Reviewed on 29th October 2005.

The Fall

Live at Irish Centre on Thursday, 20th October 2005

Rumours a-plenty, stories abound. Prior to tonight's gig, various fora have been discussing Smith's behaviour, where at Stoke, for example, he wanders off stage half way through a song, no-one knows where he's gone, and he appears up on the balcony watching the rest of the band play. At Gateshead, Smith pulls the show after 35 minutes, apparently, for no reason. What, then, will we get tonight? Certainly makes the wait for the gig to start a bit more appetising. Until of course, we get there to be confronted by the most fucking awful clichéd pretend AOR Yank rock fed to us by The People Involved. This is obviously a The Fall ploy - even if they're crap, how could they be anywhere near as crap as The People Involved? Even their mates look embarrassed. The keyboard says "Are You Involved?" on a large sticker on its body. To get me and I'd say 99% of the crowd here involved would need our heads being nailed to the floor first.

Well, well, Mr Smith seems very well behaved tonight, it's not until I think a few minutes into "Mountain Energei", at about 15 minutes in, that he starts arsing with the guitarist's amp, initiating the first of many "tut, tut" style shakes of the head. Patience of a saint, that lad, but I imagine that that's a prerequisite for being in The Fall anyroad. In between the acely sung along "Theme From Sparta F.C." and "Assume", Smith continues with his adjustments - this time removing mics from around the drum kit and using them as vocal mics, the tinker. All the time though, it's very hard to take your eyes off Smith - what's going on in his head, what's he really on about in any of his songs? Doesn't seem to matter really, him standing there at the front of the stage watching the crowd sums him up - I'm the boss, and this is what I do. Smart. "I Can Hear The Grass Grow" puts me back in a Hawkwindy state of mind, it's that kind of night. "Touch Sensitive" and "Mr Pharmacist" continue the singalongness, but it's closer "Blindness" which is the best one for me. It's now 11:15 and 61 minutes have passed without anyone really noticing, always the sign of a good gig. Such is the response of the crowd, there's even time for "Open The Boxoctosis" as an encore, and a pretty good way to wrap up any show. So Smith on reasonably good behaviour, The Fall on a definite roll at the moment, so I suggest you take in some of the remaining dates and find out more...

www.visi.com/fall/

Comments

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On 1st November 2005 at 13:04 Anonymous 4905 wrote...

Mr. Procter

I was very interested to read your review of the Leeds gig as i was present at the Manchester leg of the tour.
However, my comments are less about the band than about your actual writing style. Although i cannot speak for their performance at Leeds i found the support act to be very different than you explained. Okay, not my taste in music either and perhaps an odd choice of support for The Fall... but please, your abusive comments strikes me as inaccurate and perhaps a little inappropriately personal. Perhaps i'm wrong, but i thought the purpose of sites like these were to present accurate reports of bands and a chance for the average joe to write. I'm afraid all your article revealed to me was lazy journalism. Had you had a bad night? Did you remember something witty someone had once said and think "sod accuracy - i'll put that in instead and hope no-one notices". And, i'm interested to know, did you sit and watch everybodies faces in the entire venue to gauge the crowds reaction? Or perhaps you feel you opinion is representative of hundreds of people. Because your cool right? And you know about music, right? And your a great journalist, right?

Or maybe - because i don't know you i really shouldn't be making vast generalisations about your reason for writing - something i obviously know nothing about!

Ooh, i think there might be a moral in there somewhere.

Lucy

On 3rd November 2005 at 21:10 Anonymous 4732 wrote...

Lucy

It may be thay the support band described in this review and the band you saw in Manchester are indeed different bands. Earlier in the tour, the supports were Resist and John Cooper Clarke. At Leeds, they supports were Resist and The People Involved.

I didn't see Resist on the night of the Leeds gig. Apparently they have a female vocalist and a transvestite bassist. Was that the band you saw in Manchester?

As for The People Involved, "fucking awful clichéd pretend AOR Yank rock" is in my opinion a fair comment. They didn't go down well. They were the first band I've seen in a long time to be heckled. "Fuck off, you're shit!" heckled, at that. Their mates genuinely did seem to be embarrassed, and I got the impression that they cut their set short. The bar area of the Irish Centre was heaving, but there must have been 30 people at most watching The People Involved. So, "99%" is perhaps an exaggeration, but the fact remains that the majority of the people in the venue weren't interested - or indeed involved - in the slightest.

I think the comments made in the review are a fair representation of the events I witnessed rather than a reflection of any agenda the writer may have.

On 4th November 2005 at 12:24 Anonymous 3028 wrote...

Don't feel you have to explain yourself mate. Write the review and let the readers debate your comments.

On 8th November 2005 at 16:54 Anonymous 4944 wrote...

Display my message if you have any guts.

On 8th November 2005 at 19:01 Dave LMS wrote...

Feel free to write your thoughts "Reuben" ...

On 8th November 2005 at 22:59 Anonymous 4732 wrote...

Hello, Reuben.

For the record, your comments are displayed below. You sent them to me rather than adding them to the discussion, so please don't berate Dave LMS for not displaying them (mind you, I do find some of these menus a little confusing myself, one of the reasons it's taken so long to get back to you myself).

Anyway, this is what Reuben wrote:

"Just for your in-accurate information Dave - there weren't any heckles and the
response from the crowd was as good as it could be considering the fans were The
Fall fans. The People Involved are like any new band, glad to be doing a support
gig for a band who have such a status as Mark E Smith and The Fall, who have
worked hard to create over the years.

I find your comments totally in appropiate and offensive for a band clearly
trying to establish themselves. Your entitled to your opinion but to go out of
your way to make a statement so direct and un professional is, to be frank,
fucking wank!
And if you didn't see resist at irish centre on the 20th then the chance is you
arrived late cause they were there you muppet - how could you miss them!! they
have two girls with keyboards and a tall bass player who happily wears a skirt.
I'm a keen gig goer and i write for my local paper in my spare time, i happened
to be in the area staying with a friend and he took me along to the gig. I had
never actually listened to the fall but had heard the hype and it intrigued me.
However The People Involved were very tight , accomplished musicians, and the
energy coming from them despite the fall fans not necessarily wanting to watch
them, was what is expected of pro musicians and as far as i'm concerned their
performance stands shoulders above most unsigned acts i have seen of late.

Wanted to get that off my chest - i hope you don't have any journalistic
aspirations to get anywhere with it because you don\'t have a clue"

First things first, Reuben: AgentW and Dave Procter are not the same person. I'd have made this clear sooner if I'd found my way round the menus.

The People Involved were heckled. I heard it clearly. I heckled them myself. And I'd do it again.

They were tight, they were professional (very professional, I thought), and they were totally unsuited to supporting The Fall. They are clearly trying to establish themslves. None of this I will deny, It still doesn't mean they were any good, though. The response was not "as good as it could be". If that's "as good as it could be", what's a bad night? Being bottled off? In my opinion, audiences who pay their money are as entitled to heckle when they see things they don't like as they are to applaud and cheer bands that they do like.

As for Resist, I didn't see them. I got there as early as I could.

Like I say, me and Dave Procter are two different people. I did, however, agree with his report of the night's events.