Tell me about Fall Heads Roll

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Is it the most unanticipated Fall record to date? I have heard nothing.

― when something smacks of something (dave225.3), Monday, 3 October 2005 11:33 (twenty years ago)

I don't remember where I found it at the moment, but I've been listening to the song "Midnight Aspen" from Fall Heads Roll... It's quite good. Very relaxing and mannered for Mr. Smith.

-chadly con Queso

― chad beck (chadly), Monday, 3 October 2005 11:38 (twenty years ago)

There's a copy on its way to me. I'm always wary because the Fall seem to, as it were, fall into that critical trap of every album they put out being hailed as a Stunning Return To Form (see also Stones, Bowie, Prince, Super Furry Animals et al). The Unutterable was the last album of theirs which really did it for me, and that's getting on for five years ago.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Monday, 3 October 2005 11:40 (twenty years ago)

It's also the only recent album that hasn't gone to bargain bins.

― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 3 October 2005 11:54 (twenty years ago)

I was excited that they'd done 'Trust in Me' ... but it's not a Disney cover. Dang.

I like the current lineup a lot, it's the best he's had since ... mm, Light User Syndrome maybe? MES is more garbled and inscrutable than ever, but the band is really tight. Four songs from this record first showed up as a Peel Session awhile back, and I have to say I prefer those performances, but then I always prefer Peel performances.

I would say that Real New Fall LP is the best since Unutterable, and this one is right below that.

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 12:10 (twenty years ago)

Siouxsie did "Trust in me" the Disney one, once.

― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 3 October 2005 12:12 (twenty years ago)

Yeah I know about the Siouxsie one, I was looking forward to MES doing it in his own barely coherent way.

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 12:14 (twenty years ago)

I also prefer the Peel versions to those on Heads Roll. So far (about 3-4 listens) I think it's inferior to The Real New Fall LP ... and Midnight Aspen has to be in the top 5 for the most un-Fall-like of Fall songs. MES sounds like he's falling asleep. Overall I like it, but not sure I love it yet. There was another thread, too, but I can't seem to find it.

― TRG (TRG), Monday, 3 October 2005 14:38 (twenty years ago)

Is this a whole new band again?

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Monday, 3 October 2005 14:41 (twenty years ago)

MES inna gentle mood stylee

― Old School (sexyDancer), Monday, 3 October 2005 14:45 (twenty years ago)

I think MES should record an "American Songbook", torch-song record. And get Derek Bailey to play on it-ah

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 15:18 (twenty years ago)

We've never sounded better in my life-ah.

― MarK Lee Smith (Ken L), Monday, 3 October 2005 15:21 (twenty years ago)

I liked the third song, I think. (Something about he was looking at a yard-ah and saw a newspaper-ah. Though who knows what the hell he's ever talking about.)

― xhuxk, Monday, 3 October 2005 15:34 (twenty years ago)

is the chick still in the band?

― kyle (akmonday), Monday, 3 October 2005 16:01 (twenty years ago)

Yup.

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 17:32 (twenty years ago)

thought this was a great review (Abigail Clouseau, SF Weekly, paragraph stolen from official Fall site):

I've done some bad things in my day; I suppose all of us have. Still, I've recently been turned around, for good this time, and I owe it all to Mark E. Smith. See, in the 56 minutes it took me to listen to the Fall's "Fall Heads Roll," I saw exactly how oppressive eternal damnation could be. There you are, having passed peacefully, when all of a sudden this old British man starts speak-singing with sloppy articulation, like someone mugged him and stuck his mouth with nine shots of Novocain. He speak-sings to you about things like jackals and walking down the street and the lyrics to "Hey Jude." And just as you think, "Wow, not only can I not really understand what he's saying, but this is far more irritating than Chinese water torture," you realize that accompanying this man's voice is a weird pastiche of country and punk rock played by synthesizers and distorted bass guitars, which means it resembles the badly misshapen love child of Blondie and Garth Brooks. And so you think to yourself, "Hmm, maybe the devil appears to me like this because I squashed that bug when I was still alive, or maybe it's because I had that job that paid me under the table." Then you think, "No, nothing I ever did warrants being subjected to this for all of eternity."

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 17:34 (twenty years ago)

I'm not a huge fan of the Fall but I think it's good - admirably urgent for the most part. "Assume" seems to be pretty vintage.

― everything, Monday, 3 October 2005 17:36 (twenty years ago)

Did ANYBODY call "Interim" or "Are You Are Missing Winner" a stunningreturntoform?

I do like this one a whole lot--it's grown on me after multiple listenings. Love this version of "I Can Hear the Grass Grow."

― Douglas (Douglas), Monday, 3 October 2005 17:40 (twenty years ago)

I'm excited. The Real New Fall LP is one of their best records ever, I think.

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 3 October 2005 17:40 (twenty years ago)

I'm looking forward to this one too.

I obviously must listen to The Unutterable again too, since my first reaction is that I preferred The Real New Fall LP and indeed The Marshall Suite to that one.

― Stewart Osborne (Stewart Osborne), Monday, 3 October 2005 18:01 (twenty years ago)

I should qualify my Unutterable praise by saying that I really like the first half of the record. Real Fall LP is strong all the way through. The second half of Unutterable reminds me of the more painful parts of Levitate.

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 18:23 (twenty years ago)

"...a weird pastiche of country and punk rock played by synthesizers and distorted bass guitars, which means it resembles the badly misshapen love child of Blondie and Garth Brooks."

Haha I read this yesterday and it made me even MORE excited.

― Dr. Gene Scott (shinybeast), Monday, 3 October 2005 21:53 (twenty years ago)

that review should be in that negative reviews that make a record sound great.

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 3 October 2005 22:05 (twenty years ago)

the thread, that is.

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 3 October 2005 22:26 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, in a just world she'd be job-hunting tomorrow. Abigail Clouseau...more like Inspector Clouseau!

(Sorry.)

― Dr. Gene Scott (shinybeast), Monday, 3 October 2005 22:35 (twenty years ago)

56 minute long album: a bad sign?

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Monday, 3 October 2005 22:46 (twenty years ago)

No, Tim, it's just more for you to dislike!

― Dr. Gene Scott (shinybeast), Monday, 3 October 2005 22:47 (twenty years ago)

Surely it's a sweeping opus of Hex Enduction Hour like proportions.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Monday, 3 October 2005 22:48 (twenty years ago)

Oh, stop playing hard to get and just let it happen for chrissakes

― Dr. Gene Scott (shinybeast), Monday, 3 October 2005 22:51 (twenty years ago)

What I like about the Clouseau review is that I agree with all of her aesthetic judgements, but I draw the opposite conclusion from her, and want to listen to it.

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 23:29 (twenty years ago)

er, for 'aesthetic judgements' read 'descriptions of the music' ...

― Brakhage (brakhage), Monday, 3 October 2005 23:30 (twenty years ago)

Joe Tangari's pitchfork review refers to "the band's recent run of strong work," seemingly referring to the The Real New Fall LP and the much-loved Are You Are Missing Winner.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Tuesday, 11 October 2005 19:54 (twenty years ago)

five years pass...

man i guess at the time i thought of this as a bit off the standard of real new fall LP

but it's kinda blowing me away right now!

pacifying joint is so dope

― the medina green preservation society (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 5 January 2011 17:10 (fourteen years ago)

I love this album. I'm sure there was a bit more talk about it elsewhere though (Blindness not mentioned itt wtf?).

― O Permaban (NickB), Wednesday, 5 January 2011 17:24 (fourteen years ago)

midnight is aspen is so pretty...the guitar and bass lines are amazing

― the medina green preservation society (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 5 January 2011 17:28 (fourteen years ago)

yeah, there's a long discussion of the relative merits of the post-real new fall LP fall LPs ... somewhere. dunno where, but fall heads roll is excellent, much better than i realized at the time (was still overawed by the RNFLP, i guess). i pull it out every now and then and listen to "blindness" like a hundred times in a row until my neighbors hate me.

― carles marx (contenderizer), Wednesday, 5 January 2011 17:33 (fourteen years ago)

It's got "Blindness" on it, albiet not the definitive version (see Peel, John). Therefore this album has to be at least considered "good".

― Gerald McBoing-Boing, Wednesday, 5 January 2011 17:33 (fourteen years ago)

if you ASS-UME...you are a hume IMO

― the medina green preservation society (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 5 January 2011 17:34 (fourteen years ago)

last few trax are the best tbrr

― if anyone is lost to the tragic carnage of ILX, let it be (acoleuthic), Wednesday, 5 January 2011 17:45 (fourteen years ago)

this album is way better than I ever gave it credit for...

― the Sonic Youths of suck (Drugs A. Money), Wednesday, 5 January 2011 18:40 (fourteen years ago)

five years pass...

This live version of Blindness (which isn't really one of my favorite Fall songs) is just insanely great, and I'd say more definitive than the Peel Session. Lesson learned: pay more attention to live Fall stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=549&v=rH1KhxKh1YA

― Mercury 422 830 398, Tuesday, 9 August 2016 01:33 (nine years ago)

Stupid time continue. Anyway, this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rH1KhxKh1YA

― Mercury 422 830 398, Tuesday, 9 August 2016 01:35 (nine years ago)

goddamn

― Pull your head on out your hippy haze (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 9 August 2016 01:52 (nine years ago)

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