Great music, poor packaging
If you want to get some Joy Division on CD, you need to get this box set. It's just about their complete discography of official releases and contains everything you need - both studio albums, all the singles, and a nice bunch of live recordings. The music is outstanding - kind of a blend of the Doors, The Cure, mixed with a Sex Pistols edge... you can tell JD were a huge influence on U2 and many other bands that followed. Really they have a unique sound all their own that stands out from everything else before or since. The packaging on this box set though flat out stinks. The 2nd time I opened mine it fell apart, seriously. And while the book is thick, the information isn't that good - the writer tried to be artsy and it doesn't come off well; I would prefer a detailed band bio and stuff about the songs. But if you want Joy Division, Heart and Soul is THE item to get. Highly recommended.

box set...
all i can say is i love this box set, it is perfect and i love joy division.....buy this set now!!!!11

Essential for Joy Division fans
I'm in another phase of (re)exploring Joy Division, on the heels of finally watching the excellent Ian Curtis bio-pic "Control", which never made it in the theaters here in Cincinnati but I saw recently on DVD. It happens to me every couple of years that I feel the need the re-listen to this set from start to finish. I bought the original UK-issue of this, back in 1997.

"Heart and Soul" (4CDs, 81 tracks, 309 min.) brings just about everything that Joy Division ever recorded. CD1 (21 tracks; 78 min.) centers around the 1979 debut album "Unknown Pleasures", augmented by assorted singles and outtakes. Listening to tracks like "She's Lost Control", "Shadowplay" and "I Remember Nothing" reminds me why this band is still relevant, almost 30 years later. CD2 (17 tracks; 76 min.) centers around the 1980 album "Closer", again with lots of additional tracks from that era. CD3 (24 tracks; 78 min.) capatures everything else, including the early "Warsaw" music, 3 tracks from the "John Peele Sessions" and a bunch of unreleased stuff, such as the fantastic "Ceremony" and "In A Lonely Place". CD4 (19 tracks; 77 min.) is a collection of live tracks. The sound quality for many of them is not great, but they are still essential. The best of the bunch are the last 5, recorded in December 1979, when the band previewed a number of tracks that would eventually make it on the "Closer" album (released in July, 1980). Check out the live version of "Heart and Soul" and then listen to what it would eventually become in its final studio version, simply fascinating!

This box comes with a wealth of information, including studio session dates, release dates of singles and album, various articles and great liner notes. The article "Good Everning, We're Joy Division" (which was originally published in MoJo in 1994, according to the liner notes) is an eye-opener. This box is essential for any serious Joy Division fan (is there such a thing as the 'casual' fan? maybe, I don't know). And frankly, this is essential for any music lover, as the influence of Joy Division over the years has only grown (check Interpol, She Wants Revenge, and many other bands of this era). HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

IAN CURTIS: A Singer and A Poet
I travelled far and wide through many different times,
What did you see there?
I saw the saints with their toys,
What did you see there?
I saw all knowledge destroyed.
I travelled far and wide through many different times.

The Box Set We Should Have Seen for New Order
This is as close as you can get to the definitive Joy Division collection. The live material is just as good, with all of the concert recordings coming from the soundboard. This is a welcome change from years of scratchy vinyl audience-recorded bootlegs. The best part of this box set has to be the studio demos of two songs never properly released by Joy Division due to Ian's untimely death - 'Ceremony' and 'In A Lonely Place.'

Although 'Ceremony' was performed at the last live JD venue in Birmingham and found on the Still double LP release, this studio version includes audible lyrics for the first verse. We can't hear Ian in the Still version until the second verse due to soundboard problems. I was disappointed that Peter Hook cuts off 'In A Lonely Place' just as Ian started singing the version that contains, "Hangman looks 'round while he waits; cord stretches tight then in breaks." The official word on this is that during the original demo, the quality of the recording deteriorated after that verse. If that was the case, I'm sure the band would have recorded a second demo after they heard the playback.

After witnessing this release, I was expecting a similar release for New Order, but unfortunately, the New Order box set excludes many early rarities, like Homage, Haystack, and original 1980 recordings sans Gillian Gilbert.

Overall, Heart and Soul is a must have for the avid Joy Division aficionado.