Singles

is a 2 disc compilation of just that from the lifetime of New Order. On it, there is the original recording of Temptation from the early eighties. I have the 87 version in a few different places. I hadn't heard this early version in a very long time. It was given to me on a mix tape and like a dream, I can remember exactly where I was when I first heard it. In Puerto Rico there was a beach club for officers and although I wasn't an officer, I was a girl and military so they would let me in to sunbathe. Right there, I first heard that song on headphones through a Walkman cassette player. Every time I heard that song after that, I would think of looking up through wind tossed palm fronds at a crystal sky: an unreal blue-green-grey like eyes I knew I had seen before. I played that tape 'til it busted and after that I only had the later version.

I just bought Singles this week to listen to while I slept on the couch. I find that now when I hear that song I have a different image. I think of sitting in a near empty bar of dark wood to escape a sweltering afternoon and those same eyes telling me it could be real.