Mark E. Smith
Fear is something I try not to absorb.Collection: Fear
The thing with me. I can't stick musicians. I've thought about this. I can't stand them, and being stuck in a studio with them I think that's my strength I can hear what they can't.Collection: Strength
If it's me and yer granny on bongos, it's the Fall.
Blue cheese contains natural amphetamines. Why are students not informed about this?
I used to be psychic, but I drank my way out of it.
He told me I didn't understand, that we were from the bleak industrial wastes of North England, or something, and that we didn't understand the Internet. I told him Fall fans invented the Internet. They were on there in 1982.
I was picked on because I was timid. I had younger sisters; I couldn't turn to them for help. I didn't have an older brother.
'Re-Mit' is going to terrify people. It's quite horrible. The Fall have had enough and we're coming for you.
Every day is great for me. I dislike rose-coloured glasses.
It's just like music when you reckon it up. It's like listening to Pavement it's just The Fall in 1985, isn't it? They haven't got an original idea in their heads.
Prince's manager once told me that I was the only person other than Prince who can recruit from the streets. Which was very flattering.
I don't want security guards. I don't think security guards are particularly good for your writing.
I'm just never getting there. I'm getting round to it. I'm beginning to understand it a bit more.
The thing with me, I can't talk about my work. I find it very difficult.
I like to push people till I get the truth out of them.
Being in The Fall isn't like being in another group. It isn't a holiday. A lot of musicians are really hard to deal with. They aren't as smart as me.
I read daft history books. Sometimes the books I read are a bit crackers or strange.
My earliest memory is learning to read 'Muffin the Mule' when I was about three.
When I was 14, I used to have a calendar on my wall, crossing the days off until I was 15, because the school leaving age was 15. Then three months before I turned 15 they changed the leaving age to 16.
I do feel like an outsider, but I don't lose any sleep over it.
When I was 18, the vision was to make music that didn't exist, because everything else was so unsatisfactory.
They're weird aren't they, Prince fans?
The only good Philip K. Dick film is 'Total Recall.' It's faithful to the book. Arnie gets it.
All these cities I go to, I never see them. They may be the most beautiful places in the world, but I'll just usually go to the nearest bar. I need a couple of hours by myself.
The manners thing's got worse. People think they can just text you if they've got bad news for you. It's not on. And as for people taking pictures at gigs on their phones, that's just weird.
If you're going to play it out of tune, then play it out of tune properly.Collection: Play
We were playing a festival in Dublin the other week. There was this other group, like, warming up in the next sort of chalet, and they were terrible. I said, 'Shut them cunts up!' And they were still warming up, so I threw a bottle at them. The bands said, 'That's the Sons of Mumford' or something. 'They're number five in charts!' I just thought they were a load of retarded Irish folk singers.Collection: Son
The gigs I enjoy are the ones where I'm so angry and paranoid, and I hate the audience so much, that I put everything into it to feed off the aggressive side of it. I don't actually hate the fans but when I'm feeling angry, pissed off, and full of hate, it's a good gig for me.Collection: Hate
When I was 18 the vision was to make music that didn't exist, because everything else was so unsatisfactory.Collection: Vision
I can write, boy, I can write. That's what I do. The trouble is that it's too bloody easy for people, that's why music is in the sorry state that it is. Any idiot, actors mainly, can go in there, sing a chord, bang on a machine... I'm not objecting to that but when people get at me for trying to say something in a rock 'n' roll mode it's as if I'm the freak.Collection: Sorry
When I was 14 I used to have a calendar on my wall, crossing the days off until I was 15, because the school leaving age was 15. Then three months before I turned 15 they changed the leaving age to 16.Collection: Wall
A lot of musicians are really hard to deal with. They aren't as smart as me.Collection: Smart
I like to push people till I get the truth out of them. Get them drunk, or whatever. Then discover what they really think. Push them and push them and push them.Collection: Thinking
It's just like music when you reckon it up. It's like, listening to Pavement, it's just the Fall in 1985, isn't it? They haven't got an original idea in their heads.Collection: Fall