Cutting the Still ribbon: why you should butcher your Joy Division records

It's sacrilege, I know, but tonight, on the spur of the moment, I hacked the clunky gatefold cover off my copy of Joy Division's Still. Chopped it off with the intention of dumping* that cloth-bound cardboard monstrosity once and for all. And - Buñuel-style - slice! Yes, I got my trusty Stanley blade (a design classic in its own right) and slashed away at the fancy white ribbon that Peter Saville and his mates must have thought such a clever wheeze back in 1981.

                                                               Something must break: Still, liberated from its hessian

Why, oh why? Why do such a terrible thing? No real reason. Other than: I've always disliked the way that this record alone in my humble stash of vinyl is over-sized and doesn't ... er, fit. The rest sit snugly in their spiffing polythene sleeves but this is the exception. Also, something else. It's actually strangely satisfying to disregard the consumerist/preservationist/collector imperative that seems to be so much a part of music these days. Apparently the hessian covers accompanied only the first 5,000 pressings of the record and are now fairly valuable/collectable, but I really don't care about this. In fact, as I said recently about a Buzzcocks poster I'd somehow held onto for 30-odd years, I think virtually every aspect of musical merchandising is debased and unpleasant. And that goes for the good music just as much as the bad stuff. 

The final cut

To be clear - I've always liked Joy Division since the time a teenage friend played me his copy of Love Will Tear Us Apart (things like Transmission and Unknown Pleasures were still a year or two away for me). And I've mentioned the band (mostly approvingly) on this blog several times - like here and here. But the stifling reverence for all things JD-related has become an utter bore. And likewise, it's become tedious to see article after article praising one or other of Saville's designs for the band. It's slightly childish, perhaps, but cutting the Still ribbon is a good feeling. I reckon we should all cut the umbilical cord that binds us too closely to our musical past.