Happy Birthday Ian Curtis

Using the kitchen washing line to hang himself, Ian Curtis ended a life which some had considered was full of potential and promise. He was the lead-singer for the up and coming new wave of post-punk rock bands, Joy Division from the UK. A band that was on the brink of success with an upcoming tour of America that would only further perpetuate their popularity, tragically lost their lead singer after his life-long battle with depression and severe epilepsy.

Joy Division, named after a prostitution wing in a Nazi concentration camp from the novel 'The House of Dolls', evolved from the dregs of British punk and helped revolutionize the face of the ever-evolving music scene at the time. Curtis killed himself on the eve of their American tour, at the tender age of 23.

Unfortunately Curtis' tale is too sad for me to re-tell. He is one of my favourite lyricists ever and I guess the best way for anyone to understand his decision is to read his lyrics. Those goddamn lyrics.

I remember hearing of Joy Division for the first time after I had saved enough pocket money to buy the 'The Crow' soundtrack, since it was my favourite movie as a young teenager. I would constantly replay the song 'Dead Souls', which was actually a cover by Nine Inch Nails and I eventually managed to track down Joy Division. As an angsty teenager, his lyrics were as bleak and as emotionally decaying as my attitude but in a way I felt strangely empowered by the music and the emptiness that overwhelmed me.

Today, I still can't listen to certain Joy Division tracks if I'm not in the right mood - in those times, I instead prefer to listen to the band they became after Curtis' death, New Order. But that still doesn't mean they're not one of my favourite bands of all time; a band so...genuine seems hard to come by these days and it's only in my later twenties that I have come to truly love and appreciate them for real. I even love Curtis' strange dancing which he said was influenced by his seizures - movements he made when he was lost in the music.

The movie 'Control' is a mildly accurate depiction of his life leading up to his death - but it's not a movie I care to revisit any time soon as the inevitable ending scene left me weary and dejected for days after watching it.

You would have been 56 years old today.