GROTESQUE (AFTER THE GRAMME)

Contains 5 bonus tracks. The Fall: Mark E. Smith (vocals); Marc Riley (guitar, keyboards); Craig Scanlon (guitar); Steve Hanley (bass); Paul Hanley (drums). Includes liner notes by Nick Church. All tracks have been digitally remastered. 1980's GROTESQUE, The Fall's third studio album, is considered one of the band's most difficult and threatening works-even by Fall fans. Consisting mostly of one-chord live-in-the-studio jams that veer between Hasil Adkins-style crazed rockabilly and Mekons-esque deliberate sloppiness-verging-on-incompetence, the album is one of the ultra-prolific band's most extreme and aggressive statements. As would be the case with such future noisemongers as My Bloody Valentine or Sonic Youth, the cacophony becomes so persistent that it creates its own sort of off-kilter beauty. Above this racket, theorist/provocateur Mark E. Smith bellows and sneers his sociopolitical broadsides, most effectively on "Pay Your Rates" and the almost-melodic "Impression of J. Temperance." GROTESQUE is not for the timid, but its pleasures are many for those who can withstand the surface discord.

• Genre: Pop
• Format: Vinyl
• Released: 10/28/2016