Don’t Forget The Fall
by Walter Price
I am not an historian when it comes to Mark E. Smith’s prolific (30+ official albums) post-punk band The Fall but it dawned on me this morning that this is an outfit that doesn’t flow from the tongues of up and coming music connoisseur when they speak of music influenceers as much as they should.
If you were of high school or college age in the US in the 80s like myself you probably had a copy of The Wonderful and Frightening World Of… or The Frenz Experiment. Just two of the band’s albums that you can find solid sounds that have been copied errr should I say been the influence on many musicians for the following decades. Awesome albums to have if you want to hear where your fave 90s bands got their ‘original’ sounds…
With an ever changing sonic foundations, an outspoken frontman, forging their own paths and some moderate commercial success The Fall have done one thing very well, stayed steady on the right side of relevant. John Peel loved them and said this to John Walters, “They’ve never disappointed me yet, and I suspect won’t…I can’t think of any other artist who’s managed to do that for 10 years…I simply don’t know what it is that I like about the Fall…He (Mark E. Smith) never takes the prevailing trendy attitude…I’m pleased that he does say what he actually thinks…The Fall are always identifiably The Fall, but they do seem to evolve.”
So don’t forget The Fall!
1988
Album: The Frenz Experiment
2015
Album: Sub-Lingual Tablet
TASTY