The Fall

The Fall formed in Manchester in 1976, Mark E. Smith the constant at the centre of a band that would go through over sixty members in forty years. Smith's vision was absolute and uncompromising: a post-punk sound rooted in repetition, Northern English working-class culture, and a literary sensibility that drew on Kafka, Lovecraft, and the everyday surreal. The Fall were always exactly what Smith wanted them to be.

The early records — 'Live at the Witch Trials' (1979), 'Dragnet' (1979), 'Grotesque (After the Gramme)' (1980) — established the template: repetitive, hypnotic, and possessed of a dark humour that was entirely Smith's own. John Peel championed the band from the beginning, calling them his favourite group and playing their sessions on his BBC Radio 1 show for decades.

The mid-period records — 'Hex Enduction Hour' (1982), 'Perverted by Language' (1983), 'This Nation's Saving Grace' (1985) — are now considered among the finest British albums of their era. Smith's lyrics were unlike anything else: dense, allusive, funny, and occasionally impenetrable. The music was simultaneously primitive and sophisticated.

Smith continued to record and tour until his death in January 2018. The Fall made thirty-two studio albums — more than almost any other British band. The quality was uneven, but the vision was always consistent. Smith remains one of the most important and most singular figures in British music history.