“Psykick Dancehall” marries a stark and spindly guitar figure with a disco-like beat, punk energy, a melody of sorts and a non-linear narrative entirely different from the relatively straightforward lyrics of Live at the Witch Trials. He professed an interest in Tarot and occasionally gave readings, as did the band’s then-manager, the eccentric Kay Carroll, who helped to install Smith as the autocratic figure he became in the band, sweeping aside its earlier, more democratic incarnation. Smith had an interest in horror and the uncanny, embodied in the fiction of HP Lovecraft, MR James and Arthur Machen, but also in reincarnation, ESP and fortune telling. The most obvious of these – a preoccupation with the supernatural, paranormal and spiritual – is embodied in the opening track, “Psykick Dancehall”. Rather than honing his craft by smoothing its edges to appeal to a wider audience, Smith typically took the opposite tack, separating Fall fans from casual punks in the process by leading them down a dark and disorienting path that was like nothing much else.ĭragnet begins a run of Fall releases that share a particular kind of sound and approach Grotesque (After the Gramme), Slates, Hex Enduction Hour – but it also has traits that are uniquely its own. Smith was actively opposed to, especially in the musical landscape of 1979 when high profile peers like The Clash were writing shiny rock songs about cadillacs and the Buzzcocks were polishing their power-pop skills on Love Bites. It would be an exaggeration to say this was a deliberate move by the band, but it certainly wasn’t something Mark E. It’s far less tragic than it’s sometimes been painted, but despite any number of remastering and remixing over the years it remains undeniably lo-fi. And yet, in terms of its tunes and melodies, Dragnet is hardly alien or inaccessible in the sense that the sonic experiments of contemporaries like Throbbing Gristle were – but its aura remains stubbornly forbidding.Īs an album, the first, unavoidable thing to notice about Dragnet is its legendarily muddy sound. As such it was hailed at the time as being both ugly and impenetrable – a difficult album which, along with Smith’s often combative demeanor, would see the Fall labelled as a difficult band. The songs on Live at the Witch Trials had featured a distinctive but familiar landscape of post-industrial urban decay, bad drugs and street violence, but Dragnet was the first Fall album to feature narratives that stepped away, not just from typical post-punk tropes, but traditional ideas of how rock songs worked altogether. The real change though was in Smith himself, whose work as a writer would begin to mirror the confidence that had always been evident in his unique vocal delivery. New bass player Steve Hanley and guitarist Craig Scanlon would remain at the band’s core for at least the next decade, though drummer Mike Leigh would only last a year or so, being replaced by his predecessor Karl Burns, who would return regularly over the next few albums. Smith had replaced all of the group apart from guitarist Marc Riley with new members, bringing the band ever closer to the first of The Fall’s definitive lineups. In part that’s because this wasn’t the same band mastermind/frontman Mark E. With its sequel Dragnet, it became clear that this band was really something different altogether. With The Fall’s 1978 debut album Live at the Witch Trials, it was possible to see the group as more-or-less standard “post-punks” with a few unusual ideas.
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