Opinions on The Fall output through the 10's

I personally consider 'Your Future Our Clúster' among The Fall best works, Sub-Lingual Tablet is pretty solid too. About the rest of the 10's output, i'd say is still enjoyable and far from bad even if could be considered a bit weak for Fall standards, an standard much higher if compared with the ones from other artists.
It's interesting to note how on that decade Mark E. Smith developed a interesting heterodox vocal gutural approach, but not for everyone maybe. As Wire magazine said, that period will be exposed through different lectures through the years.

I liked them more when I could understand what he was saying, tbh

I consider myself such a huge fan right through maybe the Unutterable, every album was thoroughly digested by me but I just lost interest in the 2000s. Need to re-examine since this band since they meant so much to me for so long.

Your Future is really really good, I also like the later EPs like Wise Ol' Man and The Remeinderer

I find the last 4 LPs (Remit, Ersatz, Sub-Lingual, New Facts) mostly impenetrable, but I still own them ofc

*Remainderer

oh and the "Laptop Dog" single is great too, I don't think those tracks are on any LP

IMO Imperial Wax Solvent (2008) was the last great Fall album.

Your Future Our Clutter (2010) is the last album that was relatively worked over, slick and heavy, more of a serious and coherent statement than what followed but somewhat lacking in fun IMO. That said, it has grown on me in recent years and for some reason there are many occasions when out in the wild I find myself saying 'Aqua-rosa!" as if making some discovery.

After that Cherry Red put out all the new material, and unlike Domino (who put out YFOC) and some other labels allowed MES to put out things essentially as he liked. MES's vox had been pasted together from various takes since at least Cerebral Caustic -- not unusual for anyone in rock/pop recording of course, but in his case especially resulting in much more focused and compelling performances than the slurred takes you generally get on later live recordings. My suspicion has been that they didn't do record as much during the Cherry Red years and thus had less to work with to produce that coherence. (A bootleg of some alternate versions lent credence to MES's claim that he had a lot of lyrics for these songs that he discarded -- that is, there was a revision process.) You can enjoy the MES character on these later records but he rarely sounds like the commanding visionary of earlier years; occasionally, though, something special does crystallize.

Ersatz GB (2011) is more sprightly and arguably more fun than YFOC but also probably has a higher proportion of indulgent badness ("Monocard," "Greenway") than any other Fall album.

Re-Mit (2013) has some pretty nifty sharp garage rock tunes while being perhaps a bit slight. It is however the most fun Fall record of the decade and "Lodestones" is a thrilling closer. (I rate fun in Fall highly.)

The Remainderer EP (2013) seems to be going for something with more gravitas ("where's my time machine?") than Re-Mit, despite its shorter duration; some swear by it, but I've always found it a bit arid and insubstantial.

Sub-Lingual Tablet (2015) has some renewed focus, with more dynamic material and sense of space than they'd had since YFOC. MES's targets in the digital age are obvious; rather than attempt to be clever he just menaces and barks vitriol in a way that still commands attention. The vinyl has significantly different takes on some of the songs, most of them inferior to those on the CD (I think the CD version is on streaming services). A notably joyful Fall live document, this video from from Glastonbury, comes from this period.

New Facts Emerge (2017) is a burning hellscape of a parting salvo. I think I've only played it once since MES died, which is less an evaluation of its quality than an admission (partly just as a fan) that it's kind of disturbing. Someone nominated "Couples vs. Jobless Mid-30s" for the tracks poll and it is indeed a memorably ghastly setpiece.

xp "Laptop Dog" is on Ersatz GB.

excellent post, thanks for the correction! I was looking at the wrong tracklist.

YFOC is a masterpiece, one of their great albums. I bunged it a whole bunch of points in the 2010s poll. Menacing, grooving, triumphant, weird, bursting with mortality.

Every subsequent album is notable for having at least two great songs on it. Much as I appreciate Jesse's rundown, I suspect he and I disagree at times on what the great and bad songs are. For instance, I rate Greenway and Monocard as highlights of Ersatz GB - brooding, nasty dirges that they are. One we agree on is Loadstones, which is as they say, undeniable; No Respects Rev. and Jetplane also bang. Mister Rode, off the Remainderer EP, might be even better. Then we reach the baffling Sub-Lingual Tablet, most of which I don't really like, but 15 minutes of which are amongst the best music The Fall have ever put out imo - I'm talking about the songs Dedication Not Medication and Auto Chip 2014-2016, which respectively represent one of MES's most terrifying mutant electro-goth dirges and genuinely one of the most giddy and triumphant examples of kosmische in the canon. I really, really could have nominated Auto Chip 2014-2016 for the decade tracks poll, but went with the final album's clear highlight (again, mentioned by Jesse, a vicious, tormented horror-house garage-prog suite representing the supremely reluctant dissolution of MES). "How bad are English musicians?" he cackles while his team crash forth in glory, showing all the Squids and Oughts (who are tbf Canadian) of the world exactly how it's done.

A more-than-diverting postscript which can't be ignored, btw, is Gastwerk Saboteurs by Imperial Wax, the musicians who made all of The Fall's last six albums, given MES' blessing to continue as a band with a new vocalist. I'd put it on a par with any of these albums - the new vocalist, while not MES, is still engagingly weird in his own way, and the music is probably a tad more consistent (if a tad less unusual) than their Fall content. Turncoat especially and Rammy Taxi Illuminati are bangers. I never see them mentioned anywhere, which is a shame imo - they're a really great band, as their output over seven albums has mostly shown.

@eatandoph Interesting post.
On the 2015 Glastonbury performance, for some unknown reason there's something special about it, so it became my most watched Fall performance. And I find myself always remembering that MES rant at the beginning of that gig: 'Thanks for turning the volume down, cunts on the desk'.
And I must be the only one who enjoys the song 'Greenway'.

Read my post and see that you're not!

@imago 'Rammy Taxi Illuminati' is actually one of my favourite 2019 songs. Glad you mentioned it. Here's a performance of that song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20RTa2X1zXk

@imago. Yeah, i just realized it after posting my previous message. Nice to see i'm not the only one now.

I'm on a similar page with Imago, every album has at least two *great* songs. My picks for the 2010's:
O.F.Y.C. Showcase / Bury Pts. 1+3 / Hot Cake / Slippy Floor (edit) / Chino - Your Future Our Clutter
Taking Off / Nate Will Not Return / Greenway / I've Seen Them Come / Age Of Chang - Ersatz GB
Sir William Wray / Hittite Man / Victrola Time - Re-Mit
Mister Rode - The Remainderer
Dedication Not Medication (LP version) / Auto Chip 2014-2016 / Quit iPhone - Sub-Lingual Tablet
Wise Ol' Man (edit) / All Leave Cancelled - Wise Ol' Man
Fol De Rol / Brillo De Facto / O! Zztrrk Man / Groundsboy - New Facts Emerge

And for the best 2010's collaboration:
Molocular Meditation / VS Cancelled - MES & Jan St. Wener

His drunken slurring is what brings down much of the material from this era. I listen to this selection as I jump around The Fall's massive catalog from time to time, and it holds up with everything else they've done though obviously it's a very different feel from, say, the Beggars LPs which I just listened to all in a row (a very fun experience!).

YFOC > The Remainderer > New Facts Emerge > Re-Mit > Ersatz GB > Sublingual Tablet

Do also love All Leave Cancelled, but Wise Ol' Man

Re-Mit, EGB and SLT all felt like v good EP's-worth of material. Re-Mit did generally hang together the best of the lot. I think SLT, Junger Cloth aside, is pretty weak, though live it the material could be very strong!

Their gigs were frequently enough indifferent - not a word I associate with The Fall - for me to stop going anything like as frequently. Once every two years rather than multiple times in a year.

I also quite liked the vinyl versions of songs like Pledge and Dedication not Medication that Henry Rollins played, but I didn't buy the final and those versions don't seem available *anywhere* (licit or not).

I didn't like Ersatz GB much at all (Laptop Dog is one of the few songs I did like). rate Sublingual Tablet a bit higher than others here it seems though. I think I like the ones that bookend the decade the most - YFOC and New Facts Emerge.

"Nine Out Of Ten" is a very weird and effective career-closer imo

it really is. especially as it goes on for so long without him and then just ends.

and agree with the bookending: i like new facts emerge a lot in fact.