The Great Fall Debate

Is it a fact that "The Fall" are the most influential band of all time?

Discuss

 

Indirectly perhaps.

I'll explain that. Only the music cognoscenti have ever actually known who they are and had an appreciation for what they do. So they've been massively influential to scores of reasonably obscure bands who have in turn been copied by or assimilated into the mainstream. So you could say that Mark E Smith is the puppetmaster behind a lot of great and not so great music over the past 25 years ...

 

More influential than The Beatles, The Rolling Stones or Nirvana? And that's just the rock/rock'n'roll scene.

I've not even HEARD of the Fall.

 

Something easily rectified

The official Fall website

 

Couple of points of order m'lud.

1. They formed in 1976, so they don't pre-date the Beatles who were well ahead of their time with pioneering arrangements and recording techniques (mostly thanks to George Martin or so I'm told).

2. No-one has ever cited them as their influence. Usually the Beatles and Bob Marley and/or one or two others get mentions by all sorts of musicians when talking about what influenced them most but no-one mentions this band.

 

Beg pardon?! I guarantee you have heard music by people who regard Mark E Smith as a genius...

That's why I said above about them being an "indirect" influence on a whole strain of music over the past twenty five years... bands like Pavement, Sonic Youth and the Pixies to name but three who have had such a massive influence on bands that came later were clearly hugely influenced by the mighty Fall. Their driving forward of the postpunk scene really opened up a whole new set of ideas for many people. I recommend anyone to look into them.

 

who?

It seems that if they did have a great influence, their influence has stayed very much within the genre, so to call them the most influential band of all time is somewhat taking the piss. A really influential band will have touched bands of all kinds, not just in the rock domain.

 

That would depend on your definition of "influence" and how you gauge such a nebulous notion... who's to say that the level of influence or innovation is not greater among underrated and unknown-by-the-masses musical visionaries and their peers; those who don't get recognised by the mainstream yet who drive a genre forward for everyone later to hear in watered down imitation?

It's rather fatuous to say that a band that everyone states as their influence is necessarily the "most influential" - it assumes too much about the process. The Beatles for instance. Everyone says they were influenced by the Beatles, because it's so easy to say. Yet the Beatles were openly copying black, blues, skiffle and all kinds of music which went before, by people whose names many of us barely even know today. It's therefore perfectly possible to say that much of the true innovation went on among these generally unknown musical visionaries who so heavily influenced what the Beatles were to take into the mainstream and what everyone then went on to copy from them.

This is not to detract from the Beatles at all, and certainly they also moved forward the ideas they "borrowed" from those who they admired. I'm playing devil's advocate to an extent simply to point out a gaping hole in your reasoning and to demonstrate that things aren't always as clear cut as many think.

Just because you personally haven't heard of a particular artist doesn't mean that you don't every day hear echoes of their influence. How many people have heard of Robert Johnson these days?

 

Haven't got time to write much now but will come back with a proper response shortly but just to start off, to not have even heard of them if you are in to your music is a sin!

Mark E Smith is hugely well known within music and with The Fall (showmet has already mentioned a few) influenced bands like the pixies who many people consider to be superior to Nirvana. Kurt Cobain himself was quoted as saying that the pixies are the sole reason he got into music and formed a band. So it all follows on (and i'm pretty sure Nirvana don't class as rock by the way!)

Watch this space

 

Bear in mind the 'lyrical' influence of the Falls Mark E Smith, who is also a renowned poet, and has appeared on stage on frequent occasions with critically acclaimed mancunian poet John Cooper Clarke.


Recent bands that blatantly have had a 'Fall' influence include Electric Six and Liam Lynch. You can easily detect the maverick energy and undercurrent of humour that few mainstream bands seem to possess nowadays.

Although obscure and more famous for 'I get knocked down' (unsure of title) Chumbawumba's early stuff had an 'early Fall' sound. 'Song 2' by Blur has Fall style bass in it. These are examples of bands that have become mainstream with some influence from Fall.

The Fall were the first band to cross Techno with Punk. The Prodigy are the most famous example of a band that went on to top the charts with this new genre of music and again, the lyrical comparison is obvious for all to see.

John Peel (BBC Radio) also names the Fall as the best and most influential band of all time and is a confirmed fan of the skiffle scene which clearly pre-dates the Beatles. Peel is a hugely respected figure and critic within the music industry whose opinion carries great weight. The number of bands and artists who he must have seen over the years is incomprehendable.

1000's of bands will be indirectly influenced by the Fall. Often its the non commercial bands that can produce genuine maverick genius. Modern bands such as 'the strokes' and 'the white stripes' would not exist if the fall hadn't gone before them. The distorted vocals and mono-tone drive is definately there.

 

Well my point is that if I've not heard of them, not even by one band or critic citing them as an influence, nor by a music fan accusing any band of stealing from them or copying them, nor even coming across an advert for any concert of them or of a tribute to them, then they must have passed a fair few people by.

And yes I have heard of blues singer Robert Johnson and I like his stuff.

 

Thats fair enough, and i certainly wouldn't get into an argument about it, but with all due respect it depends on what publications you read and have read.


Also, in fairness, you are only 20 and that whole generation of music has probably passed you by. I DONT mean that you cant like music from before your time by that, so please don't take it as such, bu what I do mean is that I basically discovered them through older friends who are around the age of 30 now. It doesn't seem as if you are into this entire genre/era of music at all so I would suggest you not having heard of them at all is a lack of knowledge on your part.

But this is only like me not knowing anything about modern day classical artists, which I don't claim too, so i'm not having a go at you at all.

What I wouldn't do in your position is make sweeping statements regarding their influence when you're basing your opinion on little or seemingly no background knowledge.

You seem to have a pretty good taste in music from what I can gather and I think we'd like a lot of the same stuff.

If you want to give them a listen and form your own opinion, a good, more commercial album to try first is 'Extricate'. Give it a listen but bear in mind it wont be as mainstream as your perhaps used to so it might take a bit more listening to.

 

I could form a musical opinion of them by listening, however I wouldn't be able to determine how great their influence is.


I will have a look though. Probably one song at a time - I admit to using the file sharing system for the purpose of "try before you buy", so I'll look out for tracks from that album, or any individual songs you could recommend.

 

Indeed they have passed many people by, as I said in my first post in this thread, they're generally only appreciated by the cognoscenti who dig a bit deeper.

We're actually talking about two different kinds of influence, as well. Talking of Robert Johnson - many people only got to know about blues music through Elvis Presley. He's the one who first popularised the form in the 1950s and has been credited with "inventing" rock and roll. Whereas anyone who knows a little bit more will tell you that the likes of Robert Johnson were the true innovators behind rock and roll, but they never popularised it. So who had more influence - Elvis who brought it to the mainstream or those who truly invented it? It's impossible to say because you're not comparing like with like. Without the early blues artists, Elvis might never have had so much influence over the future of rock and roll, and without Elvis, the genre might never have grown to be the world's number one musical form.

It's like that with the Fall - they've never popularised anything, in fact they've only had a couple of their songs reach the charts in their long career. But they've been bubbling just under the surface for decades, influencing those who know, influencing the bands who do break through and get credited with starting "scenes", and consequently changing the face of modern music.

They're pretty enigmatic anyway, and tend to avoid much publicity - Mark E Smith is a strange reclusive creature. Though they have their moments, and have played the big festivals in their time. I've been lucky enough to see them live, but only once.

Sax Machine, if you use MSN I'd be happy to send you a few mp3s.

Rory, I think I want to marry you.

 

I do use MSN and I'm happy to PM you my passport address. Although it'll require patience as I'm on dialup.

 

These feelings are not unusual but I am unsure as to whether my missus (or parents) would approve and I would struggle to justify marrying for musical taste to my parents , but I certainly appreciate the thought and if ever you develop large natural breasts, a nice rump and that all important winning smile, who knows what may happen in the future!!

Hopefully showmet can provide you with some starters Sax, I recommend you start off with maybe 'Big New Prinz' and 'Cruisers Creek'.

I think I remember from your 'Busted' thread that you did some kind of music production at uni or something? I hope you will like some of the stuff but even if not I reckon you'll be able to spot the musical and lyrical similarities of the music to other music you may have heard, thus enabling you to re-think your initial thoughts on their possible influence.

Also I suppose, the Falls influence has probably often been subliminal as opposed to direct, and laid a lot of the foundations for the grunge/punk scene as it is today, without directly influencing the person who is penning the songs for any individual, modern day band. In the same way that Robert Johnson and the like set the foundation for the likes of Elvis, an then onto Cream etc. etc. The point being that the follow on list is endless.

But the PIONEERS for any particular genre of music HAVE to be given the main/ultimate credit because they devised/invented the style in the first place and without the pioneers the rest wouldn't exist, or at least not as we know it.

 

I'd much rather thank Frank Zappa for that one.

 

There are specific similarities to the fall in those songs but yeah, i'm sure zappa will have influenced too. The whole point of bands influencing others is that multiple bands/people will inspire other people. If only one band inspired someone then it would simply be copying.


You could argue that EVERY band to ever exist has had some sort of influence on the shape of music, its then just a case of how much and whether or not the influence was good or bad. No-one can ever say because musicians could well be subconciously influenced by someone without ever knowing it. Its all part of the evolution of music.

Music being produced now (what little there is of it of any quality!) is already helping (or not) shape the music of tomorrow.

Its impossible to measure influence I suppose which is why I thought the thread might be an interesting one

 

Currently listening to The 27 Points ... a half brown hatted dwarf with OAP's mobile...

They should prescribe this stuff on the NHS... who needs arsing prozac

 

Yeah... the matter of influence is actually unimportant... we get influenced by just about everything we hear... especially stuff that we dislike...


However... if you are talking about inspirational or important... The Fall has to rank as one of the most important bands because they continue to embody the ethos of independance that developed from the punk and post-punk scenes... Mark E Smith is incredibly important because he does things his way regardless of waves in popularity or taste... and there are many bands who have taken on that attitude in the alternative music scene where intregrity has more importance than popularity...

There was great BBC3 documentary on The Fall a couple of days back... very interesting...

Fly...