''Fall in a Hole'' is a live album by the Fall, recorded in

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

in August 1982 and released in December 1983 on the Flying Nun label of

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

Recording and release

The album was recorded at the last show of the group's 1982 tour of

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and

, at Mainstreet Cabaret in

on 21 August 1982, after Chris Knox got the band's agreement to record it, and the first disc of the album is taken from Knox's four-track tape recording through the mixing desk.Reid, Graham (2016)
We Need to Talk About...the Fall in a Hole Album: Almost stopping the Nun taking flight
, elsewhere.co.nz, 1 December 2016. Retrieved 11 March 2018 Knox ran out of tape, so the later songs were taken from cassette recordings by others.Shepherd, Roger (2018)
Roger Shepherd on The Fall’s 1982 tour of NZ – and the live album that resulted
, thespinoff.co.nz, 25 January 2018. Retrieved 11 March 2018 There is a detectable difference in the sound quality between the two discs due to the differing sources. Consisting of one 33

rpm Revolutions per minute (abbreviated rpm, RPM, rev/min, r/min, or with the notation min−1) is a unit of rotational speed or rotational frequency for rotating machines. Standards ISO 80000-3:2019 defines a unit of rotation as the dimensionl ...

record and one 45 rpm record, ''Fall in a Hole'' captures the group fresh from the relative commercial success of '' Hex Enduction Hour'' and debuting songs from its followup, '' Room to Live''. The sleeve (designed by Knox) features a clipping from the front page of ''Christchurch Press'' showing a photo of Marc Riley with a caption of "Happy Fall guitarist", although Riley had left the band by the time of the album's release.Gates, Charlie (2016)
When the mighty Fall came to New Zealand
, ''Christchurch Press'', 18 August 2016. Retrieved 11 March 2018 The album was originally only released in New Zealand in December 1983. However, a small number were exported to the UK early in 1984 and, in the sleeve notes for the 2002 UK CD edition, Chris Knox, who had recorded the show, stated that

Mark E. Smith Mark Edward Smith (5 March 1957 – 24 January 2018) was an English singer, who was the lead singer, lyricist and only constant member of the post-punk group the Fall. Smith formed the band after attending the June 1976 Sex Pistols gig at the ...

had been very unhappy at copies appearing in the UK and that exports ceased at his request. The album immediately became a highly valued collector's item. Smith demanded all of the profits from the album, putting Flying Nun in a precarious financial position and delaying several of the label's other releases.

Reissues

Often referred to as simply ''In a Hole'', the album has been reissued on CD three times, the first attempt (Cog Sinister 1997) being mastered from a scratched bootleg copy, complete with uncorrected vinyl skips. A 2002 reissue (titled ''Fall in a Hole +'' and issued through

Voiceprint Voiceprint can refer to the spectrogram of a voice. More specific uses include: * VoicePrint, as of March 2012 now AMI-audio, Canada's broadcast reading service * Voiceprint Records, an English record label * The stored template used to identify a ...

) was remastered from a superior vinyl copy and also added additional tracks from other dates on the tour. The most recent incarnation (Castle Music, 2006) duplicated the musical content of the 2002 edition exactly but restored the original title, omitting the "+".

Critical reception

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

's Ted Mills gave it three and a half stars, saying "the band is mostly tight, though the drumming gets a bit ropey in places, but perfection was never the Fall's reason for being". ''The New Rolling Stone Album Guide'' describes it as an "excellent live album". In the view of writers for ''

Trouser Press ''Trouser Press'' was a rock and roll magazine started in New York in 1974 as a mimeographed fanzine by editor/publisher Ira Robbins, fellow fan of the Who Dave Schulps and Karen Rose under the name "Trans-Oceanic Trouser Press" (a reference to ...

'', "recording quality, execution and song selection are superb".Azerrad, Michael; Wolk, Douglas; Pattyn, Jay
Fall
, ''

''. Retrieved 11 March 2018

Track listing

Disc One

#"Impression of J. Temperance" (Smith, Riley, Scanlon) - 4:34 #"The Man Whose Head Expanded" (Smith, Hanley, Scanlon) - 4:50 #"Room To Live" (Smith, Scanlon) - 4:11 #"Hip Priest" (Riley, Hanley, Scanlon, Hanley, Smith) - 7:15 #"Lie Dream of a Casino Soul" (Smith, Riley) - 4:13 #"Prole Art Threat" (Riley, Smith) - 3:39 #"Hard Life in Country" (Smith, Cadman - ''as listed, actually Arthur Kadmon'') - 7:29 #"The Classical (minus intro.)" (Smith, The Fall) - 5:02 #"Mere Pseud Mag Ed" (Smith, Riley) - 3:25 #"Marquis Cha-Cha" (Smith, Burns) - 5:50 #"Backdrop" (Smith, Scanlon, Riley, Hanley) - 10:19

Disc Two

#"Fantastic Life" (Smith, Riley, Scanlon, Hanley, Hanley) - 7:56 #"English Scheme" (Riley, Scanlon, Smith) - 2:20 #"Joker Hysterical Face" (Smith, Riley, Hanley) - 4:18 #"No Xmas for John Quays" (Smith) - 6:43 #"Solicitor in Studio" (Smith, Burns, Scanlon) - 6:02

Additional tracks on 2002/2006 CD editions

#"The Container Drivers" (Smith, Riley, Scanlon, Hanley) - 3:32 #"C'n'C"/" Black Night" (Smith, Riley, Scanlon, Hanley/Blackmore, Gillan, Glover, Lord, Paice) - ''this is a version of "Cash 'n' Carry" that segues into a cover of the

Deep Purple Deep Purple are an English rock band formed in London in 1968. They are considered to be among the pioneers of heavy metal music, heavy metal and modern hard rock music, but their musical style has changed over the course of its existence. Ori ...

song.'' - 5:28 #"Look, Know" (Smith, Riley, Burns, Hanley, Carroll) - 5:12 #"Who Makes The Nazis?" (Smith) - 8:36 #"Gramme Friday" (Smith, Riley, Scanlon) - 3:46 #"Slates, Slags, etc" (Riley, Hanley, Smith, Scanlon, Hanley) - 8:06 All writing credits are as per the 2006 edition.

Personnel

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...

, kazoo,

keyboards Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

* Marc Riley - guitar, keyboards,

backing vocals A backing vocalist is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists. A backing vocalist may also sing alone as a lead-in to the main vocalist's entry or to sing a counter-melody. Backing vocalists are use ...

* Craig Scanlon - guitar, backing vocals * Steve Hanley -

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

Karl Burns Karl Burns (born Carl Birtles,1958 in Manchester, England) is a British musician best known as the drummer for the Fall, featuring in many incarnations of the band between 1977 and 1998. Although several musicians have rejoined the Fall havi ...

drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other Percussion instrument, auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair o ...

, bass guitar, guitar * Paul Hanley - drums

References

{{Authority control The Fall (band) live albums 1983 live albums Flying Nun Records live albums Albums produced by Chris Knox