The Fall's Top 20 Album Covers (Part 2: 11-20)
After the last post (which rounded up those covers that didn't make the top 20) a few people asked if I was going to do singles, compilations, etc. The answer is yes, possibly, at some point! Anyway, on with the first half of the top twenty...
20. Code: Selfish (1992)
A typically striking and colourful Pascal Le Gras design. There's something rather pleasing about its quirky lop-sidedness. Perhaps doesn't quite match the contents - it seems a little too boldly cheerful for the taut aggression of 'Free Range' or the seedy swing of 'Married, 2 Kids', for example - but is still very pleasing on the eye.
19. The Real New Fall LP Formerly 'Country On The Click' (2003)
Despite the dubious font mish-mash across the top, the main image is a bold and intriguing construction that brings to mind the title sequence of an obscure English spy show from the 60s. Its full of overlapping chaos yet still has a strange sense of clarity about it. Fitting for an album full of disparate approaches that pulls it off despite the odds.
The design was by Marcus Parnell, who also designed the cover for The Fall vs 2003.
The US version was very different:
18. The Infotainment Scan (1993)
Another Pascal Le Gras design, The Infotainment Scan's cover has a pugnacious, vivid feel that sits well with an album that finds the group on more consistent, coherent and forceful form than had been the case with the previous couple of releases.
17. The Marshall Suite (1999)
16. The Unutterable (2000)
Pascal Le Gras' last cover for a Fall studio album (although his work was used on 2G+2 and various other live releases). The kaleidoscopic variations on the boxers image contrast nicely with the almost brutal simplicity of the monochrome title - which ties in neatly with the album's successful blend of garage rock and electronica.
15. Middle Class Revolt (1994)
There's a pleasingly crisp, simple symmetry to Middle Class Revolt's cover, yet another Le Gras contribution. The album's contents didn't always reflect this clarity and confidence.
14. Re-Mit (2013)
To my mind, the most bewilderingly underrated of all the group's albums. The cover design was created by Anthony Frost (whose work was also used on Extricate and Imperial Wax Solvent), Becky Stewart (responsible for the artwork on the 2017 box set Singles 1978-2016) and MES's sister Suzanne, who drew the cover of Grotesque).
Suzanne's painting of the group is a little bizarre, but also funny and touching. It is, admittedly, hard to identify which of the male musicians is which: but the Cleopatra-esque portrayal of Eleni captures well her often imperious on-stage attitude, and what's not to like about MES, replete with flowing locks, reclining extravagantly on a chaise-longue?
13. Room To Live (1982)
There's just something very pleasingly Fall-like about Room To Live's cover; other than Hex, it's probably the closest to the non-Fall-fan's idea of what a typical Fall sleeve looks like (even though most of them don't). Smith himself considered it 'one of the best album covers'.
Covered in typically random and enigmatic text ('The whining spawn of that Tent Moon ruled roost for moment. The visage was retard'), it includes a photograph of the group with the dog 'with a squint' that Smith claimed had eaten Karl Burns' passport and delayed him joining the group's summer 1982 tour of Australia and New Zealand.
12. Bend Sinister (1986)
11. Levitate (1997)
Although I can I understand why people might see a Beefheart connection in a cover featuring someone wearing a kind of mask, I don't know of any evidence thst any homage is intended.
ReplyDeletehttps://sites.google.com/site/reformationposttpm/the-pseud-mag-archives/psa-tommy-crooks
DeleteI've amended it to 'may be...' Enough similarity (just) to warrant the comment I think.
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