The literary influences of The Fall’s Mark E. Smith
After attending that legendary Sex Pistols gig in 1976 – also attended by future members of Joy Division, The Smiths, and the Buzzcocks – Mark E. Smith was inspired to start his own band. Alongside Martin Bramah, Una Baines and Tony Friel, Smith formed The Fall. Henceforth, the band – named after Albert Camus’ 1956 novel – became one of the most prominent and influential post-punk outfits of all time.
Smith, who remained the band’s frontman despite many line-up changes over the decades, was known for his outspoken, antagonistic and misanthropic nature. Despite dropping out of school, Smith was very intellectual and a keen reader. According to Bramah, “[The Fall] thought all your originality was knocked out of you at University. We were keen to learn what was interesting, but we didn’t want to be force-fed. We’d all rejected what little education we had.”
Smith used his interest in literature as a weapon, his tastes inspiring witty, well-written lyrics central to the band’s appeal. He once shared: “There were no groups around that I thought represented people like me or my mates. If I wanted to be anything, it was a voice for those people. The Fall had to appeal to someone who was into cheap soul as much as someone who liked avant-garde.” Smith’s literary tastes informed his lyrical themes, which often explored, as he called it, “the horror of the normal,” mixing dry humour with sharp social critique.
During a 1981 NME feature, ‘Portrait of the Artist as a Consumer’, Smith revealed his favourite books and authors. His interest in horror and sci-fi, such as H.P Lovecraft’s At The Mountains of Madness and Philip K. Dick’s A Scanner Darkly and The Man in the High Castle, reflects his interest in nihilism and the horrors of being human. Smith frequently referenced the two writers in his lyrics, even stating, “My stories are very much like Lovecraft’s actually.” He told the BBC that he’d “been a fan of H.P. Lovecraft since I was about 17” before giving a special reading of the author’s short story The Colour Out Of Space.
Smith was also a big fan of crime and thriller novels, such as George V. Higgens’ Cogan’s Trade. Smith enjoyed John Le Carré’s A Small Town in Germany and cited two Colin Wilson books as some of his favourite works of fiction – The Black Room and Ritual in the Dark. The Fall leader was influenced by non-fiction, such as Frederich Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil, a seminal nihilistic text. He cites Richard Meltzer’s Gulcher: Post-Rock Cultural Pluralism in America as a favourite, a book which posits that music might be replaced as the signifier of modern culture.
Mark E. Smith’s literary influences:
- Gulcher: Post-Rock Cultural Pluralism in America – Richard Meltzer
- A Small Town in Germany – John Le Carré
- A Scanner Darkly – Philip K. DickThe Man in the High Castle
- The Sirens of Titan – Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
- The Deer Park – Norman Mailer
- The Black Room – Colin Wilson
- Ritual in the Dark – Colin Wilson
- Cogan’s Trade – George V. Higgins
- At the Mountains of Madness – H.P. Lovecraft
- Beyond Good and Evil – Frederich Nietzsche
- U.S. Civil War Handbook – William H. Price
- How I Created Modern Music – D. McCulloch (a weekly serial)
- True Crime Monthly
- Private Eye
Smith’s list wasn’t limited to novels, however, and he also cited True Crime Monthly and Private Eye (whose satirical take on current affairs undoubtedly influenced the singer’s lyrics) as staples of his collection. Evidently, the singer’s wide range of literary influences helped to shape his unique writing style, cementing him as one of the music industry’s most enigmatic and captivating wordsmiths.
