Fall News

The Fall play ...

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added 26 July

Paul Hanley gave an excellent phone interview on Steve Lamacq's BBC Radio 6 show last night (25 July). You can listen online from Lamacq's page on the BBC site (it's about 1h 50m into the show), or download an mp3 of the interview here (thanks, Clayts!)

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added 25 July

Mark accepted a Diesel-U-Music Lifetime Acheivement award Friday night at an invitation-only ceremony in London. Clayts says the ceremony will air on Channel 4 at a later date.

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added 8 July; updated 20 July

The Fallshop is back in action on a more robust, dedicated server. Clayts is offering mp3s and FLACs of the Middleton gig (7 March 2005); Jilly's Rockworld, Manchester (14 May 1997); and mp3s of the Leeds Festival gig (28 August 1999).

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From an article on Mayo Thompson in the latest issue of Wire (#258) (thanks to Bob for sending it in) added 18 July

"When I worked with the Fall on Grotesque and Palace of Swords Reversed it was really
fun to meet someone like Mark E Smith. He's unique but at the same time he makes
perfect sense in terms of the traditions of this country. I sympathise with him 100 per
cent. He's also irreverant. I mean you and I are talking quite friendly here but if it
gets down to banter usually what I do is resort to being a gentleman, saying polite
stuff only, which means, perhaps, something else. But Mark E. Smith just says the
craziest stuff. He's totally wild. I loved it."

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Steven has a clip of Words of Expectation from TV Wipeout on his site. added 14 July

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Gretchen Franklin of East Enders and Telephone Thing has died. added 12 July

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Fall site news added 27 June; updated 7 July

Spurred on by the enthusiasm of new boy Clayts and an announcement by MES that he is definitely on board with communicating with us more than ever before, there are lots of projects afoot...

• Fall gigs available for download for a nominal fee. Clayts will be in charge of this area and has a vast number of gigs at his disposal. He's thinking of offering mp3 gigs for around £2 and hopefully uncompressed wav/flac gigs for £3 (it's very easy to convert a flac to a wav and burn an audio CD). There will probably be the availability of pre-burned CDRs for those without a fast connection and/or CD burning capabilities. All proceeds will go to hosting the files on an external server and any monies left over go to the Fall. Much discussion over on the Fall Forum, and Stranger has a thread/poll about which gigs should be made available.
  
• Official Fall t-shirts for purchase through the site, with all proceeds going to the Fall. Voice your opinion on what designs you'd like here, although Mark is designing the first round of T-shirts himself - see for yourself here.
  
• We've redesigned the entire site. I hope you'll agree that it's much improved, particularly the navigation bar at the top that lets you easily jump from page to page. I've also added a Fall news archive page.

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A message from Sanctuary added 20 June

A joint announcement from MES (via Clayts) & from Steve Hammonds and Paul Jones at Sanctuary Records:

Sanctuary has signed up the new Fall album Heads Roll for release in all territories outside the USA. The tracklisting and artwork is currently being finalised; details will be published as soon as they come to hand.

UK release is pencilled in for late August.

Despite erroneous reports that the new album was finished in January 2005, the actual finishing touches were added on 15 June.

Slogan Records Signs The Fall added 23 June

New label Slogan Records, part of the Sanctuary Group, has announced its first album signing, with The Fall. The label has previously only released limited edition 7"s by such bands as The Forest.

Label boss Paul Jones [formerly Elastica guitarist] said, "The Fall have been one of the most influential and mercurial bands for over two decades. I am delighted to be involved with the new album 'Fall Heads Roll' as it is on a par with their very best material."

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July 2 - Moris Tepper gig (with Ding on bass) added 24 June

at The Band Room ("England's tiniest major venue")
Low Mill, Farndale, nr. Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire

Moris Tepper, electric and slide guitarist on Captain Beefheart's last three legendary albums - Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller), Doc at the Radar Station and Ice Cream for Crow - plays here Saturday July 2 with Dingo (Polly Harvey/The Fall) on bass and Scott Mathers on drums.

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From the lastest Nightingales newsletter added 24 June

"the peel/'what a scream' version of 'urban ospreys' is to be included on a forthcoming compilation cd being released by a label called gott discs, of cambridge (uk). the album will also be featuring the fall, big flame, the membranes and other such stuff from the early - mid '80s. you can maybe get some details from www.gottdiscs.com [not yet, anyway - ed.]

Daren from Pubic Fringe:

I can throw a bit more light on the Commercially Unfriendly as I'm co-responsible for it (alongside Vince Hunt from A Witness). We've had the idea for this compilation on the boil for sometime, but thankfully Mike Gott from gottdiscs has got behind it, and has pencilled in an August release date. It's possible that we'll get it out in two months, although it's looking increasingly optimistic as we're still awaiting the masters (and in one case, a decision on which track to use!) by the majority of artists. Anyway, the tracklisting at present is

Wings - The Fall / Urban Ospreys - Nightingales / I Love You, Mr. Disposable Razors - A Witness / The Judge - Inca Babies / Debra - bIG*fLAME / War Food - Pigbros / Spike Milligan's Tape Recorder - Membranes / Cold In Summer - Great Leap Forward / Gonna Rob The Spermbank - The Ex / Blackmailer's Heartache - Shrubs / Holidaytime - Noseflutes (tbc) / Incineration - Dog Faced Hermans / Fuck America - Jackdaw With Crowbar.

I think it's a bostin' little compilation, and am really proud to be associated with it. There are some notable ommissions - Stump, Bogshed, 5 Go Down To The Sea?, DCL Locomotive - but it wasn't for the want of trying...!!

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Fall on "New Waves" compilation album updated 24 June

The Fall are not on this comp after all -- it was an error on Amazon's track listing (and on the preliminary artwork, if you look closely).

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A slow news day at the Daily Mirror (24 May) (added 24 June)

Thanks to Jon for sending this in. Not a patch on that Jahn Rhondos photo on the last Fall news... I don't see any likeness myself.

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Live From The Vaults - the real story added June 18

Mark has asked us to publish the letter below sent by himself on 10 May 2005 to Rob Ayling, head of Voiceprint Records, regarding the legality of the Live From The Vaults series.

It clarifies the non-role of Ed Blaney within Fall gruppe:

Rob Ayling responds:

Just thought I would up date you and the rest of the loyal Fall fans the world over . .

Further to Mr Smiths letter to me 10th May 2005, where he closes his letter with the line "i will not cash that cheque until ready"

I can now confirm Mr Smith has in fact cashed "that cheque".

It is now all systems go on . . . . . The Vault Series . . . . . I hope you like them !

Ed Blaney wrote in as well, to emphasize that the deal for Vaults/Interim/Rude/Access DVDs et al. was struck between MES, Rob and Ed early in 2004.

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Conway and I are delighted to welcome Clayton Hayward as co-editor of the Fall website. Clayts has done an absolutely superb job creating and maintaining the definitive Fall Track Record — now "officially" part of the Fall site with a link on the home page — and co-moderating the Fall message board. And it's great to once again have a UK-based fan running the site along with us foreigners.

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Mojo Award for The Fall updated 5 July

A message from Mark via a third party:

The band will be attending the Mojo Awards 2005 presentation ceremony on Thursday to collect an award for The Mojo Catalogue Release of the Year.

The Fall were one of five acts nominated for the gong, which is awarded to "the reissue that is both definitive and beautifully packaged."

The Complete Peel Sessions has seen off stiff competition from The Clash, Jeff Buckley, The Mamas and Papas, The Kinks and Jack Nitzsche.

And a message from Steve Hammonds of Sanctuary:

Conway:

I just wanted to say thanks for all the work you put in on The Fall - Peel Sessions box set, as you know we picked up the best catalogue reissue award last night and it goes without saying that we couldn't have done it without yourself (and of course Will, Becky and Daryl) once again thanks.

Look forward to a major Fall announcement in the next few days as well as our continued commitment to re-issuing the catalogue over the next twelve months.

Regards

Steve

Here's a blurry photo of MES from last Thursday's (16 June) Mojo awards ceremony; thanks to Steve Hammonds of Sanctuary:

And here's the blurb and a photo from the current Mojo - thanks to Clayts for scanning these in.

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The Fall Live at Deeply Vale cd is now available: see previous Fall News for details.

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Steven has a great clip of White Lightning from the Jonathan Ross show on his site.

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updated 7 July

* that MES illustration by Tony Millionaire in The Believer looks a bit familiar, the cheeky bastard! (It's based on a photo I took at the Middle East in Cambridge, 3 April 1998). A terrific essay by Douglas, though.

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17 June 2005 - Maria am Ostbahnof, Berlin: updated 7 July

Some photos here -- thanks to e floodwater for the link.

Many thanks to Alexei for providing a 10 minute video (.wmv) of bits of the gig.

Thanks to Andrew for the setlist.

Dice Man has added an excellent review on the message board of the Fall's performance in Berlin Friday night.

The actual running order:

Theme From Sparta FC / Clasp Hands / Bo Doodak / Ride Away / Wrong Place, Right Time > I Can Hear The Grass Grow / What About Us ? / Mountain Energei / Assume / Touch Sensitive / Pacifying Joint / Blindness // Boxoctosis / Janet, Johnny & James // White Lightning

Many thanks to Robert for sending in this scan from Zitty (5 July edition), and for translating the comments (added 7 July)

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10 July - Feedback Festival, Parc de la Villette, Paris: added 12 July; updated 18 July

loads of photos by Bertrand Lasseguette, Fabrice Latouche, Jean Philippe Chabot and Stephanie Mastronicola. Bertrand also has a review here.

There are a couple of video clips (Clasp Hands and Carry Bag Man) on the multimedia page, thanks to Didier.

Thanks to Pascal for the setlist and for this piece in the 6 July Telerama (en français, naturellement).

actual set played:

Theme from Sparta FC / Clasp Hands / Bo Doodak / Ride Away / Wrong Place, Right Time > I Can Hear the Grass Grow / What About Us / Mountain Energei / Assume / Mr. Pharmacist / Blindness // Carry Bag Man

Reviews on the message board.

Michael Jungbluth:

Etude

Really in time the soundcheck was beginning. The stage was captured in a cage, the band was working hard. A nice new guitar of Ben. Sounding as a pretty good musical band. Despite several discussions about broken cables or bad fixes the group was drawing sketches of their set. Extended versions of Janet, Grass Grow, Carry Bag Man (!), Sparta, micro sketches of U Wanna, Mountain, a vocal (by Elenor and the boys) of Sparta. Clear audible greek text on this. After some 70 minutes the sound seemed to be fixed: a powerful driven sound was promising an exciting enjoyment for the crowd. Its area was good enough to keep 4,000 or 5,000 people.

Excellent

This festival was run by professionalists. What a huge stage with a full service of a light show, several soundmen were trying to deliver the best, orange shirted security people, gentle ladies showing the way and handing out programm folders. Strong muscles were taking away the front fence. Only coffee at place was missing.

Governmental Estate

It was exactly as planned when The Fall walked onto the stage, a brilliant start with Sparta as Mark came in. The Parisian crowd supported by many from the neighboured countries greeted them enthusiastically. Pretty balanced set with a lot of newer songs, it looked like the group was enjoying to play this festival. Nobody would thought that MES would be in such a good spirit and in such a pleasant mood, remember they started at a quarter to eight! It must have been like a very early morning but our tin drummer showed that he is in a pretty enjoyable form at this daylight event. The crowd was well prepared, the reaction to each track was marvellous: good responses on Shipman, Assume. Not only on Pharmacist. An armada of photographers and videotakers were close to the stage, some of them were concentrating on capturing the heavy moshing. Paris, where The Fall had been missed more than a decade will be one of the best documented gigs for years.

Exquisite

Good evening, we are The Fall. Good Evening, we are The Fall, down the long, long, long ..ways (or something) Despite a very clear voice of Mark, even at the edge of the stage, I am sorry to not be able to report more details of his greetings. Drum beating, amp fiddling and atomizing the mic stands looked pretty creativ. Fortunately the stage men didn't interacte. So this performance was very fall-ish and authentic.

Controlled leaving as Mark directed to go off stage soon, just after Mountain. The encore was expanded, Assume, Parmacist, Blindness, second encore was a gem version of Carry Bag Man. Dig out the well-tuned Carrier Bag!

The green guitar, a new twelve (?) string, brought a nice sound. Ben changed to this one during Mountain and Blindness. He looked very happy and proud to play this new one.
Spen was hitting the drums like a beserk - red headed and fully concentrated.
Steven - extra applause for him working such a bass - sharp like after a shave, only distorted when needed.

Elenor produced squeaky sounds, would be nice to have them as loud as on the etude hour. Once she was worried about a big hum which came from her speakers after Mark adjusted her amps... Her voice was sadly not well transported by the PA. The soundmen risked to see her angry stinkfinger. But we were amazed to see her doing Carrier Bag. Before that she encouraged the public to do its own contributions after Mark was handing out a mic: HIT - Have Mercy On Me! The Electric Triangle and me doing a duet!

Extension

The Fall must have been busy the night before they were coming to La Villette. A new backdrop was unfolded, a blue lorry awning with a painted square on it. C&W stylish Heads Roll theme, silver typos and red-yellow flames. It looked like the backdrop was folded immediately before packing it into the van, the colours had been probably still wet. Having used an acrylic glue instead so the fix of the two fabrics may last longer than 50 minutes. Anyway, nice to have a proud new theme for The Fall - Fall Heads Roll! A big applause to the French government: not a fault spending money for the FeedBack festival and inviting The Fall to reconquer the Continent.

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Claus Castenskiold still has some of his artist-signed PBL tour posters for sale on his site -- http://www.clauscastenskiold.com -- which is worth exploring.

26 July 2005

This is the latest news and gossip off FallNet and elsewhere for those with weak stomachs. If you have anything to say, you can mail Stefan, but you can't mail the FallNet mailing list direct anymore. To subscribe to FallNet, send mail to:
fallnet-subscribe@
yahoogroups.com.

14jun05 UK & Lyon gigs, Conway's guitar tab and Adult Net pages, Jools Holland, Deeply Vale cd, MES int. w/BBC on Peel, Lime Lizard 1993, Festive 50 book, Live from the Vaults delayed, Wake Up in the City, Cuz'n Roy's yard sale on ebay, Jahn Rhondos.

27apr05 UK gigs, Left of the Dial & Scotland on Sunday interviews, Deeply Vale CD preview, Bingo Masters press release, Scherzo Schist, Live from the Vaults, Simon Reynolds, Simon Armitage, Prenzlauer Berg, Fall Cafe, Poloraoids special offer, Brix & Gromit, MES on Funhouse, Fall documentary transcript, the Fall wants your photo.

25feb05 BBC4 Fall doc, Hex reissue, KFNY gig, Fall Forum's TNSG, Ice Magazine (UK) MES int., Sun Zoom Spark articles, Playlouder appreciation, unofficial Sparta FC video, Peel set postponed 1 month, MES's New Years Honours list, 9may81 photos, Hunter S. Thompson, RIP.

07jan05 Jim Watts resigns, UK gigs, Pseud Mag, Festive 50, Deeply Vale, documentary, City Bar "fall-out", Polaroids on the Fall, Wipe That Sound, Narnack sampler.