Lillywhite Attributes U2 Connection To Ian Curtis Death ::U2 News ::antiMusic.com

Lillywhite Attributes U2 Connection To Ian Curtis Death

05/23/2013
. (Radio.com) British producer Steve Lillywhite has worked with a plethora of famous artists including Talking Heads, Morrissey, The Rolling Stones, and most recently, Thirty Seconds To Mars.

Arguably, Lillywhite is best known for his work with U2, spanning from their albums Boy, October, War and How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, to songs on the infamous Joshua Tree and more.

Lillywhite worked with what he describes as "the bad mullet band" U2 when they were on the verge of blowing up and swiftly rose to success in a time when music made unfathomable amounts of money.

How did Lillywhite manage to work with such a pivotal band at an early point in his career? Though he's been working in the "vacuum" of the studio since age 17, the producer joked with Los Angeles station KROQ's Kevin & Bean in an interview Tuesday (May 21) that he has to "thank Ian Curtis [of Joy Division] for dying."

"[U2] had a producer who produced the very first U2 single called '11 O'Clock Tick Tock,' which I think is a great song if anyone remembers that," Lillywhite explained. "And then, Ian Curtis committed suicide. Martin Hannett, who was the producer, decided not to produce the U2 album." more on this story

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