Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on March 2011
Photo courtesy of Jaspex
“I just remember coming down to [Stone Roses song] ‘Fools Gold’ at someone’s house after we’d got back from an acid house night,” Basement Jaxx’ Simon Ratcliffe tells Metropolis when asked about what the Madchester scene meant to him, “and feeling that a new dawn, an alternative world was upon us.”
The new world that Ratcliffe (pictured, left) describes took shape in the electronic dance music upheaval that germinated in Manchester in the late ’80s. Local record label Factory, the Hacienda nightclub and the so-called “Madchester” scene were the focal points of a pop culture wave that continues to break all the way to Japan. Wiry post-punk Factory bands like Joy Division and its overtly electronic successor New Order inform the current dance-punk scene, while the Hacienda’s spirit of “e ’n’ glee” revelry resonates throughout rave culture.
The upcoming Japan debut of Joy Division/New Order bass player and Hacienda co-owner Peter Hook’s Factory-themed Fac51 tour grew out of a series of DJ sets by Hook at Air near Shibuya.
“It started in 2006, when we decided to book Peter for our regular event K-Sounds,” says Japanese-Brazilian promoter Luciano Uchizono. “Our first experience was so successful that we invited him back many times. In 2007, we organized the first Hacienda event at Air and the same year booked Peter to perform at the Summer Sonic Dance Stage.”
Photo courtesy of Jaspex
This was a few years after the Hacienda-based film 24 Hour Party People became a sleeper hit, generating renewed interest in the Madchester scene. Nostalgia for the early years of rave culture also saw Hook oversee a series of Hacienda Classics mix CDs of famous and not-so-famous tracks from the era.
Meanwhile, the ever-resourceful Hook was hatching even bigger plans. These came to fruition in the form of a 2009 book, How Not to Run a Club, and the ongoing worldwide Fac51 tour, which arrives at Zepp Tokyo next weekend.
The tour sees Hook performing seminal Madchester tracks with a live band, while DJs—in Tokyo, Basement Jaxx and Felix Da Housecat, among others—interpret acid house from a contemporary perspective.
“Japanese who care about the history of electronic music are well aware that the dance music we hear nowadays was generated by classic bands like Peter Hook’s New Order,” Uchizono says.
“Factory and the Hacienda are better known by a mature crowd and by the ‘intellectual clubber’ who understands the history of electronic music,” he adds. “We hope to help them relive the Madchester experience and at the same time offer younger clubbers insights into dance music’s roots.”
“I have a great respect for the Hacienda and its place in the history of acid house,” says Ratcliffe. “That was the North, and a lot of the acid was up there before it hit London. For me, the Hacienda was a legend and you heard about various things, just like I’d heard about all these producers in Chicago where all the music was coming from. So the Hacienda to me was always somewhere I’d wanted to go. It has become part of British youth culture history.”
Club Citta
Unknown Pleasures with Peter Hook. Joy Division Celebration (live): Peter Hook, Lilies and Remains, Last Dance Revolution. March 17, from 6pm, ¥5,600. Kawasaki. Tel: Creativeman 03-6277-5116. www.fac51thehacienda.jp
