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Fantastic Life: The 20 Greatest Fall Songs In No Order Whatsoever. No.2 - Blindness

By the time The Fall sauntered into Maida Vale studios in London, camera crew in tow, to record their 24th session for John Peel’s Radio 1 programme, their renaissance was well under way. A generally ecstatic critical reception was afforded to “The Real New Fall LP” and the group had been re-establishing themselves as a formidable live act, boasting a new line-up that had Jim Watts back in on guitar and Elena Poulou now established on keyboards. Dave Milner, sadly, had left but was replaced on the drum stool by his immediate predecessor, Spencer Birtwistle. Simon “Ding” Archer had gone off to play with PJ Harvey and was replaced on bass by Steve Trafford. Ben Pritchard remained on guitar. Footage from the session shows that Smith was in good spirits, joshing with the engineers, cutting takes off in mid-flow to bark some traditionally vague instructions, dictaphoning rehearsals and crashing about on a stray cymbal during vocal takes (a sound engineer’s nightmare). The session was magnificent; the takes of the three original new songs are widely considered definitive - “What About Us?”, “Clasp Hands” and this, a modern classic that survived in the setlist from this 2004 session until the group’s very last show in 2017.

The song exists in several versions, the best ones being the speculative but punchy demo, “Blind Man”, the US vinyl LP edition and, by far and away the greatest, the Peel 24 take. What sets this version apart is two-fold. Firstly, the line-up - Watts left shortly after the session and did not participate in the recording of the song for “Fall Heads Roll”. This rendered the sound-picture too empty to have the same force. The second is the incredible, tense, dynamic performance by everyone. Essentially a circular three-note bass riff, a song like “Blindness” is going to depend on performance to a considerable degree and the Peel 24 take is thrilling. Trafford, wisely, keeps it pinned down and tight while Birtwistle is superb, making excellent use of his toms and his high-hat for dramatic effect. The guitars seethe and soar with Watts’s backwards-sounding melody (e-bow?) being a welcome repeating figure. Smith has no choice to rise to the occasion and does so with panache, adding tape skree to the mix and delivering a winding, full, detailed lyric which peaks on a panicked screeching delivery which ushers in the final third. The later album version pares this too far back, adding to the unappealing emptiness of the standard “FHR” version. But no matter, on Peel 24, they GOT it. A strong live take by “The Dudes” line-up exists too on “Last Night At The Palais”, released in 2009 but this is spoiled by an unnecessary ableist slur.

“Blindness “ was a high watermark of many a 21st century gig and is best treasured as the jewel of one of their finest Peel Sessions, a whole strand of the group’s work that is rightly treasured by fans. It served notice that Smith and Co were fit and working again after a difficult 5 years or so. By the time the Complete Peel Sessions box set was released in 2005, the group were playing their biggest venues for 10 years and this track - actually, this whole session -was a major part of the reason why.