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| Imperial Wax Solvent | 
 enlarge | Artist: The Fall
Label: Sanctuary UK
Category: Music
This item is no longer available
Avg. Customer Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 524754
Format: Import
Media: LP Record
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 12.3 x 12.1 x 0.1
UPC: 602517667969
EAN: 0602517667969
ASIN: B0017MIL7E
Release Date: May 20, 2008
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| Tracks:
| • | Alton Towers | | • | Wolf Kidult Man | | • | 50 Year Old Man | | • | I've Been Duped | | • | Strange Town | | • | Taurig | | • | Can Can Summer | | • | Tommy Shooter | | • | Latch Key Kid | | • | Is This New | | • | Senior Twilight Stock Replacer | | • | Exploding Chimney |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Album Description
Vinyl LP pressing of the 2008 release from Mark E. Smith and his ever-changing line-up of The Fall. Though band members have come and gone in the band, Mark E. Smith has managed to maintain a clear and focused musical vision. There's no other band quite like The Fall and once you've heard them, you'll never forget them. Smith has never been one to hold back on releasing new music and The Fall usually release six albums in the same span of time that a less interesting band will release one album and a single! Sanctuary.
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| Customer Reviews:
Beautiful Strangeness! May 3, 2008
11 out of 14 found this review helpful
The Fall is one of my top, most favorite bands of *all time*. 50,000 Fall Fans Can't Be Wrong: 39 Golden Greats was the fabulous compilation that led me to obtaining nearly all of their studio albums (not a cheap, easy task, mind you, with about 30 of them total!), the Peel sessions, and assorted live discs and compilations. I got into this band a few years ago...well, by 'this band' I mean Mark E. Smith and whoever happened to be part of his crew at the time, but you get the idea.
The Fall have gone through a lot of transitions in sound, which is natural because of the constant alteration of members and the ever-expanding musical vision of Mark E. Smith. Their earliest stuff was post-punky, then increasingly grew more complex, then they had some more accessible songs out in the 80s (a cover of The Kinks' "Victoria", and songs like "Cruiser's Creek") and a fantastic string of albums, including my favorite: This Nation's Saving Grace. The 90s was hit-and-miss, with The Infotainment Scan being the outstanding release amongst them. The 2000s brought two classic Fall LPs: The Unutterable and Fall Heads Roll.
The album previous to this one, Reformation Post TLC, was far from equaling, or even approaching the level of, any of the great Fall records. In fact, it sounded like the band wasn't even ready to put out an album yet, despite having a few good songs and concepts drifting around. Kind of the Cerebral Caustic of 2007, if you will. This lengthy introduction to the real, bare-bones review was necessary because, after all this...then we have Imperial Wax Solvent.
I don't think this is a return to a previous sound, per se, in the sense of going back to The Fall's roots or anything. It doesn't take a lot of Fall listening to determine that, as John Peel said the Fall are "always different, always the same" Rather, it is a deepening of a particular dark moodiness and unsettling energy that has long been an undercurrent throughout various Fall albums. Songs like "Alton Towers" and "Wolf Kidult Man" would work perfectly well for a Halloween mixtape. On the other hand, there is a cool catchiness present in songs like "I've Been Duped", "Latch Key Kid", and the instrumental "Taurig", an element almost absent on Reformation Post-TLC (except for its opener "Over! Over!", of course). "50 Year Old Man", which became pretty much infamous amongst Fall-aholics after the on-line leak of Imperial Wax Solvent, is one of the longest Fall songs in the catalogue, clocking in at 11 minutes and 36 seconds! This is one of Mark E. Smith's most rambling, growling numbers yet, and you will either love it or be driven mad by it.
Out of the Fall's 2000s releases, Imperial Wax Solvent is certainly the most strange and interesting, and probably the one I've listened to most often. The bizarre and strangely charming lyrical imagery is as present as ever ("I like to relax / With tobacco and sugar", "I'm not going to touch a single blade of grass / My garden will be like a distant past", "Painting yellow flowers / After blowing away / Another balloon string / Held at bay), and the songs flow nicely into one another. This Fall album is definitely work picking up. I'm already anticipating the inevitable follow-up with enthusiasm!
"I'm the type of guy who knows what's on CD": MES snippet June 25, 2008
If you're reading this, you probably already know the sound and the attitude of The Fall. This latest album reminds me of Jack MacGowran, the famous interpreter of Beckett. Smith's on by now reveling into the role of an elder pundit, or at least a raconteur. His poses may throw many listeners off, but watch and listen and you will be rewarded.
Uncompromising, hectoring, erudite, maddening, and either a band you must play immediately, or one that you wait to cue up, depending on when your moods match Mark E Smith and his ever-changing lineups.This latest record proves The Fall's found again a concentration on a rawer, less worked-over, more live-in-the-studio sound. The production is muddier yet when it's The Fall, this mix is intentional, most likely.
This album feels more a product of the streets. It has a twitchy, amp-driven, buggy quality that takes much from dance and DJ-led music today, but which channels this into thirty years of postpunk restlessness, and a love for primitive, plugged-in, garage rock and roots sounds. This album reminded me of the late 90's disc "Levitation" with its electronics and its emphasis on digging into grooves that may not change much, but which intend to repeat and gnaw into the structure of these-- for the Fall-- rather stripped-down, compact songs.
This stress on brevity also recalls an early 00's effort in its tone and feel, "The Unutterable," again by a group of musicians that may not have lasted long as The Fall, but which, as with this one under review, constituted a shift in the members after a period of earlier consistency. Albums tend to vary widely by the musicians who work with MES as The Fall, and the "Reformation" CD that preceded this one did not match the highlights of the more stable band that gave us the decade's solid efforts "Real New Fall" and "Fall Heads Roll." I preface my review of the album, therefore, with context, as this is essential for placing a new disc into a collection of over two dozen studio efforts and counting, pretty much at one each year.
"Alton" opens with lots of processed keyboards, akin to the jungle music experiments on "Levitation." "Wolf" features a straight-ahead, almost retro, guitar riff, akin to mid-00's delivery of short, punchy tunes. "50 Year Old Man" as you'd expect lives up for eleven minutes to its title, as if MES is rapping in his own inimitable fashion to lecture the upstarts. I did not find this as annoying as some have, but certainly it's a test of a true fan, who'd have it no other way given the lyrics.
"I've" returns to "Wolf" in its pared-down style, with a similar rant, even more 50's in its approach. By the way, unlike many recent Fall albums, the sequencing works very well. No song is out of place, no bizarre cover songs throw off the pace, and each track feels exactly where it should fit into the assortment. "Strange", having said this, does make the weakest entry, as Elena's vocal's too languid and imitates her husband's cadences too predictably: I'd have preferred hearing her own voice in her own style. Yet, the music propels the beats along well enough, and it's a brief turn at the mike for Mrs. Smith.
"Taurig" feels endless, lots of electronics and a German influence that may work off of MES with his recent work as Von Sudafed with the duo Mouse on Mars. "Can Can" gives a heavier dose of this mix, but livelier. "Tom" recalls "I've" and "Alton" in a return to spindlier guitar twang; "Latchkey Kid" has a fine fuzz effect over the electronic layers.
"Is" too gives a solid interplay between instruments, locked into a groove. "Senior" reminds me of "Wolf" with a more modern sounding, yet somehow rockabilly feel a title track of sorts. The last song closes with a grinding trade between a sharper sheen and a weary yet wise vocal valediction: "Believe me, kids, I've been through it all."
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