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Tuesday
Mar192013

New Order Mocked Glam Bands

New Order, the 80s British band, once made a video mocking Glam. I didn't know this until I was randomly reading something about director Kathryn Bigelow (of Zero Dark Thirty and Point Break fame) and came across a paragraph that said something like "Bigelow directed a video for New Order. The video is a parody of hair metal." Well, naturally I had to investigate and I came across the video for "Touched By the Hand of God." The song is from the movie Salvation!


I don't know much about New Order, so I'm not ashamed to admit I've never seen this clip before. I guess New Order thought Glam bands were an easy target to mock or something. Anyway, here's the clip. Discuss.


Reader Comments (13)

1987 was the height of Glam - an electronic band from Manchester wanting noticed and having a laugh.
March 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterRed6ixx
Bands like this were the enemy back then. Would not have been caught dead listening to stuff like this. I lumped these guys in with the Duran Duran scene.

I am sure the glam schtick was a big improvement relative to their usual thing.
March 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterRita
this is an interesting topic. I started college in 1987. The college I went to had a large population of students who came from Connecticut and Long Island, and they were heavily into new wave music like New Order. I became really good friends with one of them, and we used to have long discussions about music, he being totally into new wave, and I being totally into metal. He explained to me that new wave fans by nature were very elitist not only against other forms of music, but against other bands within the new wave genre that they didn't like. In other words, whereas the metal community in the 80s was, for the most part, united within the genre, new wave fans couldn't even unite for the cause of new wave. So, it comes as no surprise that a band within an elitist genre would parody another genre in one of its videos.
March 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterBob
I've mulled over how to proceed with replying here...

Nice topic, first and foremost ! But seriously, all the band members listed "programming" as what they do in the band. Sooooo not GLAM !!

They did give us the rump shaker from back in the day BLUE MONDAY, which was nicely redone by the band Orgy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3e_nJRzCpBE

Lame song in the video to try and ape GLAM ~ touched by the hand of god ? Seriously ? Glad the director has come along ways since this hack attempt at trying to gain popularity by going against what is popular. Haters will hate, but true fans unite.
March 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterGNR
I ther up on my mouth twice.
March 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterBrian L
Not sure being snooty about those bands from then works now (unless there is some irony in it), or about using a random sample of one college chum to generalize to a genre or sub-genre. Elitism lurks in and across all musical categories, Bob. Oh no, said the country lover . . . that is Red Dirt. Not metal . . . said the rap lover. Not . . . you get the point.

New Order, and before them Joy Division, had an incredible impact on music. And their sound developed into the electronic sound found in the video (just look up earlier material or take a listen to Hook's bass playing throughout the band's career) from the late-70s JD sound up through this period (roughly 82-88).

The video, though, is spot on if a bit too earnest. Mocking the spectacle of metal videos at the time is too easy . . . now, so perhaps the jab is a bit raw given that they were doing it then. And, no, they didn't need to get noticed. They were already quite popular internationally (if not before, then certainly after, "Blue Monday" off of _Power, Corruption, and Lies_ from 83, which GnR references).

Yes, they aren't glam. But that doesn't mean it isn't music, even if parodying means being a "hater" and being a "true" fan means listening to only a certain type of music. Thank goodness none of that would imply being narrow-minded.

. . . and you know what? I started out like Rita. But, after listening to Nitzer Ebb, early and mid Depeche Mode, Sisters of Mercy, and the like, I came to respect--and even like--some "electronic" music. Fact is, some of that music is a lot more powerful and a lot less "electronic" than one would assume not having listened to it.

Not that you need to like it, mind you. It's just that you don't need to hate one genre to love another.
March 20, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterHim
Him, your points are all well-taken, but let's remember, we're talking about the context in which we all existed in 1987, not

2013. Of course, as we get older, most of us come to realize that elitism, as it applies to anything, is a bunch of

silliness, but that wasn't so clear back then to us, or probably even the members of New Order who were still relatively

young at the time.

Also, I should have clarified my point about elitism as I saw it back then. I certainly didn't mean to imply that elitism

only existed in new wave. Of course, almost every musical genre unfortunately comes with its inherent elitists, but I still

maintain that the type of elitism in new wave was quite different from the elitism in metal in 1987. Although I referenced

the explanation of one person in my previous comment, I personally witnessed what he was talking about all around me on that

college campus. New wave fans were much more quick to turn on one another than metal fans when their opinions about bands

within the genre differed.

What does all this mean?...Well, nothing really. Now that I'm in my mid 40s, I understand that in the grand scheme of things,

New Order mocking glam in a 26-year-old video has no significance on my life in 2013, but in 1987 it would have ticked me off.
March 20, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterBob
New Order is one of those bands that never really got the credit they deserverd, really good band.

And let's face it, around that time, most of the bands in the late 80's werent original at all in their look.
March 20, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterLiam
I don't know who the singer ripped off more, Bon Jovi or Poison? I'm gonna give the nod to Bon Jovi....LOL. Clever video
March 20, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterGary
All great points Bob. I see your POV. And I respect it too.

In my original post, I was going to go a bit further in suggesting that some of that style of parody was also culturally based (not genre derived) and has popped up every now and again in other English bands (Stone Roses,Oasis, etc.). Perhaps I should have, but it felt like it was going a bit far afield.

Like I said, great post Bob.
March 21, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterHim
Really cool topic and discussion here. At that point in my life, I ran with 3 crowds -- The Hair Metallerz of my Hometown and The Punks and New Wavers, a scene that actually kind of converged, in Art School and when I had my first jobs in D.C. and Baltimore.

I'd see Priest, L.A. Guns, Lizzie Borden or G'n'R one minute and be pogoin' to this sh*t the next in clubs. It's only once I got to NYC that I concentrated on Hair Metal, having found Heaven at The Cat Club.
March 27, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterMetalboy!
Oh, and the video is one of the coolest I've ever seen.
March 27, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterMetalboy!
It's absolutely precious that anyone would get worked up over a gentle parody of the most easily parody-able genre in the history of rock. (2nd easiest to parody is if course New Wave- no one got out of the 80s without at least one horrendous haircut.
July 31, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterJimbo

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