NEW ORDER live at Paris Zenith, 26 May 2002

The set list of the Paris gig owned by David Sultan:
click and notice the typical Hooky autograph!

Of course we were the first to arrive at the venue, once again... after a while the band arrived at the backstage gate... Hooky recognised us and said it's been a long time, I replied we were in Liverpool last year actually and met everyone but him, he introduced us Jack which is as cool as his dad, we finally gave him the 50 quid with his head in place of the Queen we were planning to give four years ago and he gave us a special pass which read "Look after these two sick fuckers. signed: Peter Hook", if we had problems we would have shown it... luckily we were also the first two names on the guest list...
We also met Bernard Sumner, Steven Morris, Alan Wise (the actor introducing them), manager Andy Robinson and of course Sarge the bodyguard... we heard the whole soundcheck and learnt there would have been some nice surprises in the concerts.
Afterwards in the bar I saw a bloke looking like Jimi Goodwin from Doves, and the soundcheck of the support band confirmed they were in fact Doves, which I had the pleasure to see in Bologna a few days before... I've been really happy to see them again, though there were rumours that the support band would have been RAM, the new band of Pottsy from Monaco.
They played Catch The Sun, There Goes The Fear (great final with all the band members playing percussions), Caught By The River... I especially enjoyed Here It Comes, Words and The Cedar Room...
After Doves it was great to meet some of the fans which came from England and are on Ceremony, the mailing list... we're now proud to have the badge given by Al Jarvis, which reads "The Vikings - New Order On Tour 2002". I'm sorry we didn't meet any French though, except David Sultan, webmaster of the great fan site World In Motion...
The New Order concert was opened by a superb Crystal, followed by Transmission... a great performance, they already played it on other dates last year, but this was the first time for me... then came Regret, Ceremony, 60 Miles An Hour, Atmosphere (giving some rest to us packed in the front pogo...) and a brilliant Brutal, played live for the first time ever, Phil was great on this song... after Close Range (which was maybe the song that best represented the improvement in the sound system, if you remember the messy sound of this song last year in the otherwise excellent Liverpool gig...) came another great first time: She's Lost Control. The classics closed the first part of the gig: Bizarre Love Triangle, True Faith, Temptation, Love Will Tear Us Apart. The band were really into it, Bernard did his funny dances, and Hooky gave Jack an English flag with "Hello Hooky" written on it given by a "Viking" from the front of the stage.
The encore started with a wonderful surprise, Digital, probably the best moment in the whole concert, where Bernard confirmed he has a great voice even when he sings low, like in the early years... and he was brilliant on Rock The Shack, he played, like on the most of the songs, with an energy, with a fury you could have thought  he had lost by his age... it did seem that the end of the concert was Hooky throwing his bass on the final of Blue Monday, ended but there was another surprise... the band decided to come back on stage and playYour Silent Face (which they weren't sure to play anyway, as you can see from the question marks on the set list...), though Hooky's bass was broken and he had to watch the others from the side of the stage, maybe watching New Order live for the first time... this has been one of their best concerts ever, and the best I've seen after the legendary comeback at the Apollo in 1998.
After the show we reunited with the English fans backstage, it was great and we also met Phil Cunningham which is a nice bloke indeed, I told him I'm happy he improved his playing, he's now fully integrated in the live sound of the band, and this is really good if you think it's the first line up change since 1980, thugh Gillian might hopefully come back sooner or later...
New Order once again confirmed to be (while all the other survivors between their contemporaries seem to have lost it) the only band ageing really well, a band in perfect health that could still teach a lesson or two to these young soft trendies.