The Fall (and their many albums)

The Fall's best albums are their early ones IMO, but the recording quality is, er, patchy at best.

I would recommend:

Grotesque (After The Gramme) - their best IMO

Slates (mini LP)

Live at The Witch Trials

Dragnet

Totale's Turns

Extricate

Hex Enduction Hour

The Peel Sessions (box set)

Of the more recent albums, I eccomend:

Ersatz GB

Your Future Our Clutter

Reformation post TLC

I like Live at Witch Trials, which is a great name for a studio album.

The Fall at their best are excellent, but they can be a little difficult to sing along with at times.  

Ooh, Fall lists.  My favorite pointless exercise.

Hex Enduction Hour - Extra inscrutable cover and concept, the best band MES ever had, and the unbeatable clatter of the two-drummer line-up.

Perverted by Language - Brix arrives, the fall get catchier, and Mark takes on popular culture.  Sardonic, toe-tapping, and in some places downright beautiful.

Wonderful Frightening World - Begins the John Leckie trio.  This and Bend Sinister encapsulate mid-period Fall to perfection.  This Nation's Saving Grace is honestly just as good as the other two.

I Am Kurious Oranj - Often overlooked, but a personal favorite.  Can't sit still when this record is on.

The Fall then embarked on probably the best marriage of electronics and rock of any band in the 90s. 

Try Code: Selfish or Levitate as well as the much more popular Infotainment Scan.

Modern era favorites for me are Real New Fall LP and Ersatz GB

(it took enormous self-control to keep this list from including 2/3 of the catalog)

My top 6 with all the others falling in behind -

Hex Induction Hour

Grotesque

Witch Trials

Dragnet

Slates

Room To Live (last we saw of Marc Riley)

And because it was recorded in NZ by the great Chris Knox, and I was at the Christchurch Town Hall show: "Fall In A Hole" (live recordings with the A-Team band of Riley, Burns, Scanlon, Hanley and Hanley).

I bought a copy when it was released (vinyl obviously). It's still as mint as the day I bought it.

compiling a reccomended list of Fall albums is not an easy task mainly as their are so many of them and as yet i havent met anyone who has them all. If any one does on the forum please stand up for a round of applause  ..

If you are new to the fall then i would get hold of a copy of 50,000 Fall fans cant be wrong,  its a decent slice of the Falls back catalogue and will let you dip in and out of the varying line ups and musicall changes that have taken place.  As with any Fall compilation there are always going to be tracks that should have been incuded..

 I have to admit to getting into the Fall later on in my music listening career , due to hearing white lighting played at deafening volume at a local indie club ,, a great rockabilly stomp with MES grumbling away .

My personel favourites would be, in no particular order

I am Kurious Oranj

The Frenz Experiment == for carry bag man alone ,

Infotainment scan

Heads Roll-

Middle class revolt

TWP

just to add ,,  Imperial Wax Solvent,which has the  tracks , 50 year old man and senior twighlight  stock replacer on it ,  both to me perfect Fall outings.

Ahh!!!  The Fall.

One of my favourite indulgences.  Must have about 40 LPs, 12 inch singles and compilations.

I saw them live at the Hammersmith Palais during my student days.  Great live band.  They played one song(can't remember which) where they repeated the same 10-second segment over and over for about 5 minutes until Mark E decided it was time to move on.  Even die-hard fans were pleading for them to stop!!!

I agree with TWP that "I am Kurious Oranj" would be top followed by "Live at the Witchtrials", "The Wonderful and Frightening World of"... and "Hip Priests and Kamerads".

Favourite single tracks would be "How I Wrote Elastic Man" and "Jawbone and the Air Rifle".

Classic stuff.  I doubt we will see their like again.

Wow did that include his former wife in the band, who had more recently been seen on Gok Wan's fashion show? They are a band with a most colourful past, with many many former members.

I've been listening to 50,000 Fall Fans can't be wrong, which is perhaps a good starting point (compilation) for the uninitiated or just for that quick fix of The Fall.

It's Perverted by Language for me.

I remember their performance of Eat Yourself Fitter on the Tube like it was yesterday.

Great stuff and makes me want to campaign for the death penalty for anybody who aspires to be on the Xfactor.

Ray

Disposable Hero

It was a very, very, very long time ago but I believe it was pre-Brix.

After contributing to this thread yesterday I spent most of the evening listening to Fall tracks with a big smile on my face.

Happy days!