Steve Brotherdale's Great Mistake
I am getting dressed for work while listening to some 1977 punk songs by Manchester band The Panik, and it reminds me of one of modern rock's greatest miscalculations.It was in July 1977 that drummer Steve Brotherdale left fledgling Manchester punk band Warsaw, jumping ship to join The Panik.
In his Joy Division history, "An Ideal for Living," Mark Johnson relates how Brotherdale thought The Panik had much more potential than Warsaw.
"At a party in Macclesfield on 5 Aug. 1977," Johnson writes, "Steve played a tape of The Panik's single to (Warsaw singer) Ian Curtis, who tried to sing along with it. But Ian's vocals were completely wrong for the fast, hard style of The Panik, and he stayed with Warsaw."
As they say, "the rest was history," as Warsaw evolved into Joy Division and then into New Order. The Panik merit just a single entry in George Gimarc's "Punk Diary," suggesting their time in the spotlight was all too brief. New Order, of course, eventually released the best-selling 12-inch single in British history and have released their eighth studio album since 1981, "Waiting for the Sirens' Call," earlier this year.
I wonder what Steve Brotherdale is doing now?
posted by erik hogstrom at 11:04 AM
3 Comments:
I'm so sorry to have to say that Steve is in prison!!! Can someone rally round and help him? Such a waste and a shame!!
I'm sorry to say that Steve is having a bad time and is currently in Prison. He needs people to rally round and help him!!! Think about his contribution to music!!! Come on!!!!!
Steve Brotherdale is an important drummer. The early Warsaw recordings with Steve as drummer have a raw energy and it's a side to the legacy of punk and the success and accomplishment on the overall picture that needs to re-surface with a lot of respect for what is a great contribution. That fact of brilliance ought to be caste in stone as an integral part of the story of the success. It's so good to have the recordings.
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