In 1989, Peter Hook formed his third band, Revenge. Although NME and Melody Maker went into raptures?this was, after all, one quarter of Joy Division and New Order?eventually his stage persona as the leather-trousered Viking bass god with the low-slung weapon of mass seduction affected the way the music was received at the height of aciiiid and baggy. The S&M-lite artwork for 1990’s debut album, One True Passion, and the pseudo-repulsive song titles?”Surf Nazi”, “Fag Hag”, “Kiss The Chrome”?merely enhanced the perception of Hook as a rock pig peddling a chauvinist ideology and macho metal bluster.
Truth is, Hook’s DNA, shared with Bernard Sumner, Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert, prevents him from creating anything that’s less than gorgeously dolorous, while those bowels-of-heaven bass lines here underpin two hours’ worth of mournful melodies and Hook’s lyrical declarations of despair and self-doubt.