Dragnet (album)

Dragnet (album)

Dragnet is the second album by The Fall, released on 26 October 1979. It was recorded 2nd-4th August of that year.

The album was recorded less than 8 months after its predecessor, Live at the Witch Trials, establishing at an early stage two key patterns of the group's work; that of high productivity and that of a regular turnover of group members - only Mark E. Smith and Marc Riley remained from the debut album and Riley had changed his role from bass to guitar. Dragnet is most notable for the arrivals of both guitarist Craig Scanlon and bassist Steve Hanley. Both were just 19 when they joined the group and would form The Fall's musical backbone until the mid 90's. Marc Riley told Fall fanzine The Pseud Mag (issue #2, Feb/March 2005) that it was he who suggested Scanlon should join, as he didn't wish to fill previous guitarist Martin Bramah's shoes on his own. Riley, Scanlon and Hanley were childhood friends and they had been in Fall support band The Sirens together. This is the only studio album recorded with drummer Mike Leigh.

The album is somewhat self-referential lyrically with several songs referencing the music industry; at least 2 tracks – "Printhead" and "Your Heart Out" – quoted or paraphrased reviews of the band's live shows. "Printhead" even verifies this fact within its own lyric. It also had a muddy, inchoate production – Riley has claimed this was a deliberate contrast to the sharp, clean sound of Live at the Witch Trials (The Pseud Mag, as above). It would be their final album for Miles Copeland III's Step Forward label, the group signing to Rough Trade Records in early 1980.

"Dice Man" takes its title from the novel The Dice Man by Luke Rhinehart and refers to this on the original sleevenotes.