Why does anyone like the Fall?

And the drummer goes whomp-a-whomp-a-whommmp-a.

I guess I'm easy to please.

(Subthread: Great songs about The Fall: "Mark E. Smith & Brix," Barbara Manning)

What I'm more curious about is how the Fall have such serious devotees. Their formula seems to me to result in pretty wide stretches of less-than-necessary stuff, and it's static enough to leave me pretty confident that, say, a two-disc comp of highlights is more than any person could ever need of them. The dedication of their fans, on the other hand, makes me wonder: are there really little gems scattered all through the discography, enough little shifts of personality to make slogging through the whole thing worth it? The fact that people remember the names of their individual songs so readily would lead me to believe they must settle into very different places, but god, my limited Fall listening has not given me much indication that that's the case.

(Good way of testing this, I guess: start an "essential Fall" thread and see how lively and specific and Smiths-like the debate over what tracks count can get.)

In a word, yes. Sometimes it is often necessary to immerse oneself in a prolific artist's work to fully understand it all. Mark E Smith has changed a lot over the past 30 years, and it shows in his work. The Fall certainly can reward those with a casual interest, but if you really want to appreciate the nuances and details, you can't just be a dilletant with a best-of cd.

(Jess's list is pretty cool, by the way)

If you start an "essential Fall" thread, you will find that a lot of people like a lot of different Fall songs, and it probably won't make getting through the huge discography any easier on you.

and i swear this has nothing to do with them being cassettes

Extricate is pretty weak, I'll admit.

First Fall I ever heard was _The Wonderful and Frightening World..._, which did nothing for me at the time. _Palace of Swords Reversed_ was my conversion experience.

1. Prole Art Threat (1981)
2. How I Wrote “Elastic Man” (1979)
3. Totally Wired (1981)
4. Inch (1999)
5. Fortress/Deer Park (1982)
6. New Face In Hell (1980)
7. Free Ranger (1992)
8. Black Monk Theme, pt. 1 (1990)
9. Masquerade (1998)
10. U.S. ’80s-’90s (1986)
11. Kimble (1993)
12. Slang-King (1984)
13. Repetition (1977)
14. Hit The North (1988)
15. Leave The Capitol (1981)
16. Edinburgh Man (1991)
17. Put Away (1978)

I believe almost every band I've ever been in has covered a Fall song at some point, and sometimes it wasn't even my idea... I have vivid memories of playing "U.S. '80s-'90s," "Frightened" and "Fantastic Life."

The Classical
New Face In Hell
I'm Into CB!
Repetition
I Am Damo Suzuki
New Face In Hell
Hip Priest
Couldn't Get Ahead
Dr. Buck's Letter
Living Too Late
Hit The North
Cruiser's Creek (live from Seminal Live lp)
Dktr Faustus
CREEP
Clear Off!
Oh! Brother
Impression of J. Temperance
Prole Art Threat

Hopefully this, in addition to what Douglas and others are posting, will give you a nice long list of songs to download from your favorite p2p.

That's a Kinks song, Mike!

Anyway, I think the hype is a bit overblown, and they sound like absolute shit on pot, but they have their moments. Eh.

1) “steppin out”
2) “rebellious jukebox”
3) “dice man”
4) “rowche rumble-live”
5) “pay your rates”
6) “fit and working again”
7) “totally wired”
8) “the classical”
9) “room to live”
10) “lie dream of the casino soul”
11) “i feel voxish”
12) “c.r.e.e.p.”
13) “rollin’ dany”

14) “couldn’t get ahead”
15) “living too late”
16) “frenz”
17) “wrong place, right time”
18) “dead beat descendant”
19) “black monk theme part I”
20) “free range”
21) “strychnine”
22) “hey student!”
23) “life just bounces”
24) “spinetrak”
25) “touch sensitive”
26) “hands up billy”

Ah, lovely. I would happily shell out for a Fall boxset of Peel Sessions from then to now.

Would you believe... USA Today?

that said i still like tons of their songs, for reasons stated elsewhere in this thread.

Yeah that really fucked me up. I had a perfect playlist built from Apple Music of The Fall in chronological order broken up into 3 phases. Basically pre-Brix, Brix and post-Brix, and suddenly key tracks disappeared. Usually those tracks exist on other releases, like a best-of or some compilation, and there's some rights that have switched or something. It really sucks. Eat Y'Self Fitter is on the 50,000 Fall Fans Can't Be Wrong compilation so I had to pull it from there. Smile's nowhere. Leave the Capitol's nowhere, just some live version. Lie Dream is on the 50k comp etc.

I def started leaning to heavily on streaming so I could access these playlists in multiple places. Now it's fucked. I'd be better off finding a way to serve the playlists off my computer remotely.

50,000 Fall Fans comp not available on UK Spotify, alas, so can't plug the Eat Y'Self Fitter hole with that.

I'd dig out my old CDs if I still had a CD player! Ah well, there's always soulseek

just heard "A Past Gone Mad" for the first time a couple days ago and I was stunned not just that it was The Fall but that it was The Fall from 1993. might have to actually explore those later records I guess.

they are great

Infotainment Scan is a really good Fall record!

the perfection of "Blindness" (the Peel Session version) is completely shocking

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAHbSAJjTls

Infotainment Scan is a really good Fall record!

I get "Hey! Student" stuck in my head not infrequently.

"Noel's Chemical Effluence" is a great lost 90s track, unique in their catalog.

Probably said this on another Fall thread but I really like Middle Class Revolt, the one time I saw them it was the current album and it was a great set

(xp I actually had Hey! Student stuck in my head for weeks after this show!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rx2Y956Oq0

yes that tour was the only time I saw them as well, with Brix!

that live version of middle class revolt they toured with was so f’ing good. brix appearing, incredibly, before we heard the amazing peel christmas session with her on. anyway the 27 points version captures it v well

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyDVfnCCC1w

I saw that tour too, in Seattle. No way in those times of knowing brix was back in the band. When she came out me and others went nuts

MCR the album doesn’t connect for me somehow. The pieces are all in place but it fails to fly.

I found "Leave the Capital" on a different album on Spotify, "13”

Don't know if it's the exact same version, you know how these things run w/ The Fall.

There is a "complete fall albums" playlist consisting of the official albums, created by Cherry Red. I daresay some will have dropped off that for the same reason.

Anyone happen to know if the vinyl version of Sublingual Tablet ever got a non-vinyl release? iirc all the alternative versions were superior to their cd counterparts.

now you tell me! lol

As with much of the post-Beggars years, "Middle Class Revolt" is half great half meh. My picks for the great stuff:
15 Ways
Behind The Counter
M5#1
Middle Class Revolt!
Hey! Student
War

As for the Sublingual Tablet LP, only "Dedication Not Medication", "Auto Chip 2014-2016", "Pledge" and "Fibre Book Troll" were different on the LP. "Dedication" was definitely superior on the LP, "Auto Chip" was just an edit and the other two were a toss-up (I didn't feel "Fibre" should be twice as long).

I have MP3's of them if you're interested, ILXMail me.

Starting in 1994 or so I subscribed to the Fall email discussion list (remember those?) so I was aware of the lineup comings and goings. The list was very rockist though, most hated Brix and anything after 1982. (I've always loved Brix and the Beggars albums rule so hard).

Anyone happen to know if the vinyl version of Sublingual Tablet ever got a non-vinyl release? iirc all the alternative versions were superior to their cd counterparts.

As with much of the post-Beggars years, "Middle Class Revolt" is half great half meh. My picks for the great stuff:
15 Ways
Behind The Counter
M5#1
Middle Class Revolt!
Hey! Student
War

As for the Sublingual Tablet LP, only "Dedication Not Medication", "Auto Chip 2014-2016", "Pledge" and "Fibre Book Troll" were different on the LP. "Dedication" was definitely superior on the LP, "Auto Chip" was just an edit and the other two were a toss-up (I didn't feel "Fibre" should be twice as long).

I have MP3's of them if you're interested, ILXMail me.

Well now this is a good read:

https://thequietus.com/articles/34037-the-fall-marc-riley-craig-scanlon-paul-steve-hanley

The four of them were on the Hanley Bros podcast together a couple yrs back, well worth the listen

I lurve Marc Riley, I wish he'd reissue his Creepers stuff.

been listening to O-Mit, an EP of stuff left off Re-Mit, it's really great

nice, had no idea that existed

got one of those great Fall song titles that cracks me up: "A Disco (City)", the parenthesis kill me for some reason, miss u Mark E.

How do they feel about this description? “It really was a great band,” says Riley. “The two drummer lineup [with Karl Burns] was an amazing thing to be involved in. It felt absolutely infallible pretty much every night. We felt like we could take anybody on. We once played with The Birthday Party [in 1982] and they really went for it, it was a bit like a 'follow that...' scenario. And we did. We did a 13 minute version of ‘And This Day’, and we went hell for leather. For my money we were better than The Birthday Party that night, who were one of the greatest live bands in the world.” Scanlon then adds: “although we did play with The Cramps and they blew us off stage. Fucking ruined us.”

one for the "blew them off stage" thread! i find the image evoked by the lewder reading of that innocuous line truly delightful.

further to the interview, there is a pretty significant subset of fall cratediggers who will listen to all these different recordings critically and point out standouts - not sure if they've been in touch with those folks, but god i bet they could curate some truly killer sets based on their tapes. far better than the grey-market piles of crap that come out now.

It is wild how much stuff seems to get added to the pile every time I take a look - there’s a 4-disc reissue of Are You Are Missing Winner?

One of those sets has four renditions of "Das Boot". I mean, yeah, but

Even if there WEREN’T any outtakes from Re-Mit, they’d still have to make an outtakes ep called O-Mit

We could use a good live album of the fall heads roll tour from before the explosion of that lineup

that would be great