I, meanwhile, love The Fall. I love their sloppiness, their Englishness, their aggressiveness, the way they seize upon a hook and just beat it to death. Robb can attest to my habit of putting Fall tracks on mixes every chance I can get. So because I can’t post another Fall song as a response, I’ll go to the next closest thing.
“Red Shoes by the Drugstore” is a cover of a Tom Waits song, and I’m perfectly content to have never heard the original. Years ago, when I finally dove into The Wedding Present’s back catalog, this was the first song that really caught me. It’s probably the heaviest song they’ve ever done, built on a locked-groove bassline and featuring David Gedge speak-singing his way into a Mark E Smith impression, tossing off details and asides in a thickening accent. The rest of their quite substantial catalog plays much more with restraint and acoustic melody, but this one still stands out as a wonderful anomaly, punishing but thrilling.
m. joosse
Filed under: Mixtape, VOL 05, NEIMT, The Wedding Present
