Search - Fall :: Seminal Live (Reis)

While the Fall's paranoiac pulse and vocalist Mark E. Smith's yawping vocals always benefited from studio confinement, they made a great showing with this 1988 live set. "Kurious Oranj" and "Frenz" present Smith's more theatrical side; his ragged rants are egged on by the angled, atonal music. The band outdoes itself, however, with a charming take on the Kinks' "Victoria." But where the Kinks were wistful for lost times on such outings as Village Green Preservation Society, the Fall show only frustration at their surroundings. Call it an unrelenting storm from the land (and time--remember, the Fall formed in 1977) that launched snarly political punk. Smith had intensified his pretensions by the late '80s, and he makes a convincing madman here. You've got to hear his between-song disquisition, non sequiturs and all: "A bit later I'm going to tell you about how I made the fortune of punk rock. Since I think that music starts with Johann Sebastian Bach and ends with Franz Schubert, you're going to have to listen a bit later about my interview on television, the first that ever had bad language." Huh? --Andrew Bartlett