Modern Rock Tracks No. 1s - New Order and "Regret"
New Order reaches the top of the Modern Rock Tracks chart with "Regret," a terrific song that makes regret sound dreamy and uplifting
New Order - “Regret”
Weeks atop the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart: 6 total weeks (May 1 and May 8, 1993; May 22 to June 12, 1993)
Previous Modern Rock Tracks chart #1 hit: Depeche Mode - “I Feel You”
Next Modern Rock Tracks chart #1 hit: Depeche Mode - “Walking In My Shoes”
Billboard Hot 100 chart toppers during this time:
Silk - “Freak Me” (2 weeks, 5/1/93 and 5/8/93)
Janet Jackson - “That’s The Way Love Goes” (5 total weeks, beginning 5/15/93 through 6/12/93)
Like most college kids, my first exposure to New Order came as a result of a particular collegiate rite of passage in the late ‘90s, something which most folks remember their first exposure to and likely never forget the impact of the experience.
You guessed it: Orgy.
Lest your minds devolve into the gutter, I am of course referring to the *band* Orgy, whose 1998 debut album “Candyass” sported an amazing cover of “Blue Monday,” one I have to admit is probably my favorite version of the song (apologies, New Order fans). That speaks more to my musical tastes at the time, and it resonated with me before I discovered the song was a cover of an earlier ‘80s song from a British act that I’d only tangentially heard of prior to Orgy’s release.
Orgy’s first single managed to peak at #4 on the Modern Rock Tracks chart in May 1999, and at the time the song’s popularity led me down an ‘80s synth-pop rabbit hole. Back then, I was already revisiting a lot of tracks from the ‘80s that I’d missed as a youngin’ thanks in large part to the movie “The Wedding Singer.” Many of those songs were experimental new wave and obscure hits that didn’t cross over into my parents’ playlists or cassette mix tapes. I’ll talk about some of those in a bit, but ultimately the long road through those songs led me to this week’s Modern Rock Tracks chart topper, New Order’s biggest U.S. alternative and pop hit: “Regret.”
Though longtime New Order fans will tell you that they’ve always been a part of the mainstream music landscape, I can’t really place how or when I became aware of the band or started hearing them on ‘80s and ‘90s radio stations. My Musical Awakening™️ — as I recently mentioned in 30th anniversary reviews of R.E.M.’s “Monster” and Dave Matthews Band’s “Under The Table And Dreaming” — didn’t happen until around 1994 or 1995, so the week-to-week discovery of new songs and sounds didn’t happen for me until after New Order reached their commercial peak in the U.S. And honestly, my relatively small hometown’s most popular radio stations weren’t playing a lot of New Order, and since the band wasn’t at the forefront of pop or alternative rock at the time, I wasn’t hearing them.
But when “The Wedding Singer” came out in early 1998, it unlocked a new area in my musical brain eager to chew on “retro” sounds from the ‘80s that I hadn’t heard before or weren’t as big a part of my musical upbringing. It began with Dead Or Alive’s “Spin Me Round (Like A Record),” a song I did not know existed until Adam Sandler sang a subpar karaoke version of it over the opening credits sequence of the movie. From there, my musical rediscovery of ‘80s hits took me through quite a few long-forgotten hits, songs from acts like Thomas Dolby and Murray Head, just to name a couple.
Eventually, New Order popped up, largely aided by Orgy’s stellar cover. (Another note on Orgy, if you’ll permit: I really liked their other big single off “Candyass,” “Stitches.” That track peaked at #18 on the Modern Rock Tracks chart, and is an absolute banger.) New Order’s original version of “Blue Monday” is pretty terrific on its own merits, though it’s strange that it didn’t gain much traction with U.S. audiences.
In the U.K., New Order is basically musical royalty, and with the release of “Blue Monday” as a 12-inch single in 1983, the band scored the first of many U.K. top-10 hits, and the third of what would eventually be SEVENTEEN #1 hits on the U.K. Independent Singles Chart, which as near as I can figure is the British equivalent to the U.S. Modern Rock Tracks chart. Meanwhile, stateside, “Blue Monday” managed to find some traction on the U.S. Dance charts, peaking at #5 there, but didn’t have much traction on the Hot 100 or any other major U.S. charts, even after the modestly successful release of “Blue Monday 1988” peaked at a pedestrian #68 on the Hot 100.
Subsequent attempts to crack the U.S. market were largely unsuccessful throughout the ‘80s, though they remained a British highlight and likely a deeply underground favorite in America. “True Faith,” a 1987 release, became the first of the band’s two Hot 100 top-40 hits, peaking at #32 on the mainstream chart. And the song may have gotten a post-release boost from a prominent placement in the opening credits of the 2000 Christian Bale movie, “American Psycho.”
So this is my query in regard to New Order: Why were they not hugely popular in the ‘80s on a mainstream level, yet seemingly popped up out of nowhere during the latter half of the ‘90s and into the 2000s? At first I thought it was just me, but it seems like a good number of people just didn’t know they were there, unless you were following them closely on alternative radio or frequented dance clubs.
Case in point: Which New Order song did NOT appear on the Hot 100 when it was released in the 1980s, but subsequently became a “hit” on that chart in the mid 1990s, and is now their second-most popular track based on Spotify streams?
Answer: “Bizarre Love Triangle.”
It’s fascinating, looking back on old Billboard charts and wondering how this song just slipped under the radar of mainstream American music listeners upon its release in 1986. When the band re-released the track as part of its 1994 greatest hits album, the track managed to chart at #98 on the Hot 100 and suddenly became a retconned part of the musical fabric of the ‘80s, like it was always there. Less than 20 years after its otherwise uneventful release, Rolling Stone ranked “Bizarre Love Triangle” #204 on the 500 greatest songs of all time. It’s amazing.
Amazing is a term I would use to describe “Regret,” which is the focus of today’s discussion. It seems impossible to fathom now with each one of us owning a pocket computer with the entire world’s knowledge at our fingertips, but in the mid 1990s you could hear a song out in the world and go for months or years without knowing who performed it. This is what happened to me with “Regret,” a song I knew pretty well at the time and one that I can absolutely recall hearing on commercial radio, but I just didn’t know who performed it.
Once I finally tied it to New Order during the late ‘90s or early 2000s, “Regret” instantly became one of my favorite tracks from the band, and for good reason. The first is that it is practically perfect in melding together the synth/new-wave sounds of the ‘80s with the rock-centric alternative standards of the ‘90s. This song *feels* like it belongs in the soundtrack of a John Hughes-style teen drama/comedy starring Molly Ringwald or Anthony Michael Hall. It’s dreamy, ethereal, and smoothly connected by a droning electronic background that just evokes memories of the movies and sounds of that time.
At the same time, this is a banger of a ‘90s rock song. The bassline, in particular, is amazing, and that guitar riff leading into the refrain is so rad, it gives me chills. Not surprisingly, the lyrics tread on the feelings of regret the narrator has toward particular individuals and situations, trying to move forward while reconciling with the circumstances of the past.
I was upset you see
Almost all the time
You used to be a stranger
Now you are mine
Just wait till tomorrow
I guess that's what they all say
Just before they fall apart
Even if the song is tinged with that hint of regret, there’s an airy hopefulness to the track that makes it stand out, and that might have been a result of the collaboration that led to the track’s creation and release. Alan York, in a web article for Dig magazine earlier this year, talked about the band’s differing artistic directions and lack of desire to reunite and create the album “Republic,” yet the stars aligned for the group to put together their superlative “Regret” track:
“We were working well at the farm on one particular track, which would later become ‘Regret,’” Peter Hook recalled with fondness in his memoir “Substance: Inside New Order.” “Then Barney turned up, added some great guitar and, hey presto, we… had the best track on the album.”
Certainly, ‘Regret’ benefitted from the band’s collaborative approach, and it brought out the best in all concerned. Led by Hook’s ultra-melodic basslines and augmented by Bernard Sumner’s ringing guitars, Stephen Morris’ insistent drums and Gillian Gilbert’s lush keyboards, the track was steeped in the glorious, uplifting melancholia that epitomized the best New Order songs.
“Regret” was the high-water mark for New Order on the Modern Rock Tracks chart and the Hot 100 (the track peaked at #28), marking a long climb for the band to the top of that heap. Previous released managed to make top-5 appearances on Billboard’s flagship alternative chart, but tracks like “Fine Time,” “World in Motion,” and “World (The Price Of Love)” all topped out just below the top spot. Bernard Sumner did manage to reach the top of the MRT chart with Johnny Marr and Electronic in 1991, but for New Order, this would be the last time they’d be a presence on the American music charts.
The group disbanded for the rest of the ‘90s to pursue side projects before reuniting in the 21st century for a short stint. Hook left the band for good in 2007 and a newer lineup has been touring since the early 2010s.
I really like “Regret,” and I continue to be fascinated by the growing mainstream knowledge of the band’s back catalog. Again, most of their biggest hits in the ‘80s and into the ‘90s were not pop-culture mainstays or ubiquitous on American radio or top-40 stations, yet people (like myself) continue to discover them after the fact and somehow retcon the memory of those songs into the patchwork of experiences we all had growing up during those years.
I eagerly await an Orgy cover of this track, though I can’t imagine any band performing this song better.
Rating: 9/10
Chart Check
Other notable MRT chart songs from this time period
Relatively light list of hits for this period on the charts in 1993, but all were decent top-10 singles. Radiohead nearly tops the whole thing with its first single, while efforts from The Judybats, World Party, and Midnight Oil all fall short of the top spot.
“Regret” by New Order (but on the beach as part of a “Baywatch” filming): Same track as above, but instead it’s on a beach with sexy lifeguards. The live version of this was broadcast in the U.K. as part of a “Top of the Pops” broadcast. Fun little time capsule here.
“Creep” by Radiohead (#2): Radiohead knocked it out of the park with their debut single, “Creep,” a track that persisted in the upper reaches of the Modern Rock Tracks chart in 1993 but couldn’t quite crack the top. They peaked at #2 behind New Order, but the legacy of this song is arguably much more deeply ingrained in the annals of alt-rock history. Strangely, Radiohead never topped the MRT chart, but we’ll almost certainly encounter them on their journey through the alternative landscape in future “Chart Check” segments.
“Truganini” by Midnight Oil (#4): I swear, I almost turned this off in the beginning when the song launched into a virtually unlistenable harmonica riff. I’m so glad I didn’t though. This track is legit awesome! The bassline carries the song, and though the song is tinged with Midnight Oil’s customary social/governmental commentary, it’s a funky, fun track. It peaked at #4 behind “Regret.”
“Is It Like Today?” by World Party (#5): Former MRT #1 artist World Party comes back with a uniquely ‘70s-style smooth jam called “Is It Like Today?” The track sounds like something America would have made with Seals and Crofts or Gerry Rafferty, and it peaked at #5 behind New Order. I like this a lot more than their #1 hit “Way Down Now,” and in its own way, this track seems to presage some of the more introspective indie songs that would dominate the 2000s. Honestly, I’m surprised this didn’t appear on the “Garden State” soundtrack. This would be World Party’s last single to find a home on the MRT chart.
“Being Simple” by The Judybats (#7): The Judybats were never household names on the alt-rock scene, but they had their moments in the early ‘90s. The biggest moment came with “Being Simple,” which peaked at #7 on the Modern Rock Tracks chart behind New Order. It’s a slow-rock ballad-style jam, and feels correct for the time and place when it was most popular. The band did not chart after this effort, but this is a pretty solid track.
It will surprise absolutely no one that I'm excited to see this track covered! It's a highlight of the record, but there are a few others as well.
Knowing that the making of Republic was the music equivalent of a couple staying together for the sake of the kids makes Regret even more poignant. Tons of external pressure, tons of internal strife.
FWIW, Hook's book is an incredible deep dive. It's not unbiased, but it's an exhaustive look at the band through his eyes.
Separately, They Judybats are well worth anybody's time. In an alternate universe, they would've made the jump from college rock darlings to pop stars.
World Party is one of the most underrated and under appreciated bands of all time, in my opinion. Goodbye Jumbo was a killer album front to back.