The Mill, Preston, 5th October 2005

Well, I may as well be the first, living only a couple of minutes away.

We began with Resist - not my cup of tea I must say. Then there was a "Is he or isn't he" half hour or so before we got JCC. Not advertised but there he was, looking rather ropey compared to the last time I saw him (admittedly 20 years ago at least) but despite the lack of golden oldies he was good value.

The main act came on about 10:10 and began with Sparta FC to a great reception. MES appeared to be on good form (but I've not seen him since the Extricate tour at the Guild Hall in Preston) and almost raised a smile at one point. I can't give a set list as I haven't got the new album yet but the following were played (I think):

Clasp Hands
I Can Hear the Grass Grow
Pacifying Joint
Blindness
Mountain Energei
Touch Sensitive

and some others

MES fiddled with the spots, moved the drum mic a couple of times and 'played' keyboard on two songs. There was a bit of a kerfuffle when the neanderthal bouncers removed an over-enthusiastic dancer and we got no encores.

I thoroughly enjoyed my night and particularly the creases in MES's new shirt.

Sorry for being a bit vague but there was a bit of this as well

Good crowd?

Not sure what the capacity is there, but I would guess two thirds full. Not a sell out anyway.

Nice one Mickey, beat me to it. Great sound, band tight, MES seemed well into it tonight. All the more surprised with no encore. Songs missed above were :Ride Away- What About Us- Midnight Aspen- Bo Demmick. That's it i think, NO FUCKING YOUWANNER . Thats about the only thing missing from a great gig. JCC has done better than tonight but still good. Strange 10/15 minutes of annoying( mostly ) noise and video, with Queen, Elvis and er i forget, whatever it was is woth missing. Roll on Burnley

I actually thought the Queen, Elvis, Barbra Streisand, Jackson 5 stuff on the video was very clever ... but it got on my tits after a bit

Cheers for filling in the gaps

Setlist:

Theme From Sparta FC
Pacifying Joint
Clasp Hands
Ride Away
Assume
Wrong Place Right Time - I Can Hear The Grass Grow
What About Us
Midnight In Aspen
Mountain Energei
Touch Sensitive
Bo D
Blindness

No encore, zero knob twidddling, muted but enthusiastic crowd.

Bedtime, drunk

Saw that video stuff at liverpool last year... well it was probably a different one... but i'm a bit bored of it now...

anyway i didnt get a set list either


but they opened with sparta fc

and ended with blindness

others inbetween - wrong place, assume

no higgle tonight

and no encore

i'd say there was about 300 in... it didnt seem completely wall to wall like manchester... but busier than wrexham and huddersfield

a VERY old crowd for the preston gig....

bet they all remember totale's turns

oh well someone posted while i was thinking ...refer back to bug.

mark seemed enthusiastic as he ever seems these days - for a walking zombie man.... but a lot of lyrics cut out....

on ride away.... it sounded like 'busted bastard' .... not quite as tame as 'buster' that's on the album

i thought JCC was in a very good mood... and started well enough ... but near the end the crowd seemed to be talking loudly over the top of him... he did all his usual ones... and the same jokes... and i still laughed. ....

'resist' who came on 1st- hmmm i thought they were horrible to listen to.... sort siouxsie and the banshees type of singing... i dunno it all seemed a bit out of date.

sez we who cling on to the fall !

Another great gig, totally agree with everything FFD said in his post. Crowd was a bit quiet but hey we don't go to watch the crowd.

Thanks to Mrs S who bought me a new camcorder today and thanks to MES who looked straight at me and proceded to tidy his hair whilst i was filming.

Oh and JJC can you please get some new jokes the skoda joke must be at least 20 years old.... Still pissed myself tho

I liked it meself.
Mrs Hugh thought it "disturbing". Weird shit , none the less.

I've not seen JCC since 87.
Fat bastard's ballooned to 8 stone 2.

It was nice to see a warm reception for the guy who , allegedly, spends his spare time in Majorca these days....(dot dot dot, yeh, I know.)

The Fall were in fine fettle, maybe Eleni's keys could have been more prominent, the crowd more animated, but honestly, a class performance.

First time in 23 years that I knew all the songs in the set. (where's me anorak?)

I've been looking forward to this one, as I enjoyed the Mill gig at the end of 2003 (which is my most recent point of comparison), and doubly so since seeing the very positive reviews of the tour so far. The Mill strikes me as an ideal venue for the Fall - intimate and conducive to a good sound and atmosphere.

I thought (slightly to my 47-year-old relief I have to say) that there was very little sign of the 'young fanbase' last time, and looking round last night they seemed to have almost vanished without trace, well in N.W. Lancs anyway. I was wondering if they'll have to employ St John's ambulance at the gigs if MES keeps going much longer.

I also agree with FFD about Resist - they were almost embarrassing. I hope their bassist was listening to John Cooper Clarke when he was musing why it's always 18 stone truck drivers who turn up on GMTV talking about the issues of being a transvestite. He adopted a sort of 'Minnie the Minx' look with a denim skirt that did nothing for him, but as he's even fatter balder and uglier than me I'm not going to tell him. At least he avoided the guitarist's apparent thinking of 'see, I'm knocking on a bit now but I'm in a band and I've got leather pants'.

I was delighted to see JCC, who seemed sober and in good nick. Yes, the material was familiar and he needs to move on from the Lada jokes but he's got a natural amiability and went down well. The audience wanted to like him even when 'his new one' (Trouble at'mill) wasn't (by his own confession) all that good. I actually thought he got a somewhat better reaction from the crowd than the Fall, but more about that later.

For me, the sound/video treatments that were next up were quite intense and compelling but after about 15 minutes I was quite relieved when Ben walked out and started up Sparta. MES looked very sober, fit and clear eyed. Maybe it was me, but last time his eyes seemed to have a sort of grey cast over them that was completely gone last night. There was no carrier bag, no paper shuffling and very little singing with his back to the audience. He knocked off Stephen's amp a couple of times but put it back on himself after a few seconds and that was pretty much it as far as amp twiddling went. He rather carefully repositioned a drum mike a couple of times, played a couple of three finger parts on Eleni's keyboard and never touched Ben's amp if memory serves. His mannerisms haven't changed much but some of the 'mouth pursing' seemed worryingly involuntary at times.

Sparta wasn't too good, but I think the sound balance was off. Pacifying Joint was industrially robust compared to the Jools Holland showing and the same sort of thing has happened to 'Grass Grow' compared to the Peel version. I miss the 'down' bits of Clasp Hands but it was otherwise enjoyable. Mountain Energei was a notable improvement from last time and the version of Touch was far better than I was expecting. Bo D was written as Bo Derek on Stephen's setlist, which also included Breaking The Rules between Bo D and Blindness, but MES decided to cut it. Blindness was good but somehow not quite the epic performance I was hoping for.

I wasn't unduly surprised when they didn't come out for an encore. My thanks are due to a girl in glasses who acted as a buffer between me and an idiot who kept trying to grab Mark's hand, arm and mikestand. Him and his lady spent half the gig semi-prostrate on the front part of the stage in a sort of Wayne's World 'we're not worthy' position and got a couple of warnings from the bouncers which they pretty much ignored. Ben said after the gig that (paraphrase) 'Mark wasn't up for an encore because the lights were too close and too hot and because of the people they were having to pull off him' - and I guess that's why MES cut Breaking The Rules too, although the muted audience reaction can't have helped. I didn't think the crowd were that much smaller than last time, but it was a lot quieter.

You'll probably guess I left a little disappointed. Hard to pin down exactly why. The lack of an encore made the end a real anticlimax, particularly after 2003's 95+ minute two-encore show but it wasn't just that. The whole band, including MES, are looking very professional and controlled. Mark was in good voice and looked strong enough to go on for years yet, but for me there was an air of them just doing their job. Spencer worked hard, but Ben was impassive in comparison to 2003. No detriment to Stephen's bass playing, but I missed Ding's sheer energy. Eleni, wearing a snazzy twin-set, gave nothing away as usual. The band is good, but it's a fairly straightforward rock sound. I'm trying not to be unduly critical - after all it's the Fall, God bless 'em - but it seemed a little joyless (one brief smile from Mark apart) and lacking a bit of the 'what's happening next' excitement. I dunno, maybe my expectations were too high. Give me a shambolic show next time and I'll probably be saying that I miss their power and professionalism.

One final question - why does Mark keep missing the hair just underneath his bottom lip when he shaves?

Think the Glasgow gig's gonna be my first of those... Unless they pull a rabbit out of a hat...

I was hoping he would be ejected but the bouncers were a bit lenient with him compared to the exuberant dancer who was moved away (out of the door?). MES didn't particularly react to the guy but there was no point to what he was doing (holding the stand and touching MES's hand) and it was annoying me even if MES didn't show it.

I did wonder about his camel mouth bit which as you suggested seemed involuntary.

Also there were a couple of cars that had been broken into last night when we came out, either side of my mate's car which was untouched.

Yes, I thought one of the remaining dancers had some justification when complaining that the other guy had been thrown out "just for dancing at a 'punk rock' gig" ... I guess he wasn't taking into account that there were a lot of frail old folk like myself there who just aren't up to that sort of thing any more

I decided against a couple of parking spots when I saw glass already on the ground and was pleased/relieved when I got back and mine was OK.

I went to both Wrexham and Preston gigs.

Wrexham was quieter than Preston. The crowd was larger at Preston and the sound mix better too. No encores on either night; the Wrexham crowd stood and called for one for a long time.

I missed Resist at Wrexham but saw their unappealing, plodding goth rock at Preston. My mate reckoned the singer was trying to be Hazel O'Connor. Saw John Cooper Clarke on both evenings, and both times he got a warm reception.

Hanging around the bar before the gig, I bumped into fallfandave and had a chat. Naturally I bought his fanzine. Nice work! He'd not been able to get in at Wrexham the night before, but I think I walked past him outside the venue when in search of a pre-gig pint.

I enjoyed the Preston gig more than the Wrexham one. MES was more talkative on this one. He introduced one of the songs with a reference to Britney Spears (what's this all about?). He fiddled with the keyboards more at Wrexham than Preston. Towards the end of the set, he came to the front of the stage and peered out at the audience. He said something like, "I can only see 50 people here... hello!". Funny moment!

The couple at the front that have been mentioned above were probably the ones who picked up a loose microphone after the group had left the stage, and took it in turns to shout, "HE.. IS.. NOT.. APPRECIATED" several times.

Indeed they were.

So I missed meeting the legendary fallfandave by not hanging around the bar enough.

Have to say I utterly enjoyed myself. First time having seen the Fall and actually knowing the songs probably helps!

Me and my girlfriend were expecting MES to kick Wayne and Garth in the face, instead we had to make do with him throwing a bottle top at him!

Spencer seemed to get relatively royal treatment, with Mark regulalry passing him water.

Blindness was mind blowing from where we were standing and I can see the Grass gros sent shivers down the spine.

Spent a bastard fortune at the merchandise stall!

Agree with comments on resist, Wrong Place, Wrong Time.

Not that I'm against diversity but I'm sure they would be better off supporting a band of similar style.

[QUOTE]Agree with comments on resist, Wrong Place, Wrong Time.

Not that I'm against diversity but I'm sure they would be better off supporting a band of similar style.


Do you think there might be such a band?
Shit. I suppose there might. That hadn't occured to me until now.

I thought it was splendid - really tight and MES totally together. Reminded me a bit of the wall of sound produced on December 1990 tour when down to a MES/ Shanley/ Scanlon/ Wolstencroft four-piece - no frills. Typical that you get that and no encores but when everything is falling apart you get all sorts of oddities and encores etc. (Still no Pharmacist/ White Lightning - hurrah!)

Great venue and sound - very nice area (!) nowhere near town centre - a far cry from the Guild Hall.

Ticket-Line didn't send tickets in post and no record on the door but they let me in anyway which was good altho' that ended up more expensive than taking a chance not sold out. BAH!

Sorry to throw a spanner in the works, but I thought the Preston Mill gig was one of the poorest Fall performances for sometime.

After the sonic bombardment of the first few songs, it took the new song (not sure of title) with the dominant keyboard riff to bring my ears back off the back-wall.

The whole point of the Fall live is that the vocals and music have room to breath in an unpredictable environment. I can't say it was the new songs only, some of which I thought had real promise, but they just seemed to batter through each and every one.

I couldn't believe the 100 miles per hour 'Touch Sensitive'. No quieter bits for us anoraks to sing-along.

Seemed that things were on the mend for an excellent 'Mountain Energie', but an average 'Blindness' left me numb as the band left the stage. Why was Ben's guitar treatment high on echo? I hate bands who stand still, and I like songs to be changed, but last night didn't work for me. I left, not waiting for an encore. I've seen the Fall enough times to spot 'not coming back' body language from MES.

Pity, because the previous sighting at the Manchester Bierkeller late in 2004 was brilliant.

Room To Live?
The music needs Room To Breathe.

Regards, John.

Where do I begin other than saying;

I WAS THE OBNOXIOUS TOSSER AT THE FRONT. Oh and how I loved every minute of it, Fall fans.

Being a fan since year dot. It amazes me to see so many retarded bald blokes standing there, motionless, with their arms crossed, foot tapping when the best band in the UK play live. What a bunch of wankers. I believe Johnny Logan is making a comeback… Can i suggest you all go and see him instead.


I can't really be arsed quoting all the bollocks written about me thus far, but let me say this;

I wasn't with the bird at the front.

I shouted into the mike "Roche Rumble" (admittedly a couple of times, so shoot me)

The bouncer told me to get my foot off the stage. (Whoooh scary stuff eh)

Mark actually said to me and I quote "I think your the only one listening" (I can live with that, can you?)

So as a die hard Fall fan, here’s a real review:-

Crap support band, even if everyone does deserve a chance.

JCC old hat. Yawn… If you want nostalgic then go and see the Beat.

The Fall. Amazing. Seriously on top form. Great set, only hampered by 37 - 43 year old blokes who have nothing to rub their remnants of hair-gel into.

I can hear the hair grow.



Mark I salute you. See you soon. X

Fad Gadget.

Good on yer, chief. Glad you had a good night

"Spoiler"

It wasn't a stray microphone!

It never is...

Mark being the kind and generous type, kindly hands a mike out to the moshed up people at the front...

It's a love thing.


Fad X

Mike as in Mic and not the bloke Mike...!

I must remember to change these gloves as they are far to thick!