From: "S. Meijer" Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 06:05:05 -0500 "The Fall, that name has become a musical definition within itself" (Sounds) Here is my account of the interview I did with MES in 1989 (July or August). I had been trying to reach Smith for a couple of weeks, because I wanted to do an interview by phone for the magazine I had just started with some friends. The concept was: I made a list of ten of my favourite Fall songs, and would ask Mark E. Smith to comment. I called the record company in England (Phonogram at the time, I think), called the management, and finally got promised that my message would be forwarded to him. Then, one day, the phone rang. "My name is Mark Smith", said the person on the other end of the line. I'm not lying, although at the time I could hardly believe it myself. (Since then, I've done more interviews by phone, and know it's not that strange to have the artist call the journalist.) I told him what my idea was. He agreed, but asked twenty minutes to think about the songs, to refreshen his memory. He wrote down my list, gave me his phone number and asked me to call back in twenty minutes. When I dialled the number, I got an answering machine ("Leave a message!"), but right after that Smith in person: "Hello?" During the conversation, he was very friendly, he laughed a lot, asked me what I liked about the tracks, and so on. He said my list was "a nice choice". I wrote everything he said down, then for the article translated it in Dutch. Now, I will have to translate from Dutch to English again, so the quotes are not *exactly* what he said. But close enough. Let's move on to the songs. I listed them in chronological order. 1. VARIOUS TIMES (or. the b-side of the 7" _It's The New Thing_, compiled on _Early Fall 77-79_). One of The Fall's tracks that deals with time (others are _Futures And Pasts_ and _Wings_). Smith says he tried to be narrative in that song, to tell a story. "I remember being very proud of the lyric. It's very simple. Just before writing it, I had heard something from the Shangri-La's, _The Future, The Present, The Past_ or something like that, a horrible song. (laughing) It made me write this." The song in question is called _Past, Present And Future_ and it isn't that bad really. It resembles _Various Times_ in that the singer announces each verse with "past", "present" and "future". Smith says "Right, we're gonna go back", "present" and "future", I think. I ask him about the chorus, is it "human race"? "Yes, it is. The structure of verse-chorus-verse was pretty unusual in those days. [for a new wave band, I suppose he means] We wanted the chorus to be a vocal noise, it wasn't intended to be understood." 2. THE CLASSICAL (from the _Hex Enduction Hour_ LP, 1982) A very exciting track, I think, from the opening sounds, enhanced by Smith's talking, shouting and screaming ("KILL IT!"). Also very uplifting, partly because of the hilarious lyrics ("Hey there fuckface") and because of the repeated sentence "I've never felt better in my life". Smith says it's one of his favourites as well. "When we recorded that album we were sick of the music industry, the record was meant to be against that. It was our way of saying 'fuck off!' to those people. _The Classical_ is the song that sums it all up, it's the anthem of the record. I figured: if you want to say it, you might as well do it in the first song. We were tired of the whole thing at the time, thought about packing it in. We were fed up with the whole thing. The ironic thing is that the record was intended as a piss off, but everyone loved it!" 3. SMILE (from -Perverted By Language_ LP, 1983) I remember hearing John Peel play it on Dutch radio (he had a column in a Dutch radio show), recording it and playing it over and over again on a cheap cassette recorder. Again, spine-chilling screaming. A scary song. But also very funny: "would ask for a fag in Texas", to show the stupidity of the person he's talking about. Smith: "The lyric was aimed against the cocktail clubs that were on the rise, then." Was it also about a particular type of person, I asked. "Yes, about the hypocritical type that says he wants anarchy but are in fact very bourgeois. I now have the luxury of not hanging around with them. Those people didn't even like our music that much, but they hung around all the time anyway." I ask him if the screaming in that song was influenced by Alan Vega, the singer of Suicide, a duo from New York, who screams a lot. "No, I hardly know his work, really. I heard something off the first album the other day, that was good. I saw him perform when he was over here, but I didn't like it. But I just think it's part of rock & roll to try something different, something new. If it sounds right." 4. DISNEY'S DREAM DEBASED (from _The Wonderful And Frightening World Of The Fall_ LP, 1984). A very pleasant song, with a nice melody. In an interview with a Dutch magazine, Brix said it was about Disneyland, an incident where Mark went on a rollercoaster and was white as a ghost when he came off it; ten minutes later, on the same machine a woman was beheaded in an accident. (This 'psychic' quality of Smith is a recurring theme in interviews; he has said for instance that _Kicker Conspiracy_ predicted the hooligan trouble, and _Zagreb_, obviously, the war in Yugoslavia.) I ask him about the sound of the record. It was very well produced, unlike _Dragnet_ for instance. Did he ever listen to that record again? "Yes, a couple of months ago. I think it sounds that way because that sound was current at the time. But the technicians that were involved with it didn't want their names on the sleeve, even the studio... It wasn't even such a great studio, but no one wanted to be linked with that record. (laughing)" About _Disney's.._: "I think Disneyland is becoming like McDonalds, I don't think Disney meant it like that." 5. PETTY THIEF LOUT (from the b-side of _Couldn't Get Ahead_, also on the b-sides compilation). One of the many very good b-sides of The Fall. Smith asks me what I liked so much about the song. I try to explain. (The dynamics, the atmosphere...) He says he's proud of it himself. "It was probably a mistake to put it on a b-side. It's about my early teenage years, when I hung around with petty criminals. It's about petty crime, by people under sixteen years old." 6. MY NEW HOUSE (from _This Nation's Saving Grace_, perhaps The Fall's best LP - 'Oh, to be thirteen and have this be the first record one heard', Sounds magazine wrote). A proud song about Smith's new house. He bought it off a baptist, the spare room is fine, etc. A sequel to _No Bulbs_, in a way ('the former tenant was anti-corporal punish, meant well but came to nothing. (..) At the end of my tether, I destroyed years of hippy craft. (..) You need light here even in the morning, compared to this Saint Petersburg was nothing'). Smith: "Yes, that was about a shitty flat I lived in. Then I bought this house, I still own it - in fact, I'm talking to you from it now." People often look for deeper meanings in his lyrics, I say, but this appears to be just about the house, right? He agrees: "People don't see the obvious." So this is just about the house? "You sound disappointed (laughing). But it's just about that, yeah." "Did you hear Sonic Youth's version of it? It's hilarious, they got the lyrics all wrong. They heard something else completely, apparently. When I heard it I thought it was a joke at my expense, but they keep saying in interviews how much they like The Fall. Apparently it was too much trouble to get in touch with me to see if the lyrics were correct. Their versions of our songs are hilarious." Sonic Youth recorded _My New House_ and more Fall songs for a Peel session. It's available on a bootleg (_4 Tunna Brix_). 7. R.O.D. (from _Bend Sinister_, 1986) "Realm Of Dusk, what do you think of that one?" Smith asks. I say I like the guitar a lot. "That was Brix, brilliant. It was an instrumental at first, I added the vocals later. It reminded me of surf music. The lyrics are about approaching the mediocre." I ask him how he feels about _Bend Sinister_, because he says something different about it in each interview. "I like _Bend Sinister_, it's brilliant, but I think it's been over-reported on. I found that critics always write things like 'this is obviously the record of a dying band', and later say they always thought it was a great record." 8. ENTITLED (another b-side, from _Hey! Luciani_, 1986) Prominent role for the bass. The rhythm section of The Fall is underestimated, I say. Smith agrees totally: "Without Steve Hanley The Fall would be nothing. He's great. He still can't tune his bass properly. It doesn't sound like a bass at all most of the time." Smith is in a hurry by now, but I want to know what the song is about. "It's about being friendly - not in the male, sexual sense, just friendly - to someone who didn't accept that." 9. GUEST INFORMANT (b-side of _Victoria_, 1988). A very powerful song, with hilarious lyrics: 'The miserable Scottish hotel resembled a Marillion or Genesis nineteen seventy-three LP cover'. Smith: "It's about hotel paranoia, about incompetent hotel staff. They're always going on about how wonderful their hotel is, but they can't even keep your room locked. I tried to pass my suspicions about hotels on to the rest of the group (laughing)." _Guest Informant_ was a part of the play Smith wrote, _Hey! Luciani - The Life, Times And Codex of Albino Luciani_. "I was satisfied with it," Smith says. "I lost a lot of money on that play. I learnt from it that theatre people are obnoxious, they're very class-conscious. The funny thing was that rock critics hated it, theatre critics hated it, but the people who liked it, apart from Fall fans, were middle aged people. They laughed their head off. My parents too, they can't stand Fall shows, but they loved the play. I think there's an adult sense of humour in it. I'd like it to be performed by others, that's why were getting it printed." I don't know if this ever happened, though. 10. VAN PLAGUE? (from _I Am Kurious, Oranj_ LP, 1988) A great song with a wonderful rhythm. Smith: "When I was working on _Curious Orange_ [the ballet], I heard or read about the theory that William of Orange brought VD [venereal disease] to England. Ridicilous of course, probably originating from mad Catholics, but it inspired me to writing a song about the question where AIDS originates from. There are several theories. For the tune I wanted an Amsterdammish melody, a dock melody." Well, that's it, hope you enjoyed it. Remember this list of favourites is from 1989, a lot of great Fall records have been released since. My favourites would now include _Blood Outta Stone_, _Free Range_, _Service_, _Paranoia Man In Cheap Shit Room_ (esp. the line 'his neighbours now are listening to this'), _Edinburgh Man_, _Return_, the list goes on and on. Any comments are appreciated. What do you think about these songs? I would love to know. Sietse Meijer (S.Meijer@let.uva.nl.) 'I am not here to cheer you up'