http://www.uncut.co.uk/news/joy_division/news/10094Tony Wilson died of a heart attack last week. This came after battling with cancer and everything else he battled in his life. Why does it matter to us? Because without Factory, without Manchester- my youth would have lacked color. You'd be hard pressed to find a town anywhere in the world that has had more artists of influence than Manchester- and those people have a lot to do with how we are what we are. Maybe that doesn't matter- maybe you find us vile. Irrelevant. The point is, he made these bands go from nowhere to my waiting little ears in a suburb in Georgia as long as I can remember- and the man was just fucking brilliant. He was foolhardy, bad with cash, over-educated and underpaid- but amidst it all, he created the real indie label against which the others have been judged- at least by anyone with a sense of history before and during the 90s. He spent more on the product and failed to profit at all from changing the world. His legacy lives on and is just being discovered by the public at large- but over the next ten years you will surely know him as more than a Granada News man. You will see him in the shadows in the upcoming Ian Curtis biopic "Control"- you can see him played by Steve Coogan in "24 Hour Party People." You can hear his legacy in modern electronic music and the so called "post-punk revival." He built the Hacienda and created the rave almost by accident. He was an incredible giant on which too many of us unknowingly stand- no he was not perfect. He has been portrayed negatively and positively depending on where the tide rolled-
but seriously- can you think of just one label where at the end of the deal the artists walked with all the rights and monies without even a hint of a legal battle?
There is no tribute fitting enough to be paid to the man- but so many of us owe him whether we know it or not. We are working on our own.
Don't forget where you came from.
Pardon me if I seem a little preachy.
-P