Closer is a record whose influence stretches through U2 (a young Bono proclaimed Ian Curtis the world's best frontman and included a tribute to him on their debut album), Jesus and Mary Chain, Nirvana, Radiohead and Arcade Fire.

Joy Division bent the rock template out of shape, opening the doors for others to experiment musically and lyrically. This, the band's second and final studio album, has an appropriately morbid symmetry. The Manchester band started recording with the producer Martin Hannett on March 18, 1980, two months to the day before its lyricist and lead singer Ian Curtis hanged himself. The album was released two months to the day after Curtis's death. Its funereal cover, of the Appiani tomb in Genoa, Italy, provoked accusations of cashing in, though the design had been chosen months before. The cover is perfect, for this album reeks of loss, both in the lyrics and as the final act of a band just starting to spread its wings from guitar-based indie rock to synthesizers and drum machines. There's sombre beauty here, in the music of Passover and The Eternal, matched by Curtis's impressionistic words as he reflects on being torn apart, between the new life opening up to him and the old one he could not bear to leave behind for fear of hurting loved ones. “This is the crisis I knew had to come,” he sings. His resolution to it was self-consciously dramatic, but what an epitaph this is.

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Jesus and Mary Chain - Psychocandy

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