
New Order were still finding their feet as their thoughts turned towards making a second album. Their 1981 debut Movement felt very much like a record mired in their past. Released just a year and a half after the suicide of their former singer and Joy Division bandmate Ian Curtis and the decision to begin again under a new name, it was not the fresh start they really needed.
Some of its songs had even been played live by their former incarnation and the decision to make it with Joy Division producer Martin Hannett only strengthened that his was Joy Division minus their mercurial frontman.