Love Will Tear Us Apart by Joy Division (solo bass arrangement) | Karl Clews on bass

My arrangement, for solo 4-string electric bass, of Joy Division's 80s hit single, Love Will Tear Us Apart.

Love Will Tear Us Apart is a song by the English rock band Joy Division, released in June 1980 as a non-album single. Its lyrics were inspired by lead singer Ian Curtis' marital problems and struggles with epilepsy. The single was released one month after Curtis' suicide.

Love Will Tear Us Apart reached number one in New Zealand and was certified double platinum in the United Kingdom, selling and streaming over 1,200,000 units. The song has an ongoing legacy as a defining song of the era. In 2002, NME named Love Will Tear Us Apart as the greatest single of all time, while Rolling Stone named it one of the 500 greatest songs ever in 2004, 2010, and 2021.

Joy Division first recorded Love Will Tear Us Apart at Pennine Studios, Oldham, on 8 January 1980, along with the B-side, These Days. This version was similar to the version the band played live. However, singer Ian Curtis and producer Martin Hannett disliked the results and the band reconvened in March at Strawberry Studios, Stockport (where the Neil Sedaka song "Love Will Keep Us Together" had been recorded in 1973), to re-record it. Each instrument was recorded separately. As Morris recalled:

Martin Hannett played one of his mind games when we were recording it – it sounds like he was a tyrant, but he wasn't, he was nice. We had this one battle where it was nearly midnight and I said, "Is it all right if I go home, Martin – it's been a long day?" And he said [whispers], "OK ... you go home". So I went back to the flat. Just got to sleep and the phone rings. "Martin wants you to come back and do the snare drum". At four in the morning! I said, "What's wrong with the snare drum!?" So every time I hear Love Will Tear Us Apart, I grit my teeth and remember myself shouting down the phone, "YOU BASTARD!" ... I can feel the anger in it even now. It's a great song and it's a great production, but I do get anguished every time I hear it.

Though guitarist Bernard Sumner played guitar on the song, the band convinced Curtis to play Sumner's part live. According to Sumner, "We showed [Ian] how to play D and we wrote a song. I wonder if that's why we wrote Love Will Tear Us Apart, you could drone a D through it. I think he played it live because I was playing keyboards." The guitar heard on the recording was a 12-string Eko.

Curtis' singing style on the later version of the song is an imitation of Frank Sinatra, after Factory Records owner Tony Wilson had given him a record of the singer to use as a model. As Hannett felt this was a special song, he kept remixing it, even as many as 15 times.

Performed on a 2020 Bogart Karl Clews Signature 'Broadsword' bass.
Recorded directly into Cakewalk Sonar Platinum, via a Presonus Audiobox. Video edited using TrakAxPC.

Karl Clews Signature 'Broadsword' bass by Bogart: https://www.bogart-bass.de
Instrument cables by David Laboga: https://www.davidlaboga.com
Custom leather guitar straps by River Straps: http://www.river-straps.com
Gig bags by Harvest Fine Leather: https://www.harvest-guitar.com
Gear bags by Lugville: https://www.lugville.com
My website: http://www.karlclews.com
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My Patreon page, for tabs, audio downloads and more:   / karlclews  

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