“Make sure you review the band and not the crowd” was advice given to me at the
end of the night, which means of course I’m going to mention the crowd because
they were that awful! On first walking into corp I thought maybe I’d got the
wrong day and turned up at a football convention as the room was full of
middle-aged men with beer in hand and I did feel somewhat out of place as if
they were all thinking ‘she can’t possibly know this band!’. Well I do, and
what a gig it turned out to be! I tried not to let the crowd spoil it and ended
up moving to the back to get out of the throng of drunk men falling about and
spilling their beer everywhere and it was far more enjoyable.
I wasn’t really sure what to expect from support band I, Ludicrous (♥ &heart 
as
I’d only heard one song of theirs before and even though I liked it when I
heard it, in the context of anticipation of seeing The Fall they really
disappointed me. Their songs seemed like bland, empty Fall rip off’s with poor
lyrics and just one guitar. The singer appeared to think he had the same
presence as Mark E. Smith but really didn’t and, as they themselves said in one
of their songs ‘we’re shit, we’re the support band’. Enough said there I
think.
Once they’d finished I was thoroughly ready for The Fall (♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ &heart to start and
having to sit through the support and wait until 10pm was definitely worth it
for the performance The Fall gave. They came out to the strangest introduction
I’ve ever seen with a bizarre poem read out that felt a bit like some kind of
rally to get the crowd going and only proved to get the beer guzzling men more
fired up and irritating than before!
Mark E. Smith of course came out after the rest of the band to keep his status
as the real star of the show intact and for a rather quiet, still man he really
did command the stage and the audience’s attention. When he did speak it was in
his usual incomprehensible manner and he mainly took to walking about the stage
fiddling with dials on band members instruments, as I believe is a usual
occurrence (and has led to many fall outs with members not prepared to accept
MES as the ‘leader’), and even took over wife Eleni’s keyboard on some
occasions. I think you get the idea that MES essentially IS The Fall and runs
the show, no questions asked and it’s a case of unless you want to get booted
like many previous members you just really don’t argue!
The set was what I expected in the sense that it really wasn’t aimed at pleasing
the crowd in just playing the most well-known favourite tracks but rather
played lots of obscure old tracks mixed with material from the soon to be
released new album. Smith did give us some classics though by ending on, a
personal favourite, ‘Pacifiying Joint’ from last album, ‘Fall Heads Roll’ and
‘Theme From Sparta FC’, which the crowd naturally loved. An excellent
performance of ‘White Lightning’ in the encore was another crowd pleaser and a
less obvious track but great to hear. I was also pleasantly surprised that not
only did we get an encore at all, but in fact got 2. There would have been a
third if the crowd had their way but that would have been a bit unnecessary and
was glad the last encore of ‘White Lightning’ really was the last encore as it
was a great way to end. I really recommend trying to catch The Fall at other
dates on their tour if you missed them in Sheffield, they’re an awesome live
band offering a new experience of the songs you love to listen to and Mark E.
Smith is simply a legend.
Setlist (sorry if I’ve missed any!): Exploding Chimney / Fall Sound / What About
Us / Alton Towers / Wolf Kidult Man / 50-Year Old Man / Tommy Shooter / Theme
From Sparta FC / Pacifying Joint / I’ve Been Duped / (encore) Blindness /
(encore) Wings / White Lightning
By Stefi Avis
