Compiling early raw material and a number of later singles and b-sides, Substance 1977-1980 is a fine, impressive collection not exclusively for Joy Division/Factory completists, but really for everyone, which is an uncommon effect in singles and b-sides collections, really; this often, in fact, seems like an intended album. Nevertheless, listeners will hear an obvious sense of growth over the course of the work, from the inception of the band (as Warsaw) through the record proper’s compelling climax and finale, ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart,’ originally released one month before singer Ian Curtis’s death.