NO: 02 OCT 1986 Tower Ballroom, Birmingham

thehappyone23

Setlist

Sooner Than You Think, Bizarre Love Triangle, Shellshock, Sunrise, Thieves Like Us, Paradise, Confusion, Broken Promise, Temptation, Ceremony, State Of The Nation, Weirdo, The Perfect Kiss

Soundcheck (10 minutes): Sooner Than You Think, Paradise, This Time Of Night

Multiple sources for this one. Review based on a second generation cassette in my archives that turns out to sound better than either version referenced.

Stephen Smith: "I think my tape is along the same lines as yours. Mine has a somewhat crunchy sound all the way through, listenable but far from perfect. The Order take the stage to loud whistling."

BS: "Thanks very much, we've not even played yet."

Accompanied by Hooky thwaking his bass a few times.

Sooner Than You Think

Everything is in sync for this one, with aptly timed feedback squalls.  

Hooky twangs his bass after it finishes.

TJ's ticket stub, from MDMArchive

Bizarre Love Triangle

PH: "Alright, punters! This is Biz...Bizarre...Love...Triangle." (pronouncing the song title really slowly)

BS: "Thank you very much."

Shouts from the audience.

BS: "We're gonna play a new song, now, it's called 'Sellsock'."

He's slurs this fairly badly, the spelling above being a more accurate rendition of the pronounciation than the proper title.

Punter yells out "1-2-3-4".

Echoed whoop during the intro. Really good performance.

Sunrise

On the TJ version, some punter repeats "Fuck off" about three times.

BS: "Thank you very much, we're gonna play a song for our meatheads in the audience now...you got a drink, Terry?"

Fans cheer when they hear the opening synth swath.

At the point where Bernard strums his guitar during the intro, a punter near the taper can be heard saying, "Change...[something] tonight." (about the setlist?) Somebody else cries, "Is it going on?" (this is on my M/1, but can be heard on the TJ version as well, which makes me wonder if they're the same source)

[These are on Stephen's copy as well.]

More bass thumps at the end of the song.

Thieves Like Us

PH: "Any requests?

Punter calls out for Temptation.

PH: "Who's that fucker? I did that in Glasgow."

BS: "This is a song we've not played for a long time. But we're gonna play it just for you lot."

lyric: "Love is the air that supports the fucking eagle."

BS: "What a song, what a song. The lyrics are just poetry. [punter utters foulmouthed broadside] How can you swear after a song like that?"

He sounds justifiably proud of this masterpiece,

Paradise

'The Bird' talks during the intro.

BS: "Right, we're going to attempt something off our new LP, Brotherhood, now. It's called 'Paradise'"

lyric: "I looked you into your fucking eyes, I saw you everywhere."

At the end, Hooky throws out the bassline to of all things, Exercise One!

BS: "Michael Jackson, did someone shout 'Michael Jackson'? He's alright, actually, Michael Jackson, I like him, he's good."

Confusion follows. The master tape apparently suffers from a bit of warbliness at this point, which is not unknown from other tapes from this source. This Barney throws out a real "wanky" guitar solo during this song.

Lots of shoutouts at this point with somebody blowing a whistle.

Hooky says something that is obscured by Barney strumming his guitar. Something like, "Someone got a gram then..." He then follows this up with, "been cribbing, you bastards." (in reference to TJ yelling out the song title right before!)

Broken Promise

45cat

This song is LOUD, there's feedback nearly through the entire length.  

A/B cut at the end of this.

Temptation

BS: "There's still no cure even after that.

On my archives tape, the left channel levels are low (it's unbalanced). I haven't tried to correct it. The TJ bit is cut, and is missing the introduction, it seems.

[Stephen's tape doesn't have this defect.]

Has the "uno-dos-tres-cuatro" bit.

Barney goes swear-mad near the end of this incendiary version of this song.

Between this song and the next there's some hard rock-like guitar riffing, not something you'd normally associate with these guys.

Ceremony

Another wanky guitar bit provided by Bernard.

PH: "And how do you follow that, you may say? Well, this is how."

The crowd cheers.

State Of The Nation

Has more of the warbling that Confusion (in the same position on the A side) had. Again, probably an issue with the master. Not present in the TJ version, which does have a dropout (stereo shift) between 0:16 and 0:45, and again between 1:30 - 1:40. [Stephen's tape doesn't have this dropout]

BS: "Thank you very much, good night!" Hooky ends it all with bass pyrotechnics.

The band leave the stage and there's an edit. On the TJ group, the PA music has some funky-type music with female vocals.

They come back for the encore, and a very annoying loudmouth hurling invective at the group.

BS: "You ready, you ready?"

BS: "Shh...Fucking shut up a minute, already?"

punter: "Fucking pop group!"

PH: "Oh, a fucking pop group, eh? What's wrong with fucking pop groups? You're at the front, you cunt. This one's for, er, Happy Mondays."

BS: "Come on stage and say that you fucking twat. [Hooky: "Oh"] Wha'? Come up. C'mon. Come up. Come on stage. Come on stage!"

(both Barney and Hooky accompany their baiting with instrumentation)

PH: "Go on!"

BS: "You! Come on stage."

Fans cheer loudly as I presume said punter presumably gets cold feet and runs off.

BS: "We might be a pop group, but you're a fucking wanker."

This garners a tremendous response.

Weirdo

BS: "That weirdo! One two three four, one two three."

Tremendous amount of energy, probably only bettered in their Byron Bay '87 performance.

The Perfect Kiss

BS: "That's a piss-up. Ain't we tough, ain't we tough. I'm sorry if we offended you before by the way. I didn't mean it. Cuz I love everybody, I love everyone. Everyone."

The TJ version has a garble at about 0:47, and another shortly after 2:00, with a few others throughout. Hooky makes an utterance about 4:10.

This source also includes the following soundcheck tracks:

Sooner Than You Think

At the end Barney says, "The only way...[can't make out rest]"

Paradise (first take)

At 0:55, Barney cries, "Ed, more bass sequencer, lad!"

Paradise (second take)

BS: "A sequencer is about too much, it's [?] too much, the sequencer."

Ends with Barney soundchecking guitar riffs

This Time Of Night

Taper records a bit of this.

Versions

Printed on the ticket stub was the following "No cans, bottles, cameras, or tape recorders".   Clearly, no one abided.

AUD #1	TJ	Sony WM-D6			TJ	TJ: "Mine didn't come with a soundcheck, as a) its our own recording b) we didn't arrive until the soundcheck was over. The soundcheck recording I have is nowhere near as good quality and is only two tracks (TTON/STYT). Unfortunately we managed to lose the first two seconds of Temptation - tape flip went a bit less smoothly than usual due to overexuberance from audience member positioned just behind my mate who was holding the D6 (at least that's what his excuse was at the time). You can hear me quite clearly on the recording just before Broken Promise (yes, it was me who'd been cribbing according to Hooky). Truth of the matter was that during Sunrise, the set-list taped to Steve's kit became partially visible, and I could see that track 8 had two words of similar length and knowing what they'd been playing recently I took an educated guess!"
AUD #2	RJ	Sony WM-D6c?		ANA1 (from CH)	SOL, paraquem	SOL is not 100% sure RJ taped. This *may* be the same version with soundcheck tracks BV received from CH. paraquem seeded a slightly better copy than my CH "ANA1".
AUD #3	Lazlo	Sony WM-D6	ECM-929LT			Seeded 2022-08-09. Lots of talk between tracks. TIALP after end of Shellshock. Cut in "Temptation" at 5:15 point at A/B flip.
AUD #4	UKBT?				perspexorange	Starts with "We All Stand" which is interpolated from a different show, missing TPK at end. Start of "Temptation" cut at A/B flip. Between BLT & Shellshock we can hear "David, we're so good", no idea what that's on about, maybe the UKBT recording?
AUD #5	SD	Sony WM-D6c	ECM-717	ANA1	IA, bcingyou	His copy was from SD, so presuming this is it. Seeded 2022-08-23.
AUD	DW			ANA1	HTM (who has ANA1 of this source)	HTM: "I went to this show with a (now sadly departed) lunatic who taped the show and nearly managed to get us both killed. On of my all time favourite NO events for the really intense atmosphere and of course the "F*cking W*nker" incident....and, as far as the DW Tower Ballroom source is concerned, take your favourite source of the gig, play it out of a cheap boombox and record it from a distance in mono with a sock over the mic and you'll have a good idea of the quality of Dave's effort. He did however trade for a good quality copy, which I'll seed to Dime in the near future..." (not sure if this ever happened)
AUD	SOL	Sony WM-D3	lapel mic		SOL	SOL: "I was at this gig with my Sony D3 but tape has walked out on me and the copy I made for a mate has also done a runner. I remember a heap of guys taping this close by (left hand side looking at the stage)
AUD	Paul?				SOL	SOL: "another guy who worked as a porter at Marylebone Hospital."
AUD					SOL	SOL: "One more who I have very vague memory of (tall dark hair with chubby appearance)."
AUD	LK + mate	Sony WM-D6 + ?			SOL	In addition to LK from Bradford, SOL notes that Lees's mate from London who looked like Sid Vicious (lived in a flat in South London who also recorded Woolwich Coronet.). Taped from left hand side.