On this day just one year ago we received some very sad news that blew us away … our dear friend Ward De Prins, co-founder and one of the main driving forces behind our Peek-a-Boo Magazine, curator of the Black-Easter Festival, and so much more … had unexpectly left us for good.

His love for music and especially the more darkish alternative and out of the ordinary music was so intense, he dedicated most, if not all, of his free time to Peek-a-Boo Magazine. He was always ready to give his full support to bands, promoters, editors and writers who shared the same musical passion!

Ward's music preferences were quite eclectic, he loved Einstürzende Neubauten, Goethes Erben, Pink Floyd and Coil, to name a few … but he was also very fond of many vocal artists, classical music and opera…

But his real and all-time hero … was without doubt … David Bowie who also left this planet only 2 years before!
Only a couple of weeks before Ward passed away, he shared with us he was still unable to open and listen to his still sealed copy of Bowie's last album Black Star. Now his sorrow is over and he is reunited with his hero.

Ward passed away on 14th February at his home in Antwerp, he was only 48.

Rest In Peace our dear friend! Things are not the same anymore... WE MISS YOU!

20.04 + 21.04 Black Easter 2019 - In memory of Ward De Prins
Just one week before his death, Ward also told his friends he was again full of energy and ready for another edition of Black Easter in 2019... sadly he would never live to tell... But some of Ward's closest friends decided to still make his last dream come true! Based on found a personal band wishlist and with the full support of Ward's family these friends have now succeeded in putting together a worthy Black Easter edition for 2019.

Today, exactly 40 years ago (14 February 1979) John Peel broadcast the first Peel Sessions, a studio live session performed and recorded by Joy Division at the BBC Maida Vale studios in London on January 31st, 1979.

Below the setlist of this recording & broadcast session.

Exercise One
Insight
She's Lost Control
Transmission

At the time of broadcasting, all performed songs were previously unreleased.

Later that same year, on 10th December, John Peel broadcast a second recording session by Joy Division

7 years later, in 1986, the first 'The Peel Sessions' EP, was released by Strange Fruit Records. The version of Transmission featured on this EP is one of the few recordings available where both Ian Curtis and Bernard Sumner played guitars at the same time.

The EP spent thirteen weeks on the UK Indie Chart, peaking at number 4.

The release of a second volume of the Joy Division Peel Sessions would follow in 1987.

Below you can listen to the original repeat transmission broadcasted by John Peel on 5th April.

Discogs

Today, Peter Hook (Born Peter Woodhead) of Joy Division and New Order turns sixty-three-years of age. Celebrating his career in music is near impossible with respect to the remarkable success he achieved with the aforementioned bands, however that moment in time at the start of his career may perhaps be the place that sums up Hooky the best. Something he has taken to revisit in recent years with his band Peter Hook And The Light, again touring the individual albums this year which will see him perform the albums Technique and ‘Republic’ in their entirety. Keeping the flame burning brightly as his own unique support act at all shows where he performs a selection of Joy Division numbers in his own faithful style.

Transmission

The pulsing bass , the thunder of the drums, the synthesiser and bass working perfectly as a unit, and then Ian Curtis singing in his low-larynx-gothic projection;
"When the routine bites hard
And ambitions are low
And the resentment rides high
But emotions won't grow",

'Love will tear us apart', perhaps one of the most memorable songs by Joy Division,their calling card,released posthumously after Ian's death.The lyrics a mirror of his frame of mind and his failing marriage to Deborah(Deborah Woodruff).

To say one song was all there was to Joy Division,that they can be defined by three minutes and eighteen minutes of dark thumbing brilliance or even their two studios albums of perfect surreal-starkness-,'Unknown Pleasures' 1979 and 'Closer' 1980.
The metamorphosis that happened with New Order does not define anything that happened before either.

Joy Division were a sum of everything that was good about Punk and 70s music in general. Iggy Pop, Lou Reed and certainly David Bowie and his Berlin era, with 'Low' and 'Heroes' an inspiration, after all pre-Joy Division were called Warsaw taken from the Bowie song of the same name.
But Curtis injected his own vision and distinctive voice to it, Joy Division have influenced so much about today's modern music from The Cure to Radiohead.

Manchester

One of the biggest influences on the Manchester scene was the infamous gig by the Sex Pistols at the Lesser Free Trade Hall on the 6th-of -June 1976 as part of the Anarchy tour. In the audience that night were, apart from Curtis, future members of the Buzzcocks were present, whose founder member Pete Shelley organized the gig and even opened for the Pistols. But more importantly to the story the two founders of Factory Records Martin Hannet and Tony Wilson. On a side note however. also present and influenced was Mark E. Smith of The Fall, Mick Hucknall of Frantic Elevators and much later Simply Red and one Steven Patrick Morrissey, who would form The Smiths. The influence that one night had on the late 70's and early 80's music industry is staggering.

The goth-injected, controlled passion of Joy Divisions second and final album 'Closer',is in essence a brilliant rock album, some have gone as far to say the best rock album of the-eighties. Released posthumously on July-the-18th 1980 almost two months after the death of Ian Curtis.
Unloved by Sumner and Hook, unhappy again with Martin Hannets mix, very hard to imagine why as Hannet, both genius and madman, has managed to merge the bands sound into a more positive and melodic experience than on 'Unknown Pleasures'.

Peter Hook and New Order exist as two separate entities now, but their sound is rooted as it always will be very much in the past.

Phil Western (°12 August, 1971, † 9 February, 2019) was a producer/engineer/composer and programmer who has been active in music for close to 20 years and has close to 40 albums released to date.

He is known for his collaborative work with his close friend Cevin Key (Skinny Puppy) in the electronic music projects like Download and PlatEAU, as well as his own solo albums, many of which have been released on his own label, The Record Company. His production and engineering work includes remixes for Skinny Puppy, Nine Inch Nails, Monster Magnet and many others.

May he rest in peace.
DISCOGS

Punk, at the very beginning was an expressionist- revolution, a reflection of the failings within society delivered perfectly and directly through the simplest forms of music.
Whilst true for most punk bands which sprang up in the late nineteen-seventies, for Belfast’s Stiff Little Fingers it is true more so than any other. The second-of-February this year marks forty-years since the release of their incendiary debut ‘Inflammable Material’.

What better way to celebrate than looking at the beginnings of Stiff Little Fingers and the core of one of the most explosive Irish albums of the twentieth-century.

Starting life as a Deep Purple covers band was never going to resonate with what they felt inside, the broken concrete landscape of Belfast was a perfect muse for their frustrations.
Formed in-1977, Stiff Little Fingers consisted of:Jake Burns vocals and guitar, Ali McMordie guitar, Henry Cluney on bass and the man who introduced them to punk Brian Faloon on drums.
A false start but a historic one, as the deal signed with Island Records fell through they had to rely on a new indie-label. On the fourth-of February 1979 ‘Inflammable Material’ became SLF’s first album and the first album distributed by Rough Trade Records, though it went one better and became the first independently released album to chart in the UK, hitting a peak of number 14.

This is a musical-observation into the heart of a dangerous time, an angst ridden dialogue between Jack Burns and the listener, with a very direct eyewitness report from the ground. This was art colliding with realism in its finest form.
Although not a concept album as such but it does tell a very real story. ‘Inflammable Material’ serves as a time capsule which could be dug up in a hundred-years time to show the perspective of that youth culture. Any common thread connecting these tracks becomes very obvious to the listener.

The album is an honest and unrestrained view of what the band members had witnessed as everyday aspects of Northern Ireland, where reality is central and not escapism. This is not an album packed with love songs or romantic themes to get lost in, the landscape this release presents is submerged in war and those caught up in the tense crossfire.

“Inflammable material, planted in my head
It's a suspect device that's left two thousand dead
Their solutions are our problems
They put up the wall
On each side, time and prime us”- Suspect Device

Kevin Burke-Jan 2019