Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
A night of sweaty joy with New Order at Fillmore Miami Beach
Revered post-punk electronica icons New Order began their fournight residency in a packed Filmore Miami Beach on Tuesday, an energizing evening of deep cuts and dance hits, sweat and euphoria, and an intense appreciation of Joy Division.
Such was the energy in the room that, somewhere between “Shellshock” and “Guilt Is a Useless Emotion,” you may have wanted to test that sign taped to the wall by the stage: “No moshing or crowd surfing.”
In kicking off their extended stay at the Fillmore, New Order’s Tuesday concert drew inspiration from the songs and new arrangements featured on their recent album, “(No,5m,20Mia),” a recording of the band’s famed 2017 Manchester International Festival set.
Nearly all the songs on the Manchester album were performed on Tuesday, including several favorites that were not heard on New Order’s stop at the Fillmore in 2019, such as “Shellshock,” “Guilt” and “Ultraviolence.” The band has indicated that they will be tinkering with the setlist for upcoming shows at the Fillmore on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.
Co-founding guitarist Bernard Sumner took the stage at 9 p.m. to an instrumental version of “Times Change,” accompanied by drummer Stephen Morris (a co-founder and, like Sumner, a founding member of Joy Division), multiinstrumentalists Gillian Gilbert and Phil Cunningham, and bassist Tom Chapman. Behind them, above the darkened stage, Super-8 film scenes of old Miami flickered.
For the next 1 hour, 45 minutes, New Order filled the room with fresh interpretations of their timeless and influential music, and basked in the adulation of a wildly enthusiastic audience, many too young to have been paying attention when “Low-Life” was released in 1985.
Sumner, 64, was a spry bandleader, with plenty of bounce in his step and vocal skills still equal to the challenge of elevating the old songs. On guitar, he and Cunningham brought the velvet and the hammer to the task, especially on a soaring cover of Joy Division’s “Disorder.”
“This is fun,” Sumner told the crowd after a performance of “Vanishing Point.” And it was.
It was a night of singalongs that started from the opening notes of many songs, with the highest highs coming on the pulsating hit “Bizarre Love Triangle” (“Every time I see you falling…”), “True Faith” (“I feel so extraordinary / Something’s got a hold on me…”) and the percussive “Blue Monday” (How does it feel / To treat me like you do?”), layered in synth-y peril.
Other songs that seemed most likely to inspire a mosh pit: the electronic square dance “Ultraviolence,” “Plastic” (from the 2015 album “Music Complete”) and the irresistible “Temptation,” another crazed sing-along (“Up, down, turn around / Please don’t let me hit the ground”). Pure joy.
New Order played two encores, opening with Joy Division’s moody “Decades,” Sumner on a darkened stage backed by fuzzy video of the late, great Ian Curtis. It was followed by Curtis’ tour de force, Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart,” interrupted by poignant applause when the video screen was layered with the words “Forever Joy Division.” Sumner doesn’t have the low gear that Curtis’ vocal could cruise in, but the lightness of this version seemed like a more representative way to send people on their way.
New Order performs , Friday and Saturday at the Fillmore Miami Beach. Doors open at 8 p.m.