2013 - Mister Rode

20 April: Single - Sir William Wray
13 May: Album - Re-Mit
9 December: EP - The Remainderer

"I got a name I got a face"

The single (another limited edition job, 1500 copies this time, for Record Store Day) has different versions of songs from Re-mit so let's just jump to that.

My first exposure to the album was while on holiday with Mrs Vanity and Presumption in Cornwall. We had a self-catering place so were eating in a lot. The dining table was out of sight of the televison so we listened to Marc Riley's BBC 6music show over dinner. At around 7:30 one evening he played Loadstones. Fantastic. When can I get my hands on this new album?

Riley's no fool.  Loadstones was easily head and shoulders better than just about all the rest of the record to these ears (Victrola Time excepted).  I didn't much like the album at the time and I'm sad to say I still don't love it. It's not as coherent as some of the recent records.

We get No Respects Intro to kick us off which raises expectations and leads into Sir William Wray which is a good example of the album, the group tank along but Smith's voice is too distorted to add much.

Kinder of Spine has the feel of a psychotic episode about it, Noise is little more than its title.  One of those Fall in-joke tracks that must have been fun at the time.

Hittite Man is much more like it. There's a return to the YFOC sound, Pete Greenway taking the lead throughout and the group at exactly the right distance from Smith's proclamations. Pre-Mdma Years is a minute and nine seconds of shouts and keyboard mess.

The full No Respects Rev.  feels like it could have benefitted from being a couple of minutes shorter. The early country and northern, surf sound getting more frantic and being a bit of an assault come the end. Victrola Time was the choice for 2012 but to repeat myself it's an astonishing piece of work.

Irish certainly does have a Gaelic feel to it at first but the hihghlight for me is Dave Spurr's bass. On the downside, Smith's double vocal becomes increasingly in competition with the group. Similarly with Jetplane which starts with some military-style drumming while MES is double-tracked talking about 'airline queues' and 'innovative ideas'.

Jam Song is another where two (or more) ideas are competing at the same time to the detriment of all the them most of the time. Loadstones is great though. Smith's voice has more clarity than most of the album for a start. It's some of Elena's best work on the record too. I have a feeling that I read somewhere that the music is pretty much a Captain Beefheart track but I can't remember which.

Loadstones would have been the comfortable choice for the year but a six-track EP/album dropped on us in December, The Remainderer. I prefer it to Re-mit but it's another one I don't massively love. Again, it lacks a bit of focus.

A great bit of detective work from the Fall forum has found that the title track is based on the Baywatch theme. Don't let that put you off! It's a solid opener. Amorator! brings us back to the psychobilly side of the Fall and then fades that down to bring synths and MES to the fore. It grows on you.

I'm sure not many readers will be surprised that Mister Rode is the choice for the year so I'll come back to that. Rememberance R is another play on I Wanna Be Your Dog/Elves, slower this time though. Not much happens for five minutes and then Ding turns up with a vocal - it's alright.

The Say Mama/Race with the Devil covers wouldn't make any list of the Fall's best cover versions. Sad to say this is little more than filler. Touchy Pad plays up the catarrh voice and has Tamsin Middleton shouting lines like 'Where's my time machine?' The second half of the record certainly doesn't live up to the first.

Mister Rode then. Is it about the anonymity of travelling? Of being a hospital patient? A more existential look at the travel through life? You can make it about Lance Armstrong if you try hard enough! It doesn't matter, it's a masterpiece! Pete Greenway's guitar pierces the double drum-kit battering delivered by Keiron Melling and Ben Garratt. There's enough space and variety between the two Smith vocals to make this effect work a treat. Listen to it on repeat.