Martin Hannett

Martin Hannett (born Manchester, Lancashire, England^[1] 31 May 1948^[2][3] – 18 April 1991), sometimes credited as Martin Zero, was a record producer who helped develop Joy Division and was an original partner in Factory Records with Tony Wilson. Hannett's trademark sound, most apparent on Joy Division's debut album Unknown Pleasures and its follow-up, Closer, is sparse and eerie, complementing frontman Ian Curtis' baritone vocals.

Biography

Early years

Hannett was raised in a working class, Catholic^[4] family in Miles Platting, Manchester,^[5] attending Corpus Christi school^[6] and Xaverian College in Rusholme. In 1967,^[6] he began to attend UMIST (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology) where he earned a degree in chemistry but chose not to pursue that profession.^[4]

Career

After he graduated, he began to learn to play bass.^[6] He was bassist with Spiderman King^[6] and as member in a band called Paradox, in 1973, alongside Paul Young, later of Sad Café and Mike + The Mechanics.^[7][8]

His production work began with the cartoon show All Kinds of Heroes soundtrack, which also was produced by Steve Hopkins (with whom later worked again). By the time, he also began to mix at pub gigs. Another early production works included Greasy Bear material, Belt & Braces Road Show Band's eponymous album, in 1975, and five songs from Pete Farrow's repertoire, later included on that artist's compilation album Who Says There's No Beach in Stockport, in 1977. However, he first came to musical attention the latter year, when, as Martin Zero, he produced the first independent punk record, The Buzzcocks' Spiral Scratch EP. Under the same moniker he produced early records by punk poet John Cooper Clarke, whose Salford monotone was complemented by drum machines, simple synthesiser motifs and Hannett's own bass playing. As Martin Zero, Hannett appeared on Top of the Pops playing bass (actually an acoustic guitar with four strings) on Jilted John's eponymous single, which he also produced.

Hannett became most closely associated with Joy Division. Hannett's meticulous production, heavily influenced by dub, created a space at the heart of Joy Division's sound, pitting the band's spartan, jagged instrumentation against a spacey void, the latter being created by studio manipulation. For these purposes, Hannett often utilized looping technology to treat musical notes with an array of digital filters and both Melos analogue and digital and AMS digital delay units. Hannett would use effects from both ends of the price spectrum to get his reverb and echo effects since the AMS delay was much more expensive and complicated than the Melos analog tape and bucket brigade devices. His techniques are especially prominent in regard to the band's drum and synth sounds, which use the echo and digital reverb effects, the notes echoing and reverberating through a spare sonic backdrop. The first synths Hannett and guitarist Bernard Sumner both used were Transcendent 2000s and then ARP Omnis. Also evident from his dub influences was the mixing of the bass (treated with a Clone Theory pedal provided by bassist Peter Hook) and drums higher in the mix than usual, and placing the other instruments further back. The unusual effect which can be heard in the background of the track "Atmosphere" is supposedly Sumner stroking a set of chimes and fed through a microphone into a couple of Hannett's AMS delays. Hannett also liked to feed sounds through his Marshall Time Modulators; he had two of these and Strawberry Studios owned a third, which he used.

As a producer, Hannett obsessed over drum sounds, never being content until they completely coincided with the sounds in his head. Legend has it that he once forced Joy Division drummer Stephen Morris to take apart his drum kit during a recording session and reassemble it to include additional parts from a toilet. He also reputedly had Morris set up his kit on a first floor flat roof outside the fire escape at Cargo Recording Studios, Rochdale. The studio was used for the recording of "Digital", "Glass", "Atmosphere" and "Ice Age". Hannett's unorthodox production methods resulted in drum sounds mixed with synthesisers that were both complex and highly distinctive. According to Hannett: "There was a lot of space in their sound. They were a gift to a producer, because they didn't have a clue. They didn't argue. A Factory Sample was the first thing I did with them. I think I'd had the new AMS delay line for about two weeks. It was called 'Digital'. It was heaven sent."^[9] Hannett was instrumental in the early development of these particular AMS delays asking the engineers in the AMS company to try and recreate within the electronics the sounds he was hearing in his head.

Hannett's production can also be heard on Basement 5's album 1965 - 1980. Like many British bands of their time (e.g., The Clash), Basement 5 had a harsh, punk attitude borne out in their dystopian lyrics referencing unrest in the early Thatcher era. However, musically, they draw from a slightly wider palette than many of their punk peers, utilizing a variety of Caribbean influences, particularly reggae. With the help of Hannett, they blended such traditional styles with tuneful, contemporary synth-pop, yielding a sound that balances the rustic and the futuristic, in much the same way that Joy Division managed to meld primal, Kinks-ian riffing with a menagerie of studio effects and manipulation. Hannett remixed some of the tracks from 1965-1980 for In Dub, which features dub versions of Basement 5's material.

In 1981, Hannett was name checked by the Dead Kennedys frontman Jello Biafra on their track "Nazi Punks Fuck Off!," which appears on the In God We Trust, Inc. EP. Biafra introduces the track by saying, "This is 'Fuck Off', overproduced by Martin Hannett, take four." The comment was tongue-in-cheek; Hannett never produced for the Dead Kennedys. A similar quote precedes the song "Fuck Me" by "Mihi" as appears on Regret, the first volume of the I've Girls Compilations.

Hannett worked briefly with U2, New Order, and Factory Records band Stockholm Monsters.

Death

A rift formed with Factory and he sued them in 1982 over a financial dispute; the matter was eventually settled out of court. At this point, Hannett's career had spiralled into decline due to his heavy drinking and drug use, especially his use of heroin. His weight eventually doubled (to roughly 26 stone, or 364 pounds), and he died of heart failure in 1991 at the age of 42 in Chorley, Lancashire. Hannett is survived by a wife, daughter and a son.

Fictional portrayals

Hannett was portrayed by actor Andy Serkis in the 2002 film 24 Hour Party People, which was based on Tony Wilson's career as the co-founder of Factory Records and The Haçienda nightclub. In the DVD commentary, Wilson notes a review that described Hannett as Serkis' "strangest role," and points out that Serkis is best known for his portrayal of Gollum in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. Wilson concludes that the reviewer's implication is correct, that indeed, Hannett was far stranger than Gollum.

Hannett was portrayed by Ben Naylor in Anton Corbijn's film Control.

Selected discography

Albums produced

• Belt & Braces Road Show Band, Belt & Braces Road Show Band 1975
• Pete Farrow, Who Says There's No Beach In Stockport? 1977 issued on cd by Ozit Morpheus
• John Cooper Clarke, Disguise in Love 1978
• The Durutti Column, The Return of the Durutti Column 1979
• Joy Division, Unknown Pleasures 1979
• Pauline Murray And The Invisible Girls, Pauline Murray And The Invisible Girls 1979
• Basement 5,1965-1980 1980
• John Cooper Clarke, Snap, Crackle & Bop 1980
• Joy Division, Closer 1980
• Magazine, The Correct Use of Soap 1980
• The Psychedelic Furs, The Psychedelic Furs 1980 (songs "Susan's Strange" and "Soap Commercial")
• A Certain Ratio, To Each... 1981
• Joy Division, Still 1981
• Magazine, Magic, Murder & the Weather (mixed) 1981
• New Order, Movement 1981
• Section 25, Always Now 1981
• John Cooper Clarke, Zip Style Method 1982
• Armande Altaï, Nocturne Flamboyant 1983
• Blue in Heaven, All The Gods Men 1985
• The Stone Roses, The Martin Hannett album 1985 (Finally released as Garage Flower, coupled with the single So Young in 1996)
• Walk in the Walk, Walk the Walk 1987
• Happy Mondays, Bummed 1988
• The High, Somewhere Soon 1990
• Joy Division Martin Hannett's Personal Mixes2007 - now officially owned by Joy Division
• Joy Division In the studio with Martin Hannett2008 - now officially owned by Joy Division

Singles produced

• Buzzcocks, Spiral Scratch 1976 as Martin Zero
• Jilted John, "Jilted John" 1978
• Joy Division, "Transmission" 1979
• OMD, "Electricity" 1979 as Martin Zero
• Kevin Hewick, "Haystack" 1980
• Joy Division, "Love Will Tear Us Apart" 1980
• U2, "11 O'Clock Tick Tock" 1980
• Pauline Murray And The Invisible Girls, Mr X 1980
• Pauline Murray And The Invisible Girls, Searching For Heaven 1981
• Crispy Ambulance, "Live on a Hot August Night" 1981
• ESG, "ESG" 1981
• New Order, "Ceremony" 1981
• New Order, "Everything's Gone Green" 1981
• New Order, "Procession" 1981
• Stockholm Monsters, "Fairy Tales" 1981
• The Stone Roses, "So Young/Tell Me" 1985
• Kit, "Overshadowing Me" 1990
• Kitchens of Distinction, "Quick as Rainbows" 1990
• New Fast Automatic Daffodils, "Get Better" 1991

Compilations

• Martin: The Work of Record Producer Martin Hannett (Factory Records, 1991)
• And Here is the Young Man (Debutante, 1998)
• Zero: A Martin Hannett Story 1977-1991' (Big Beat, 2006)

See also

• Music of Manchester

References

External links

• The 24 Hour Party People movie website contains an extensive biography of Hannett.
• The Martin Hannett biography project
• [6]
• Martin Hannett page.
• The Invisiblegirl website contains a page about Hannett in the early 1980s.
• The work of record producer MARTIN HANNETT
• Martin Hannett and Tony Wilson in Strawberry Studios, July 1980 Martin Hannett explaining his production of Pauline Murray And The Invisible Girls's "The Visitor" song.