One Song - New Order's "Blue Monday"

Episode Date: February 1, 2024

On this special rerun, Diallo and Luxxury dig into the biggest selling 12 inch single of all-time: Blue Monday, by New Order. The guys break down how the song was created, its surprising disco influences, and one of the most nonchalant vocal performances ever recorded.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In communities across Canada, hourly Amazon employees can grow their skills and their paycheck by enrolling in free skills training programs for in-demand fields. Learn more at aboutamazon.ca. Hey, one song listeners, it's luxury, and I'm here with a quick message. I'm recording this right after returning from a writer's retreat where I'm working on a book about the history of musical borrowing, from sampling and rhythms to, of course, interpellation. There's going to be lots of footnotes, obscure drum. drum machines, you're going to love it. I'm really proud of it and excited to share it with you when it's done in the winter of 2025. That's right. Turns out writing a book takes a long time. Who knew? The other thing I'm working on is our Valentine's Day episode. Diallo and I are going to be talking about an artist

we love and a song that we love. It's Marvin Gaze, let's get it on. And you can hear that episode on Sirius XM on Valentine's Day, February 14th, and wherever you get your podcasts on the 15th. But now I want to share a one song that newer listeners may have missed. It's our Blue Monday episode. And it's one of my favorites. I hope you like it too. I'm actor, director, writer, and sometimes DJ Diallo Riddle. And I'm producer DJ and sometimes guy on TikTok who whispers interpolation.

Luxury. And this is one song. The show where we deconstruct and celebrate some of your favorite songs from the past 60 years in music history and tell you why they deserve one more listen. We promise you'll never hear these songs the same way again. D'all, how have you been? I've been going back and listening to Chuckie Booker Games, which is the song that Mark Morrison used for Return of the Mac.

Okay. And what's funny to me is that... Is it a sample? It's a sample, yeah. And first of all, the Chuckie Booker music video is insane. Like, it's got so many early 90s music video tropes. like girl standing by window while the curtain blows. Like, it's just got some really great 90.

Some great. But, like, I would encourage listeners to go back and discover Chuck E Booker's games because it is a phenomenal song. And it's one of those rare instances where the song that sampled it, sampled it only like three years later. Oh, wow. Like, it wasn't that much, like, it wasn't in the world for like 20 years, like it typically. It was like three years later.

I wonder, Chuck, I mean, did Chuckie Booker get paid? We're going to have to do some research and find it. out. What happened to my man, Chuckie Booker? I'm sure he's still out there singing. Hopefully he makes some money every time we play Return of the Mac. I hope so. Did you discover the original from the sample? I'll be honest. I knew, because in Atlanta, you know, Atlanta didn't play a lot of hip-hop on the radio in the 90s during the daytime. So we got slow jams. And Chucky Booker's games was like a big hit on, you know, R&B radio. Okay. So when Return of the Mac came out, yeah, most of us knew it was a sample, but like return of the Mac now is like this

famous song that you can play almost anywhere in the world. You know, you lie to me. You know, like, you can play that anywhere. Meanwhile, Chucky Booker's, you know, why you want to play your games on me. Not as famous. So I encourage everybody to find Chuckie Booker. I think he has an I instead of a Y at the end of Chuckie. Chuckie Booker games, you'll be like, oh, snap, I didn't know return on the Mac was a sample.

That's awesome. I can't wait to check that out. Hey, I'm not here to tell you what to do with your time. But I think we are ready to get this show started. Let's get this show started. Let's do it. I think we should. Well, today we have a song that holds a special place in my heart.

It is a song by an English synth pop band called New Order. And the song is Blue Monday. Amazing. Diallo, have I ever told you my New Order story slash my first day of seventh grade story? No, you haven't. I have to know more. Yeah. So here's the story.

This little kid with curly hair called Blake was at a new school. Marine Country Day School. Shout out to all my peeps in Marin County, California. I was the new kid. I didn't know anybody. And what did I do? I have thought about this moment for decades ever since it happened. And it has been referred to me by many of my since friends.

But knowing nobody, I stood up on a giant rock in the field. I put my hand to my forehead. And I started looking around as though I was on a ship looking for land. And that is literally what happened. on that first day of seventh grade because it was funny to me. That was like the moment that I knew I'd be a lifetime narcissist.

It was all happening in this only child's head, this entire fantasy, that this would be funny, that it would make sense, and that it would give me something to do while these other kids who knew each other, said, hey, welcome back to school. Hey, I like you. I like you. I didn't know anybody.

So that was my experience. First day of seventh grade. Oh boy. And it's very therapeutic to say this out loud to the world. we're here for your therapy oh my goodness it's cheaper than the real thing so here i am i'm in seventh grade and it's sort of that age or maybe the pop radio starts to become less of what you listen to i latched on to when this song came on i immediately latched on to this sound which was like nothing i'd heard before it was fast it was dancey but while it was sort of this electronic underpinning

it had this sort of punk rock on top and it had this singing vocal which was like not even that good It sounded like nothing else on the radio. And I want to play some of it for you. Can I start to build what that track sounds like? Well, let's listen to the drums. Right out the gate, right out of the bat. You have something which is a single instrument, just the kick drum, not even the entire drum set, but it's giving you this like signature.

This song is knowable in the first second and a half. It really is. And, you know, those are some iconic drums. When the 80s were having their real, you know, sort of comeback retro moment in the 2000s, I was a DJ. and I will say as a DJ, you love those kind of songs that start off with just the drums. Yes. Because it really, you know, it helps you find the tempo.

And it also, because there's nothing else there to clash with the music of the song going out, it really sounds like you can make that blend and transition really smooth. What's funny is that I knew this song when I was a kid too. And just like you, I was like kind of like a weirdo. Like all the kids in my school listened to, you know, R&B. there wasn't really a whole lot of hip hop being played on the radio back then um and i just you know like the kids knew that like i like well they thought i liked elvis i actually like the beetles you know they're like oh you're that kid who like elvis and i was like no to them it's the same

thing yeah yeah yeah and it's funny like i didn't know terms like punk i didn't even know really to me like if you'd ask you know me that year when this song came out i would have thought punk was like that really discordant doesn't make any like I would and if you told me synth pop I would have thought you might have a lisp or something it's none of these it was like black music and white music maybe because I was growing up in Atlanta um but it was like this was white music but it was like white music did like I love do you know what I mean like it was just like and it's funny you thought the vocals didn't sound I thought he had a great voice I like the fact that he sounded like very dispassionate you know he's like

how does it feel like nobody sings like that on the rb side of the point that he does do that particular moment like that. Just generally speaking, though, like Bernard's lyrics and his singing are just so off the cuff and irrelevant that they turn out to be like iconic and make the song. It's kind of like the Meg White drumming phenomenon. It's like it wouldn't work with anything else. You wouldn't want like a, you wouldn't want shock a con on top of that song. You know what's crazy is one of the very first CDs or tapes that I ever bought is a group

electronic which Bernard is in and getting away with it, which is a. song that's, you know, God, I freaking love that, that song. So that's sort of like singing, that style of singing, long before I knew who Joy Division or any of these other groups were. I just loved it. I thought it was like really cool. Totally, all of that. And we're going to get deep into the vocals in just a moment. Before we get into that, though, I want to talk a little more about the drums. What's really cool about this song is it's a melting pot of a whole lot of different influences. And one in particular, that New Order, by the way, have extensively talked about this. I have about five books and seen 12 interviews and there's literally a whole podcast.

So there's no sample stitching going on here. They have talked about how they literally decided to take the drumbeat from this song for that intro that you just heard. That's a cool fucking fact. I have never heard that song in my entire life. Donna Summer, Our Love, right? 1979. George and by the way, that sounds like that's like ready for a remix too. Just our love will last forever? Oh yeah. Just that little chunk, right? We got to put that to We do have a sky project. After the show, we'll... We're we're winking at each other.

We know exactly what we're doing next. And what's kind of interesting about that is that the Donna Summer original is a live drummer. And the way they got that, because a live drummer with one foot on the pedal can't do that, uh, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, unless you're John Bonham from from Led Zeppelin, but that's its own thing. So what they did was they have a delay paddle that makes that go

da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, those 16th notes. But what New Order did, these guys were absolute, wonderful nerds. They built their own equipment. They would buy the things right off the shelf that were brand new. They had one of the first DMXs, which is the drum machine that came before the 808, and everyone knows of it. And before, that's right, before DMX and DMX crew. And they programmed that beat. That's how they got it to do the thing that a drummer, a live drummer couldn't possibly do. And what's interesting about that is this is this is a moment where this band, this punk band, this post-punk band, formerly Joy Division, they become New Order when their singer commit suicide.

they decide to completely transform themselves and do the most punk thing imaginable, which is to borrow from non-punk music, borrow from dance music, use drum machines. These things are extremely uncool if you're like a diehard dyed in the wool punk rocker at this time. I think that's actually one of the lasting, you know, ingratiating things about punk is that, you know, they were always willing to throw out the rulebook, you know what I mean? And I feel like whether it's blondie deciding, you know, they were. were a punk band, but then one of their first big hits is Heart of Glass, which was originally called the disco song.

Yeah. So, like, I feel like it's that ability to throw out the rulebook. I mean, like, you know, it's the same way that like DJs were scratching records. And that was sort of like, oh, we're going to make an instrument out of the turntable. Like, it seems like the late 70s, early 80s was just a really exciting time to try new technology, try new technique and, you know, try some things on the techniques. 12. Shout out to DJs out there.

You saw that coming. Insider info. Insider joke. We're going to dig a little deeper into the background of the band and their influence a little later, but I got a question for you. Dialla,

were you a cool kid in seventh grade? Yeah, I'm afraid I was. You were? I was a bit of a jock. You're afraid you were. You know, people look to me whenever the wall was being thrown. You wouldn't have been my friend.

No, I was a nerd. Oh, you were. You weren't a jock. I fell for it. Hook line and sinker. You don't see this cool jacket that I have on. Like, I was clearly a big nerd who's trying to make up for his later life.

You could have been a sports guy who got converted. I was a sports guy who got converted. I had baseball cards. But that's not the same thing as a jock. That's not the same thing as a jock. That doesn't make you a jock. That does not make me a jock. I really walked right into that, didn't I?

They're not the same thing. When you are the card collector, you think you're as cool as the jock, though. It's not quite the same. That is the nerdiest thing I think I've ever heard. I was a jock because I collected little pieces of paper with pictures of athletes on them. We've got to be kind to our 13-year-old selves. It was my protective armor back then, thinking that I was part of this larger world because I had the baseball cards and knew the stats.

I came to the realization real quick. You know, one day while playing basketball in elementary school, even, I was just like, I'm not good at this. So I'm going to go another direction. Smart. I'm going to stick out this unclaimed territory over here. Well, that's what I did with music. That's literally, that's where this band and this song comes into play.

Yeah, I mean, I would argue that they sound like, I mean, that, you know, know, to mention the vocals again, he sounds like kind of a nerd. And I think it was like, nerds unite. Right, right. Right. You know, we as nerds heard that voice and we were like, I can know that. Yeah, this isn't like Simon Laban or Paul Younger or Shaka Khan. This guy's sounded cool. This guy's not a good singer. He's just a guy singing. There's a distinction. And the guy singing, that's what punk rock is. You know, I heard it is good singing, but also like, very like lecturely, like professorial. Okay. Maybe. So it's sort of talky. Talky, talky singing. Shrek shanga.

Shrekshanga. Well, let's pause there for a second. Back up a little bit and get into the band. Because New Order, as many people know, but not everybody. So if you're joining New Order party a little later, used to be Joy Division. And Joy Division, the band, Seminole post-punk band out of Manchester, late 70s. Two albums and then the lead singer committed suicide. It was like right before their U.S. tour, right? They're leaving the next day on the U.S. tour. And Ian Curtis puts on an Iggy Pop record and commits and and was watching like Looney Tunes cartoons

apparently right at least according to the film 24 hour party people which if you haven't seen that movie like you know after you finish this show go go watch that movie it's a great movie with with Steve and Coogan

I love that guy great great great movie a lot of fun even if you don't know that music but I'm sorry please continue no worries no I mean I want to know more about these nerds and in the wake of their singer dying is they're like what the hell do we do and the three of them that were left over gradually put the pieces back together, started writing new songs.

There's some really cute early footage where they don't even know who's singing, so all three of them try singing. There's some live footage when they go to New York, which is going to be important in a moment. They go tour in New York. They're called, they may or may not be called in order for the first few shows, but they don't even know who the singer is. They're figuring it out. But, okay, so they had some setbacks, obviously. They're done to their singer being a pretty big one. Yeah, that's a pretty big one.

But they regrouped. And not only did they reform, they added the drummer Stephen Morris' girlfriend, Gillian, on keyboards. They also... They didn't know that. Their keyboard is a girl? Jillian is Stephen Morris's wife now. They're still together all these years later. Oh, that's beautiful.

Yeah, and they've got tanks in their backyard. They're crazy. They have tanks? Yeah. I don't know why. For some reason, the drummer from New Order collects tanks. It's just something he likes. I'm still worried about them.

I see a lot of... That's true. A lot of militaristic stuff going on. Right. I mean, these guys are growing up in postwar like England. There's bombed out areas. I mean, this is like different from, like, in America, we didn't have bombs, like, in that building next to us kind of thing. So it's very interesting. They all grew up in the shadow of the war in a much more direct way.

Also, the era. These guys are a little older than us. But you're right. Their war obsession is really interesting to think about. It's clearly a big part of this band. I got to say one thing is I didn't know what they look like. Like, we've talked a lot about how the vocals made us think that they were like, you know, kindred spirit nerds with us. But I don't think I knew it at all.

what the band looked like. Like who, who were they? Was the whole no pictures thing intentional? Absolutely. It was the contrarianism goes all the way down to their record label factory, which is that movie 24-hour party people is about Tony Wilson. Their entire schick, if you will, was let's just do it differently, do it the way we want to. A big fuck you, by the way, to London, because they're in Manchester, so it's like a smaller town. So like the music industry, it's very centered in London. I think, I think mystery with like pop artists is so cool. like, I didn't, you know, like, Sheik went out of their way. Yeah.

To not have their faces at first on, like, albums. And Roxy Music did that. And Daft Punk did that. Right. You know, like, we didn't know what Daftunk looked like. Ghost Face Killer. When he first came out, the reason he was called the Ghost Face Killer and the Wute is because he was the one Wutee member who always had a mask on in every video.

Like, I feel like, we need more mystery. Yeah. I don't need to know. Who are you, Charlie Puth? I don't need to know. It makes it kind of more special. Yeah. And these guys didn't put their faces on album.

I'm kidding, Charlie. Oh, yeah. We love you, Charlie Poole. Maybe try a mask every now and then just to mix it up if you'd like. Not because you're ugly. You're pretty. Dead mouse, he might be. He's a handsome man.

Who knows it? Oh, he's handsome. I think so. That makes me angry then. Show your face, Dead Mouse. So we've talked about the mystery element of the band. One other thing I need to point out is we talk a lot about, we think a lot about between the two of us as disco fans, the whole disco demolition moment.

1979 disco sucks. Disco ends. Disco doesn't really end, as we all know. Disco just goes underground. And when a really important thing happens when New Order plays in New York at that show, I'm just referring to, they go out and they party and they go to all these New York nightclubs. And they are exposed to disco music. And it's not just the disco music. There's many forms of disco music.

There's sort of the Latin tinge. There's the black tinge. There's the gay tinge. They're going to gay nightclubs where the BPMs are crazy because Blue Monday is 130 BPM. And Sylvester is 130 BPM. Oh, yeah. There you go. And for my understanding of dance music history,

there is a BPM distinction happening in a lot of these clubs, especially in the late 70s. So they're going, they're getting these fast BPMs. Everyone's popping whatever ammo, I don't even know. And they're going crazy at 1.30. And they bring this home with them. They bring this idea home with them. They're like, we want to make a fast dance record inspired by their experiences in New York. So not only did they bring the BPMs back, they brought some of the Sylvester synth bass back.

And I'm going to play a little bit of that for you right now. So what we just heard was a programmed 16th note. bass pattern. Like a human can't play that so perfectly. And it's not happening on a base start. It's happening on the Moog synth. And it is evoking very, very closely, this. I mean, first off, everybody borrows and takes and is inspired by stuff. So I don't, but that, I have never heard that, I've never heard that relation before. And now I'm like, oh, you could, you could almost sing Blue Monday over. You totally could. And not only is that connection there, the Sylvester connection, but there's another track with a very similar sound on the bass,

on the synth bass, as well as the structure of the sound. And that's the song that at the time, New Order was also going to their own club, the hacienda, which had just opened in Manchester. Very important club. And this is one of the biggest hits at that club at the time. Do you know that track? I know, I know it. But what is it?

Classic Italo track by a Klein and MBO called Dirty Talk. Dirty Talk. Right, right. There's something I love. Can I tell you one of the things I love the most? I mean, like, clearly this is like the stuff that you and I, like, really, really like. But what is that clap? Like, what is that?

That's not like a snare. Is that just like a hand clap? So a lot of times to get that in the early days, they would literally program white noise on a synthesizer. And you could just hit a note that had been the filters and knobs had been manipulated in such a way. Instead of getting a pitch, you would just get a, ca. And Marauder does that too. That's so hard. That hand clap, no pun intended, it slaps.

It's a slappy clap. It's a slappy clap. Slappy clap. So, D'all, you asked me a moment ago about bass guitar, because what we just heard, that synth part isn't played on bass guitar. And as you know, Hooky from Joy Division and New Order is a bass player, famous for his very melodic bass parts. I didn't know his nickname was Hooky, apparently.

His name is Hooky. Peter Hook. Yeah. Peter Hooked. I did Peter Hook. I never Hook. Perfect, because he came up for the hook in the song. which he's playing on top of the baseline.

He's a bass player not playing a bass line, but actually a melodic part. And here it is. And just to get a little nerdy for a second, wow. That baseline, it's very EQ'd, so there's like a low,

high pass filter, so you don't hear a lot of low end. So it can be on top of the baseline. And there's also parts later in the song where there's another bass part that's kind of used as a solo. So there are parts of the song where we've got three bass things happening at once,

which is insane, but somehow works. Can I just say, The whole jangly guitar with like tons of echo on it almost never, almost never fails. You love it every time. And if you like that, you might like where it came from. It came from somewhere? Oh, yes, it did, my friend.

What is, is that Sergio Leone? Yep, that's a soundtrack to a Sergio Leone movie called Fistful of Dollars. Fistful of Dollars, yeah. And that is, that's an Ennio Morricone track. Yeah, Morricone. Yeah. I, sorry, that's a few dollars more from the trilogy, though. This is part of the trilogy.

Right. What's crazy about that is the second you started playing the spaghetti Western song, I knew what was going to happen. And I was like, there's a new order call back in here. Like, you know, that's insane. And by the way, that was only the spaghetti Westerns given when they came out, that's only like 10 years old. You're right. By about the time that they're using it. It's like if I, it's like if you and I took something from like Superman versus Batman.

No, it's not even that long ago. It's like 10 years ago. Hooky was just happened to be watching. He tells the story. I will not call him Hooky. I don't have that relationship with Peter Hook. It's Hooky. It's Barney.

It's Steve and it's Jillian. Oh, wait, Bernard. It goes by Barney. He goes by Barney. He looks, it is a radio show, but his disappointed look on Dalla's face. Never meet your heroes.

If I had known they were Barney and Hooky, I would have turned this radio station off. British do that and they call sandwiches like Sammy's. They're so silly. They're so silly those Brits. So Blue Monday spent 38 weeks in the top 75, and has been dubbed a synth pop classic. Wow. When you said the 575, it really blew my mind. In some of those weeks, it was at number one. Okay. It wasn't like, said it at 74 for 30 weeks.

But you really got to spread it out across the two-thirds of an annum. Yes. And by the way, global hit. You know, like you said, number one 12-inch of all time. Maybe we should talk about that. It is the number one 12-inch single of all time to this day, which is kind of crazy. Especially because there's a factoid that I've seen reported 30 different. ways where they actually lost money on every copy because they printed it as a die cut. It looks like a floppy disk. It's a nice 12 inch. It looks like a floppy disk. And they had like a special machine to cut out holes in the cardboard. So they lost money. It's a piece of art. It's a piece of art. And yet somehow it always ends up in the dollar bins when you find that one record

store in your town that hasn't been gone out of business. Exactly. Exactly. We're going to get into more about this song's production a little later in the show. Plus, I'm going to talk about how this song not only influenced me as a music fan, but as a music maker. All that coming up after the break, stay tuned. Welcome back to one song. Before the break, we pulled apart the bass guitar and synth from New Orders Blue Monday to examine the band's revolutionary sound. Let's go even further into the mix. Let's do that.

Do a deep dive. Right. You know, let's go even further into the mix. Already talked about how these guys pioneered bringing dance beats into post-punk music and pop music, frankly, because these, This track hit the pop charts. It was, as we saw, 75 in the top 75 for 38 weeks. But people were buying this and people were dancing to it big time. And it was a revolution in certain quarters that didn't necessarily have

130 BPM dance tracks before this. One thing they were also a pioneer in is they were early to the sampling game. I didn't know that. I didn't know that they sampled at all. There is a sample in this song. They had just gotten a very early prototype, an early example of an emulator, like a very early sampling device. I don't even know how many seconds of sampling time. It was probably like two seconds and maybe eight bit, very low resolution. But they used it on this track. And I'm going to show

you the part they used. Okay. I'm going to play that in the mix for you. Just in case you know that one? You know what that is? Not only. I was going to say when you were playing some of the parts earlier that I was waiting for you to tell me that the keyboardist actually was playing that. Okay. She is. Okay. So that's so. But what about the choir? But the choir. But the choir? yeah that's not that's not no and as soon as i play the source he'll be like oh yeah i got that and here it is to recognize that that's craftwork my friend that is uranium by craftwork and they were one of the first i love that craftwork was making songs i mean like granted some of those craftwork songs completely work in the clubs but some of those weirder craft work songs like like who listening to that

song was like oh this is definitely gonna rock the car this is hell yeah like we did hey we're not finished guys we need that drone we need some of that drone sound Yeah, that's from their radio activity from 1975. And they grabbed a copy of that through it in their sampler and just in the spirit of experimentation, through it in the mix. Now, of course, it is an important part of the song to this day, but it's something that you may not have noticed otherwise. Oh, I think we should actually hear a little bit of its use in the song, in the mix. Here we go, in the mix. Oh, by the way, you just singing that made me think what were a little bit of a foreshadowing when we get to the actual vocal stems and talk about the lyrics.

But what did you just sing? You make me feel? How does it feel? Oh my gosh. Okay, revelations are happening on my- Get hooky on the phone. Get hooky on the phone. Get Barney on the phone.

Get Barney and Barney on the horn. Barney, I need a Sammy. I feel like a cigar-chopping like producer. Hey, I need hooky and Barney. Get him on the horn. Get him on the horn. All right. That's, I mean, this is insane.

It's crazy. It's crazy town USA. This is like, you know, when you're standing at one of those paintings and like, it's a whole bunch of different pictures, but then when you take a step back, it looks like Barack Obama's face. Like, this is incredible to see all these parties come together. That is a great analogy. That's awesome.

That's right. Absolutely true. And it's getting chills hearing all this stuff come together, though. Right. You know, what's really ironic about this song is all of the effort, all of these new toys and new technologies. All these parts. I haven't even gotten to the part where they like programmed something. It took them all night long and then it was wrong and then they kept it.

There's a lot going on. That's insane. The irony of it, though, is they intended for this song to save them labor because they despised doing encores. When they were playing in New York, I was just mentioning before, they would do 27-minute shows and then leave the stage and it would cause a riot. And it got to the point where their manager was like, could you guys like come up with one more song, please? Wait, why was it causing a riot when they were- Because people paid money to see them and they leave after less than a half an hour. They wouldn't even do the encore. The encore is like this, you know, whatever. The history of

encores is, oh, it's a surprise they're coming back. But of course, it's the expected thing. And that voice is a character I'm working on called Lamar. Lamar's going to get his own spin-off. So their idea was like they would just push a button and sort of play this song. And that way they wouldn't have to put it in a solid 30 minutes. A thousand percent, right. This was yet another up yours to the man that they would have a song that would be a push button and walk off the stage kind of situation.

And then it turned out to be this track that they were like, wait, this is actually really good. I think we have a hit on our hands. And then it turns out to be the number one. That's always the way. It's always the way. Blur is like, blur is disappointed with their reception in the United States. And they're like, everything over there is grunge. And so they make a little two-minute song called Song 2 to make fun of American Grunge.

And then, of course, that becomes the biggest blur song of all time. That's always how it is. You're absolutely right. Well, this was... You've got to be comfortable and kind of relax and not taking it too seriously, I think, sometimes in hard to really stumble upon what you're capable of. Well, this effortless throwaway backfired on them big time because they put all this time and effort into it and they created a monster hit.

Monster hit. So we've been teasing the iconic vocal from this track this whole episode. So we're finally going to play it for you. These are the isolated vocals from Blue Monday by New Order. How does it feel to treat me like you do when you've laid your hands upon me. I thought I was mistaken. I thought I'd heard your words. tell me how do I feel

tell me now how do I feel wow I didn't know that we were using auto tune back then that's a vocoder and they had originally wanted for the whole thing to be that robot voice thing and then they just couldn't quite get

to where they were happy with it so they mixed it in and that's why it's got that kind of cool play I was going to say it's weird to hear the isolated vocals the isolated vocals because it actually sounds higher in register than I'm using

to hearing it in my ears in the mix. Does that make sense? In the mix, it sounds like a deeper voice. It sounds like, oh. I think you're right. That's an interesting thing you noticed where the context of the music kind of creates an environment

or the vocal, because everything else is so hard and boom-dink-p-like, it's so intense that his vocal kind of benefits from that. But on its own, it's a little bit... On its own, it feels a little bit higher. and yeah, I know it's not auto tune. It's a vocoder, but it's like,

there's more going on with that vocal. It's not like a, just a clean vocal. Like there's, there's doubling going on and. Imperfection. There's imperfection. And I kind of like it when it goes extra roboty at the very end of that. Oh, me too. That part's great.

Yeah, I like that texture. There's kind of like a phasey thing on it, which I hadn't really noticed before, like a phase filter on top of it, which is very, like when you hear it isolated, that literally could be an a cappella in a daft punk song. I was just thinking that. Right? Doesn't that feel like something that DaFunk would use?

It's usually those, it's those same characteristics. It could be like a Stardust music sounds better with you. It's how they treat the vocals with the same things. It's a real vocal, it's a vocoder, and some phasing. They've the same, you know, checklist. You gotta have all three. You got to have all three. You mentioned earlier that there's like some wonkiness, some timing that may be off in the song.

Yeah, it's so funny whenever I think about like how they put the song together because it really brought out another side of these guys. Like they got really nerdy. they would go home and they would learn these manuals. By the way, these are early proto, you know, these machines are hard to operate. Yeah, yeah. And they just, like, sat down and looked at these 500-page manuals

and learned how to use Oberheim DMX drum machines. And learn out a sequence. That's another thing where they would use the drum machine pattern to sequence the synth. That is like a revolutionary concept. They're in the middle of Manchester. There's no internet. There's a YouTube.

They're figuring this stuff out for themselves. And one thing that happened a few times is they would program something and then it would get destroyed or it would get lost. or it would be wrong. So there's this one part of the song where there's a sequence that's wrong. But when they heard it in the mix, they were like,

that's kind of like, let's kind of like, let's leave it in. So I'll play that for you now. I'll play it for you now isolated. And then you'll be like, oh, it sounds all right. But in the mix, it's like, what is happening?

Sounds weird, but okay. It sounds definitely sounds weird. It doesn't sound crazy. That, that, that, that, that sounds like it didn't quite come in at the right time, right? Well, here it is in the mix. what's funny is that is that keyboard that goes that's clearly well lined up

with his vocal the other part sounds almost like a half idea that they were like well we'll just bury this a little bit down in the mix well it would be it would sound right on with the rest of the sequencing because it's this little it's a pattern that if it was like lined up correctly would just feel normal and it would align with what the bass line

is doing and where the chords are going but it's off by like a 16th note or something hear it yeah and it's like they couldn't they probably could have like taken five hours to reprogram everything to get it right but they're just like actually this is kind of cool let's leave in because it's not like nowadays where like it's really it's a lot easier to change things now exactly versus back then right now we could look at the screen in ableton and like nudge you'd know the yeah the segment and move it over here at the end but back then you had to like start from zero start from scratch they're like just leave it it's like this is bar 58 and like there's so much going on to like get the exactitude

of what you're sequencing and programming, and there's no YouTube to help you. Of course. And by the way, sometimes when things are wrong, like, you know, I feel like your brain kind of fixes them a little bit or just things,

oh, that's where that's supposed to go. Right. I feel like, you know, hip hop producers like Dilla and Timbalin have always made use of the idea of things not landing exactly where you expect them. Right. So that they,

so it sounds new and there's like some tension there. Right. And it sounds new as a big part of it too. It's like, I haven't heard this before. let's see if we can't make it work and add to the vocabulary. So a little earlier we were talking about how this song made a big impression on me as a baby luxury in seventh grade. But as we've been talking about it, and as I've been listening back to the stems,

it's still so fresh, first of all. I've been hearing this song for 40 years. But it's reminding me of another seminal moment in my life when I started actually making music, when I started becoming a songwriter myself. What's funny is that when I started making songs, you would never recognize luxury at the beginning. Those first demo tapes or whatever what I was making. It was all this like riff rock stoner stuff.

It was like Kaias are. They're this stoner rock band who later became Queens of the Stone Age. The lead singer did, Josh Hami. It was his first entity. And it was just a slow, sludgy, black Sabbath. Stoner rock, really slow tempos. Like tuning down to sea. So everything's like, rumble.

And I love that. And that's what I was making. And I was talking to my friend Summer, shout out to Summer Berks. she gave me a couple of like, she listened to myself. She's like, I think what it needs. She was basically suggesting that I kind of lighten the mood a little bit and be more like me, who I am. And we were talking and eventually clicked that I wanted to try using some machines.

I started thinking about New Order and the stuff that I really genuinely loved from a little earlier in my life. And I'll never forget the time. I went to rehearsal space back when I was like, had my first songs and I was looking for a band. And I would just bring a guitar. and like a drum machine and I remember being in the room playing the drum machine coming out through the giant PA monitors and playing guitar and singing and being like this is so satisfying the sound

of machine and man and it's like I'm imperfect my guitar playing is not that great my songs are a bit like you know I'm I'm a new songwriter there's nothing polished about this at all yeah yeah this is raw this is rough but underneath it there is a steady tempo that is locking everything in and kind of making it fun, making it danceable. And that was really the origin. I should say the new order that I was hearing come through the speakers that was my music, but I could hear where it came from. I could hear the new order being like 90% of the sound I was going for. Can I just weigh in on then say that I think that I think dance music is in some ways very pure. And if you think about the popularity of rock and roll taking off, like people used to play rock at,

sock-ops so that people could dance, you know? And for most of its history, hip-hop was, you know, dance music. It didn't mean that, like, that was the first goal of it, but you could usually move to hip-hop. I think that's one of the reasons why sometimes when I hear some of the more, let's just say, emo hip-hop of right now, I'm like, damn, how could you ever dance to this? Like, I kind of want to get back to the groove. And even when you said earlier today, that disco sort of ended after Kamiski Park. I think it ended as like a genre that record labels were into. But look at off the wall and thriller.

Those are a disco record. I feel like black audiences never gave up on disco. Disco just sort of moved into the 80s. That's right. Because off the walls, it's a record. Hip-hop, right? Yeah, and hip-hop, like, you know, Sugar Hill Gang, that was disco. So in some ways, disco didn't go away.

It just continued to evolve. And I think that what you're saying is very, true bands like New Order and again I was the only black kid at my all black school in elementary school listening to New Order and Pet Shop Boys and Human League and all these different groups but I think the reason why I was into them more than the American rock bands was because the British understood yeah like people want to dance people want that groove right you know and I think all these British groups they didn't forsake the groove no the dancing this is at the core of all that stuff yeah absolutely it's not guitar driven it's

still drum-driven music. Right. And of course, you know, fine, we can make some, we can go back in time and find some rock bands

that have some dancingness to them. But essentially, you know, there is a bodiness to the live element of rock music, but it's kind of aggressive and it's like slam dancing.

And, you know, it is a cathartic thing, but it's not like, rhythmic and, and like, you know, sexy. Yeah. I think that the same way

that a lot of live drummers were coming at drum machines, you know, they were like, oh, I got to stand out, I got to be Keith Moon, you know, but there was something

about that drum machine and I grew up in the south where we had like you know we had Miami bass and we had you know uh planet rod by Africa Mubato which also samples craftwork uh yes it does all that stuff interpolates the dance yeah the dance was very important I'm so sorry I had to give you an interpolation no no no listen you it's my brand it's my brand it's my brand I get it well Diallo I am so glad we got to talk about new order today because it's just a personal my personal connection to the band to this song is so deep in ways that I didn't even realize until we were halfway through this talking about it just now. Like the epiphanies were happening live on air.

I was learning live on air. I didn't know half as much that I thought I knew about this song. And I loved hearing about your experiences with the band and the song too. I think all in all, this may be the greatest episode ever taped of a podcast or radio show ever made. Well, it's definitely going to be in the top 75. It's in one of the 38 in the top 75. So that was Blue Monday by New Order. Now it's time for a segment that we call DJ Challenge.

Luxury and I will each come up with five songs for a secret scenario. We each selected before the show. I love this game. And by the way, I am a DJ. I am also sometimes a DJ. Okay. I'm going to go first. I am, by the way, seeing this for the first time.

So the secret scenario you selected for me, this is news to me. We just don't even know. I don't even know. Here's the DJ Challenge. You get a phone call. You have to DJ a party for, okay, it's 2005. had to DJ party for Prince. Oh my God.

Are you insane? I would slam the phone down and cry and run to the next city. They're going to out of love. They're going to sweeten the deal. Just to be clear, Prince is one of my most idly idols of all time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And my worship for him is terrifying me. That's what's happening here.

Because how am I going to please? How am I going to please Prince? I mean, like, he famously will walk out of the party if a DJ plays a Prince song. And I can picture this because I've been to please. Paisley Park. So I can picture the room where this would be happening. I could picture that's the setup in the area away from where the costumes, well, currently are. I don't think they would have been there when he was alive. But now there's all the costumes from the other eras. No, you got it. You have to play something. I'm going to play something. I'm going to play. Oh,

I know exactly what it is. Okay. What are you going to play? I'm going to play Jonny Mitchell. Because Prince is a huge Johnny Mitchell fan. You're going to play album cuts, I assume. I'm going to play. Because that's the other thing hard about Prince, he's not like somebody who's just casually into me. Like, he knows, he knows, he knows music. He's deep. He's deep. He's, he's you know. I'm going to play, or maybe I could play Mavis Staples because I just learned that he was obsessed with that. I think that's a safe bet.

Yeah. I think if it was me, I'd probably go like, you know, early 70s, early 70s funk. Yeah. See,

that's why I was so excited when I had the Joni Mitchell moment because I was like, oh, that would be not expected. Uh-huh. But it's also not danceable and it would clear the dance floor and he'd be irritated. What if I, I mean, I could be risky.

Yeah. I could be risky and play one of my favorite mixes of his own songs. I do love the long version of pop life from around the world in a day. I do too. At baseline. Mm-g-gunk-git-com-k-c-c-c-c-c-t I will say. DJ Rashida, who's out here in L.A., she did a lot of the parties for Prince, like at his house or like whenever he had a party out in a club.

And she tended to do, yeah, she was a person who told a friend of mine. I think she might have told me too, but she definitely told a friend. of mine, you can't play Prince. Then I'm going to go with Funkadelic. Shit, goddamn, get off your ass and jam. I think that's the way to go. He's also a big sly fan. God damn.

Get off your ass and jam. That's the one I'm doing. That's the one. That's a great answer. Thank you. Give me one. Give me a DJ challenge, my friend. You know what?

I just thought of a great one. Here we go. The year, the year is 2012. Oh, okay. And there's a special event happening, and it's called the inauguration. Second inauguration of Obama. Barack Obama.

Okay. What you do? So we've had four years already to get used to it. That's like a nightmare scenario for me because, you know, when you DJ a party for politicians in general, I think I did one for, I did one for Villarragoza. We're in D.C. We're in D.C. Yeah.

Okay. Well, I was going to say I did one for L.A. Mayor Villarigosa. I think I did one for Eric Gersetti when he was running. Don't hold any of those guys against me. I need the money. Daddy had to spend some records and get some cash for his kids. You know, it's always tough because on the one hand,

you have a lot of, it's almost the opposite of Prince. You have a lot, you have people who basically are not music experts. All they want is the result of everybody dancing. Yeah. So you get that a lot. You're like, oh, God, it's the worst thing you can hear as a DJ. It's like, play something upbeat. Like, they don't know what upbeat means.

They just know that that means people get up and start dancing. So, but also you can't embarrass them. like if I'm doing Obama's party, like, I can't be playing like NWA. You can't, you could literally bring down a person's career and thereby, you know, the country by your song selection. I just think it's high stakes. So if I'm playing Obama, Obama's party, I'd probably put, 2012 was Goatee. Someone I used to know.

Oh, you're right. Yeah, that might have been a huge thing. I'd probably play that. You might be able to get away with crazy by Norles Barkley. Like it's almost like you have to play What's happening on the radio? That people assume the cool kids are into Even though we know the cool kids are like

Once you're in the top 75 for 38 weeks The cool kids have moved on to something else But yeah I would probably play a selection of safe bets Would you play? No, you go first No, I was going to say like I know that Questlove has done Parties for the Obamas and You know some other friends

I think Adam 12 DJ Adam 12 played some. I'll tell you what's a safe bet. You can always play stuff like Stevie Wonder. You know, like you can definitely play like the safest version, safest coolest version of like a wedding set because that's never going to really have anything offensive. It's one of those examples where you kind of don't want to make the news.

Now, let's say it wasn't the Obama's. Let's say it's like some attention star of people. Let's say it's like the cast of Vanderpump rules. Like if that's the case that I'm absolutely, Curball. First off, James Kennedy from that show is a DJ. He proudly says, I open for Cascade. So, you know, by the way, shout out to all the people who watch Vanderfum rules.

It's a guilty pleasure of mine. And I feel like with that crew, I would probably be willing to play 21 Savage, Drake, and everything else is popular on the radio. So there you go. That's sort of the balance. For the Obama, you've got to go safe for other people. It's like, make the news with your playlist. Could Blue Monday make the cut?

Actually, you could probably play Boo Monday for Obama or the Vayner Pump kids. It kind of works in both, doesn't it? That's magic. You could probably do both. And Cole and the Gang Celebration would work in both. My man, luxury, do you have any final words for seventh grade? Oh, hang in there, buddy. It gets so much better.

Yeah. But also, hold on to this anecdote because it'll be funny in 40 years. 40 years? That's a little more than it would. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's be generous. It'll be funny. No, you know what?

Maybe you're right. Maybe you need a. few more years and then it's going to truly be that. I'm not quite healed as this show demonstrates this semi-therapeutic show. It's been great though. But in season two of this show, you're going to be like, I'm finally over it. I'm golden. I'm going to say, how do you feel? And your reply will be mighty real. Now there you go. Luxury, help me in this thing. All right. Well, coming from me, luxury, DJ songwriter and interpolation whisperer. And me, Diallo Riddle, actor, director, writer, and sometimes DJ.

This has been One Song! One Song is a Sirius XM and Kevin Hart's LOL radio production. It's hosted by me, luxury, and my friend Diallo Riddle. This episode was produced

by Matthew Nelson and Jordan Colling with engineering from Marcus Homb. Additional production support from Leslie Guam, Charles Childers, and Alicia Shimata. This show is executive

produced by Kevin Hart, Ty Randolph, Mike Stein, Brian Smiley, Eric Eddings and Eric Weil. Luxury again, and I really hope you enjoy that episode. To keep up to date with our show, remember to like and subscribe. And to keep up to date with Diallo and I, find us on Instagram.

He's at Diallo, D-I-L-L-O, and I'm Luxury, L-U-X-X-U-R-Y. Or on TikTok, he's Diallo Riddle, and I'm at Luxury X-X. Stick around, keep your eyes on the one-song feed, and we'll be back with some fresh episodes for you soon. Interpolation.