Listen to The Fall’s “Rowche Rumble” from upcoming 1981 live albumA 15-SONG THE FALL PRIMER

Next week Castle Face is releasing The Fall's Live at St. Helens Technical College, ’81, which finds one of the best-ever lineups of the iconic Manchester band -- Marc Riley and Craig Scanlon on guitar, Stephen Hanley on bass and his brother, Paul, on drums -- playing at the top of their game. We've got the premiere of "Rowche Rumble," The Fall's great 1979 single where bandleader Mark E Smith rants about valium and those who take it. In his best Nervous Norvus he snorts, "I'll never never never never do it again!"

Marc Riley, who is a BBC 6 DJ these days, told us a little about the origins of the song. "This was the first time Craig and I saw down to purposefully write a song for The Fall," Marc says. "He (and Steve) had just joined the band and I remember we were sat in the front room of my house going over riffs and stuff. I came up with a sequence that (in my mind) was akin to The Stooges ’Tight Pants/ Shake Appeal’. Of course it ended up nothing like it...but once we all got together in the rehearsal room it came together as a pretty ferocious beast. Particularly once MES started weaving his bitter magic and the pounding drums kicked in.”

The St. Helens Technical College performance of "Rowche Rumble" is particularly hopped up, and the recording is fantastic. Listen to that below.

The Fall - Live at St. Helens Technical College, ’81 is out February 19 via Castle Face (pre-order). Castle Face label head (and OSEES frontman) John Dwyer notes that "We have reached out to every surviving member of the band, the sound person, the bootlegger who recorded it and the photographer and received their blessings & help piecing it all together." Castle Face is donating 50% of the profits of the live album to Centrepoint which "helps the homeless in the Manchester area get back on their feet, so the local and deserving Fall fans get a little, and give a little back, too."

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A 15-SONG THE FALL PRIMER