It's just wrong!