Excavate!
THE LOUDER THAN WAR #1 BOOK OF THE YEAR
A ROUGH TRADE, THE TIMES, MOJO, UNCUT, THE HERALD BOOK OF THE YEAR
This is not a book about a rock band. This is not even a book about Mark E Smith. This is a book about The Fall group - or more precisely, their world.
'To 50,000 Fall Fans: please buy this inspired & inspiring, profound & provocative, beautiful & bonkers Book of Revelations.'
DAVID PEACE
'Mind blowing . . . there is so much to enjoy in this brilliant book.'
TIM BURGESS
'A container sized treasure trove . . . I strongly advise you to buy it.'
MAXINE PEAKE
'The most wonderful, unashamedly intellectual, pretentious, ridiculous, exciting hymn to this incredible group.'
ANDY MILLER, BACKLISTED
Over a prolific forty-year career, the Fall created a world that was influential, idiosyncratic and fiercely original - and defied simple categorisation.
Their frontman and lyricist Mark E. Smith spun opaque tales that resisted conventional understanding; the Fall's worldview was an education in its own right. Who wouldn't want to be armed with a working knowledge of M. R. James, shipping-dock procedures, contemporary dance, Manchester City and Can? The group inspired and shaped the lives of those who listened to and tried to make sense of their work.
Bringing together previously unseen artwork, rare ephemera and handwritten material, alongside essays by a slate of fans, EXCAVATE! is a vivid, definitive record - an illumination of the dark corners of the Fall's wonderful and frightening world.
Bob Stanley is the author of Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Story of Modern Pop (Faber, 2013), and Too Darn Hot (Faber, forthcoming), and has written for the Guardian, The Times, NME and The Face. He is also a filmmaker, and founding member of the group Saint Etienne. He was Writer in Residence at the British Library in 2017.
Tessa Norton writes regularly about art, books and music for various publications including The Wire, and for exhibitions and events including Liverpool Biennial and The Tetley. She published the artists' book The Fields Here Are Full of Ghosts with Wysing Arts Centre in 2019, and she is a Jerwood Arts Fellow at FACT gallery for 2020-21.