Day 127: I guess it just goes to show you know...

This is one of my fave early Fall soundz, one which rings with a still-youthful Mark's seething anger and vitroil, while still sounding like he's having a laugh. It'd be weird to hear him do it now, but as they say, delving into the past is never dignified (as this blog has shown).




Song: Lie Dream Of A Casino Soul
Album: Single in 1981

So this is one of the most deceptive songs to be recorded by The Fall, the way in which Mark delivers his lines, all manic and almost like he's just walking down the street just singing to himself covers up some truly inventive and science fiction-esque lyrics. What appears to be a song about the day after a pills binge, the talk of not eating the weekend and the haze of a Germanic weekend away soon becomes a living nightmare, although as MES puts it here, 'I had an awake dream'.

What this actually is seems to be an Open All Hours scene gone Philip K Dick, mannequins have security cameras in and burly guards are mobilised to deal with a lacivious, leering pervert and the whole report is delivered in this eerie, half-manic voice that just gets you all itchy.

The line about proles dancing in cardboard pants is probably part of a bizzare vision brought on by the Sunday morning comedown, but seems unsettling rather than humourous.

Previous to this, it's a bit more tame, what the descriptions conjure up are the moments when you emerge from a party or night out in the crisp but cold morning light, taking in the world through raisin-tight eyeballs, 'Went home to my slum canyon/ On my way i looked up/ I saw turrets of victorian wealth/ I saw john the ex-fox/ Sleeping in some outside bogs' this suggests the small town nature of the song, Wigan gets a mention (Wigan isn't that small though surely?) but it suggests everyone knows each other and knows who this Johnny is. Calling him an 'ex-fox' though might mean literally that, an ex-fox, a formerly live fox, could even be a reference to Thin Lizzy's/Phil Lynott's Johnny The Fox, so could be a glam rocker just passed out, who knows?

Until inspecting this song closely, I'd always thought it quite a lively, light number, but it's full of filth isn't it? Curse you MES, curse you to hell (Wigan?).
This version is also worth hearing, it's got some amazing additions, instead of just cutting his dick off, he cuts his head off too. Note the completely wired keyboards and the Elvis like swagger he adopts for some lines. This is my favourite Fall live album at this moment in time, it's amazing.



Also like his voice-trumpeting at the end too, this gig sounded weird, people sound really miffed by the whole affair, well you would wouldn't you?