She's Lost Control

Curtis primarily drew the lyrical inspiration for "She's Lost Control" from a young woman with whom he had become acquainted through his employment as an Assistant Disablement Resettlement Officer at a Macclesfield occupational rehabilitation centre between 1978 and 1979.So This is Permanence: Joy Division Lyrics and Notebooks Ian Curtis, Deborah Curtis, Jon Savage (2014) p. xxii {{ISBN|978-0-571-30958-0}}{{cite news|url=http://www.macclesfield-express.co.uk/news/local-news/ian-curtis-tribute-new-development-8976706|title=Ian Curtis Tribute as New Development Launched in Town Centre|access-date=17 May 2017|newspaper=Macclesfield Express|date=3 April 2015}} The woman had epilepsy and had been desperate to find employment,{{cite news|url=https://www.ft.com/content/d91398d6-d75c-11e6-944b-e7eb37a6aa8e|title='It Sounded Like Nothing Else' — The Story of Joy Division's She's Lost Control|access-date=9 September 2017|newspaper=Financial Times|date=23 January 2017}} yet she suffered seizures whenever she came to the exchange, which would greatly disturb Curtis, who himself suffered from epilepsy. At one stage, this young woman ceased attending her appointments at the occupational rehabilitation centre.{{cite book|first=Chris|last=Ott|title=Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures|date=31 March 2004|publisher=Continuum|location=New York City|isbn=0-82641-549-0|page=70}}{{cite news|url=http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/whats-on/music-nightlife-news/manchester-bands-song-lyrics-inspiration-13537337|title=The Inspiration Behind Some of Manchester's Best-loved Songs|access-date=9 September 2017|newspaper=Manchester Evening News|date=28 August 2017}} Initially, Curtis assumed she had found a job, but he would later discover she had died of an epileptic seizure.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jul/15/joy-division-10-of-the-best|title=Joy Division: 10 of the Best |access-date=9 September 2017|newspaper=The Guardian|date=15 July 2015}}{{cite book|title=A Smell of Burning: The Story of Epilepsy|first=Colin|last=Grant|publisher=Jonathan Cape|location=London, England|date=2016|isbn=9780224101820|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-_PlDAAAQBAJ&dq=%22ian+curtis%22+%22she%27s+lost+control%22+%22died%22+%22seizure%22+%22job%22&pg=PA63|page=63}}{{cite news|url=http://www.haaretz.com/jewish/features/.premium-1.637139|title=An Unlikely Tribute: How Cult U.K. Band Joy Division Found Inspiration in Auschwitz |access-date=9 September 2017|newspaper=Haaretz|date=15 January 2015}}{{refn|group=n|Curtis would later inform his wife he had been informed this woman had choked to death in her sleep as a result of an epileptic seizure. Consequently, one of Ian Curtis' greatest fears was dying in his sleep as a result of an epileptic seizure. Due to this fear, he and his wife would establish a ritual whereby, upon evenings following a Joy Division gig in which Curtis did not experience an epileptic seizure, Ian would either sit in a chair and wait for an epileptic seizure to occur in his wife's presence, or lie in bed with his wife as both listened in silence, to await a change in his breathing rhythm (which would signal an impending seizure), in order that his wife could help him, before he would sleep.{{cite book|first=Deborah|last=Curtis|author-link=Deborah Curtis|title=Touching From a Distance|publisher=Faber & Faber|location=London, England|date=1995|isbn=978-0-571-17445-4|pages=72–73}}}}

The woman's unexpected death and Curtis' subsequent awareness and experiences of the stigma endured by individuals suffering from neurological impairments formed the lyrical inspiration for the song.{{cite book|first=George|last=McKay|title=Shakin' All Over: Popular Music and Disability|publisher=University of Michigan Press|location=Ann Arbor, Michigan|date=2013|isbn=978-0-472-12004-8|page=111}}{{cite book|title=The Oxford Handbook of Music and Disability Studies|editor1-first=Blake|editor1-last=Howe|editor2-first=Stephanie|editor2-last=Jensen-Moulton|editor3-first=Neil William|editor3-last=Lerner|editor4-first=Joseph Nathan|editor4-last=Straus|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford, England|date=2016|isbn=978-0-199-33144-4|page=238}}

The hand-written lyrics were included in the new British Pop Archive, housed in Manchester's John Rylands Library, in 2022.{{cite news |last1=Youngs |first1=Ian |title=Joy Division and Coronation Street treasures launch British Pop Archive |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-60998194 |access-date=6 April 2022 |work=BBC News |date=6 April 2022}}

The composition of "She's Lost Control" centres upon Peter Hook's bassline, played high up on the neck, and a mechanistic drum beat played by Stephen Morris. For the song's recording, each drum was recorded completely separately, as producer Martin Hannett obsessively pursued clean drum sounds with no "bleed through" (when one drum's sound is added to the signal of another drum unintentionally) on songs he considered potential singles.

Live, this song would be played at a faster pace than that upon the album, and much more aggressively, with Curtis often shouting the lyrics before the bridge sections. The syndrum used upon live performances of this song would often be more abrasive and louder in the mix than was used in the studio recordings. On later live recordings, Curtis would play a keyboard line during the coda, one of only a few songs on which he would play an instrument.{{cite book|first1=James|last1=Nice|first2=Jon|last2=Savage|title=Shadowplayers: The Rise and Fall of Factory Records|publisher=Quarto Publishing Group UK|location=London, England|date=2011|page=31|isbn=978-1-845-13634-5}}

A number of live versions of the song appear on re-issues of the band's albums. In addition, the 2008 compilation release, The Best of Joy Division, includes the Peel session the band had recorded of this song in January 1979.{{cite web |url=http://www.gerpotze.com/joydivision/jddisco1.htm |title=Joy Division Discography Part 1 |website=gerpotze.com |access-date=16 May 2017}}

Many indie bands and artists have since covered "She's Lost Control". These artists include Girls Against Boys, Siobhan Fahey, Grace Jones and Spoek Mathambo. The bass riff for "She's Lost Control" was also sampled in 1993 by the Manchester electronic music group 808 State for their single "Contrique".{{cite web

| last = Carlson | first = Dean

| title = 808 State - Statetostate - Review

| url = http://www.allmusic.com/album/statetostate-mw0000953448

| publisher = AllMusic

| accessdate = 13 March 2013}}

A very loose cover version of the song, recorded by the Greek minimal wave band Alive She Died, featured prominently in a 2016 advertising campaign for the cruise/resort collection of the Italian fashion house, Gucci.

The 2002 film 24 Hour Party People includes a scene dramatizing the recording of the song, and suggests that Morris recorded the drum beat on the roof of the studio, as well as continuing to play the beat long after the other band members had left the studio.

The name of the song is referenced in the title of the 2007 Ian Curtis biopic Control, which includes the incident which inspired the song, and also the actual recording of the song. This later scene depicts drummer Stephen Morris using an aerosol can sprayed into a microphone as percussion.

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{{refbegin}}

• Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division. Peter Hook (2012). {{ISBN|978-1-84983-360-8}}
• Shakin' All Over: Popular Music and Disability. George McKay (2013) {{ISBN|978-0-472-12004-8}}
• Touching From a Distance:Ian Curtis and Joy Division. Deborah Curtis (2005). {{ISBN|978-0-571-17445-4}}

{{refend}}

• 2018 Radio X [http://www.radiox.co.uk/artists/joy-division/what-is-shes-lost-control-by-joy-division-about/ review of "She's Lost Control"]
• BBC Arts [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02rn39z archive performance of "She's Lost Control"], originally broadcast 15 September 1979
• [http://joydivisionofficial.com/ Official Joy Division website]
• "She's Lost Control", [http://www.allmusic.com/song/shes-lost-control-mt0035138775 reviewed at AllMusic by Ned Raggett]

{{Joy Division}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:1979 songs

Category:1980 singles

Category:Joy Division songs

Category:Songs about suicide

Category:Songs inspired by deaths

Category:Song recordings produced by Martin Hannett

Category:Songs written by Bernard Sumner

Category:Songs written by Ian Curtis

Category:Songs written by Peter Hook

Category:Songs written by Stephen Morris (musician)

Category:Songs about diseases and disorders

Category:Works about epilepsy