taken from an interview with mark e smith that appeared in volume, september 14, 1992. this was part of the u.s. promo
package for 'infotainment scan'. smith is more famous for, um, "sacking" members of the fall than for being rejected himself.
But they say he (Smith) was 18 once, way back in 1977. He worked on the docks in Manchester. He liked music, especially the Velvets and Can. He'd had a few auditions for local heavy metal bands, all of which he had failed in spectacular fashion. He was tone-deaf and they all hated him anyway.
But he had a sound in his head - a stark, muddy, primitive, uncommercial sound - that he got some people together to explore in 1977. They were The Fall, and the resulting EP was called 'Bingo Master's Breakout'. It came out a full year after they made it, thanks (unbelievably now) to the help of good old Danny Baker, whose adrenaline fanzine auspices persuaded bigshot CIA man's son and Police drummer's brother Miles Copeland to whack it out belatedly on his Step Forward punk label. Smith had typed all the lyrics out in his lunch hour at the docks, on the works typewriter. There was, however, a problem with the EP.
"Nobody liked it," says Smith, not sounding too worried.
"Everywhere we went, nobody wanted to know. They wanted to make it
New Wave. We went to Virgin, we went to Martin Hannett, we went
round to Rabid. The Buzzcocks' label (New Hormones) actually paid
for the recording, which was great of them. It was very rough and
all that. Out of tune and that. It was good. Stark, sort of."