Saturday, 26 June 2010

THE FALL – YOUR FUTURE OUR CLUTTER (DOMINO)


THE FALL – YOUR FUTURE OUR CLUTTER (DOMINO)

As ever the latest Fall album is the best since their last and it almost feels obligatory to describe it as a return to form now.  For the win everybody.

This is my modern soundtrack for walking through carnage, for the hairy and hectic times that I find myself having to get through Colchester High Street.  Muck on the streets are akin to the music on these sheets.  There is a clutter here both of the physical and of the mind.  More people should listen to Mark E. Smith, he’s certainly been around long enough to have seen everything.

Smart comments aside, this is genuinely a very good album.  I appreciate the ridiculous manner in which it opens with “O.F.Y.C. Showcase” as if it were some punk musical laying out its wears.  As absurd as this notion be, for this record I sense Mark E. Smith is really working hard.  Thanks Domino.

From here the record literally marches forward with “Bury Pts 1 & 3” that stomps in excruciating fashion, initially being delivered in muffled bootleg fashion until the correct version (correct part) comes crashing through along with enormous hook to match.  Everything about this song works.  Each player sounds solid and amazing with an incredible amount of presence.  It’s a recording up there with the best work of Albini (especially the drums).

All but two tracks on the album weigh in at over five minutes in length.  There is real width to the compositions and often Smith takes quite a while to arrive on the scene as some staunch repetition lends much to the groove and drive of the record.

The floating degradation of “Chino” wins the day as stand out track as it hovers over proceedings with menace and motion.  Fortunately it later ends on the comedown of “Weather Report 2” where Smith almost sounds laidback recounting what he sees around him, musing on the past.  Then there’s abduction and the closing whisper “you don’t deserve rock and roll”.

As ever with new albums by The Fall this is their best since the last but this time it really is, several times over.

Thesaurus moment: appurtenant.

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