Recording
Love Will Tear Us Apart
Joy Division
Independently chosen for3 of our lists. Here is what each of them said.
- Released
- 1980
- Label
- Factory
- On
- Post-Punk, The Eighties, and The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
- Updated
- 2026-08-29
Analysis
6 sections, no single moment the energy jumps to, 59% of it spent climbing.
- Tempo
- 143.6 BPM
- holds throughout
- Dynamic range
- 3.3 dB
- compressed hard — very little between the quiet and the loud
- Length
- 3:30
- measured from the YouTube master
The record, end to end
Click the track to jump · ← → move between sections
- 0:00Apeak0
- 0:15Bbreakdownbar 9
- 0:27Cpeakbar 16
- 0:48Abuildbar 29
- 2:51Aliftbar 103
- 3:12Doutrobar 115
0:00 · A · peak
sits at the top of this record's range · instrumental · one of 3 stretches of the same music (A)
- Lasts
- 0:15
- Energy
- 100
- Brightness
- 21
- Density
- 78
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
energy falling away mid-record, percussion thinning · instrumental
- Lasts
- 0:12
- Energy
- 81
- Brightness
- 100
- Density
- 100
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
sits at the top of this record's range · sung
- Lasts
- 0:21
- Energy
- 93
- Brightness
- 83
- Density
- 58
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
energy and brightness climbing without a break · sung · one of 3 stretches of the same music (A)
- Lasts
- 2:03
- Energy
- 78
- Brightness
- 0
- Density
- 74
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
a short rise that does not resolve — a fill or a transition, not a build · instrumental · one of 3 stretches of the same music (A)
- Lasts
- 0:21
- Energy
- 85
- Brightness
- 0
- Density
- 72
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
the closing fall · instrumental
- Lasts
- 0:18
- Energy
- 0
- Brightness
- 1
- Density
- 0
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
Brightness and density are scored against this record's own sections, not against music in general — they say how its parts differ from each other, and nothing about how it compares to anything else.
- drums
- the drum kit, separated from the mix
- bass
- the bass part, separated from the mix
- vocals
- the voice, separated from the mix
- other
- everything else — synths, guitars, keys, strings
Separated into parts by a source-separation model, so each lane is the instrument it names.
- peak
- sits at the top of this record's range
- breakdown
- energy falling away mid-record, percussion thinning
- build
- energy and brightness climbing without a break
- lift
- a short rise that does not resolve — a fill or a transition, not a build
- outro
- the closing fall
Measured from the YouTube master on . Section labels describe how the energy of the recording moves, not its musical form — a machine can see loudness climb and jump, it cannot hear a chorus arrive. Anything we were not confident enough to state is left out rather than shown with a caveat.
Ranked No. 1 in Post-Punk
Peter Hook plays the melody on bass, Bernard Sumner plays the atmosphere on a cheap synth, and Ian Curtis writes the plainest lyric of his life. The genre's one unarguable pop record.
Picked by The Eighties
Factory gave its bands the copyrights and had no contracts to speak of, which was ruinous as a business and is the reason this record sounds like nobody was consulted. The decade's most covered song, released by a Manchester club with a design habit.
Picked by The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
The bass carries the melody, a cheap synth carries the weather, and the lyric refuses every available metaphor. Guitar music's most perfect three minutes.