the corpo wrote:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHQcoPUEskA

This is one of my favorite clips evah.

the last time i saw the fall in dublin, he had a quickly assembled new band, having just fired everyone the week before.

some young lad had been drafted in on guitar, probably had one practice and didn't know the songs, so he just tried to add simple little parts along.

smith would walk over to the amp and start fiddling with the settings, something he often does, but at this gig he would fiddle then turn it off.

leaving the poor kid there looking like an idiot. the next song would start, smith would walk back over, fiddle and then turn it off, all the while shouting over and over "marshall-uh! make very fine-uh! aaaaaaamplifiers!"

after about a half dozen songs, smith walks offstage, 2 minutes later his manager ed walks on, with what appears to be a hastily written note, walks up to the mic and reads off what mark has just written


"the guitar player is a buffoon"


worst....gig.....ever

i know a fall fan in argentina that was really obsessed with them. he had about 30 albums, counting, cD, vinils, bootlegs, and live stuff. the 'legend' says that he only listened to the fall for one year straight.

Steve V. wrote: I remember seeing a concert video of them where he pushes the sound tech practically off the stage while he is fixing a mic because he didn't seem to want anyone to disrupt his grand entrance.

Here is other evidence of his pushing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xx37bAtHkvk

the fall are playing my town next week. i've been given e mail permission to interview the boy smith. but i have no idea what to ask him, he probably wont understand my accent for a start....

my ideas for questions are limited.

1. fancy a pint/nip
2. how come your band allways sounds the same even when it's different folk playing the guitars and all that.
3. is music a better job than working in a shop or doown tit' pit.
4. do you think having a government is usefull.
5. do you have a wristwatch.
6. have you ever been to Buckie/and or Banff
7. i like the song where you go on about a band or folk playing music somewhere and you say "they were a bunch of twats-uh" which song is that.
8. can you lend me a tenner.
9. is elijah wood related to you.
10. was john peel a cock, or was he allright.
11. do you think its better to have a car or tae get the bus.

these are not the best questions i admit. better ideas are wellcomed.

i meant wellcomed-uh.

wow..only 50? the fall are the rolling stones of 'post-punk.'

Yesterday, MES. Today, the state of Ghana.

simmo wrote:Happy Birthday-uh

You curmudgeonly old git-uh

There is a man who has never met a plastic surgeon...thank christ.

Two steps back-uh! Two steps back-uh!

Dr. Bucks' lettah...chunkachunkachunk-chunkachunkachunk

Those are the only two Fall songs I've ever heard, but I dug them lots. He and his band look like unbearably cool postpunkers, so I oughtsa checkem out (especially since Mark Prindle idolizes them).

That's not a very recent pic of MES, he looks bit more lizard-y now.

Anyway, happy belated to him. The new album is bonkers.

We fed MES and band a few years ago. Here we are in front of my old restaurant.
He gave me a bottle of Glenfiddich. I hadn't seen him in person for twenty years, when we opened for The Fall in 1983. Dang if he didn't remember some details about the show. Sure, he looks sort of older than he is, but that happens to a lot of people, drinking or no.