The Fall’s fanbase is notoriously obsessive, but there aren’t likely too many fans who would consider the band’s seventeenth full length studio release, 1995’s ‘Cerebral Caustic’, to be one of their very best. It lacks the sheen of 1994’s ‘Middle Class Revolt’, and kicks off a three album run of less essential offerings. The rougher production values call back to the band’s origins in some ways, but with less distinctive material in hand, the bulk of ‘Cerebral Caustic’ often sounds like Mark E. Smith and cohorts going through the motions with a selection of garage rockers given a post punk edge. If you approach it expecting not much more than that, it’s actually fine for what it is, but considering the band featured Karl Burns, Steve Hanley and Craig Scanlon at this point, and the album marked the brief return of Brix Smith, it should be better than it is.
Perhaps one of the bigger red flags is that it’s actually a cover tune that provides one of the original LP’s best cuts. MES was always great at sourcing 60s material for The Fall’s reinvention, but Zappa/The Mothers’ ‘I’m Not Satisfied’ is unrecognisable. The original is a doo wop pastiche – all swooning melodies and tight harmonies with a 50s heart. Here, it fills three minutes with a spot on garage rock workout, loaded with hard edged rhythm guitars and pulsing bass lines. Adding further power to the classic garage sound, MES’s voice has been subjected to a world of distortion, bringing some extra roughness that really appeals.
Other standouts from ‘Cerebral Caustic’ include ‘Rainmaker’, a tough sounding indie/post punk workout that pushes Scanlon’s guitar to the fore, offering a brilliant contrast with Smith’s sometimes lax vocal; the brilliant ‘Life Just Bounces’, a fuzzed up rocker driven by Burns delivering a tight drum groove while a heavily distorted MES barks his way through a repetitious hook, and ‘North West Fashion Show’ providing a fat bass groove from Hanley, a few weird keyboard parps from the soon-to-depart Dave Bush, and a spoken vocal obsessed with “Richard and Judy’s vested offspring” sounding more like a piece of audio verite than a typical MES performance-ah. In terms of pure experimentation, this is definitely ‘Cerebral Caustic’s highlight.
Elsewhere, a deliberate choice to experiment backfires: the semi acoustic ‘Pine Leaves’, a track adorned with samples and harmonica is fairly tuneless, and ‘Bonkers In Phoenix’, a number that relies heavily on an inebriated sounding MES repeating the title against some hard programmed beats and pitch adjusted voices has far too much potential to annoy.
When falling between these two extremes, the album often resembles Fall-by-numbers, offering the long time fan very few surprises. However, if accepted on its own terms, the rockabilly fuelled ‘The Aphid’, guitar driven ‘The Joke’ – a throwback to the ‘This Nation’s Saving Grace’ era with its huge riff and furious energy – and dirty sounding ‘The Pearl’, centring around a dirty bass grind from Hanley, will certainly provide solid entertainment. For the Brix fan, ‘Don’t Call Me Darling’ should also hit the mark, with the prodigal musician adding a real bite to a one line chorus with a post-riot grrrl anger, complimenting the track’s stomping rhythms perfectly. It isn’t “classic Fall” by any stretch, but when capturing ‘Cerebral Caustic’s rawer edge, it provides a great snapshot of the album sessions.
As part of their ‘Fall Sound’ deluxe reissue series, Cherry Red Records expanded ‘Cerebral Caustic’ in the summer of 2026, placing the original LP alongside four discs’ worth of supplementary material.
The entire LP is presented a second time as “pre-release rough mixes” sharing something that’s beyond a set of demos, but not yet ready for public consumption. Aside from sounding as if they’ve been sourced from a third generation cassette dub, many of these do not provide a huge alternative from the final product. However, there are a couple of notable exceptions. The most obvious of these is ‘Bonkers In Phoenix’ which is heard before the sped up vocals were applied, and with Brix much higher in the mix. This doesn’t make this obtuse sound collage much more favourable, and it’s likely just the most obsessive fan who’ll return to this – and the rest of the rough mixes – with any regularity. Hearing ‘One Day’ performed with an extra layer of distortion offers something fun, in that an already furious number sounds like one of the best “raw” Fall numbers before the relative production sheen is applied.
For the bigger Fall fan, it’s only disc three that shares something “new”. The featured live show from Rennes, France in April 1995 has existed as a practically unlistenable bootleg for years, but it finally emerges here in pristine quality from a soundboard source. Not that the clarity makes the most challenging elements of this show a lot more palatable: during ‘The Joke’, a bright sounding piano weighs down the performance with a world of atonal notes, and MES barks and yelps in the manner of someone doing a cheap impersonation of The Fall, and ‘Birthday’ is woefully loose, with clanging guitars supporting Brix’s incredibly out of tune vocals. The usually reliable ‘Idiot Joy Showland’ is almost equally tuneless, dominated by a clanging guitar and ugly keys, saved only by Mark adding a raw and slurring vocal that typifies many of The Fall’s mid 90s shows, and although MES sounds great on a furious ‘Mere Pseud Mag. Ed’, Craig appears to be hammering through a world of ugly, atonal riffs at times, threatening to derail this performance at any moment.
For the patient, the show offers some redemption. The more melodic ‘Bill Is Dead’ features some pleasing interplay between the instruments, and even though the source makes MES sound a little distant in places, the results provide an interesting insight into a very different sounding Fall. Although it could’ve sounded like Fall-by-numbers fare, the combo of great drumming and the vocals occasionally turning into a mumbling goblin provide some interesting entertainment. A rendition of ‘Paranoia Man In Cheap Shit Room’ provides another set highlight on a musical level, although the more obtuse elements of Smith’s performance will ensure it really isn’t for the more casual fan, and a buoyant ‘Big New Prinz’ showcases some superb guitar work underscoring a barking vocal which sounds like archetypal Fall. What comes as perhaps the biggest surprise here is how well Zappa’s ‘I’m Not Satisfied’ fits with the self-penned material; it’s an even more natural fit with the live show than it is the parent album.
When everything really hits, the potential in the mid 90s Fall is clear for all to hear. The still brand new ‘Life Just Bounces’ is powered by a superb Karl Burns drum part, rattling bass grooves and a classic sounding MES drawl, while the also new ‘Chiselers’ – at this point, unreleased in studio form – features Burns playing his arse off with an unshakable drum shuffle, powering the number in a way that allows squirling synths and buzzsaw guitars to drop riffs and sounds as required.‘Pearl City’ captures the band in full on punk mode, with Scanlon’s scratchy guitars working a riff that sounds like something from the ‘Dragnet’ sessions crossed with a CBGB’s roughness. Even the stabbed, rock ‘n’ roll inspired keys fit with the energised feel, despite being half buried. These three performances alone make this worth adding to the mountain of Fall gigs in your collection, but better still, the stomping ‘Glam Racket’ sounds superb with MES and Brix taking full advantage of call and response vocals, whilst the buzzy rhythm guitars hit a sweet spot between garage rock and noisy glam. A highlight of 1993’s ‘Infotainment Scan’ provides a reliable highlight here a couple of years on.
Discs four and five recycle everything from ‘The Twenty-Seven Points’, a ragbag selection of (mostly) live tracks recorded between 1992 and 1995, originally released via Permanent Records in August 1995. With its lack of coherence – even the sourced material isn’t presented chronologically – along with the inclusion of aborted performances and other sketches, it’s fair to say that this is really not aimed at the casual listener.
Obviously, for the fan, it offers some great bits to be cherry-picked. There’s an absolutely furious sounding ‘Ladybird’ sharing an abrasive guitar against a startling loud rhythm, showcasing a mid 90s Fall at full power, a bass heavy ‘Idiot Joy Showland’ sounding a little more bootleg-centric, but providing a great snapshot of a surprisingly focused MES, and a fudgy sounding yet still energetic ‘Free Range’ bringing a full scale jangle. The always reliable ‘Glam Racket’ appears in a brilliantly punchy rendition before an outing of ‘Lost In Music’ shows off the band’s more fun side, with MES yelping incessantly against a wall of synths and busy guitar riff. As always, this feels out of place against the self-penned numbers, but presents a popular fixture of the era’s live sets.
Also noteworthy is a ragged ‘Big New Prinz’ with MES unleashing a really carefree yelp in a throwback to much earlier Fall performances, and a muddy sounding ‘Strychnine’ which makes Hanley’s bass more audible than on some of these recordings, but also features an energetic lead guitar break that’s unfortunately a little lost in the audio mix.
The aforementioned unfinished bits and pieces really derail this release – ‘The Twenty-Seven Points’ would unlikely be the most coherent Fall listen, even without them – but there’s one addition here that feels like an important slice of history. ‘Idiot Joy Showland’ (as recorded at the Kentish Town Forum in 1993) has a troubled beginning. Following a few bars of the distinctive and busy riff, MES appears rattled and yells at “Rex…” to “sort it out”. An audio tape of Smith reading a spoken word piece is played over the PA system until the band are ready to return. As a result, the version of the song that’s played ultimately sounds sharper than ever, with MES very obviously wanting to make up for the audio issues.
As for the set’s studio tracks, the highlight is supplied by a cover of Slapp Happy’s ‘War!’ which gives Burns a great rhythm to work with, creating a brilliantly rigid base for an angry sounding Smith. The version here sounds a little rougher than the mix that would appear on ‘Middle Class Revolt’ but is certainly none the worse for that; unlike some other Fall demos and alternates, it’s clearly a finished take. Elsewhere, the drum machine heavy ‘Cloud of Black’ shows The Fall at their most 90s sounding, falling somewhere between a band pitching themselves at the more adventurous NME reader and the alternative dance crowd, on a track with a tuneless vocal set against a drum machine heartbeat. [This would also appear as a bonus track on an expanded ‘Shift-Work’ in 2007, where it still feels like it goes on forever, despite just clocking up the four minutes.]
On top of the studio and live material, this set features the obligatory Peel Session – in this case, session #18 from November 1994. It’s one of the more interesting sessions, since the band take the opportunity to drop a couple of Xmas numbers in with the trad Fall material. A tough version of ‘Glam Racket’ sounds great with Brix joining on vocals for the chorus, while ‘Numb At The Lodge’ sounds surprisingly slick, with the guitars at the fore and the band almost sounding like they’re aping some of the contemporary indie bands of the era, helped by Brix’s very melodic vocal. The real fun happens elsewhere, though, with an absolute mauling of the Bobby Helms classic ‘Jingle Bell Rock’, now all rockabilly drums and shouty voices, and the standard ‘Hark! The Herald Angels Sing’ reworked in the style of a 60s garage band playing in a rather slack way. MES occasionally sounds like he’s taking the piss, but not as much as the falsetto vocals that arrive for the titular hook. In some ways, this track should be a skipper, but for those without the lavish (and out of print) ‘Complete Peel Sessions 1978-2004’ box set, it’ll provide some genuine amusement.
With a wealth of supplementary material, this five disc set should represent the final word on ‘Cerebral Caustic’. However, the double disc release from 2006 isn’t actually cancelled out by this epic set, since the promotional interview with Mark and Brix hasn’t been reprised here. In terms of what’s featured, of course, there’s plenty to represent this era of an ever evolving band. For the big fan, there isn’t necessarily enough unreleased or rare material – the Fall only played sixteen live shows to promote the original record – but those who’ve never owned ‘Cerebral Caustic’ or feel the need to upgrade their previous copy with a 5CD box will get still get good value here.
June/July 2026