Various - The Hacienda 1982

by Tommy Gunnarsson

published: 7 / 1 / 2023

Label: Cherry Red Records
Format: CD Box

2022 sees Manchester’s iconic club The Hacienda celebrate its 40th anniversary, and Cherry Red has compiled four CDs worth of tracks associated with the club’s first year.

Review

If you have even the slightest interest in the early 80s UK indie scene, you have most likely heard of The Hacienda, the iconic Manchester club, where lots of the indie superstars at the time (and the decade, to be honest) played during those years. For instance, local legends The Smiths played their third ever gig here in February 1983, and New Order became regular guests here (which wasn’t very strange - they were signed to Factory Records, who ran the club). But, first things first - the Hacienda first opened its doors on May 21st 1982 (I turned four on that very day, actually, which might explain my somewhat fuzzy memory of the event), and it was very soon a must-go-club in Manchester. The post punk scene was already getting smaller and smaller, and new musical styles were standing in the wings, ready to take over. Enter new romantics and new pop, among others. But when the Hacienda opened up, they played music from a vast range of genres, mostly music that influenced both the punks and post punks, but also the aforementioned new scenes, and that’s what we're getting on this brand new four disc compilation - music played by the DJs at the club during its first year, and also songs by acts who played live at the stage. The songs on the four CDs are sequenced like they would be during a night at the Hacienda 40 years ago, starting out with the more downbeat and experimental songs, and then working its way up to the uptempo, floor-filling songs that ended the club night in the wee hours. It’s interesting to compare the track list for this compilation to that of the ‘Music for New Romantics’ 3CD box set, which was released this month as well (you can read my review of it here on Pennyblackmusic), as many acts appear on both of them. This just goes to show how the underground scenes crossbred at this time in the UK, even though many of their followers probably wouldn’t admit it at the time. Acts like Suicide, A Certain Ratio, Siouxsie & The Banshees, ABC and Iggy Pop are therefor associated with both the New Romantic scene and the Hacienda scene, which might sound a bit strange, but influences were coming from all kind of ways at this time. As with most compilation of this kind, there’s a mix of well-known songs (like Tears For Fears’ ‘Mad World’, Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five’s hip hop classic ‘The Message’ and ABC’s ‘The Look of Love’) and more obscure deep cuts (like Mathilde Santing’s ‘Behind a Painted Smile’ and Royal Family & The Poor’s ‘Art of 45’), and of course there’s plenty to read as well, with a foreword by Peter Hook (of Joy Division/New Order fame) and an essay by music journalist Mick Meddles. Lovely stuff!