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Post Punk

Prestwich, one constant member

The Fall

The Fall formed in Prestwich, Greater Manchester, in 1976, and took their name from Albert Camus's novel at founding member Tony Friel's suggestion. Mark E. Smith was the only constant. Around sixty-six musicians passed through the band over its forty-two years, about a third of them for less than a year. John Peel was their most devoted champion, and The Fall recorded 24 sessions for his show while releasing 31 studio albums between 1979 and 2017. The years with American guitarist Brix Smith, from 1983 to 1989, brought them closest to the charts. Smith died at home in Prestwich in January 2018, aged 60, and the band ended with him.

Melbourne's loudest export

The Birthday Party

The Birthday Party started out as the Boys Next Door, formed by schoolfriends Nick Cave, Mick Harvey and Phill Calvert in Melbourne and joined by bassist Tracy Pew and guitarist Rowland S. Howard. They took the new name when they moved to London in 1980, where John Peel championed their noise, and recorded Prayers on Fire in 1981 and Junkyard in 1982 before moving on to West Berlin. They broke up in 1983, after a final show back in Melbourne. Cave and Harvey went on to form the Bad Seeds, and Harvey and Howard joined Crime & the City Solution. Pew died in 1986, and Howard in 2009.

From Tel Aviv to Crammed Discs

Minimal Compact

Minimal Compact was started in Tel Aviv in 1980 by Malka Spigel, Samy Birnbach and Berry Sakharof, who moved to Amsterdam within a year looking for a bigger scene. They were among the first acts signed to the Belgian label Crammed Discs, set post-punk against Middle Eastern rhythm, and built a following across the European underground. Guitarist Rami Fortis joined in 1984, and the band split in 1988. Sakharof and Fortis went on to become two of Israeli rock's defining solo artists, and later reunited as the duo Fortisakharof.

San Francisco, 1975

Chrome

Chrome was formed in San Francisco in 1975 by Damon Edge and bassist Gary Spain. When Warner Brothers turned down their debut, The Visitation, Edge put it out in 1976 on his own Siren label. Guitarist Helios Creed joined after that first record, and the Edge–Creed partnership produced Alien Soundtracks in 1977, which started life as music for a radical San Francisco strip show, and Half Machine Lip Moves in 1979, often cited as the beginning of industrial rock. Three more albums followed by 1982. Edge married the singer Fabienne Shine in 1980, moved to Paris in 1983 and kept recording as Chrome there until he died of heart failure in 1995. Creed has carried the name on since.

Manchester, Factory Records, 1978

The Durutti Column

The Durutti Column took its name from the Durruti Column, an anarchist unit in the Spanish Civil War, by way of a 1966 Situationist comic strip. From 1978 it was the vehicle of Manchester guitarist Vini Reilly, one of the first acts Tony Wilson signed to Factory Records. Reilly's classically trained, echoing guitar shaped The Return of the Durutti Column in 1980: nine instrumentals produced by Martin Hannett, housed in a sleeve made of sandpaper. Percussionist Bruce Mitchell joined in 1981 and became his frequent collaborator, and in 1987 The Guitar and Other Machines became the first UK album released on Digital Audio Tape. After a stroke in 2011, Reilly could no longer play the guitar as he once had.

The Collection