From: Jack DeGuiseppi Date: Tue, 20 Sep 1994 21:45:59 -0400 My internet provider is going through Chapter 11 and was shut down for a few days so I hope this gets out. BTW, I've really enjoyed reading the concert reports as MES makes his way across the US. Anyway -- I'm going to the Seattle show tomorrow night. Any other Fallnetters going to be there? Jonathan did I read you went to Ohio State? I spent a few years there myself --long time ago--remember the anti-war protests of 69? There is a biweekly music newspaper/magazine in Seattle called _The Rocket_. They recently ran this interview with MES. I must warn you, this interview makes him sound unusually normal. I'll try to write about the Seattle show. Jackd ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Formed by Mark Edward Smith during the British punk explosion of 1977, The Fall have continued, through-out the years, to develop their cynical take on post-punk rock. Regardless of fashion or sentiment, they have bounced from label to label, with the focus of their work remaining dutifully on their music. We at _The Rocket_ thought thatSilkworm's Tim Midgett and the unflappable Mr. Smith might make agood cerebral match. We put them together via transcontinental telephone wire and here is what happened. . . Tim Midgett: Do you watch much television? Mark E. Smith: A bit, I've been watching it since I got in last night, yeah. In Britain, no; I don't attempt to anymore. It's get-ting very...it's fucking lousy, actually. TM: It seems like most bad American TV is just, you know, horrifyingly bad, but bad British TV is just boring. MES.: That's right. In America at least you can always laugh at something. What they're trying to do in Britain is a sort of cable and they're not really used to it It's just sport all the time. Or talk shows, but these people aren't really Oprah Winfrey, you know? [laughs] TM: Is that dog-training show still on? MES: [Long bout of laughter] Noooo .. TM: What the hell, wasn't that thing like the number one show in Britain for a while? MES: Yeah, right, Barbara Woodhouse, you mean? TM: Yeah. MES: Yeah, well, that's fucking typical, allright. They're all people with problems, you know. The British are not really used to talking about them. It's really just em-barassing to them. Like I say, it's either all sport, or, they're not really investing in any programs. It's all reruns and that, which you never used to get. TM: Ithink the perception of most is that,for all intents and purposes, you are the Fall, along with whoever you cobble together to play. Is that at all accurate, or do Steven Hanley and Craig Scanlon [bass and guitar, Fall members since I979] have more influence on things than might be readily apparent? MES: Well...l am perceived as the spokes-man, but at the moment we've got five other composers in the group. Four or five years ago, I really did have to push the group through, you know, musically. Now they're all writing and that. They have become pretty indispensable. I kind of leave 'em to things and that, which I never used to do. I never used to trust anybody, really. TM: How do you pick the songs you end up covering? You do such a wide range of material from the Kinks to Sister Sledge, yet they're always apt, really great versions of the songs, and they all sound like The Fall in the end. MES: That's because we can't do them properly. [laughs] Ah. . . I decide. I think it's a waste of time doing a cover version if one, it s not timely or topical, and two, if it sounds the same. I like to embellish everything in a cover, you know, a few more Iyrics, different arrangements. TM: Is that a Henry Cow cover ['War"] on Middle Class Revolt?Are you actually a fan of that group or just that particular cut? MES: Well, that's not really Henry Cow, it's Slapp Happy. No, I didn't like a lot of that stuff, actually... TM: I was kind of surprised that it was on there MES: Yeah, I find most of it very boring, though the Slapp Happy bits of it were good. I decided we should do it because it fit in with *Free Range* [single released dur-ing Operation Desert Storm] and stuff like that, what we'd been doing. But I went to get the Slapp Happy LP out, and I'd lost it; I hadn't really played it for about eight years. So, all I had were the Iyrics on the back, and I had to explain it to the group, you know? from memory. TM: I suppose that can sometimes be more fruitful than picking it out note-for-note. . . MES: Well, the funny thing was that I found the record again, and it's a completely different bloody song. [laughs] Same Iyrics, you know, but the arrangement is completely different, not even the same notes. It's funny what you think things sound like. TM: Well, see, now you can put your name on it and get a piece of the publishing. MES: [Laughs] No, no, I don't believe in that. TM: A lot of critics have had difficulty accepting the more "techno" moves on the last few records as legitimate. They kept saying, "Oh, isn't this ironic that The Fall are using these techno things,"like it was some deliberate ploy to comment on the state of pop music or something. MES: Well, there's a bit of that as well, but, um. . .I mean, Dave [Bush], our keyboard player, he really is into all that stuff, and l'm quite into a lot of it, especially some of the Italian rave music. It's really ex-perimental, really heavy and good. I think it's bullshit to say that, you know. For some reason these people have still got this idea that we're a college band. There's this sort of misguided image that The Fall are, like, an indie band or some-thing....We've always been into abusing instruments, you know. Especially new ones, because you can sort of. ..destroy them [laughsl- TM: So here it is, 1994, most of the bands you started off with have either com-pletely sold themselves out or mutated into other and usually less vital things or justfallen by the wayside. What do you think TheFall's "place in history"is going to be if and when you ever decide to call it quits? MES: I don't know. They'll find something bor ing to say about us. I never stop to think except enough to where we keep going. It's always the next record for me. TM: Is that why you've been able to keep at thisfor so long? MES: That's right, yeah. I still haven't made the best one yet. The Fall play the Backstage in Seattle on Sept. 21. Mr. Midgett will, regretfully, not be in attendance, as he has embarked on his own tour with Silkworm.