Search - Fall :: 15 Ways to Leave Your Man: Live

Excellent

Joerg Colberg | Northampton, MA USA | 07/10/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"There is no category for The Fall. They are their own category. I don't think anybody really cares whether some record company dumped them or whether it's yet another live album. It's The Fall. This live album definitely is a must for any fan. It contains some classics and some more recent songs. The performance is amazingly tough and powerful and Mark E. Smith's rants come across very well. I don't like Brix' singing (I never liked it) and that other guy who's shouting some stuff is also annoying but it's The Fall, man! I always liked their live stuff somewhat better than their studio stuff and this CD is one of the best! The live version of "Das Vulture..." alone is worth the money."

Not so excellent

coca-ebola | United Kingdom | 11/09/2003

(2 out of 5 stars)

"I can't agree with the affirmative tone of the previous review - to my ears this is a pretty grim document of Mark E Smith's difficult years. Whatever was troubling him (see Simon Ford's book for details of his bizarre behavior) it inevitably fed into his live performances, and this disc - edited together from two very different source tapes (two different gigs, perhaps?) - contains too many numbers where Mark either can't remember enough of the words, or just can't be bothered, he doesn't want to be on stage anyway. The much-maligned vocals of Mike Bennett are actually the only thing to invigorate `Chiselers' (or whatever you call it), `Pearl City' and 'LA'. Brix of course does the same for `Darling' and `Feeling Numb' (but it's still a mess, not as good as the In The City version).
It has its good moments - like `Reckoning' and `Hey Student' - but this disc is only worth picking up as part of the `Time Enough At Last' package, and you need to be a total Fall fanatic to appreciate that!"