Posted on: May 12, 2014 Posted by: John B. Moore Comments: 0

Peter Hook, known best as the co-founder and bassist for the wildly influential bands Joy Division and New Order, can also add fledgling club co-owner to his CV. In The Hacienda: How Not to Run a Club, Hook goes into hilarious detail reliving the disastrous experience he, his New Order band mates and his label bosses at Factory Records had in starting and running into the ground this popular Manchester nightclub.

Popular? Why then did the company’s ledgers read like they were burning money by the piles inside the club? Well, let’s start with hiring money-is-no-object architects, then securing a loan from the beer distributor, who requires you to buy his beer at an unbelievably inflated price, so you are practically losing money with every drink. At a slew of other regretful mistakes, like repainting the club almost weekly and repeat for about 15 years. Hook is surprisingly frank and good-humored about the whole experience, considering just about all of Joy Division and New Order’s royalties from the 80’s and 90’s were sucked into the Hacienda. From the club’s peak in popularity as ground zero for the “Madchester” rave and music scene in the early’90s up to the constant gang run-ins up until the club’s closure in 1997, the anecdotes are reeled off in hysterical detail.

The book is a perfect companion piece to Hook’s brilliant 2013 book Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division. Someone needs to give Hook a full time column, and quickly.

The Hacienda: How Not to Run a Club by Peter Hook/paperback, 386 pages/It Books/2014

HACIENDA

The Hacienda: How Not to Run a Club by Peter Hook (Book)

Leave a Comment