Fall
News - 20 June 1998
Fall
News - 20 June 1998
Bulletin and quiz - from MES
See also: http://fall.cjb.net
"BULLETIN:
Contrary to the rumors in the N.M.E. of 13th June 1998. Mark E. Smith is not auditioning for the Spice Girls - Mark says 'I've just got rid of three big girls already, in New York City'. He extends his profound apologies.
Question One: How many tracks did the members of the arc play on 'Levitate', the last official L.P. by The Fall?
a. 10
b. 5
c. 2
Answer c."
Records
TRACKLISTINGS:
"GROTESQUE"
How I wrote elastic man, City Hobgoblin (sic), Totally Wired, Putta Block, Pay yr Rates, English Scheme, New Face in Hell, C N C Mithering, The Container Drivers, Impression of J Temperance, In The Park, WMC Blob 59, Gramme Friday, The NWRA, Grotesque
"PERVERTED BY LANGUAGE"
Man Whose Head Expanded, Ludd Gang, Kicker Conspiracy, Wings, Eat Y'self Fitter, Neighbourhood of Infinity, Garden, Hotel Bloedel, Smile, I Feel Voxish, Tempo House, Hexen Definitive/Strife Knot, Pilsner Trail.
-----
Smith on Smith:
The note from Key Mail Order merely states 'Due to financial problems, the label who were to issue the above title are now unable to do so.'
-----
Also seen in the shops:
The Fall - Northern Attitude
"An alternative selection"
18 tks licenced from Trojan records, usual tracklisting incl. Fiend With
A Violin, E.S.P. Disco, etc.
-----
Download the Mark E Smith font:
* True Type font for Windows PCs
* whatever it is that Macs use
http://www.visi.com/fall/news/mesfont.html
Created with the highest British attention etc by Paul Wilson, FallNetter and soon-to-be OBE. Hats off to Paul.
---
From: Geoff Caves
Subject: 101 uses of the MES font
1. Print out the titles of your alltime favorite fifteen Fall songs in 48 point bold (don't forget to abbreviate some of them). Crumple the page up and send it to Stefan claiming that you've just dug the set list of the best Fall gig ever out of a trunk in your attic.
1a (from al) also write to Pavement offering to design their next album cover. ooh - slap my wrists
2. Nab the lyrics of Guest Informant from the Lyrics Parade. Insert your prefered alternative for "What's that stink of analyst". Print it out in MES font. Produce the page at parties to impress your friends claiming that MES wrote the lyrics down for you just to clarify things.
3. Write a stiff letter to Receiver/Trojan in MES font.
4. Hey! Students. Extend your university career by one more year. Submit your final year thesis in MES font. The examiners won't like it and you'll have re-enrol to submit it the following year. That means valid student ID to get you discount on Smashing Pumpkins CDs and into the best discos in town for another 12 months!
-----
From: Steve Beeho
Subject: Falling Through Time
One good reason not to leave the capital.....
> The London Musicians Collective have been awarded a month's license
to
> broadcast Resonance Radio (on 107.3 FM) to "central London".
>
> On Saturday morning I was leafing through the Resonance Radio
supplement
> which had just come through the post and a programme called The Fall
Out
> Show caught my eye. On second glance, it turned out to be one of those
> chill-out deals. Zzzzzzz. I knew it was too good to be true, I
thought,
> but wouldn't it have been cool if they'd devoted a show to the Fall.
We
> can but dream etc etc.
>
> AND THEN!!!
>
> Turning over the page to Sunday's listing, I saw this:
>
> 14:00-15:00
> FALLING THROUGH TIME
> A history of the Fall Part 1 : 1977-1987
> Featuring interviews, unreleased and live tapes and lots of great
music.
> Produced and presented by Grant Showbiz and engineered by Xentossa
Jones.
>
> I swear, I thought I was hallucinating for a minute.....
>
> Now I know what you're thinking - but it wasn't quite the cornucopia
of
> exclusives implied by the above. But it was still a blast, all the
same.
> The only "unreleased" track was Dresden Dolls (which surely
everybody's
> familiar with) and the live tape wasn't particularly elusive either.
On
> the other hand, Grant Showbiz's love of the Fall shone through
> unmistakably. The interviews were predominantly culled from old radio
ones
> (I assume) but most of the snippets were new to me eg MES on their
first
> (?) US tour: "we went to Cleveland and they hated our guts - which I
was
> really proud of". The only other voices heard were John Peel (at the
very
> beginning), Brix and Rex Sargeant (sardonic tales of the Fall in
Studio).
>
> Although the volume of Fall stuff played was impressive enough, given
that
> most of it was straight off the records, I wouldn't have minded a
couple
> of songs being dropped in favour of more anecdotes and observations
from
> Grant as his comments on the Fall's "spectral beauty" were
consistently
> judicious and incisive. Anybody who can refer to Martin Bramah's
> "beautiful spidery guitar" on Various Times gets my vote. Maybe he
should
> write a book or something.
>
> The following tracks were played (all quotes from GS) :
>
> Dresden Dolls
> Various Times
> Before The Moon Falls (Introduced with: "Mark is often portrayed in
the
> press as a dour reactionary but there is a wonderfully warm spiritual
side
> to him")
> That Man ("nobody seems to notice the humour in the Fall")
> Leave the Capitol (apparently virtually every take bar the one finally
> used contained the line "showbiz mimes, minute details" rather than
> "showbiz whines....")
> Joker Hysterical Face
> Backdrop (according to GS, this version was "unavailable anywhere
else"
> but it just sounded like the one from In a Hole to me)
> Hotel Bloedel
> Couldn't Get Ahead
> Shoulder Pads
> Sleep Debt Snatches
>
> Part 2 is on next Sunday, same time/same place (21st June
14.00-15.00).
> Apparently it's also accessible via real audio at
http://www.l-m-c.org.uk
>
> There's tons of other fascinating stuff being broadcast as well - eg
27
> June has been designated Saturn Day and will feature a mere 17 hours
worth
> of Sun Ra.
>
---------
From: Tom Wootton
The British Grenadiers (18th Century)
1. Some talk of Alexander,
And some of Hercules
Of Hector and Lysander,
And such great names as these.
|: But of all the world's great heroes,
There's none that can compare
With a tow, row, row, row, row, row,
To the British Grenadier. :|
2. Those heroes of antiquity
Ne'er saw a cannon ball
Or knew the force of powder
To slay their foes withall.
|: But our brave boys do know it,
And banish all their fears,
Sing tow, row, row, row, row, row,
For the British Grenadier. :|
3. Whene'er we are commanded
To storm the palisades
Our leaders march with fusees,
And we with hand grenades.
|: We throw them from the glacis,
About the enemies' ears.
Sing tow, row, row, row, row, row,
The British Grenadiers. :|
4. And when the siege is over,
We to the town repair
The townsmen cry, "Hurra, boys,
Here comes a Grenadier!"
|: Here come the Grenadiers, my boys,
Who know no doubts or fears!
Then sing tow, row, row, row, row, row,
The British Grenadiers. :|
5. Then let us fill a bumper,
And drink a health to those
Who carry caps and pouches,
And wear the louped clothes.
|: May they and their commanders
Live happy all their years
With a tow, row, row, row, row, row,
For the British Grenadiers. :|
------
al:
forgot to mention, I found some tangential Terry Waite con recently. It turns out T.Waite was in the British Grenadiers!!!! but was invalided out due to some ear-related problem.
fascinating stuff, eh.
------
From: Graham C
Subject: Odd Fall item
Saw a 'for promotional use only' CD in Sister Ray records for 5.99, titled 'Sampler no. 13'. Included Pay Your Rates, Joker Hysterical Face and Prole Art Threat among tracks by John Martyn, John Wetton, Tom Robinson, Claire Hamill.... on the Voicegroup label, whoever they.
-----
From: PeterConkerton
Subject: food for thought
This has been at the back of my mind for some time, while the Receiver debate rumbled on, & this morning I finally remembered the source: it's from Q 114 (Mar '96), an article about the guys who run CD re-release companies. This bit refers to Laurie Pryor, grand fromage of Dojo Records (part of Castle Communications...)
...the label need not lose big-league levels of sleep about their sales figures: as Pryor happily testifies, seemingly paltry statistics can still lead to the glorious sound of cheque fluttering on to doormat. "You can make a profit on 1000 CDs", he enthuses. "Easy. When the CD thing started happening, indies were saying that they thought it was going to kill them off - but I think it saved them. You can't make 1000 records and make money, but with CD, even with these sort of figures, it's possible to make a pound per unit."
Explains a lot, hm? Also, note he doesn't have to sell 1000 CDs to Joe Punter, just to the distributors. Hence the racks are full of grubby Receiver shite that not even 1000 of us are prepared to buy. Later in the piece, Colin Miles of See For Miles records has a fascinating insight:
"Without sounding arrogant", he says, "I find that invariably, when artists get involved, they're not necessarily the best judges of their own records..."
- so he prefers to bung stuff out off his own bat, with as little contact with the artistes as possible. Sound familiar?
And finally, possible slight Fallcon. The third label covered, Ace Records, is run by Roger Armstrong & Ted Carroll, formerly proprietors of Rock On, who recall re-releasing Vince Taylor's 'Brand New Cadillac' in 1976. "Later covered by The Clash", they remark...
Mind how you go Pete, Book-keeper of Atlantis
------
Subject: Another set of Fall pretenders
The original pretenders, of course are South Dakota Death Metal band "Fall" at http://fall.superb.net
This lot are from Scotland, call themselves October Fall, and are another HM band
http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Backstage/1476/
-------
Tom Wootton:
Apparently orang-u-tangs are the only animal apart from humans capable of sarcasm, an inequality in their temporal lobes causes this, as well as schizophrenia. My anthropologist friend eagerly cited the evidence of a zoo-keeper. He went into an enclosure to clean it out while two orang-u-tangs sat watching him, he went out, came back again, and noticed the orang-u-tangs had swapped positions.
It might be necessary to stretch your definitions of sarcasm a little in order to appreciate this, nevertheless I like it.
-------
From: "Philip Johnson"
Subject: Oblique Fallcon In Liverpool Echo
>From an op-ed piece in tonight's Echo:
'PATRIOT SHAME - Thugs who think they are fighting for England
'As two Merseyside men are jailed for their part in the Marseilles violence, PADDY SHENNAN asks why our hooligans insist on fighting for their
country.
'Three lions on their shirts, Sun hats on their heads - and absolutely nothing between their ears.
'The braindead boneheaded British bulldogs are back in action - and they're fighting for YOU. For Britannia, so she can rule the waves.
'Even dear old Winston Churchill - in the tiny, perverted minds of the morons who marched on Marseilles - would have been proud of this nation's eternal disgrace.'
Fact: in his younger days, Paddy Shennan was a fanzine editor and maker of independent cassettes, including one called 'Eating Apple Crumble While Listening To Rowche Rumble'.
------
AmC:
A couple years ago when the Win95 TV ads with "Start Me Up" were onevery other commercial, I happened by chance to synch up the beginning of City Dweller with the start of this ad, and it was transformed! It was like the perfect video somehow - rapid-fire shots of people rushing around and bringing up multiple multi-tasked fast-running instances of killer apps, with MES going "get out of my city you mediocre pseuds - and take those rat-type bastards with you."
------
From: Pete Diaper
Subject: Re: r'n'r and growing up
DK sez:
> One neighbourhood I inhabited for a while in Bristol was positively
swimming
> with old style bequiffed rockers, complete with drainpipes, tattoos
and
> brylcream. This as late as the late 80s. Oddly, a lot of these people
become
> hairdressers, or barbers.
This reminds me of the time I was molested by one such rocker in
full Ted outfit in a queue to see Aliens (late 80s?). Started with a
diatribe against mods - apparently the mod/rocker thing was still
pretty big in certain areas "oop North" - and ended with a tutorial
on Zombies, and how to stop them:
"D'ya know what I'd do if a zombie came across that road now?"
"Er... run away?"
"Run away?! No, I'd run straight at 'im and bash 'is fookin' 'ead in
with a fookin rock, that's what I'd do!"
I've never forgotten that advice.
-------
Entry to Radio 1 'Fantasy Festival' section of the Steve Lamacq prog
>FallnetFest 98
>
>Shirehorses
>Half Man Half Biscuit
>Blue Orchids (reformed)
>Captain Beefheart And The Magic Band (reformed)
>Ark
>Fall
>
>DJ John Peel O.B.E
>
>Co-presenters Mark E Smith & Jo Whiley
>
>Well I'd go!
>
>Martin Wheatley
---------
From: "Peter Diaper"
Subject: Fall City Allstars
All this talk of ex members and ideal line-ups has set me to thinking. Why doesn't MES nick a few ideas from the world of football? There must be enough ex players to create a team of 11 and still have 50 or so substitutes - each with their own talents and style of play - that he could call from the bench as appropriate. Hell, he doesn't even have to stick to the 11 player limit. So if a gig's not going too well, say he figures the audience aren't responding to the tinny keyboard sound, he just has to call out "Hanley enforcement-ah!" and stick on an extra couple of bass players, mid song. Old skool audience? Substitute Julia with Una. You get the idea...
----------
From: "Philip Johnson"
>From the book review pages of today's Mail On Sunday:
THE BOOK OF LIES by Felice Picano Little, Brown 16.99 (423pp)
When professor Ross Ohrenstedt begins cataloguing the multitudinous papers of a gay literary icon, he ends up with more untitled manuscripts than he bargained for. Driving around California to interview the surviving members of the Purple Circle, an Aids-decimated literary society, he learns more than he cares to about incestuous artistic communities. Based on Picano's involvement with the Violet Quill Club (which included Edmund White and Christopher Cox), this is an absorbing Henry James-style comedy of manners about how even when some writers find their way out of the closet, others still get left behind.
--------
From: Chris Kovin
Subject: Grimm of the Week
The Strange Feast
A blood sausage and a liver sausage had been friends for some time, and the blood sausage invited the liver sausage for a meal at her home. At dinnertime the liver sausage merrily set out for the blood sausage's house. But when she walked through the doorway, she saw all kinds of strange things. There were many steps, and on each one of them she found something different. There were a broom and shovel fighting with each other, a monkey with a big wound on his head, and more such things. (!)
The liver sausage was very frightened and upset by this. Nevertheless, she took heart, entered the room, and was welcomed in a friendly way by the blood sausage. The liver sausage began to inquire about the strange things on the stairs, but the blood sausage pretended not to hear her or made it seem it was not worth talking about, or she said something about the shovel and the broom such as, "That was probably my maid gossiping on the stairs." And she shifted the topic to something else.
Then the blood sausage said she had to leave the room to go into the kitchen and look after the meal. She wanted to check to see that everything was in order and nothing had FALLen into the ashes. The liver sausage began walking back and forth in the room and kept wondering about the strange things until someone appeared--I don't know who it was--and said, "Let me warn you, liver sausage, you're in a bloody murderous trap. You'd better get out of here quickly if you value your life!"
The liver sausage did not have to think twice about this. She ran out the door as fast as she could. Nor did she stop until she got out of the house and was in the middle of the street. Then she looked around and saw the blood sausage standing high up in the attic window with a long, long knife that was gleaming as though it had just been sharpened. The blood sausage threaterned her with it and cried out,
"If I had caught you, I would have had you!"
------------------------------------------------------
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