Mojo - The Music Magazine

This Good Friday, Manchester hosts a charity event to raise relief funds for victims of the Japanese earthquake. Billed as 'FAC 51 The Haçienda Presents From Manchester To Japan With Love x', it's being held at city centre venue Sankeys. Among those taking part are Basement Jaxx, Delphic, 808 State, Justin Robertson, Dave Haslam, Rowetta and Peter Hook. Tickets cost £15; you can also donate at www.justgiving.com/hacienda.

Hooky will also be playing Joy Division's album Closer with his new band The Light on May 18 - the anniversary of Ian Curtis' death - and 19, at his club The Factory. These shows are presented in association with mental health charity Mind and The Keith Bennett Appeal, and will be recorded for vinyl-only release later in the year. The Light continue their tour of Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures in Britain, Europe and Ireland this month until June.

Hooky's also got new EP 1102 / 2011 coming on May 9 on his label Hacienda Records; it will feature the previously unrecorded Joy Division track Pictures In My Mind (sung by Hook) plus new versions of the Joy Division tracks Atmosphere, Insight and New Dawn Fades - sung by ex-Happy Mondays vocalist Rowetta.

So Hooky - Rowetta singing Atmosphere?
Peter Hook: "I don't think I really have to justify that. The reason for it was that everybody who loves Rowetta has been asking us to record her. I was reluctant to do it, 'cos all I'm doing is giving the miserable f**kers more ammunition to have a f**king go at me. The thing that swung me, is that I think Rowetta does give something different to the songs. Rowetta sings them so well, and brings a different feel and a different kind of melancholy, and I think if people want to hear it, let them hear it. I'm happy to do that for Rowetta because I f**king love her. She works so hard and she's so nice about what she does - she's so unlike the way that most people act in this business. I wouldn't have the ego to record myself singing those songs."

What about the new track, Pictures?
"Pictures is different, Pictures is a lost track, never finished. Someone brought it to my attention. The tape was stolen off Rob Gretton. So when I heard it I thought, we should just finish that. My son Jack insisted we do it. He said, 'I thought you said that Ian Curtis said you should finish all your tracks?' 'Cos Ian always said, 'finish them all, even if you don't like it, because somebody will love it.'"

What's it like revisiting Closer?
"I must admit that has been a bit of a shocker. We were playing it the other day, and my god, that felt weird. So much weirder than Unknown Pleasures. But the songs sound wonderful. I was blown away, listening to The Eternal, Heart and Soul, Decades... Jesus. I have grown men crying. I was almost f**king crying. Ha ha! Very, very moving."

Will you tour it?
"It sounds quite trite, taking it out as a tour. I'm 55 right, my touring days are pretty much over, what happens is that I still love what I'm doing and if someone asks me to play somewhere, you consider it and you do it. I'm not selling anything, the LPs have been out for 30 years. And that's a great compliment, to be asked. Especially as I'm not with the others. If it was all three of us, with Gillian singing or summat, I could see why they'd want it."

Could that have happened?
"I was thinking about the other day, if I went to the band, as they were before we split up, and said, 'Hey lads, how about us doing an Unknown Pleasures gig?' I know for a fact that Bernard would just have laughed. You can't make people do what you want them to do. There's only one person you've got control over and that's your bloody self."

See www.peterhook.co.uk for more info.

Photo courtesy of Mark McNulty.