Spider-Man, Frank Miller, The Fall and Bend Sinister!

 

Yes, there is a connection! Six years before The Fall's Bend Sinister album (1986) writer, Dennis O'Neil and Frank Miller, having discovered the band Shrapnel at CBGB, decided to incorporate them into the Spider-Man King-Size Annual #14. 

The term 'bend sinister' appears in the intro (above) as translated by Doctor Strange. In reality it has a few different meanings and why not introduce another? 

Now, Mark E.Smith was no doubt referencing Nabokov's novel of the same name when he titled The Fall's ninth studio album Bend Sinister, not only to prove his literary chops (as if we didn't know already) but because the phrase is so interesting, of course. That and the fact that 'bend sinister' was also 'used in older literature to mean a defect, stain, or stigma on someone's reputation', apparently. Smith may have been suggesting that society was 'stained' and defective or, perhaps, his reputation was at the hands of those in the media who did not appreciate him. Either way, I was surprised to see the band in the Spider-Man story chanting the term as they marched, Pied Piper-like, through the streets of New York. 

Book: You Must Get Them All: The Fall On Record - Steve Pringle

I was playing Reformation Post TLC in the shop yesterday whilst tidying up the books and a punter (40-something man) turned to me and said "Which Fall album's this? Reformation, isn't it?" So we engaged in a Fall Conversation. He'd been a fan for years, saw them several times. I admitted being very late to 'the party'. Of course it was good to chat to someone else with smart ears. You can't spot a Fall fan, can you? Unlike ye olde times of the tribes, when you knew someone's taste by their clobber. Fall fans don't have a uniform, the only uniformity being an appreciation of Mark E. Smith.

You must get all books about The Fall? No, not really, but this is highly recommended. Published by Route, but unless you snapped up the special ed, signed and numbered, you'll have to wait until October. Steve Pringle discusses every track on every album, with final evaluations and info about reviews and reissues along with how many times each track was played 'live'. There's also a Who's Who of band members.

Paul Hanley's intro makes some good points, one being the online availability of The Fall's music. It's refreshing to read a non-puritanical opinion regarding vinyl collecting vs online listening. The 'new puritans' can, after all, be a little...trying? But hey, each to their own obsession. They don't heed Smith when he says, in New Puritan, 'I curse your preoccupation/With your record collection', obviously. Or perhaps he was echoing someone else's comments about him? As with so many of MES' lyrics, there's ambiguity and a double edge.

I may not be a vinyl collector of The Fall (a bunch of CDs is all), which is not to say I wouldn't like them on vinyl, but I am a 'printhead' and as Hanley says in relation to this book, 'everyone prefers to get love letters on paper rather than by text'. I'll push books all day long over Kindle or reading online. Much of this content stems from Pringle's online site, which did a similar thing. Naturally, that content has been removed and besides, You Must Get Them All greatly expands on what was on the site. It also acknowledges the online Fall fan sites, homes of total obsession over small details. 

You may not need to get every album by The Fall but when it comes to books about them, you could do a lot worse than buy this. It serves as a great primer and is guaranteed to have you either returning to, or discovering anew, albums by our longest-running, weird and wonderful band(s).  

Crude art: Digital doodle/ Jan St Werner & Mark E Smith

RTomens, 2019

Doodling during a few idle moments, since when else would you doodle? Unless you make a studied habit of it and I'm sure some people do. So the blank screen was gradually filled, first with totally random lines then gradually the idea of a 'face' came to me because, you know, the lure of representation is so hard to resist. Although what kind of face this represents is anyone's guess. It's crude. It's OK to be crude, right? Perhaps crude art will be big n 2020? The kind of art made by untutored people...outsider art, if you like. But as a friend said to me last year, I'm too 'knowing', apparently, to make Outsider Art. I don't know what I'm supposed to 'know' really. Just some art history (20th century) is all. 

Is the art of Mark E Smith crude? Some would say so...rough around the edges....but oh so knowing. As from this afternoon I know that the new Jan St Werner album on Editions Mego will feature Mark E Smith. Some early good news for 2020. Read more about it here.