DURING a titanic Temptation, Bernard Sumner is briefly bathed in light; rock royalty in a golden crown.
Not that Barney would thank you for such a grandiose metaphor. He’s wearing the look of mild embarrassment when brandishing the mic that he has done for most of his band’s three decades in power.
And, some key moments aside, he also sports an irritable air this evening, grumpy at the sound quality that threatens the latest gig on this comeback tour of sorts.
Not that he’s been one for forcing his vocal high in the mix, mind. That this band have consistently broken boundaries with a singer boasting far from textbook tonsils and the occasional way with a dodgy lyric makes their achievements all the more remarkable.
One of the seminal bands of the eighties, they took guitars and drenched them in club culture, pioneering electro pop with the drums and keyboards pairing of Stephen Morris – famous line: “I’ve always wanted to be a drum machine” – and Gillian Gilbert.
The notable absence from that inventive original line-up is Peter Hook, he of the trademark low-slung bass and stage schtick nicked straight from the A-Z of classic rock god poses. Sadly, he’s also now known for the ruck that means he’s not here.
In his place is new bassist Tom Chapman, displaying an impressive ability to fill some very large boots.
And it’s during the majestic Temptation, when he’s leading the crowd-clapping homage to the sweeping grandeur of this song, that you realise he’s the luckiest fan in the land of pop.
This is at the end, followed only by a daunting Blue Monday and then they’re gone, Barney’s special guitar packed away and not a sniff of their first incarnation’s most famous song, Love Will Tear Us Apart, which they’ve trotted out previously on this tour.
No worries, there were other fine moments, not least one from the Joy Division-era in the shape of Ceremony, the song that launched New Order after the death of Ian Curtis. It came after Crystal and a sprightly Regret and before Bizarre Love Triangle and the sudden sense of liberty that comes with True Faith.
Some of this, if not quite all, was still very magical indeed.
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