explain to me the greatness of the fall

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You either get it or you just don't get it, I guess.

thats about it, really!

― bb (bbrz), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 13:43 (eighteen years ago) link

I've been listening to the Fall since about 1987, but its only in the last few years I've really become obsessed with them. Always liked 'em, but now that they're approaching 30 years of strong output, I think they might be without peer. They can be a "jangly sort of rock band" but they can also be a killer synth-pop band ("Hit the North") a perverted version of U2 athemic rock ("Sparta FC") garage noise thugs ("Repitition") and abraisive avant gardists. Lyrics are a big part, but MES pushes the music in a way Dylan never does.

Part of the problem is that they don't a single point of entry- a Village Green Preservation Society or a London Calling a Daydream Nation that lets you get your feet wet. The Fall catalog is an endurance test to some extent- I'd say the last few albums are as good a place to start as any, though others will disagree and are just as correct. The Fall are argument. I needed to hear about six albums, including a few that were flat, before I really started to love them.

― bendy (bendy), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 14:46 (eighteen years ago) link

Well, it's like Beefheart.

Do you start with a 'commercial' type, like "This Nation's Saving Grace", or a full on one like "Perverted by Language"? Or a best seller like "Cerebral Caustic", or a big plunge like "Peel Sessions".

There are many ins.

― mark grout (mark grout), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 14:54 (eighteen years ago) link

...but no way out.

― NickB (NickB), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 14:57 (eighteen years ago) link

how true.

― mark grout (mark grout), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 14:59 (eighteen years ago) link

check the guy's track record.

― lexurian (lexurian), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:00 (eighteen years ago) link

the way i got into the fall was almost exactly chronologically. when i heard slates for the first time, it was all over. theyre muscular and angular at the same time, and bludgeony and melodic, too. at their best (99% of their 1980-1985 output), they sound like A REAL BAND, like parts of an integrated organic whole. hawkwind is the same way for me.

― don't start a RYE-OTT! (plsmith), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:02 (eighteen years ago) link

that "50,000 fall fans can't be wrong" comp is a great place to start, for sure; excellent all the way through. my first was "the wonderful and frightening world of..." and i still think that's a good first album to get, it's much poppier and easier to listen to than most of their albums.

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:10 (eighteen years ago) link

The comp is the best "in" out there. Bendy pretty much nails it. Tha Fall do so many things and hearing too much of one angle off the bat can easily throw you (esp if you are going into the Fall because yr told you have to).

― bb (bbrz), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:17 (eighteen years ago) link

This Nation's Saving Grace worked well as an "in" for me.

― moxie alvarez, Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:18 (eighteen years ago) link

The Frenz Experiment was my first-ah.

― Zora (Zora), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:21 (eighteen years ago) link

yeah - actually, 50K fall fans is a pretty good intro.

― don't start a RYE-OTT! (plsmith), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:28 (eighteen years ago) link

It was only after I picked up six or so records and had them for a while that I "got it." Mark's genius isn't centered on any one song or record, but manifests itself over his entire career. Visionary concealed in the ordinary. Trash heap immortals.

― senseiDancer (sexyDancer), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:37 (eighteen years ago) link

the fall are great for the words they use and the sounds they make.

― scott seward (scott seward), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:38 (eighteen years ago) link

I first heard No Xmas for John Quays and Mother Sister on Peel around 78, but didn't get into them till Grotesque. What struck me then was the comedy, the not being able to believe you were actually hearing this, and the music that sounded like it was on the brink of falling apart. Sometimes it helps to be English to get the humour and the references - like in the Classical, there's stuff about the decline of British manufacturing industry in the early 80s; or Lie Dream of a Casino Soul is all about the vanished northern soul scene. But they have fans all over the world, so being a brit isn't a necessary condition.
They got less hilarious as time passed. A lot of people really rate The Wonderful and Frightening World, but to me the Fall are not a pop group. Only real fanatics have all 756 albums, or whatever it is now. But every few years I'd hear a track on Peel and be knocked out again, stuff like Telephone Thing, Dr Buck's Letter.

― dr x o'skeleton, Wednesday, 18 January 2006 15:42 (eighteen years ago) link

its true, the Fall do the "this shouldnt work and i love it all the more for it" better than just about anyone. Though Fall Heads Roll sounds pretty sensible in this day and age.

― bb (bbrz), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 16:12 (eighteen years ago) link

thats because people rip off the fall more than ever these days!

― don't start a RYE-OTT! (plsmith), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 16:31 (eighteen years ago) link

for one thing!

― bb (bbrz), Wednesday, 18 January 2006 16:32 (eighteen years ago) link

Hex Induction Hour is a good starting point. It has "Hip Priest" on it. :)

― Harrison Barr (Petar), Thursday, 19 January 2006 01:43 (eighteen years ago) link

Cerebral Caustic was a big seller?

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Thursday, 19 January 2006 01:45 (eighteen years ago) link

To explain the greatness of The Fall is too explain the greatness of MES, which is impossible.

It's ok not to like them though. I've got pretty much everything since "It's the New Thing" (couldn't get Bingo Masters Breakout in Leamington Spa, those of you who know Leamington Spa in the late 70s will understand why...) but my beloved cannot listen to them for more than 30 seconds. And then only if it's Bill is Dead. Actually "Extricate" is as good a place to start as any. I'm gonna put The Littlest Rebel on right now.

― Ned T.Rifle (nedtrifle), Thursday, 19 January 2006 09:29 (eighteen years ago) link

I think maybe trying to work backwords from post-punk like Gang of Four and late Joy Division into punky Fall is not going to work for you. It'll be easier to learn to appreciate some early UK punk and then listen to the early Fall and then later Brix (and even later!) Fall if you want to understand where they fit, where they came from, where they went and why they're great. Even their early early stuff can be total synth pop like "industrial estate" or totally Gang of Four type upbeat swinging post punk like Rebellious Jukebox. Later stuff like "Barmy" is just flat out fucking catchy and figuring out the millions of layers to his lyrics is always fun.

― DDDDDD, Thursday, 19 January 2006 09:49 (eighteen years ago) link

Cerebral Caustic was a big seller?
-- Tim Ellison (thefriendlyfriendlybubbl...) (webmail), Today 1:45 AM. (later) (link)

Sorry, I meant "The Infotainment Scan"

9 Fall Infotainment Scan May 1993

― mark grout (mark grout), Thursday, 19 January 2006 10:12 (eighteen years ago) link

I needed to hear about six albums, including a few that were flat, before I really started to love them.

this sounds about right, although i was hooked somewhere around the fourth one i heard.

― danielle the animal steel (Jody Beth Rosen), Thursday, 19 January 2006 10:50 (eighteen years ago) link

> I needed to hear about six albums, including a few that were flat, before I really started to love them.

If I needed that much convincing I wouldn't (didn't) bother.

― Niall, Thursday, 19 January 2006 14:29 (eighteen years ago) link

I had a similar reaction to The Fall for years. Then one summer I was sick of all the music I was listening to and played nothing but Palace of Swords Reversed for weeks and I cracked it.

To quote the wise men above, many ways in and no way out, but small samplings and drive-by listenings are definitely not going to get you in. It helped me to focus on Smith's lyrics; if you can get a beam on his worldview the rest falls into place (hah).

Given your current situation I'd recommend their more sonically challenging outings such as Dragnet or Perverted By Language. One of the comps like Palace or 50,0000 Fans is a good place to start as well.

But if you're looking for killer bands with amazing production, The Fall are not really what you're after.

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 19 January 2006 15:00 (eighteen years ago) link

except when they're a killer band or have amazing production.
or both.

― senseiDancer (sexyDancer), Thursday, 19 January 2006 15:15 (eighteen years ago) link

fifteen years pass...

This compendium of Mark E. Smith’s onstage observations has the ‘journal of record’ feel of Alan Bennett’s diaries pic.twitter.com/9rdIjArJFb
— Ben Thompson (@btfoshizzle) February 27, 2021

chuckled at: Good evening. This one is for Mark Ellen and his stinking breed.

― calzino, Saturday, 27 February 2021 18:51 (three years ago) link

You can get it here:
https://www.atlastbooks.com/shop/p/slangking-nickas-planck

Or you can just scroll through the gigography and read snippets from different gigs, here's 1982:
https://thefall.org/gigography/gig82.html

― Gerald McBoing-Boing, Sunday, 28 February 2021 21:27 (three years ago) link

Thirty quid?

― Mark G, Sunday, 28 February 2021 21:36 (three years ago) link

wasn't this band just some bloke talking over a racket

― no (Left), Sunday, 28 February 2021 21:42 (three years ago) link

not just any racket

― oscar bravo, Sunday, 28 February 2021 22:25 (three years ago) link

Not just any talking.

― Punk's not daft (Tom D.), Sunday, 28 February 2021 22:39 (three years ago) link

ffs Left

― I like signing up to dead sites (sleeve), Monday, 1 March 2021 01:19 (three years ago) link

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