The Fall – Totale's Turns (It's Now Or Never)

A furious and insistent Fall tear up the north. The band has the off kilter tightness of that era, very appealing. Fun to hear Mark E. shout at a guitarist for "showin' off." Mark E. is charismatic and cranky, demanding attention. Despite the low fidelity, it's a fine listen for a Fall fan.

The only knock is the inexplicable sandwiching of a studio cover of "That Man" and a home demo of "New Puritan" before the rousing live conclusion.

It doesn't matter that these live songs were recorded in different spaces at different times. There is a flow, and it all hangs together nicely until we get to "That Man." At least we can rely on the Fall to go nuts in an extended "No Xmas for J. Quays."

It always reminds me of “Dragnet” does this LP. It has that same lo-fi energy about it, as if they couldn’t give a shit about the sound quality, just the song quality!
Best songs? “That Man”, and the best Fall song of all Fall songs, “Fiery Jack”!

I love this album its bloody awful but in a good way

High quality packaging - Nice thick well produced non-gloss sleeve and a textured inner sleeve (with pictures + text) plus a plastic inner-inner sleeve. The record is a nice weight and sounds better than my previous copy which can not be from 1980 (I bought it brand new in about 1990) and is not a pressing listed on discogs. This older copy sounds tinny in comparison to this, which is more raw.

I am very happy with this, since I prefer re-issues to stick to the original material and do it well, instead of adding bonus content or spreading a single LP across 2 LPs.

On the negative side, I think that some of the transitions between tracks are not as on the original vinyl (e.g. an extra 1 second pause).I haven't checked properly, but sometimes the next song does not kick in quite as quickly as my memory expects it too.