Mark E. Smith: The howling memories of the last punk in England

For more than forty years he led the iron hand, alias ""the largest punk group in England"".Mark e.Smith died yesterday, only 60 years old, and the whole rock nation frozen.But who inspired LCD Soundsystem and released around thirty albums without ever stopping?A man who was yelling but never without reason.Life story of an honest rocker made in Manchester and posthumous interview.

The members of Pink Floyd?""They are very small"". Les fans de foot ? « Des lêcheurs de culs de la pire espèce ! » La Russie ? « Ce ne serait pas forcément une mauvaise idée de la bombarder à l’arme nucléaire… » Jusqu’à sa mort annoncée hier, à l’âge de 60 ans,Mark e.Smith has always been careful to let the powder speak.Literally as well as figuratively.To serve as a vehicle for its vociferations, blood and valves, a group.His name: The Fall.

Lors d’un de ses derniers passages à Paris, dans le cadre du festival Villette Sonique,Mark e.Smith had pushed the dread caused by his rage a notch further.May 31, 2011.The Live of The Fall in a sunny Villette park is coming to an end.For at least ten minutes, the Sue group with big drops and has revived the rhythms of their title ""Blindness"". Au milieu,Mark e.Smith is static, practically without emotion.Neither joy, nor hatred, nor resentment against this French public whom he nevertheless loves quite little.That a beautiful morgue that comes from afar.Besides, he no longer sings.On the other hand he gratifies the bass player, drummer or guitarist of his training (all interchangeable) of a series of black looks.Especially when one of them, in swimming, slows down the cadence.In the final bouquet he is coming out of his pocket a small recorder.The attachment to the top of his microphone foot with adhesive tape.Press the ""reading"" button and leaves his group and his audience without any regard.End of the concert?Actually not exactly. A mesure que la voix de canard deMark e.Smith resounds in the microphone, the troops knead then re-malaxent until bodies exhaust their electric paste.And if finally the heritage that the Fall will leave on the world of music from England and besides that was this one: an injunction to never soften.

Mark Edward Smith, plumber's son.Born in one of the worst suburbs of Manchester, Prestwich, on March 5, 1957, five days before Alsama bin Laden came to the world.Prestwich?The kind of place where you have to invent ""bigger than life"" dreams (footballer, rocker, this kind of chimera) if you want to survive.For the young Smith it is necessarily a little more difficult.The grandfather of Mark had the custom of recruiting workers for work under construction at the exit of Salford prison.The grandson accompanied him.It was by observing the daily harangue that the young man says he pulled his contempt of contemptuous duck: ""When I was a kid, I dealated a little speed at the singer of Velvet, Nico, who found me chou. Mais à part ça, rien de très sérieux pour me lancer dans le même métier ! » À 19 ans,Mark e.Smith decides for a career in rock by leaving a sex pistols concert at Manchester’s Free Trade Hall.The same concert also assisted Ian Curtis, Tony Wilson, Howard Devoto (the entire Madchester mafia).This scene has been repeatedly fictionalized in articles but also in the cinema (""24 Hour Party People"" by Michael Winterbottom).Nevertheless, rock becomes a serious escape to the young man who has placed the school and vegetates on the docks to win his crust: ""Whatever I do as music, it will necessarily be better than the punk shit that we could hearat the time!»»

Still lacks the mastery of cynicism.If he had been better merchant of himself and his loose dog loose, the leader of The Fall could have been full of pepettes.For that he should have connected to his contemporaries in the middle of a clearance sale of punk illusions, Joy Division, New Order, The Smiths, and all the Joyeuse.Las, he made the opposite preferring to invent an experimental style at the crossroads between the German kraut, the minimal techno and the rockabilly of Gene Vincent.Inevitably this is not everyone's taste when the emblematic boss of the Factory Records label begins to theorize around the virtues of the Madchsetter scene on the local economy.""I have never been accepted within any clan whatsoever.On some occasions, it's chic to say ""I love The Fall"", but our fans are rare. Nos disques se vendent mal, nos labels nous virent comme des malpropres ! » Surtout,Mark e.Smith fucks the tokens.Neither nice nor cool, her opinions are torn like a rusty knife.Put it to the legendary Manchester scene and he sighs: ""Even when I go to the Midwest, there is always a plouc to ask me if I personally know the guys from New Order.Worse, it is sometimes a stupid DJ who finds smart to pass a Smiths disc when he notices me!»»

""There are so many Nazi groups that claim our influence.One day, I will commit a lawyer so that they pay me all the right of law on the use of our name in an interview!As a rule, the musicians who admire The Fall are made on it when they learn that its despot runs its bad mood in the vicinity.Everyone becomes a frightened puppy as soon as the Duce or Le Dérucator de The Fall points his Corrne de Vieux Freak chiselled to amphetamines. James Murphy, le New Yorkais derrière LCD Soundsystem « J’ai rencontréMark e.Smith, we talked and he even came to one of our concerts.When we were together, a guy programmed our song ""Losing My Edge"" on a juke box.Mark e.Smith started to get upset: ""It's a shame this thing, he dive everything!And indeed, the guy had the brilliant idea of passing just after one of the songs that The Fall had made on a little production House Techno.It was the same thing, except that this song came out after ""Losing My Edge"". Je ne savais plus où me foutre ! » Quand on l’interroge sur sa sale réputationMark e.Smith folds his clebard eyes, smiles with what he has a teeth left and swallows a sip of everything he goes to his hand;Bourbon, beer, cider: ""I only tried to have an honest man position in a deeply dishonest world, that of rock.My intransigence does not pass!»»

Autre corporation durablement traumatisée par l’excentricité deMark e.Smith that of the musicians of The Fall, themselves.On the sites of fans devoted to this underground cult of England we listen to, something like, 45 guitarists, bassists, drummers and synths, each exhausted by the beast during their CDD within the group.In 30 years of underground career, this remains a remarkable statistic. Certes,Mark e.Smith also married some of his female partners within The Fall.This happened twice: the first with the former guitarist of American origin Brix, the second with her current keyboard, Elena Poulou.Brix Smith: ""The first time I met Mark was a concert by The Fall.I remember that I really caught my tokens.Yet I went to plug him out once out of stage telling him that I loved his music, but that I did not understand a fucking word to what he was saying in his songs.He found me cute and covered me with compliments!»»

D’accord, mais une fois ses poussées de romantisme digéréesMark e.Smith starts to yell, vitute, bang, humiliate ... Reasons for these nerve crises?Sometimes it takes a poorly placed look.Others are the fault of a guitar rope that breaks in the middle of a concert or because of a dash of humor that does not pass.Besides, all those who were once a member of The Fall quickly understood that it was everything except a cool job.From time to time the crises of Rages of Prestwich Pitbull take a downright surreal form.2007.Phoenix, Arizona.The leader of The Fall fails to spread out on stage after having slipped on a banana skin negligently left to the ground.Once returned to the lodges, he ruminates, then embarks on one of his proverbials: ""I asked these morons of musicians who accompanied me to denounce themselves.As none was courageous enough, so I fucked them up!»As simple as that. A l’heure actuelle plusieurs sources annoncent queMark e.Smith would have died alone in his Manchester apartment.Perhaps surrounded by a dozen of his cats he adores, but without human presence by his side.Normal for someone who was mainly held in respect for the solitary and parias at Captain Beefheart or Louis Ferdinand Céline.Not so amazing from a man who appointed his group The Fall, in reference to the famous book by Albert Camus, ""La Cock"".In this novel there is a sentence that could summarize the character: ""We rarely entrust to those who are better than we.We would rather flee their society.Most often, on the contrary, we confess to those who resemble us and who share our weaknesses.""

En 2010,Mark e.Smith gave one of his very rare interviews to the French press.The meeting occurred in the salons, not very suitable for this kind of character, of a large London hotel.Under the miracted gaze, half in love with a press attaché from the label of The Fall at that time.Before even launching the conversation, the old Smith took a look full of disdain at the factotum.He first detailed the poor boy's quickdraw (fine mustache, fluorescent sneakers) then nailed: "He has a fuck.He probably thinks he looks in the spot, but this guy especially looks like a fucking goat breeder!»».The rest was amendment.

Quand ton autobiographie (Ndr : « Renegade : The Live And Tales OfMark e.Smith ”) did you go out to the United Kingdom have you been surprised by its success?

This book ranked in the top ten sales of the year in the "Tests and Documents" category.This is a surprise!Especially if you look at the number of records that we actually sell.But hey, I'm not going to complain about it.When we play in Germany now, there are as many 16 -year -old kids as old 40 -rods old schnocks.For the Germans, the thing goes so far that some magazines wrote that I was a model to follow for youth.Here, I recently read that the Germans were a particular people.There are women who leave their husbands and never the opposite.As I have made a lot of place in my life, I must be a fucking German who ignores.Ah, ah, ah ...

How has a character like you so passionate about literature never tried to write a novel?

I would never be at the level of the best, I would never be Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Evelyn Waugh or Ray Bradbury.Why pollute the world with a bad book?There, I am rereading "North", of this good old Céline.How do you want to get to such a level?Impossible.

You lent your voice to the third album of Gorillaz. C’est assez inhabituelMark e.Smith at Gorillaz.

The other group of Damon Albarn, there, blur, it was never my thing.London petty bourgeois who sing bullshit for London petty bourgeois.Gorillaz, it's still more ambitious.And to say that for me it was a group for the kids.

The meeting with Damon Albarn?

He made me a big impression: intelligent, very intelligent, too intelligent perhaps.At the time, I had problems with my all rotten hip.Just putting me standing it made me suffer the martyr.The studio experience with Gorillaz was strange.There was Albarn in the middle of this immense recording studio and around him a team of tears who noted the least of his thoughts: five writers, five designers, five videographers, etc ... You would have thought in a fuck'anticipation.I stayed four days and attended the birth of three insane songs.All that in this weird atmosphere.And at the end you feel like you are part of a film, not a record.Strange, right?

How does a group like The Fall, regularly anti-commercial, manage to survive in the world of record industry as we know it?

Sum Bout Bitches Letting Niggas Drive The Car Just don sit right with me😭

— SackChaser🏋🏼‍♂️💸 Fri Jul 23 21:23:20 +0000 2021

I don't understand anything about the record labels.Most of the bastards we have worked since the late 1970s have tried to stop me.The big game of labels is to try to prick my cash.By all means.Twelve years ago The Fall was in the hole vis-à-vis independent or commercial record companies.We were throwing up constantly: "Mark, sorry, but we cannot continue together.The Fall does not sell enough CD’s!"I digested these dismissals with philosophy.Obviously, that we did not sell enough discs of records!The guys of our labels pressed only 9000 whores of CD’s at each outing.How do you want to make a career with such a miserable volume?

This is an easy excuse: your group does not work commercially because the discs are not distributed enough.

It's the truth !How many times at the end of a concert, I could hear the catchphrase: "Hey!Mark I love your music, but the problem is that I can't find records in store!»O.K, guys, in this case, do not complain that there are some who download what they cannot buy anyway.There is a certain logic.Industry invented its pirates.In the name of what, I would cry on this situation.Long live the economic irony that has generated this free model.

Can you understand those who, among musicians, complain about the Internet?

Free, I don't like that, even if I tell myself that if I was 15 years old today, hey, he, I would go to steal things.If my music is used to develop an underground industry, I am for.I don't like hackers who swing shit videos on YouTube.Do not give your money to YouTube or Google!These guys are already multimillionaires.What interest do they have to deplete people like us even more?Death to the big companies that get worse on my back!

Do you say "dead to big companies", but do you support the independent pirates?

I have the biggest respect for these guys who put titles for free download on their blogs.They make me think of these old rastas who sold the bootlegs of The Fall in the Camden market in London.They also had a little grass to make ends meet.No problem.When the authorities wanted to fuck them on the street and seize their cd’s pirates I mobilized for them.It was at the end of the 80s.We were a few groups of the moment to defend them: The Fall, Echo and the Bunnymen if I remember correctly ... The other musicians, the big stars, were all delighted that the cops come to piss them off.Things have not changed so much.

Manchester, did your city have changed?

Considerably.Awfully.Before this place was the paradise of alcoholism culture.Whatever time you wanted to throw a behind the tie, there was an open club, a welcoming pub.Now, all the clubs are alike: they close early because of stupid legislation and their design is the same, that you are in Manchester, London, New York or Paris.The world has become a uniform place with the same cute girls everywhere and the same stupid students in the streets.In Manchester as elsewhere, things are well adjusted: kids are studying, fathers will see Manchester United in the stage and women run the sales.All this middle class stked up by its habits terrifies me.But maybe I should get used to living in this world.

Est-ce que tu crois queMark e.Smith is still afraid where has England pop culture enter?

One day or another, my friend, you become frequentable for the mass.Queen Victoria was considered a slut and today the English people recognize virtues.When I was young, I loved Johnny Cash.All the people of good taste told me that I could not appreciate a like that, a fascist.It was necessary to prefer The Clash, which did not tell me anything good.Today we made Johnny Cash an icon.One day or another a poor clown will hit me on the flop and tell me that he has always found that the music of The Fall is "cool!" I fear it…

Interview originally published in Vox Pop magazine of April 2010