Mark E Smith was a Salfordian post-punk music legend who was the fronting man of the famous band, The Fall.
Mark sadly passed away on January 24 2018, at just 60-years-old. He fought a long and hard battle with terminal lung cancer before sadly passing away. He was an inspiration to many and especially aspiring musicians from Northern working-class backgrounds, like him.
At the time of his death the world paid special tributes to him, from ex-band members sharing personal memories to the thousands of written articles and not forgetting the touching social media posts from his fans. A local newspaper described his death at the time as a “strange kind of anti-matter national treasure”.
He was born in March 1957 and spent his childhood growing up in the Lower Broughton area of Salford before he moved to Prestwich in Greater Manchester. The community spirit continues to thrive just as well as to when Mark was roaming the cobbled streets as a child.
Being from Salford guided him in channelling his inner Northern working-class deep-rooted music. But being a punk music star wasn’t always on the cards for him.
After leaving school at the age of 16 in 1973, he briefly worked at a local meat factory before moving on to work at what is now known as Media City. The skyscrapers and rows of office blocks were once non existent and instead, there lay the busy Salford Docks. The docks formed a key part of the Port of Manchester from 1894 before they were shut down in in 1982.
Mark began working at the Salford Docks as a Shipping Clerk in 1973, still a young boy freshly out of school. He worked there for about three years until he was 19-years-old. It is said that Mark used to write song lyrics on his lunch breaks while working at the Docks.
Mark had a music awakening after attending a Sex Pistols gig in 1976 which led to him making the decision to quit the docks to follow his new dream of to be in a band.
The infamous Pistols gig which inspired him to take on music was at the Manchester Lesser Free trade hall. After the gig he decided to name his band after the Albert Camus novel, The Fall, and the rest is history. Mark set up with the band with friends, Martin Bramah, Tony Friel and Una Baines- who missed their first gig because she couldn’t afford a keyboard.
His distinct perspective was deeply tied to the Salford and Manchester industrial backdrop, keeping a distance from London-centric music scenes and instead anchoring his work in a sharp, Northern working-class surrealism.
Mark once said: “Rock and Roll isn’t even music really. It’s a mistreating of instruments to get feelings over.”
Although he was allegedly difficult to work with, Mark’s music was appreciated and respected by fans and critics.
His pronounced sing-slur made him unlike any other frontman and he inspired devotion among fans who were drawn to his singular presence and rambling poetry. Mark served as a leader of The Fall and was the only ever permanent band member across the band’s extraordinary 42 years of running.
Over the timeline of the band creating much-loved top hits, the group released over 30 studio albums before concluding with their last album, New Facts Emerge in 2017. Something which amazes many is how the band had over 60 musicians over the 42 years, with members usually moving on after a year or so.
However, one of the band members, Brix Smith who was a guitarist and collaborator stuck was an exception to this because she was in fact married to Mark for a few years, before they split up and another person took her place in the band.
Some legendary songs that may ring a bell are Repetition (1978), How I Wrote Elastic Man (1980), Totally Wired (1980), Hit The North (1987) and many many more.
Mark truly had a captivating, complex personality. It has been said that he was difficult to work with, while he was most commonly known for his biting whit. He reportedly once fired a sound technician for ordering a salad.
He was particularly suspicious of being trapped with fame, so he avoided socialising with other people in the music industry. Instead, his inspiration for music came from writers such as, Thomas Hardy, Phillip K Dick, Edgar Allen Poe and HP Lovecraft.
We’re seven, not far off eight years since the passing of the Salford born legend musician and still, his music and personality remains to bring a sense of community to his fans, with hundreds of social media pages and Facebook groups tributing him. Fans across the world continue to share everything, from their favourite songs from The Fall to their most memorable memories of the musician.
