Mark E. Smith ... being Mark E. Smith...

This has some nice reports of antics:
Excuse me, weren't you in the Fall?

Eat Y'self Fitter!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RlK0Xd4c2c&eurl=http://apiarynews.blogspot.com/2007/03/interview-pinky-of-tv-carnage.html

Funny how Karl Burns was one of the most famous members of the Fall, after Mark E obv, but hasn't been seen since!

That daily mail article is the first piece of writing about MES I have ever seen that does not contain even one instance of the word 'curmudgeon'.

To be fair, that is the picture you see when you look up "curmudgeon" in the dictionary.

haha, via paperthinwalls:

The Fall singer Mark E. Smith faces charges after admitting to killing squirrels in his back yard. Pavement responds by killing not-as-good but far more acclaimed animal.

what, grey squirrels?

That daily mail article is the first piece of writing about MES I have ever seen that does not contain even one instance of the word 'curmudgeon'

we had a tiny, semi-tongue-in-cheek piece in the paper about him yesterday. i inserted "curmudgeonly" as the second word :)

http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,,2273490,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=10

that reminds me, from that guardian article above, when did Bo Diddley "claim" to be a fan of the Fall? Ditto Calvin Klein.

that guardian extract is fuckin' awesome. i am begging, borrowing or stealing that book.

or maybe just buying it when it comes out in a couple of weeks :/

My ambition at the time was to get a flat, take drugs, and not work.

ha!

that's still mine, really.

(actually: managed the first bit. just need to work on a way to combine the second and third.)

Come the mid-70s, I was sharing a flat in Prestwich's Kingswood Road with my girlfriend, Una Baines. I wasn't in love with her, but you're stuck when you're on the dole

cannot fucking wait to read all of this. he seems to cover a good 20 years of his life in that one excerpt though!

I saw some interview w Smith where he claimed that Bo Diddley had watched the Tube when they were on and said they were the only decent rock&roll band on...

Calvin Klein had asked MES to be in an ad, but I think they went with Kim Gordon instead.

Those Guardian extracts are pure gold. When is the book coming out?

this is going to be great.

musically: the book's out in the UK at the end of this month, i think (just before i get paid -- bugger). i didn't manage to blag a review copy, either, although the literary editor promises me that if another copy appears (stranger things have happened), it's mine.

given the ASTOUNDING FEAT OF FUCKING LUCK i had with the mysterious peel sessions box set that just turned up out of nowhere, i'm not holding out too much hope.

At least if you have to pay for it, it won't be with USD...I'm just going out on a limb but I don't think this one will be available via Amazon US.

I sacked Marc Riley on his wedding day! I didn't know he'd just got secretly wed. I said to Kay Carroll, who used to manage the group, "We've got to ring him, we've got to get rid of him," because he was getting out of hand: wanting to do Totally Wired twice a night, playing Container Drivers with his cowboy hat on and all that kind of thing. Even Kay was a bottler - she got all nervous on the phone. She's like, "Marc, I've got something to say to you ...", not getting to the point. So I said, "Give me the phone" and he says, "Mark, how did you find out?" and I go, "What?"

"I only wanted a private wedding. I got wed today." Of course, I thought, "Why didn't you invite me, then, you cunt?" And I say, "Congratulations, mate. And by the way, you're sacked." So you can see why he's a bit scarred.

From my past experience it may be available through Amazon US but you'll still be getting it from a UK seller, so might as well stick to amazon.co.uk...

playing Container Drivers with his cowboy hat on and all that

OMG this book is going to be so great

"Rock N Roll isn't music, it's the abuse of instruments to get a feeling over." -- Mark E. said something like that.

The Oxford dictionary of Quotations awaits...

The Fall: The Wonderful and Frightening World of Mark E Smith
Fri 10 Sep 2010, 21:25 on BBC Four

Synopsis
A profile of one of England's truly unique and underrated bands, The Fall.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0074r00

is this new? it's marked as a repeat...

Yeah, it pre-dates John Peel's death.

So when's the 3CD W&FWOTH remaster/deluxe edition, BegBanqs?

WOTF, obv.

25th October, 2010 it seems.

Also, it's a 4CD set.

http://hmv.com/hmvweb/displayProductDetails.do?ctx=280;0;-1;-1;-1&sku=110458

Oh, it's an Omnibus edition.

Buy early, £13.99!

That Fall doc's well worth seeing if you haven't before and you enjoy watching Alex Higgins-looking dudes mumble into their chests.

It's all up on Youtube btw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-Ff-7ui9BY

etc...

http://www.nme.com/news/the-fall/53488

"We were playing a festival in Dublin the other week," he told Australian magazine Brag. "There was this other group warming up in the next sort of chalet, and they were terrible."

He added: "I said, 'Shut them cunts up,' and they were still warming up, so I threw a bottle at them. The band said, 'That's the Sons Of Mumford [sic] or something, they're Number Five in charts!'. I just thought they were a load of retarded Irish folk singers."

that description Smith uses is a generous one tbh

renegade is fucking hilarious from start to finish. one of my favourite mark e. smith things is refering to a take that member as 'orange howard'.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/may/21/mark-e-smith-interview

Human souls are not cheap.

What is the trait you most deplore in others?
A lot of people seem obliged to have a viewpoint.

this is kind of a t-bomb

What makes you unhappy?
All UK comedians.

Finally something for Lex and MES to bond over.

^lol was thinking about posting something like that

Is there an MES biography? I need to know how someone like this happens.

There's the 'autobiography' Renegade (a backwards fulfilment of the prophecy in Twister), which feels like an extended interview. It's definitely funny in places and has reasonable amount of stuff about his childhood, but I did feel slightly trapped by him going on rather. He'd become a bore by this time imo, although I realise there are many who feel that about him all the time (In fact i liked this q&a precisely because it the most agile interview he's done in years). And of course you don't believe a word of it.

Other stuff, like Simon Ford's The Fall, tends to about, well, The Fall rather than Smith's early life. Although the Mick Middles book does have a GRATE interview with his mum.

So, um, probably Renegade I guess. But a structured and researched look at his pre-Fall life, not really.

Although the short answer is probably 'shit loads of drugs, strong elements of northern working-class religious non-conformism veering to mysticism. Again, vein of working class self-education and independence. The above elements finding vehicles in punk, Blake, satire, science fiction and ghost stories. Clearly s very strong, single-minded person and equally clearly from nearly all accounts extremely funny and often quite sweet and charming.'

Mark E Smith ‏@Markesmith 8m

Best wishes to Mr Nelson Mandela. Big Fall fan and quite a nice bloke, once you get to know him. #legend

Yeah, those are funny for a bit, but they get repetitive...

Head of Mark E. Smith, 2013
Claus Castenskiold
https://scontent-a-lga.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/1234333_10151865682728729_165597955_n.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgaRehO-oiY

C4 news, last night

http://dangerousminds.net/content/uploads/images/MEStranslationCapture465.jpg

Yeah, nicking stuff off other web pages.

http://dangerousminds.net/comments/the_falls_mark_e._smith_was_on_the_tv_news_again_last_night._it_didnt_go_ve

It's not that impossible to make out what he's saying: I was unsure what Elena had said but.

February 23 1981, Plaza Ballroom, Glasgow.

http://i.imgur.com/tmTzNU7.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/0A1AKB3.jpg

60 today. Or 62, depending on who you believe.

60 today. Happy birthday MES!

Happy Birthday Mark E. Smith! The Quietus' 60 Favourite Fall Songs

good list marred by nothing off levitate

Oops, I was a bit ahead of myself with the birthday announcement. HBMES!

Mark E Smith...March the Fifth...

Ha, he was born on that date deliberately.

Here's the definitive rant...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEKQ4SgKJe0

Thanks for the Quietus link. Hadn't seen this before, the performance of Tempo House that's on Perverted by Language (my favorite Fall, today). Happy birthday MES:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTJdWN6BqwU

RIP

ha

Jeremy Allen doesn't understand Sparta FC.

Good list though! High Tension Line should be on it.

http://i4.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/incoming/article12695202.ece/ALTERNATES/s615b/mark-E-Smith.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/V1bb2Fc.png

A man kept alive by language