This review originally appeared on Goodreads on July 27, 2015.

Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division

By Peter Hook – It Books – January 29, 2013

Review by Robin Marx

This is a phenomenal look at one of the most influential and mythologized bands in modern music, written by one of its founding members.

The book is written in an immensely engaging style. Rather than go for an aloof, literary voice, Hook writes as if he's telling tall tales down at the pub. Joy Division fans will find a lot to love here; the book is packed with colorful anecdotes, including many that do a lot to humanize post-punk's pseudo-martyr figure Ian Curtis. There's so much detail about individual gigs, and the sections where he provides track-by-track commentary on Joy Division's albums were especially appreciated.

While immensely entertaining, I also got the feeling that Hooky was a bit of an unreliable narrator. Some passages—about drunken fights and pre-suicide warning signs from Ian that the band had turned a blind eye to—seemed very honest and self-reflective, but it felt like (due to the current and much-publicized acrimony between them) he minimized Bernard Sumner's contribution to the band. That was the only sour note in the book for me, everything else was pitch-perfect.

Wholeheartedly recommended to even casual Joy Division fans.

★★★★☆

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