Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
For the vast majority of the time what is needed from music is the ability to knock the door of complacency down so far and fast that it splinters, fractures and disintegrates into sawdust. To take on the comfortable and undeservingly content is a right that many dare not venture into and yet, especially at this time of year when the ballot boxes of discontent are brought out with alarming military-like precision. Thankfully Manchester’s The Falling understand that to bring such things to the attention of music lover is their inalienable right.
Just So You Know and the Library are two songs that don’t just complement each other, they hit out at the same time and land a punch so devastating that the head wobbles in appreciation and ducks quickly lest it be on the end of the next charming blow.
Whereas Just So You Know sits in the range of the good time experience, the cutting dash that is enjoyed by all, Library really has a dig at the twin features of British society, those willing to join in with the book bashing, the Nazi state of mind that a book that disagrees with the corrective thinking must therefore must be burned. According quite rightly to John Done Jr., Jason Hanley, Andy Keating and Brian Mitchell, those that never bother to read in the first place, it is the intellectual sin of the modern age, alongside hearing and reproducing ad nauseam one side of the story without investigating all the possible angles. It is an evil that somehow has become common place, butter and corroded and makes a mockery of the claim to be part of a civilized society.
The melody is complete; it rages with proper British introspection and interrogation, it is the damning but done with the firm hand and not the bluster of insincerity of those who shout against the wind but with nothing to add bar their own cocky voices.
Just So You Know and the Library are two great tunes from a great band.
The Falling play at Magnet on May 30th.
Ian D. Hall