{"id":5876,"date":"2011-12-13T00:11:46","date_gmt":"2011-12-13T00:11:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/?p=5876"},"modified":"2011-12-13T00:42:44","modified_gmt":"2011-12-13T00:42:44","slug":"the-fall-step-forward-records-1979","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/the-fall-step-forward-records-1979\/","title":{"rendered":"The Fall – Step Forward Records – 1979"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Frightened \/ Crap Rap 2 \/ Like To Blow \/ Rebellious Jukebox \/ No Xmas For John Quays \/ Mother Sister \/ Industrial Estate<\/a><\/p>\n

Underground Medecin \/ Two Steps Back\u00a0 \/ Live At The Witch Trails \/ Futures And Pasts \/ Music Scene<\/a><\/p>\n

My second favorite Fall LP (after \u2018Grotesque After The Gramme\u2019) is the immensely fine debut LP \u2018Witch Trails\u2019 which placed the band solidly into a fair few hearts and minds belonging to the generation that were lucky enough to listen in to the nightly late night John Peel Radio One show. A disjointed sound added with the strange lyrics of Mark E Smith sculptured The Fall more in the shape of Captain Beefheart\u2019s Magic Band or Pere Ubu than their contemporaries in the Manchester (or indeed any cities) punk scene, most of which tended to sound a little more pedestrian. One of the most interesting bands of the era who were still putting out interesting work a decade after this debut LP was released.<\/p>\n

Text below ripped from the Wikki.<\/p>\n

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\u2018Live at the Witch Trials\u2019 is the debut album by The Fall, first released in March 1979. It is not, despite its title, a live album, but was recorded in the studio in one day and mixed by producer Bob Sargeant the next. Bassist Marc Riley stated that the group had been booked into the studio for a week but Mark E. Smith had fallen ill, leading to the cancellation of the first three days. No singles were taken from the album, a practice that would be commonplace for the group until 1986.<\/p>\n

Some songs dated from earlier incarnations of the group with both Tony Friel and Una Baines featuring on the writing credits.The album was given a generally positive reception, with Record Mirror in particular giving it a full five stars and describing the album as \u201ca rugged, concerned, attuned, rebellious jukebox\u201d. Melody Maker was less impressed, being especially negative about the group\u2019s then-rhythm section of Marc Riley and Karl Burns. In the event, by the time the album was released, Burns had already left the band and guitarist Martin Bramah also quit shortly afterwards to form Blue Orchids, leaving Mark E. Smith as the sole remaining founder member.<\/p>\n

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RECORD MIRROR, March 31, 1979<\/strong><\/p>\n

In which The Fall are pressured into recording the record in a single day, said record smacking of raw urgency, presenting the \u2018consumer\u2019 with a \u2018then\u2019 as opposed to \u2018now\u2019 reflection of The Fall.<\/p>\n

The Fall\u2019s erratic complacency at the recent Nashville gig worried and angered me: if they have the ability to move on, side-stepping that dour, dire formularisation syndrome, capitalising on the excellence of this vinyl statement, the future will be optimistic.<\/p>\n

People acquainted with them will not be bemused, startled or surprised by this record; they will, instead, accept and love it. \u2018Witch Trials\u2019 is not brilliant, revolutionary, activist, radical. It is complete and representative, and good.<\/p>\n

The Fall are captured and perceived as a band with identity, stroppily, successfully, garnishing their bumbling threads, keyboards \/ bass \/ drums \/ guitar \/ Mark Smith\u2019s sarcastic, caustic, sour voice\u2026 and hammering them into a logical patterned whole; it sometimes comes over as rehearsed incompetence\u2026 but is more often stylised, electric, invigorating, appealing rock music. When, as on, \u201cNo Xmas for John Quays\u201d, the music sounds totally out on a limb, ultimately sliding apart at the seams, Mark Smith comically intones an off-key harmony and the whole band skirt joyously back in to tie up proceedings.<\/p>\n

Mark Smith on stage is a tortured, pained, screwed-up, angry voice, occasionally exhibiting a humour-trait, whilst appearing to the cynicist, too miserable and venomous to be believable. Their insight, level headed commitment and nihilistic visions are indisposable, impossible to glibly sneer off and kiss off.<\/p>\n

Their sound is a rugged, concerned, attuned, rebellious jukebox sound: Bob Sergeant, the producer, the middle-man, has avoided the obvious temptation to interfere and distort the proceedings. What happens, therefore, is that \u2018Witch Trials\u2019 pinpoints and relays a bands attitude, it\u2019s reaction to convention, to expectation, to mainstream.<\/p>\n

This is exemplified on the closing \u201cMusic Scene\u2019, originally scheduled for a 6 minute span: as the band play on (and on) at the close, the engineer bawls intermittent \u201csix minutes\u2019 and \u2018six forty\u2019 time checks. And they just keep on going, comically, carelessly, drawing to that inevitable conclusive halt only when they\u2019re damn well ready, and after eight minutes.<\/p>\n

When Smith sings, \u201cwe\u2019re part of the music scene\u201d it becomes clear how much the band hate and reject that ironic inevitability.<\/p>\n

And now that, with this album, The Fall are established as a genuine force, efforts must be made to stay potent and one up in the face of acceptance and slob-inducing praise. Cop out, cop out ?<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re still one step ahead of you \/ I still believe in the R and R dream \/ R and R as primal scream\u201d<\/p>\n

Now keep things that way.<\/p>\n

+++++<\/strong> (5 stars = unbeatable)<\/p>\n

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MYSELF, MICKEY \u2018PENGUIN\u2019,\u00a0 WHOSE FORTY FIFTH BIRTHDAY IT IS TODAY \u2013 THE PHOTOGRAPH WAS TAKEN SOMEWHERE I DO NOT RECALL IN 1981 OR POSSIBLY 1980.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Frightened \/ Crap Rap 2 \/ Like To Blow \/ Rebellious Jukebox \/ No Xmas For John Quays \/ Mother Sister \/ Industrial Estate Underground Medecin \/ Two Steps Back\u00a0 \/ Live At The Witch Trails \/ Futures And Pasts \/ Music Scene My second favorite Fall LP (after \u2018Grotesque After The Gramme\u2019) is the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-links-downloads"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5876"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5880,"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5876\/revisions\/5880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/killyourpetpuppy.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}