A Past Gone Mad

Lyrics

The Infotainment Scan

(1)

Serial killers were always a bore in my book (2)
Along with Spangles and soccer books (3)
Rid us of old fogeys
Scuttling and swerving over the roads,
Comma,
Kids in pubs
(Passable)

Why is Pete Gabriel always following us? (4)
(Passable)
And before the grub comes a moralist (5)
Dissonance of infotainment (6)

A past gone mad!
Alive and well, he is on all channels
(Kiki Dee) (7)
Dwelling in craven environment

If I ever end up like Ian McShane slit my throat with a kitchen tool (8)
And if I ever end up like U2 slit my throat with a garden vegetable (9)

A past gone mad
(Passable)

Take a look back
Rear-view mirror: it's all behind you

A present gone mad
Tra-tra-la, follow, track that lava
Past, present gone mad.
Passable
A past gone mad.

Mark Goodier Session May 17 1993

Roaming over the road
Camper van
Serial killers were always a bore in my book

Passable
Passable

Roaming around they go down the deep deep deep streets
What is he talking about now

Passable

Fucking square meals are useless for you
Out of thin air, big night, old house
It's that time again
It's the time of the fall

Bowing to a tyrant, incorrigible horrible hotel
In a suit marked 1948
Indicative of a blinkered attitude
That suit is now in the bucket

If I ever end up like Ian Mcshane cut my throat with a garden tool
If I ever end up like Ian Mcshane cut my throat with a kitchen tool

It's a good life in Europe
Passable
Passable

If I ever end up like that twat from Points of View I'll cut my throat with a tool (10)
If I ever end up like Richard Madeley cut my hands off with a axe-wheel  (11)

Passable
Passable
?Passable
Ahh Ah ah ahh

?Passable
Ahh ah ah ahh
?Passable

[See, the rocks in Spain look like the ones 'round the lochs in the Highlands]  (12)

Notes

 1. The title seems to come from the same Marvel Spiderman storyline (1976) that partly inspired "Various Times," which consists of "Marvel Team-Up" #41--#44. The cover of #43 proclaims "A Past Gone Mad!" (thanks be to Dan).

 

MES, in Select magazine is asked whether the song takes aim at the House scene. He replies, "Those lyrics are more about blokes in their mid-30s trying to swing out. Always makes me laugh, that does. I'm not against dance. What I'm having a crack at is all these guys in their mid-30s who're married with kids, and because they've seen The Hitman and Her once, they're going out to clubs and ruining it for the young kids. Get my drift?"

10-4. 

"There's a lot of fellas in this country who won't grow up..."A Past Gone Mad" is like, you turn on the telly or listen to the radio and it's all '60s music or '70s music. And they go, It's because they don't make the tunes the same anymore. It's niot that it all (heated) it's because the fuckin' people in charge want to wallow in their past...Really good groups just got an LP out get three lines, and then you get three pages on who Yes' drummers were."

^
 

 

2. The song is an attack on nostalgia; serial killers seem an odd object to remember with wistful fondness, though (on at least one live version they're lumped in with Marc Riley, who reliably comes in for knocks any time MES can't think of anybody else).  Are there people nostalgic for serial killers? Or is this a sarcastic reference to politicians or other prominent historical figures, many of whom are technically serial killers in some sense, such as Churchill or Stalin?

Dan: "In his 'Portrait of the Artist as a Consumer' (NME, 15 August 1981) feature, MES lists under 'Reads': True Crime Monthly."

From Matt Tempest:

Interesting to note that 18 March 1979 The Fall played Bradford's The Royal Standard - the Yorkshire Ripper's favoured pub, at the height of his killing spree. Highly possible he was in the audience.

Sutcliffe's case differs from the UK's most high-profile other serial killers - Shipman and the Wests - in that the latters' crimes were only discovered retrospectively. Sutcliffe sparked something close to mass hysteria and paranoia in West Yorkshire in the late 1970s, with the ongoing killings, and the police's inability to catch him.

^

3. It's notably odd that MES says "soccer" rather than "football" here. Spangles were a hard candy that was discontinued in the early 1980s; nostalgia for these is also proscibed in "Paranoia Man In Cheap Sh*t Room" and "It's a Curse."  

^

4. Gabriel had a top ten album the previous year but, although MES couldn't have known this, he was to take a ten year break between that album and the next one. Here he is presented not exactly as an object of nostalgia, but more like an item from the past that refuses to go away.  He had a hit song in 1978 with "Follow You, Follow Me," in any case (thanks to Weirdbrother). 

^

5. This alludes to Bertholt Brecht's line from Threepenny Opera "Erst kommt das Fressen, dann kommt die Moral" ("first comes the food, then the morals"); Fressen means something like "feeding" rather than eating, as it is usually said of animals (thanks to Reformation for tracking this down). Neither MES nor Brecht see this as a bad thing; latter's point is that basic needs must be taken care of before a certain level of humanity can be expected of people, whereas formers' is that Gabriel's do-gooder mug keeps putting him off his supper.  

^

6. The pronunciation is "dis-own-ance," as if "Pete" Gabriel is disowning infotainment. "Infotainment," which is also mentioned in "Service" as well as in the title to the album (The Infotainment Scan), is a term of relatively recent coinage that is generally used to criticize the vapidity of television news programs.  The line on the surface suggests saying a prayer before eating ("grace"), and perhaps refers in context to television shows moralizing about the lurid horrors that they are selling (for instance I am reminded of the appalling To Catch a Predator).  

^

7. Kiki Dee (Pauline Matthews) is an English pop singer mostly known for the lightweight duet with Elton John "Don't Go Breaking My Heart."

^

8. Ian McShane played a loveably unscrupulous antiques dealer named "Lovejoy" on the show of the same name, which is certainly what MES has in mind, since on certain live versions he names the character rather than the actor; McShane can perhaps be forgiven now after his brilliant turn as Al Swearengen on Deadwood.  

^

9. It sounds like "If I ever end up like you..." for a moment. The Fall wound up opening for U2 at some point; MES claimed that the audience threw Bibles at them, a typically hilarious false-but-true claim, and one that is quite in keeping with the sentiments of this song.  

^

10. Points of View is a program on the BBC in which viewers letters about the programming are featured. It has been running since 1961. At the time when this song was probably composed, the host was Anne Robinson. Previous hosts, to that point, were Barry Took (1979-1986), Kenneth Robinson (1965-1969), and Robert Robinson (1961-1964, 1969-1971). Apparently none of these Robinsons are related to one another. It would be unusual, although not quiite unthiinkable, I am told, to call a woman a "twat" in the English of England.

As Dan points out, the line does not necessarily target a host, but possibly a guest...

^

11.  Richard Madeley is an English journalist. He and his wife Judy Finnigan hosted the chat show Richard and Judy. Finnigan is the subject of a possible allusion in "Is This New." As far as I can glean, an "axe-wheel" is a kind of rim for an automobile the edges of which could, I suppose, be sharpened...

On the version on The Twenty-Seven Points (passable) it's "If I ever end up like Judy Collins, cut my throat with a garden knife" at one point. 

^

 

12. From the beginning of the live "Glam Racket/Star" on The Twenty-Seven Points: "The rocks in Spain look like the ones around lochs in the highlands, on or on the continent."

^

Comments (44)

dannyno
  • 1. dannyno | 13/06/2015
Typo in note 5!!

"Ganriel" instead of "Gabriel".
dannyno
  • 2. dannyno | 10/07/2015
See the cover of Marvel Team-Up, feat Spiderman and Dr Doom (same sequence as inspired parts of Various Times)

Image
Martin Gammon
  • 3. Martin Gammon | 29/07/2015
Ian McShane has now basically re-invented and aquitted himself as a villain character actor including his roles in Sexy Beast and Kung Fu Panda!
C.Marshal
  • 4. C.Marshal | 17/03/2018
Re: Serial killers.

We do tend to be fascinated by stories, whether true or fictional, about serial killers; 'Silence of the Lambs', The Yorkshire Ripper, 'Seven' etc. I've always thought this might be MES having a pop at those who fetishize &/or glamourize people like The Krays, The Moors Murderers, or who write songs about 'the thoughts of Jack the Ripper' - step forward Stephen Patrick Morrissey.

Are you are missing hip priest? Always appreciated! MES RIP
C.Marshal
  • 5. C.Marshal | 18/03/2018
One other thought which coloured my thoughts on this lyric. Morrissey has always had an air of nostalgia about him, a harking back to an England that may only have existed in his mind.
dannyno
  • 6. dannyno | 21/03/2018
In his "Portrait of the Artist as a Consumer" (NME, 15 August 1981) feature, MES lists under "Reads": True Crime Monthly. I reckon if we tracked down some contemporary copies of the magazine (which apparently started publication in April 1981) we might find some lyrical inspiration.
Matt Tempest
  • 7. Matt Tempest | 04/04/2018
Re: "Serial killers were always a bore, in my book"

Interesting to note that 18 March 1979 The Fall played Bradford's The Royal Standard - the Yorkshire Ripper's favoured pub, at the height of his killing spree. Highly possible he was in the audience.

Sutcliffe's case differs from the UK's most high-profile other serial killers - Shipman and the Wests - in that the latters' crimes were only discovered retrospectively. Sutcliffe sparked something close to mass hysteria and paranoia in West Yorkshire in the late 1970s, with the ongoing killings, and the police's inability to catch him.
John Howard
  • 8. John Howard | 03/08/2018
Was listening to this song today, looked up Ian McShane and this line in the Lovejoy Wikipedia page struck me:
"Within the trade, he has a reputation as a "divvy", a person with almost unnatural powers of recognising exceptional items as well as distinguishing genuine antiques from fakes or forgeries."
So if he ends up like Lovejoy, arguing over the relative value of antiques or like U2 long past the sell by date living off of past glories we are to kill him.
its too late now obvs, but still...
bzfgt
  • 9. bzfgt (link) | 06/08/2018
Yeah, that is intriguing, I always took him to be dissing McShane himself rather than the character...
John Howard
  • 10. John Howard | 06/08/2018
sort of the opposite of pre cog: "post cog"
bzfgt
  • 11. bzfgt (link) | 16/08/2018
Much more common, too
George
  • 12. George | 07/06/2019
Maybe it's a long shot but the serial killer reference always made me think of those dodgy cash-in volumes from Colin Wilson - that "Encyclopedia of Crime" thing. I know that MES read CW cf. Deer Park from Hex.

I think Ian McShane can also be forgiven through his connection with Game of Thrones - not his appearance thereon but for his comment that GoT was basically just "tits and dragons" - an observation which I'm sure MES would have appreciated.
bzfgt
  • 13. bzfgt (link) | 03/07/2019
George, in one way that's not a long shot, as that's precisely something MES is likely to have been influenced by...on the other hand, we don't have evidence of a direct line of influence.

I'm glad we've exonerated McShane!
Jb
  • 14. Jb | 27/01/2020
Mark Goodier session (an attempt at rendering)

Roaming around they go down the deep deep streets
What is he talking about now

Fucking square meals useless for you
Out of thin air, big night, old house,
It's that time again
It's the time of the fall

Bowing to a tyrant in incorrigible, horrible hotels
In a suit marked 1948
Indicative of a blinkered attitude
That suit is now in the bucket

If I ever end up like Ian Mcshane cut my throat with a kitchen tool
If I ever end up like Ian Mcshane cut my throat with a kitchen tool

It's a good life in Europe
Passable
Passable

If I ever end up like that twat from Points of View I'll cut my throat with a tool
If I ever end up like Richard Madeley I'll cut my hands off with and axe-wheel

Passable
Passable
Jb
  • 15. Jb | 27/01/2020
In 1993 Anne Robinson was presenter of the BBC's points of view.
bzfgt
  • 16. bzfgt (link) | 01/02/2020
Posted with additions and corrections
bzfgt
  • 17. bzfgt (link) | 01/02/2020
Can someone make out the missing word in the "rocks" section?
bzfgt
  • 18. bzfgt (link) | 01/02/2020
Points of View: isn't it unusual to call a woman a "twat" in England English? I seem to see it applied to men more often. So, the current host was Anne Robinson, but the previous were men and he could mean one of them (or a guest host?). Also, are all these Robinsons related? I mean, I could look that up, but it's not important that I can see, just idly curious.
dannyno
  • 19. dannyno | 01/02/2020
It is remarkable how many Robinsons are involved with Points of View; so far as I know they are not related.

It does feel unusual to call a woman a "twat", yes, though not I suppose impossible. It does strike me as a gendered word.
dannyno
  • 20. dannyno | 01/02/2020
But note that it is just an assumption that "twat" refers to the programme's presenter. This may not be the case, since the programme had interviews and voice-over reading of letters.
dannyno
  • 21. dannyno | 01/02/2020
In March 1993 (or thereabouts), ITV launched a viewer-opinion series of its own, called The View, presented by Loyd Grossman.

Perhaps MES was mixing up the two programmes.
dannyno
  • 22. dannyno | 01/02/2020
The version on The Twenty Seven Points (with the title Passable) has "If I ever end up like Judy Collins.."
dannyno
  • 23. dannyno | 01/02/2020
bzfgt, comment #17. The "rocks" segment in the Goodier session version is hard to hear but is presumably the same as the beginning of the The Twenty Seven Points version of Glam Racket-Star:

The rocks in Spain look like the ones round the lochs in the Highlands.
dannyno
  • 24. dannyno | 03/02/2020
The front cover image I originally posted in comment #2 isn't displaying any more.

Here it is again:

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/marveldatabase/images/0/05/Marvel_Team-Up_Vol_1_43.jpg
bzfgt
  • 25. bzfgt (link) | 07/03/2020
Poor Judy Collins...last person I'd expect to swim into MES's bleary, reptilian gaze....
bzfgt
  • 26. bzfgt (link) | 07/03/2020
And I say that with affection of course!
bzfgt
  • 27. bzfgt (link) | 07/03/2020
Who gets the kitchen knife on Passable (27 poiints)? Full Nelson? Bull Nurse? I have terrible transcribing ears, I know.
bzfgt
  • 28. bzfgt (link) | 07/03/2020
After Judy Collins buys it, he almost sounds like he's doing Elvis on the U2 part...
bzfgt
  • 29. bzfgt (link) | 07/03/2020
OK now that I figured out how to paste images I put it in the note, I hope whatever killed it doesn't get it again....
imn
  • 30. imn | 23/09/2020
I'd guess that the reference to soccer books is a dig at the use of the word "soccer" rather than books about football themselves. Mark talked about his enjoyment of books by Malcolm Allison and Len Shackleton in interviews.
bzfgt
  • 31. bzfgt (link) | 27/09/2020
Maybe but why are the books a bore? The ones that call it "soccer" are boring?
Weirdbrother
  • 32. Weirdbrother | 07/10/2020
Why is Pete Gabriel always following us?

Likely a sly reference to Follow You Follow Me by Genesis. Sly because:
You and me = us
Gabriel had just left the band when they did this

Dwelling in craven environment

Another possible 70s 80s TV minor celeb ref to John Craven host of dull BBC children’s news programme. After that he moved on to even duller Countryfile - reports on rural, agricultural, and environmental issues in the United Kingdom - hence craven environment. And of course, both programmes are prime examples of shite infotainment laced with cheap nostalgia.

So much from so little.
dannyno
  • 33. dannyno | 17/10/2020
The link to Various Times in note #1 doesn't work.
dannyno
  • 34. dannyno | 17/10/2020
Comment #32. Gabriel left Genesis in 1975. Follow You Follow Me was released in 1978.

Also, John Craven's Newsround was ground-breaking and brilliant, I'll not hear a word against it!!
Weirdbrother
  • 35. Weirdbrother | 18/10/2020
Comment 34.

3 years count as "just" when you're to the right of 50.

John Craven's Newsround? Not dull... Seriously?
dannyno
  • 36. dannyno | 18/10/2020
It told us kids about the world, had reports from the grown up reporters explaining war and disasters and other stuff without talking down. It was great.
dannyno
  • 37. dannyno | 18/10/2020
Also, the members and ex members of Genesis were in their late 30s in 1978...
John is Stupid
  • 38. John is Stupid | 11/10/2021
Is there any evidence that Marvel comic was even available in the UK then? It seems unlikely Smith would have flown to the states and seen it.

There is finding anything that contains the song title upon it. And there is supporting evidence. They're not necessarily the same.
dannyno
  • 39. dannyno | 17/10/2021
Comment #38, John is Stupid.

A fair question. Sometimes here we enjoy pointing out literary, musical, cinematic/televisual or other artistic echoes, regardless of whether we think it likely they were intended. Sometimes we draw attention to lyrics we think probably do refer to particular sources. They obviously fall on a spectrum from the speculative to the plausible to things MES has himself acknowledged (although of course MES is not necessarily always reliable). What kind of a thing is this? Well, I think it’s in the plausible category, but I would not say we can claim to know that the comic is the source.

Let me answer the question directly in summary, and then we’ll review the strands of evidence in greater detail.

So: “Is there any evidence that Marvel comic was even available in the UK then? It seems unlikely Smith would have flown to the states and seen it.”

The short answer is “yes”.

A Past Gone Mad dates from 1993, and so there’s no particular difficulty imagining that contemporary comic collectors would be able to obtain comics from the late 1970s. It’s a bit odd to say that it’s unlikely MES would have “flown to the states and seen it”, because by 1993 MES had flown to the US many times. But actually, MES was referring to the same comic back in 1978. If he was able to obtain the comic in 1978, then would seem to be no special problem about 1993. If John Is Stupid means instead to question the 1978 Various Times reference, then I would suggest the doubt is misplaced given the explicit reference to Dr Doom in that song.

Right, let’s get into the detail.

First of all, we know that MES was a long-time reader of American comics, and that they were indeed imported to the UK.
In Renegade, MES says: "When I was twelve, thirteen, I was into reading imported American comics." He was still reading them in later life. In Alternative Ulster #8, MES mentions the marriage of comic characters Atom and Jean Loring, a reference to Justice League of America Comic #157, August 1978. And after MES’ death, his friend James Fennings Stern posted a comment to the Mark E Smith Tribute Page on Facebook that “one of Marks favourite characters was the joker. Mark was a huge comic book fan i still have one he gave me called bizzaro world where supermans world gets flipped upside down...” (a reference to a DC comics storyline from 1960).

Secondly, as mentioned above MES had already made lyrical use of the same Marvel comic series. As note #1 documents, the 1978 song Various Times makes an unmistakeable reference to the 1976 Spider-man/Dr Doom storyline from Marvel Team-Up, starting with issue #41. (see http://annotatedfall.doomby.com/pages/the-annotated-lyrics/various-times.html).

It is the cover of issue #43 of that series which states “A Past Gone Mad”. If MES was capable of referring to a 1976 Marvel comic in a 1978 song, it doesn’t seem problematic to think that he could do so in a 1993 song.

Thirdly, “A Past Gone Mad” is not a particularly common phrase. It’s by no means unique to Marvel comics, so we cannot say the reference is certain, but nor is it so frequently encountered as to lead us to entirely dismiss it.

Fourthly, as already noted, these comics were available on import and MES did buy them from an early age. However, the sequence of comics in question did also get official UK distribution.

For more detail, see: https://www.comicpriceguide.co.uk/us_comic.php?tc=marteamup. That says that although the first 20 or so issues were not distributed in the UK (but still available from specialist dealers), subsequent issues “were widely distributed in the UK.”

Images of UK distributed and sterling-priced editions of the relevant issues can be seen here: https://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=478261
dannyno
  • 40. dannyno | 17/10/2021
Here's an image of the non-import sterling-priced UK edition of issue #43, published like the US edition pictured above in March 1976.

https://dannyno.org.uk/magpie/marvel43uk.jpg
dannyno
  • 41. dannyno | 17/10/2021
So let's be clear, it is both entirely possible and highly likely that Various Times was written with Marvel Team-UP comic in mind.

"A Past Gone Mad" is a phrase that appears on the front cover of the same comic, and is not a terribly common phrase. It is therefore plausible that MES either remembered or re-read the comic and re-used the phrase.

However, this is 15 years later, and the lyric doesn't contain any strong references to the comic like Various Times does. However, it does concern the passage of time, as Various Times and the comic storyline do.

So there are reasons to say it's a plausible quotation, and reasons to not to commit to that position too strongly.
bill
  • 42. bill | 18/01/2022
... re: 'that twat off points of view' - the show was presented by Jeremy Vine, but at a later date than this song was penned, I think. Vine claimed to be a fan of Mark and the Fall, but their one encounter, on the Newsnight tv show on the occasion of John Peel's death, was memorably stilted and vexatious. I'm sure you know this well anyway. 'Are you the new one? Are you the DJ?' Vine seems sincere in his love of music, though my prejudices insist he is more of a Vapors man, more into New Wave, into 'post' punk twenty years after the fact/

I remember seeing Robin Day present Points Of View when I was embryonic or thereabouts. For overseas listeners, Day was a bow-tie sporting broadcaster who might well have fit the bill of 'twat', but there again, much the same could be said of all the rest, perhaps it's a composite, generic 'points of view man'. () There were no guests as such on Points Of View, just the presenter and voice-overs narrating viewer's letters, as the title suggests (though this has changed now slightly - yes, the show still persists). The theme tune was an instrumental rendering of 'when I'm 64'.
dannyno
  • 43. dannyno | 28/01/2022
Comment #42, by bill.

Jeremy Vine presented Points of View from 2008-2018, so c15 years after this song was written.

Are you sure about Robin Day on Points of View? I can find no indication he ever presented it. He was not a sports broadcaster, but a political journalist who was perhaps most famous for being the chair of Question Time.

Are you perhaps mixing him up with Des Lynam, who presented Points of View in 1999 (still after this song debuted) and was best known as a sports presenter?
Ian McShane
  • 44. Ian McShane | 30/01/2022
And if I ever end up like U2 slit my throat with a garden vegetable =
"slit my throat with a garden tool" with "Risible!" added over "tool"

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