Factory Records: The Periodic Table of Factory Records

Notes: The Factory cataloguing system, whilst apparently disorganised and without pattern holds many hidden charms. The last digit of the numbers show many groupings:

0 - Major albums
1 - Major posters, concepts, events, buildings, miscellaneous
2 - HAPPY MONDAYS (and initially ACR)
3 - JOY DIVISION / NEW ORDER
4 - THE DURUTTI COLUMN
5 - Selected albums and Christmas cards
6 - Factory Classical
7 - KALIMA, NEW ORDER offshoot projects (REVENGE and ELECTRONIC)
8 - NORTHSIDE 9 - KALIMA, MIAOW, THE OTHER TWO

The Periodic Table is colour coded according to the colours of the Factory 'Boxed cassette' series (including unissued variants) and a couple of "inventions". The Table first appeared in Scream City fanzine.

The Factory Records catalogue with its incomplete series of FAC numbers from 1 to 511 is the foundation upon which Factory was built. Encompassing not only regular music releases but also posters, concepts, videos, films, books, dentistry, animals, buildings and even the late Tony Wilson's coffin.

Some FAC numbers are significant because of what they represent, including:

FAC 13T - A latter day T-Shirt featuring the label graphic used on FAC 13 and other releases
FACT 24 - A Factory Quartet featured 2 records and featured 4 artists (it was also 2 x 12" records!).
FAC 83 - Hacienda 1 Year (the first birthday was in 1983)
FAC 148 - the bucket on the Styal Mill water wheel is 1 of 48 buckets
FAC 240 - the wall planner starts on 24 January 1978 and represents the first 10 years of Factory's history. 10 x 24 = 240.
FAC 289 - Advertising / Campaign for the New Order album Technique. This was in February 1989 (2/89)
FAC 321 - the video for FAC 123 'The Perfect Kiss' by New Order
FAC 424 - Tony Wilson's novelisation of the screenplay for 24 Hour Party People was "for 24"
FAC 451 - Jane Stanton's Love Will Tear Us Apart film about FAC 51 The Hacienda was numbered 451 and "for 51"
FAC 511 - And You Forgotten: A Memorial Event for Rob Gretton was so numbered because Rob would've been 51 had he lived.

The FAC prefix was also modified to reflect the type or format of the catalogue entry. Regular singles, concepts, events, etc bore the regular variant of "FAC". Albums were attributed FACT and by the mid-Eighties compact discs (be they singles or albums) were assigned FACD. Compact cassettes including the boxed cassettes were FACT with a C after the number (e.g. FACT 14C). CDR or CD-ROM albums became FACDR and the shortlived series of Digital Audio Tapes were FACT with a D after the number (e.g. FACT 275D).

Of course the odd special variant from these rules exists, a sample of which follows:

FAC 51B - Merry Christmas from the Hacienda flexidisc
FACX 79 - Factory's Christmas gift in 1979
FAC 111D - the semi-official cassette release of 'You Hurt Me' by SHARK VEGAS
FAC 112P - promo 7" of 'Life's A Scream' by A CERTAIN RATIO
FACDVD 424 - the DVD release of 24 Hour Party People

To add further curiousity value, certain numbers were allocated more than once, probably because Factory forgot that they had issued the numbers before (or perhaps because they were being deliberately perverse). On more than one occasion a number was issued more than once, either because there were distinct variants of the same catalogue entry, or (in most cases) because Factory forgot that it had already allocated the number and used it again.

FACT 10 JOY DIVISION Unknown Pleasures
FACT 10+4 posters
FAC 51 The Hacienda
FAC 51B Merry Christmas From The Hacienda
FAC 79 QUANDO QUANGO Love Tempo
FACX 79 Christmas Present
FACT 105 BITING TONGUES Feverhouse The Soundtrack
FACT 105 HOWARD WALMSLEY Feverhouse
FAC 137 QUANDO QUANGO Genius
FACT 137 VARIOUS ARTISTS Shorts
FAC 221 'Factory Goes to Hollywood'
FAC 221 Factory Contract
FAC 222 HAPPY MONDAYS / KARL DENVER Lazyitis
FACT 244 THE DURUTTI COLUMN Vini Reilly
FACT 244+ VINCENT GERARD / STEPHEN PATRICK I Know Very Well How I Got My Note Wrong
FAC 251 New Factory building
FACD 251 STEVE AND GILLIAN Loved It (The New Factory)
FAC 289 NEW ORDER 'Campaign Technique'
FAC 289 THE WENDYS The Sun's Going To Shine For Me Soon
FAC 301 Factory Conference 'Think About the Future'
FAC 301 'First 50'
FAC 318 Classics in Motion
FAC 318 Flying Start Exhibition Stand
FAC 400 JOY DIVISION Transmission
FACT 400 Various Artists Palatine The Factory Story / 1979-1990
FACT 400v VARIOUS ARTISTS Palatine. The Free Vid
FAC 401 '24 Hour Party People'
FAC 424 ANTHONY H WILSON 24 Hour Party People
FACDVD 424 '24 Hour Party People'
FAC 451 JANE STANTON Love Will Tear Us Apart - A History of The Hacienda
FAC 451 '24 Hour Party People' Hacienda

And then there's the undone numbers which were allocated but never happened.

The last FAC number chronologically was FAC 501 which Tony Wilson allocated to his own coffin. This number is not attributed to the gravestone unveiled in 2010 .

It is understood that no further FAC numbers will be issued.