Marc Riley BBC Radio 6 Music with The Fallen Leaves, Paul Slattery & Retro Man Blog!

Photographer Paul Slattery joined The Fallen Leaves on their trip up to Manchester for their Marc Riley Session on BBC Radio 6 Music on Monday. He has kindly filed a report from the front-line at "Media City" with some great photos, which I am very pleased to share on the Blog. The band slammed through three songs, red hot and raw versions of "Against The Grain", "Passing By" and "Trouble" - that according to Marc had Paul Slattery throwing a few shapes and playing air guitar around the studio. "Maybe The Fallen Leaves have found their own 'Bez'" he said. Luckily it was broadcast on the radio...There was a short interview and the band threw in a few of their catch-phrases and expanded on their theory that "a good idea played badly is better than a bad idea played well". Paul then explained that he had been transfixed by seeing Rob Symmons play guitar for the first time at last December's Retro Man Blog Night at the Half Moon. He then went on to very generously lavish praise on the Blog and Marc commented that he had "been on the Blog, and it's great!". I'm blushing as I write ha ha...! Who says you can't get advertising on the BBC...? Anyway, I am extremely grateful.



Marc Riley with The Fall in 1979...Photo by Paul Slattery

Marc Riley joined The Fall in 1978, going from fan to roadie to band-member, and it was around this time that he first met Paul Slattery, who photographed the band extensively during this period. You can see some of Paul's great shots in Mick Middles' Omnibus Press biography "The Fall". When he left the band, Marc went on to form Marc Riley & The Creepers, who I once saw at the Hammersmith Clarendon back in 1985 when they supported The Three Johns. In the many examples of acrimonious departures from The Fall, Marc Riley's must rank right up there with the best of them as insults were traded back-and-forth via songs such as The Fall's "The Man Who's Head Expanded" and "C.R.E.E.P." and then back again with The Creepers' brilliantly titled, "Jumper Clown". When the Creepers finished, he formed The Lost Soul Crusaders and went on to run In-Tape records and work as a Plugger for bands such as Pixies. Marc also contributed to the controversial "Oink!", probably the only kid's comic to end up on the top shelf in newsagents alongside other more "adult" material. However, it's probably as a Radio DJ that Marc is now much more widely known and his "Mark & Lard" DJ double-act with Mark Radcliffe raised his profile even higher. Moving across various channels since joining the BBC, he now has a superb show on BBC 6 Music going out at 7-9pm every Monday to Thursday. Of course he not only has the good taste to play The Fallen Leaves and indeed get them in for a session, but Monday's show also boasted Buzzcocks, Kid Congo, T-Rex, Jesus & Mary Chain, PJ Harvey and The Cramps - great stuff indeed...! Here are some of Paul Slattery's photos of The Fallen Leaves in session...

Rob Symmons

Matthew Karas

Rob Symmons and Rob Green

William Lewington

Marc Riley with The Fallen Leaves

Listen to the whole of Monday's excellent Episode here or just The Fallen Leaves session, the interview plus the chat with Paul Slattery (and Retro Man Blog mention...) can be listened to here.

Don't forget our Retrosonic Podcast two-episode special featuring The Fallen Leaves story, "A-Side: Punk Rock for Gentlemen" and "B-Side: Simple Songs for Complex People" both of which can be downloaded for free from our Soundcloud site and are well worth a listen.

Although Paul Slattery hasn't yet published a book solely on The Fall, you can see his photographs of the band in various biographies and magazine features. He does however, have two books available on those other Manchester giants, The Smiths "The Early Years" and Oasis "A Year on The Road" published by Omnibus Press. Both books are crammed full of iconic photographs with notes and anecdotes, and are available from all good bookshops and Amazon. 

The Fallen Leaves next live show is their regular "Minimum R'n'B" Club night at the excellent 12 Bar Club in London's Denmark Street on Wednesday April 03rd.