The first NO album I got was Brotherhood in summer '87 I think, from a friend whose mother worked in Zürich. It had a sticker with band and album name on and the friend bought herself a leather jacket, so I thought how cool it would be if I got to see them wearing that jacket and stuck that sticker on it.
The first one I actually bought was Lowlife, my mother took that same friend and me to Graz for her workers union trip the following spring.
Unknown Pleasures preceeded them all though, I manged to get it at a record fair in Zagreb in spring '87.

Edit: can't believe I wrote Movement instead of Brotherhood?

Edited by user 16 August 2012 11:29:51(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Movement, vinyl.

Power Corruption & Lies when it came out in 1983.

I'd bought Ceremony /EGG / Temptation / Blue Monday but for some reason I'd skipped Movement, which I bought in 1984.

I heard True Faith on a Top 40 US radio station in the late summer of 1987 and captured most of the song on a cassette tape that happened to be in my stereo. It was completely different from anything else I had every heard. Hearing it for the first time was like being blind and suddenly having the gift of vision- it changed my whole perception of music in an instant. I started scouring the local record stores for any release with this song in it. In the meantime I played my cassette-recorded version probably hundreds of times. None of the record stores that I had access to carried a good selection of singles but I eventually found the double cassette version of Substance (I also bought The Smiths - Strangeways Here We Come at the same time since I was intrigued by its cover). Within a few months I bought PC&L, Lowlife and Brotherhood as well. I never listened to Top 40 radio again.

Technique

First purchase any New Order was Substance 1987 on cassette. First non compilation album was Low Life.

Substance was my first NO album, though I was late on board and didn't pick it up until the early 90's though it was one of the first CD's I ever bought.

Republic after hearing regret on Z100 radio station in NYC

PCL, cassette and I still have it tucked away in a box. I get it out every couple of years to look at it!

The best of after hearing Crystal on the radio, then a month later I got Low-life and Get Ready, the rest soon followed!

What a Stooge!

Substance. BLue Monday had intrigued me, Confusion had confused me - it still grows on me every time I play that tune, just slowly gets better and better, in the same way as Coffee and TV by Blur does. I bought a 12" of Thieves Like Us in a charity 2nd hand bookshop that had a few records in as well. Loved it.

True Faith I thought was fantastic too. So I guess it was in 1987 that I bought Substance, on double cassette.

New Order forever.