Featured In
ALBUMO-Mit - EPThe Fall
Albums by The Fall
ALBUMAre You Are Missing Winner (Deluxe Edition)The Fall
ALBUMNew Facts EmergeThe Fall
ALBUMDragnet (Deluxe Edition)The Fall
ALBUMWise Ol' Man EPThe Fall
ALBUMSub-Lingual TabletThe Fall
ALBUMYarblesThe Fall
ALBUMCreative DistortionThe Fall
ALBUMRe-MitThe Fall
ALBUMErsatz GBThe Fall
ALBUMThis Nation’s Saving Grace (Expanded Edition)The Fall
The Fall's Popular Music Videos
Hit the North, Pt. 1
The Fall
Big New Prinz
The Fall
Victoria
The Fall
Cruiser's Creek
The Fall
There's a Ghost In My House
The Fall
Wrong Place, Right Time
The Fall
Bury
The Fall
Mr. Pharmacist
The Fall
In These Times
The Fall
Frenz
The Fall
Artist Playlists
The Fall Essentials
Mark E. Smith lords over four decades of punk mutations.
Inspired by The Fall
How to channel Mark E. Smith's dry wit and furious scorn.
The Fall: Influences
The garage rockers and proto-punks that made Mark E. Smith.
The Fall: Deep Cuts
A gentler side of post-punk's most scornful band.
Artist Biography
The post-punk era was defined by rock bands expanding their horizons with non-rock influences, but for The Fall, the experimentation was as much verbal as musical. Upon forming in Manchester in 1976, The Fall were among the legion of cantankerous combos rising up in punk’s first wave, but the band’s frontman, Mark E. Smith, sounded less like a singer than a pirate-radio broadcaster narrating a never-ending documentary about England’s descent into dystopia. Early Fall records were a roiling mixture of rockabilly racket and primitive Krautrock, and by the time they released their first messterpiece, 1982’s Hex Enduction Hour, the group had already developed a reputation for revolving-door lineups that were as unsettled as their music. But with the addition of Smith’s American wife, Brix, in 1983, The Fall enjoyed a period of stability, brightening up their sound with synth accents, group-chant hooks, and Kinks covers that landed them within striking distance of the UK Top 20 charts. After Brix’s departure in the mid-’90s (around the time savvy Britpop bands like Blur and Elastica were channelling The Fall’s irascible essence), the group underwent many more permutations, yet always retained their uncanny balance of caustic energy and cryptic commentary right up until Mark E. Smith’s death in 2018 at age 60.
Hometown
Manchester, England
Genre
Alternative