These days, Peter Hook is a pretty great interview.
We’ve spoken to him a few times for this website, and just last month we posted an excerpt from his new book, Substance: Inside New Order, centering on the riot the electronic-pop legends allegedly caused after their 1985 gig at the Boston Opera House.
This week for the Talkhouse, Hooky skips chatting with journalists with Unknown Pleasures tattoos and saddles up with a fellow Manchester luminary, Andy Rourke. The Smiths bassist teamed with Hooky and Stone Roses’ Mani for the Freebass project, so the pair go back in friendly ways you’d certainly expect.
And their crossover in conversation makes for an intriguing eavesdrop. Among the topics in the 25-minute chat are Andy and Johnny Marr’s respect for Joy Division, Hooky’s never-ending battle against his former New Order bandmates, the two enduring their own legal issues with their famous bands, and the recent spate of biographies by pretty much everyone other than Rourke himself (unless we missed that one).
Listen below.