Mark E. Smith

Smith's parents had moved to nearby Sedgley Park, Prestwich after their marriage in 1955.

Mark Edward Smith (5 March 1957 – 24 January 2018) was an English singer-songwriter.

He was the lead singer, lyricist and only constant member of the post-punk group the Fall.

These include their early late 1970s line-up, the classic Fall period of Riley/Scanlon/Hanley, the Brix years of 1984-89, their early 1990s revival, and everything after the on-stage fight in New York, after which Hanley quit and Smith was arrested (see below).

Smith formed the band after attending the June 1976 Sex Pistols gig at the Lesser Free Trade Hall in Manchester and was its leader until his death.

During their 42-year existence, the Fall's line-up included some sixty musicians, with whom Smith released 32 studio albums and numerous singles and EPs.

Smith had a difficult and complex personality and was a long-term alcoholic.

He was known for his biting and targeted wit, evident in interviews, for which he was much in demand by music journalists throughout his career.

He was suspicious of the trappings of fame and largely avoided socialising with people associated with the music scene, including other Fall members.

The dark and sardonic aspect of his personality often appears in his lyrics; he especially derided music industry people.

Smith's approach to music was unconventional and he did not have high regard for musicianship, stating that "rock & roll isn't even music really. It's a mistreating of instruments to get feelings over."

The Fall are regarded as one of the most important and influential post-punk bands of the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s.

Although Smith was difficult to work with, he was revered by fans and critics, and on his death was described as a "strange kind of antimatter national treasure."

Smith was born to working-class parents Irene (née Brownhill) and Jack Smith, in Broughton, Salford, the eldest of four siblings.

He had three sisters: Suzanne (who later painted the front sleeve for the 1980 Fall album Grotesque (After the Gramme)), Caroline, and Barbara.

His grandfather, James Brownhill, had been involved at the Dunkirk evacuation and fought in France during the Second World War.

Jack was too young to have fought in the war, but joined the army as soon as he was old enough.

He married American guitarist and Fall member Brix Smith on 19 July 1983, after they met in April 1983 in Chicago during a Fall American tour.

She joined the group on guitar and vocals for the album Perverted by Language and co-wrote some of the best-regarded Fall tracks from the period, and is widely credited for introducing a more mainstream, pop-oriented element to the group's sound.

Smith's father died suddenly in 1989 of a heart attack.

According to Simon Ford, Smith did not become interested in music until he was about 14, when his father "allowed a record player into the house."

The first single he bought was Paranoid by Black Sabbath, and his first gig was the Groundhogs at Manchester's Free Trade Hall.

He attended Sedgley Park Primary School, and later Stand Grammar School for Boys before leaving aged 16.

That year, he left home and moved in with his girlfriend and future Fall keyboardist, Una Baines, later of the Blue Orchids.

He subsequently took an evening class in A-level Literature.

His first job was in a meat factory before he became a shipping clerk on Salford docks.

The Fall were named after the novel by Albert Camus, and initially consisted of Smith and his friends Martin Bramah, Una Baines and Tony Friel.

By this time, Smith was unemployed, having dropped out of college at the age of 19.

He gave up his job as a shipping clerk at Salford docks shortly afterward to focus on the band.

Their early line-up was formed from early members of the punk rock movement.

Their music underwent numerous stylistic changes, often concurrently with changes in the group's line-up.

The Fall's 40-year career can be broken into five broad periods, based on the band's membership.

She remained with the Fall until the couple divorced in 1989.

Smith remarried twice after this.

His second marriage to Saffron Prior, who had worked for The Fall's fan club, ended in divorce in 1995.

He married Eleni Poulou, also called Elenor or Elena, in 2001.

Poulou joined the band in September 2002 and left in April 2016.

Smith and Poulou divorced in 2016, and Smith's partner at the time of his death was his manager Pamela Vander.

Referring to the Fall's 60-odd former members, Smith said that he had "only" fired around half the number of people he is said to have dismissed, and that some left of their own free will.

He would fire musicians for seemingly trivial reasons; he once dismissed a sound engineer for eating a salad, later explaining that "the salad was the last straw."