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- Home /
- The Annotated Lyrics /
- Nine Out Of Ten
Nine Out Of Ten
Lyrics
The company supplied
The company supplied
Nine of out ten, they gave me (1)
Nine out of ten
Nine out of ten, they gave me
nine out of ten
And, come and and listen to my story
From when I started
I was in an orphan home since I was one
I was an orphan baby, all along
And when I was they gave me one out of
One out of ten
Then I was older
I was older
Made a home when I started
Nobody cared
If I was, a-baby, dead or alive
Nine out of ten
The company supplied, they said
Too dark baby
Try and understand,
You don't break rules you don't follow them (2)
Sub-lingual
Five out of ten
Nine out of ten
They gave me nine out of ten (3)
Notes
1. According to John Robb's review on the Louder Than War website:
"The final track ‘Nine Out Of Ten’ is an acidic dark humoured snark attack on yours truly for giving Fall mate Ed Blaney’s recent very good album [which features MES on several tracks--TAF] a good review on this site and is all the better for its pointed assault on your author and probably loads of other targets in classic free form Fall style. It made me chuckle so much that I decided that [I would give] the 32nd Fall album the same score – otherwise it would have been a ten."
Corroborating this interpretation, Pro Rae on the Fall online forum points out that at the Fall gig from 2017-01-27 in Southampton, MES "clearly says, shortly after the 2:00 mark, 'and I got a review from John Robb.'"
The comment about Robb may have been improvised; since Robb knows about it, it's possible he was there. If this is the case, MES may have seen him and thoiught of the happy coincidence of the lyric and the score given Blaney's album. Really, who knows? But it's not clear that the song has anything to do with John Robb.
Since MES's recent illness and death, some have suggested the numbers in the song refer to survival odds.
According to Elliot R: "I just found a cigarette packet; the NHS warning on the front says 'Smoking causes 9 out of 10 lung cancers.' Probably a coincidence but I wanted to share it on here."
This may indeed be a coincidence, or it may be significant. MES died of lung and kidney cancer on January 24th, 2018. It's possible that the song is a meditation on his impending death, but at the same time I don't want to assume too much and start seeing things that aren't there. Do what you will with these clues, if that is what they are.
Caetano Veloso has a song called "Nine Out of Ten" (thanks to " " [sic] Tim Goldie).
John Howard points out a musical similarity between this and "Herpes Simplex" by Lizzy Mercier Descloux...coincidental or not, it is a plausible connection.
Dan reports that the band tweeted that this was the last thing recorded with MES.
2. The meaning of this line would change depending on how it is transcribed; for instance, "You don't follow rules, you don't! Follow them," but the above seems most likely. For more, see the discussion of this line on the Fall online forum.
At the NME awards in 2018, Brix gave a speech in a kind of tribute to MES. She said, among other things, "It is said you are remembered for the rules you break. But for Mark E. Smith, there were no rules." See also "Before the Moon Falls": "I must create a new regime/Or live by another man's," which paraphrases Blake's "I must Create a System or be enslav'd by another Man's. I will not Reason & Compare; my business is to Create."
3. The song ends with a lengthy repeated guitar coda. From David Cavanagh's feature about MES from the April 2018 issue of Uncut (pp.50-56, quote from p.56):
"He was animated as he sang his final vocal for the album ('Nine Out Of Ten'), with guitarist Greenway seated beside him. The song came to a natural end. Greenway stopped playing. 'No,' Smith said. 'Play it again.' He got up and walked slowly around the studio, tapping bits of percussion, while Greenway strummed the chords for three, four, then five minutes.
And that's exactly how we hear it on the record. The track ends. The guitar resumes. But Mark E Smith is now silent."
From "The Fall: album by album", in Uncut magazine, July 2019:
PETE GREENWAY: We didn't know at the time that it would be the last album and I'm sure Mark didn't. People have drawn conclusions from the last track, "Nine Out Of Ten", and how it ends [without vocals for the second half]. I'd met Mark for a beer and we ended up at the studio. I was too drunk to play and Mark just spouted lyrics about his life, spontaneously. I was surprised it ended up on the album.
Comments (47)
No, I don't think this is so straightforward as that.
Nine Out Of Ten's live debut was at the gig at Fibbers, York, on 19 November 2016.
https://sites.google.com/site/reformationposttpm/fall-tracks/9-10 records Chris Goodhead's transcription of the lyrics from the York performance:
Here's a scrap of lyrics from the Arts Club Theatre, Liverpool gig of 21 January 2017:
The "'and I got a review from John Robb" line appeared at the Engine Rooms, Southampton gig, 27 January 2017 https://youtu.be/ycPReNoX6aU
Note that MES laughs as he says it, which maybe might imply it's an improvised line?
Note we don't just have "nine out ten" in these lyrics - but "four out of ten", "seven out of ten", and "nought out of ten" as well.
Note that the lines about bluebottles and Cornwall do not appear on record.
But there's some echoes of something along those lines, isn't there? What do you mean, "no"?
No, I don't think this is so straightforward as that."
Of course not. If it is an attack on Robb--a big "if"--it is not only, or even primarily, that.
I know this isn't your style, but a lot of people seem to think that when you find out "This song does X," you've identified what the song is "about" and all else becomes irrelevant. If Fall lyrics are anything, they are almost always--without really thinking a lot about of it, I'm tempted to say always--the antithesis of that. And then a lot of the same people accuse us of foreclosing interpretations!
The most ridiculous extreme of this was that absurd discussion about how "Two Steps Back" can't allude to masturbation because it's about Martin Bramah...has there ever been a greater non sequitur?
(Not to suggest that 9/10 shouldn’t also be read as an album/career/life rating)
There was no Southampton gig in 2016 - it was the following year. I think you've mistaken Pro Rae's "9/10 Southampton" for a date, when it's obviously a reference to the song title!
He was animated as he sang his final vocal for the album ("Nine Out Of Ten"), with guitarist Greenway seated beside him. The song came to a natural end. Greenway stopped playing. "No," Smith said. "Play it again." He got up and walked slowly around the studio, tapping bits of percussion, while Greenway strummed the chords for three, four, then five minutes.
And that's exact how we hear it on the record. The track ends. The guitar resumes. But Mark E Smith is now silent.
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thefall/nine-out-of-ten-interpretations-notes-and-queries-t42842.html
It's not from Q. It's from Uncut.
Here's my post there:
"David Cavanagh's feature about MES from the April 2018 issue of Uncut (pp.50-56), quote from p.56:
p.s. there was a typo in that last line - should be "exactly" not "exact".
This last track with its long guitar coda had an air of finality which scared the wotsits out of me. Again I took it personally, not because I thought it would be the last Fall LP but because I thought it could be my last fall LP.
I'm fortunate, after a period of treatment I've got 9 out of 10 chance of being ok.
I think MES here has been given 9 out of 10 prospect of dying (soon) from his illness and tackles it with humour through mock self-pity (I was an orphan etc.). The guitar loop is terribly final and is the survivor; there can always be a new guitarist in the Fall but never another singer ("do you think they'll replace him?" said my mother on the phone).
Press play again at the end and segue back into the album. The voice returns, alone, defiant. His vibrations will live on.
four out of ten they gave me four out of ten
you see the waves crashing on Bournemouth
you see the blue skies of Truro
i see a bluebird crossing the window
seven out of ten they gave me
nine out of ten they gave me
then they discovered me, they said you're ungodly
one out of ten they gave me
come listen to my story, of bono
...Wait till you hear the record if you think that's nonsense
The gig was in 2017, see comments 4 and 5 for all the dates.
Caetano Veloso (Transa) - (02) Nine Out of Ten - I'm Alive
Enjoying playing it back to back with The Fall's one (which I'm coming up with an angle on but ain't ready to write that here yet yeti)
I'm alive
The age of gold, yes the age of old
The age of gold
The age of music is past
I hear them talk as I walk yes I hear them talk
I hear they say
"Expect the final blast"
I walk down Portobello road to the sound of reggae
I'm alive
I'm alive, vivo muito vivo feel the sound of music
Banging in my belly
Know that one day I must die
I'm alive
And I know that one day I must die
I'm alive
Yes I know that one day I must die
I'm alive vivo muito vivo
In the eletric cinema or on the telly
Nine out of ten movie stars make me cry
I'm alive
And nine out of ten movie stars make me cry
I'm alive
"1989-12-11" would be 11th December 1989 to me.
https://twitter.com/ImperialWaxBand/status/1319385342215114758
https://louderthanwar.com/the-fall-ersatz-gb-album-review/
I've never particularly bought into the John Robb theory (which doesn't mean that interpretation isn't there to be found), but I see no reason to think that his Ersatz GB review is a more likely reference point, not least because it was published in 2011, years before this song was performed let alone recorded. It's not impossible, obviously, but I don't like it.
In favour or the Robb/Blaney theory is that the Blaney review (https://louderthanwar.com/ed-blaney-urban-nature-album-review-salford-grit-and-wonk-pop-from-fall-acolyte/) was published only 6 months before the live debut (or first documented performance) of the song at York on 19 November 2016.
And we have the 27 Jan 2017 Southampton gig MES reference to John Robb giving "me" nine out of ten. This appears to be the only time we know of where this happened. Perhaps Robb was there and that prompted the comment which then gets read back into the text as though it were an original intention. The Membranes played Southampton just three days before the Fall gig, and I'm not sure if that makes Robb's presence more or less likely (why hang around in Southampton, even to see The Fall?), but it needs noting as a possibility.
And then Robb's July 2017 review of New Facts Emerge where he says (already quoted in the notes):
Thing is, I challenge anyone to look at these lyrics and find any signs of an attack on anyone at all, let alone Robb. There is no "acidic dark humoured snark" attack or "pointed assault" to be found whatsoever, as far as I can see.
Furthermore, while at that York debut the song appeared on the setlist as "9/10", the lyrics refer to 4/10 and 5/10, but not 9/10.
The scrap of lyrics grabbed at the Liverpool gig contains lyrical detail about Truro and blue bottles (also heard at York) that didn't appear on record. It also has "nought out of ten" and "none out of ten". Live recordings show how the lyrics evolved over time.
Robb doesn't say why he thinks the song refers to him (perhaps he was at the Southampton gig or someone told him about it the ad-lib, or perhaps someone else close to MES told him it referred to him). We can't rule it out, and it fits chronologically (if you accept my presumption that MES tends to use recent sources) but I tend to think that any Robb connection is either reverse engineered or that the title began life as a reference to the Blaney review but subsequently evolved out of all recognition. Or perhaps it started with "none out of ten" and changed from there.
The FOF discussion of this song is here: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thefall/nine-out-of-ten-interpretations-notes-and-queries-t42842.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZw8UEe2x_U