Control - Touching From a Distance (5)
Comments(0) Courting angst is always an unsettling business but rarely more so than when the flirtation is a salve for other types of meaning. In an age of short termism, where the quick fix is king, there’s something almost quaint about the notion that life can be an artistic process, in motion, incomplete and crucially, imperfect; an apprenticeship to be served whatever the cost. Of course this is pure anachronism when set against the contemporary backdrop of machine tooled MOR pop records and a cast of millions for whom the ultimate act of pop rebellion is to challenge the omniscient X Factor judging panel. And even that small gesture only seems notable through its absence. Hard to imagine a Leona Lewis or Will Young or let’s face it any other aspiring contestant walking up to Simon Cowell, calling him a cunt and then hovering menacingly in his grill until he’s agreed to their demands. Yet that’s precisely what Ian Curtis achieves in a now legendary encounter with Tony Wilson - founder of Factory Records, the kingmaker at Granada TV and therefore Simon Cowell-esque figure bestriding the late 70s Manchester music and cultural scene like a lank haired colossus . It’s also a vignette that’s lovingly recreated in the Anton Corbijn biopic of the life and death of Ian Curtis, ‘Control’, currently on nationwide release.
