Disney’s Joy Division T-shirts actually kind of awesome

This past Monday, an outcry raged across the internet in protest of Disney’s latest T-shirt, a likeness of the Mickey Mouse symbol, presented in the style of the pulsar featured on Joy Division’s seminal debut album, “Unknown Pleasures.” Despite all of the baggage associated with Joy Division’s history, the Disney website even went so far as to specify, “Inspired by the iconic sleeve of Joy Division’s “Unknown Pleasures” album, this Waves Mickey Mouse Tee incorporates Mickey’s image within the graphic of the pulse of a star. That’s appropriate given few stars have made bigger waves than Mickey!” The guy who wrote that blurb had to have known he was being cheeky with that one.

Despite a knee-jerk reaction of disgust amongst the indie community, the shirt sold out in a matter of hours, and it’s hardly believable that these purchases were from a barrage of Disney fanatics. Sure, the idea of a conglomerate like Disney trying to combine our childhood pleasures with the unknown ones we received from hearing “Love Will Tear Us Apart” for the first time in our teen years is a little strange, but its combination in a logo on a T-shirt is hardly anything to get bent out of shape about. It’s also something that has been done before. Urban Outfitters for one have had a T-shirt design for years that used the “CP 1919″ pulsar, its use an obvious homage to Joy Division, but after all, the image is public domain, something Peter Saville knew very well when he designed the cover over 30 years ago. This idea also is a continuation of a readily used concept of desecrating sacred cows on T-shirts for humorous purposes — how many shirts have you seen using the Black Flag symbol brandishing the names “Lady Gaga” or “Justin Bieber”?

When asked for comment on the shirt, bassist Peter Hook remained passive and somewhat flattered by the recognition, “It’s a funny one,” he tells Billboard. “I suppose you would have to say it’s a compliment coming from an organization like Disney. When you consider that Joy Division were only together for three years, it’s certainly a fantastic compliment thirty-four years later to still be able to make a splash like this is. The fact that it’s sold out is an even greater compliment” — the stock ran out before Hook could even get his hands on one. Joy Division’s other two surviving members, Bernard Sumner and Stephen Morris, who are still continuing on without Hook as New Order, couldn’t be reached for comment, but it’s unlikely anyone was asked considering the public status of the pulsar.

While its borderline perverse that Disney would sell a Joy Division T-shirt, as the company is something one would like to imagine as untouched by the world of drugs, sex, and suicide, the shirt is pretty cool when one disconnects the idea that Disney designed it. The combination of a symbol of childhood innocence mixed directly with a symbol of despair, loneliness, and paranoia, is a pretty clever juxtaposition, and if some rogue graffiti artist had made the tee and sold it through an independent website, everyone would be singing its praises. The Mickey Mouse symbol has been used as an ironic icon for years in the art world, and the fact that the Waves Mickey Mouse Tees for Adults subsidiary is also joining this movement is an interesting example of the blurring of culture lines – the underground and the mainstream reaching a peak in self-awareness.

Probably the biggest shame about the amount of press surrounding the T-shirt is the fact that the kitsch value will wear off instantly being that everyone already knows about it. Considering that in matter of weeks these tees will be popping all over hip spots everywhere, I think I’ll have to pass on getting one myself — after all I can wait for a “Doolittle” T-shirt with Mickey Mouse hunched over with a halo over his perked ears.