Jilly's Rockworld, Manchester, Monday, 9th April 2007

MES seemed well out of it, he was all over the place in Sparta and Fall Sound, but things improved from Mountain Energi onwards. Smaller venue and crowd than last 2 Manchester gigs, OK but slightly disapointing end to the tour compared with the gigs I saw earlier. Safi was back unfortunately and was fucking unbearable even by his wretched standards.

Senior Twilight Stock Replacer
Theme From Sparta FC
Pacifying Joint
Fall Sound
My Door Is Never
Mountain Energei
The Wright Stuff
White Lightning

Blindness

Reformation!

I thought MES was actually pretty on the ball....and the crowd was pretty good, it was rammed on the dance floor..and those pillars didnt make it much easier to see.


tonights performance was extremely powerful, mes singing the beginning of blindness offstage for a few minutes then gradually making his entrance was great.


the only real disappointment is that it was a very short set, or at least it seemed so. And I couldnt hear whatever Pete was playing.

off top of my head:


STSR
Sparta
Pacifiying Joint
My Door
Mountain Energie
White Lightning

Blindness

Reformation

I thought he was on excellent form!

This band really does go from strength to strength with Rob's piledriving bass and Orpheo's superb drumming the backbone. It was the full 2 guitars and 2 basses line-up tonight and it was very powerful.

Tim and Rob showed real confidence when singing the opener which was superb. MES came on towards the end and improvised some amusing nonsense about one of those "top 100 worst" programmes and added "We are The Fall...your worst nightmare!"

Fall Sound was excellent with the added improvised lyric "No Newsnight for you, you fucking student!" and The Wright Stuff was a real highlight. Eleni's vocal confidence is now simply wonderful and we need to hear more of her and her truly marvellous accent and delivery. She even does some actions to the song now.

I have to say I'm a bit bored with Sparta and White Lightning now (much as I love them both) and it really is time they were dropped. I was also disappointed that this set is virtually the same as many of the dates 6 months ago. They also went off at the end of White Lightning after just over 40 minutes, and although we know there's a probable encore and couple of possibly lengthy songs, I don't think that's good enough for 20 quid. They came on just before 10.30 and went off just after 11.30.

Blindness was stunning though, and Smith sang the first half from behind the curtain at the side of the stage, Wizard of Oz-style, while the band kept that hypnotic groove grinding away. MES stuck in a Reformation lyric with the line "TLC...treacherous...", but thankfully didn't add the other 2 letters of the acronym. He also repeated the word "blindness" several times during the song, which I can't recall happening often.

Reformation! too was huge and finished the gig nicely with the band carrying on without MES with great confidence.

Apart from the samey set, my only other concern is some of Tim's guitar work. It's a fine line between interesting lead guitar work and pointless fret-wankery and I think he came very close to crossing it tonight, particularly on the intro to My Door and at a few points in White Lightning.

A great night though, and a good-natured crowd. Didn't see anyone from here though - where were you all?!

Totally agree with this though. He really is a talentless twat.

At least on occasion last year some of the music was vaguely listenable and kinda matched the images, but tonight was just unlistenable. I know Primary school children who could do better audio-visual 'art' than this!

And I know Smith probably thinks it's funny that it pisses so many people off, but because of his migraine-inducing efforts I know at least one person who I'm going to have great difficulty in persuading to ever attend another Fall gig!!

Oh - one more thing before bed.

The mic was handed out during Blindness and there were some excellent contributions - one particularly good rant from someone with the repeated line "Youth Justice System" and some nice shouty "Hit the North"s. Excellent!

Night night.

Had to leabe ten minutes before the for the train. Met the band in the afternoon, briefly, except Mark. Really enjoyed it, although there was something strange about the sound like. Bouncing off different walls an' that. You could be behind one of those pilars and hear sod all, and step out and be blasted. Still fookin' great though.

I found it a bit fucking wierd that this audio/visual stuff was so much louder than the group.
Superb gig, a bit short, like. But get the priorities right.

Perhaps MES should have started his live mixing before the gig started and turned this stuff down. A lot.

I really enjoyed it, Blindness was the highlight for me again....... just when you think that song has peaked the band take it up another level, brilliant. I think maybe some of the crowd at the front thought they were there to watch 'take that' though, a couple of guys got a lot of stick for having a good time, ie. dancing. HEY STUDENT!!!
It was the first time i've seen the video guy..... I must admit I quite enjoyed the Sinead O'connor bit but the set seemed to tail off from there.

Agreed- I didn't even realise he was there till the 3rd song when I noticed him behind Eleni. Agree with Hugh McSheep too, Safi was far to loud- much louder than the band.Quite a few people went into the foyer when he was playing. I turned up without a ticket so had to go in early which unfortunately meant seeing the support band,a sort of rap/metal outfit. The PA guy introduced them as 'here's something Mark cut for you earlier today'???Then, before Safi there was tedious dance music courtesy of same PA guy.Why he thinks we want to hear this shit I don't know. Blindness was the highlight of the gig for me too- wonder what Mark was laughing at before he reappeared.

If your talking about the guy in the denim shirt then he deserved everthing he got, nothing pisses me off more than some oaf barging his way through midset then jumping about like an arsehole, spilling his drink everywhere. If your gonna mosh, do it at the front where its expected. I felt so sorry for those two blonde girls he was constantly bashing into.

Apart from that, great gig, I really enjoyed it, far more than I did Holmfirth.

If your talking about the guy in the denim shirt then he deserved everthing he got, nothing pisses me off more than some oaf barging his way through midset then jumping about like an arsehole, spilling his drink everywhere. If your gonna mosh, do it at the front where its expected. I felt so sorry for those two blonde girls he was constantly bashing into.

I didn't see that, but I'd agree completely.

There was a lot of dickheads in Leicester last year knocking my girlfriend and others around even though we were miles from the front. It's fucking annoying.

It's obvious where the mosh/non-mosh line is. People should respect it.

And if people wanted to have beer tipped on them they'd probably be at Bierkeller...

Here's the rather nice Jilly's poster...



Apologies for the join but I've only got an A4 scanner...

It was indeed fantastic, and at around 11 minutes probably one of the longest versions ever I reckon.

I should have mentioned before that while audience members had the mic during this epic, Smith was performing possibly one of his finest and most prolonged 'banana-fingered assaults' (©2005 Clayton Hayward) on Eleni's keyboard ever.

It was pure genius and surely showed Safi Sniper how to do a cacophonous racket properly and with real style!

What a show. A bit short when you look back at the track listing but it felt just about right at the time. Blindness was brilliant as noted and The Wright Stuff shat all over the album version with a really interestin delivery and variations.

M.E.S's banana fingers were indeed quite tuneful in comparison to his bashings at the other gig i've seen.

All in all a top night and the 2 other guys who i went with enjoyed it equally, meaning a possible 3 more tickets sold for the Ritz show.

That Safi guy was pure shit. Who the hell is he?

Anyone tape it?

Personal friend of Mark and Elena I think.

I really enjoyed marks shoving dave and rob to the front at the end of reformation, it made the ending all the more intense.


he did very little messing with the amps last night as well which i think helped, and he didnt seem to be needling rob as has been spotted on this tour before

I'd forgotten about that super long keyboard solo thing in blindness, that was ace!

One of my top 3 Fall gigs. All excellent, plus I had a strangely intense experience in the mesmeric Mountain Energei, almost as good as sex and just as not-long-enough.

Eleni was inaudible at the front, and am therefore baffled by Wright Stuff comments above, never having been to lip-reading classes meself like.

Other than that, and that big tall twat who was pissing everybody off by falling about like a pissed hippo and waving his Magner's around like the dick he obviously congenitally lacks, a top night out.

If your talking about the guy in the denim shirt then he deserved everthing he got, nothing pisses me off more than some oaf barging his way through midset then jumping about like an arsehole, spilling his drink everywhere. If your gonna mosh, do it at the front where its expected. I felt so sorry for those two blonde girls he was constantly bashing into.

I didn't see that, but I'd agree completely.

There was a lot of dickheads in Leicester last year knocking my girlfriend and others around even though we were miles from the front. It's fucking annoying.

It's obvious where the mosh/non-mosh line is. People should respect it.

And if people wanted to have beer tipped on them they'd probably be at Bierkeller...

Maybe I worded my critique a little strongly. Yes, the flying Magners is at worst annoying, but there was no malice in what he was doing, he was just enjoying himself in his own oafish way! I think he was in pretty acceptable mosh territory..... sometimes its just easier to bounce along with them. I'm only a little guy myself and I admit its hard work, but if you're gonna stand near the front watching a band such as the Fall it happens...... at least there were no nobheads swinging their elbows about like at the Buzzcocks show last year.

i was a little disapointed with the gig, the set was a little short and it looked as if the place was only half full, on the upside i quite enjoyed the support, not safi who had a vomiting bass line going then it just stopped and he stared a new track, i thorght the idea of a dj is to mix the songs? i thorght eleni was much more confident on the wright stuff - maybe the mic was just turned up as she was really quiet in liverpool, blindness was amazing but i really wanted systematic abusse!

roll on the ritz

I was offered free tickets.... But in the end just could not be bothered going (and I used to love Jillys when i was younger).
The only variation in modern Fall gigs is offered when the band don't show up.

Nearly 30 hours later, and my ears have finally almost stopped ringing!

Fall gigs these days are like lobster aren't they? Expensive, and they don't last long, but super tasty and exquisite whilst they do. It did seem a bit thinly attended, but that's what you get for having gigs on Bank Holidays I guess.

There was a guy in a wheelchair near the front, and there were some girls sort of shielding him from some guys leaping about like berks. Just because M.E.S. is abusive and obnoxious (on occasion), doesn't mean we as fans should emulate him.

Unlike everybody ever in the world ever who has ever attended more than one Fall gruppe gig ever, I liked White Lightning. My dad would have liked to have heard that - he hated the Beatles on account of them ruining music - because it really was like rock 'n' roll 1958 style.

Blindness was stunning. Just when you thought it couldn't get more intense, up it went another level. As for knob twiddling - there seemed to be plenty from where i stood, and Pete wasn't playing notes as such for quite a lot of the tunes....lots of wild tremelo arm action and guitar-sound-atmospherics, rather than melody I think...oh, and Mark turned off his amp for a while i think. Pete just stood there arms clasped, until Mark turned him up again during one track.

I'm really glad I went.

This is patently not the case.

I'm absolutely stunned to hear this Gaz!

It was a great gig. Haven't you woken up to the new Fall Sound yet?!!

To clarify my position, I absolutely love White Lightning - I just don't think we need to hear it done live quite so often, especially when they only did a very miserly four songs off the new album.

Having said that, I did like Rob's deep-voiced backing vocal at Jilly's which nicely recalled the Big Bopper original and Craig Leon's backing vocal on the Fall's version.