Love it or hate it, and there’s probably more people in the latter camp, “Das Boat” is an audacious creation. Unsurprisingly, it was never performed live.
“Das Boat” is inspired by the West German war movie Das Boot (1981), written and directed by Wolfgang Petersen. The film is based on an autobiographical novel by Lothar-Günther Buchheim. Originally published in 1973 Buchheim’s novel has been widely translated; the first English translation was published in 1974 by William Collins under the title The Boat.
Das Boot, the original novel, 1973The Boat, English translation, 1974Das Boot, movie poster, 1981
In 40 Odd Years of The Fall, Tommy Mackay describes the track as:
Old fashioned prog rock spacey wah wah guitar accompanying U-boat radar simulated noises, eventually subsiding into watery electronic pulsing… The sweeping electric foghorn as the end is a bit mesmeric, but overall it’s a bit wanky and dull. Mindblowing if you’re pharmaceutically enhanced.
Mackay, 2018, p.217 [sonar noises, surely, not radar]
Steve Pringle’s verdict in You Must Get Them All is similarly negative:
…you won’t easily find many Fall fans who will defend this ten-minute slab of noodling electronics. For the first and only time in their career, the group sound like Pink Floyd; not only that, they manage to sound like two different eras of Pink Floyd. The portentous opening pulses with oscillating synth and delay/reverb-heavy rock guitar hero soloing that would be right at home on the Floyd’s multi-million selling mid-70s LPs. The rest of the track features quirky noises and childish voices that recall the whimsicalities of the Syd Barrett era. Although not without the odd moment of interest, it’s still a piece of overlong self-indulgence.
Pringle, Steve (2002). You Must Get Them All: The Fall On Record (p.431).
On the original annotatedfall.doomby.com, bzfgt characterised the track as “part mesmerizing psych-out and part kitsch.” John Dougan, in his review of Reformation Post TLC for furious.com, called it “witless fuckery”.
Having had to listen to it umpteen times to improve on the minimalist transcription originally provided by annotatedfall.doomby.com (“Das Boat / U-Boat / Ee-ee, ee-ee”, job done), I now find it a surprisingly enjoyable listen. But that might just be Stockholm Syndrome.
Mark E. Smith himself seems to have a had a mixed view of the track:
“It just got out of hand, that track,” admits Smith. “That’s me and Elena. I was going to take it off, but people love it.”
Mark E. Smith, interview with Tim Cumming, The Independent, Music Magazine, 22 February 2007.
We also have a brief comment on the song from Eleni (who, despite what MES said above, is not listed in any of the song credits):
Q: How did you go about making such a masterpiece as Das Boat? It’s deadly!
A. We were in Gracie Fields studio and used Henry, which is one of Gunther’s friends, as an inspiration. Henry had an in-built sound voice (the song of the American red-winged black bird) sounding like: EE EE!
We made a new soundtrack to the (not that bad) movie Das Boot and not because being in the studio is a bit like being underwater.
Mark loved historical movies. I like electronic music.
“Red Winged Blackbird”, with sound. Audubon bird series by Wild Republic in assocn. with the National Audubon Society (US), see their plush toys page. Source: Video clip with sound pinched from amazon.com.
“Q&A with Eleni Poulou”, interview by Sonja Delibasic of The Mighty Fall Facebook page, using questions suggested by other TMF members. This question from “Arbogast King”. Answers posted to Facebook 7 November 2020 [available online here, no page numbers (p.14)].
There are three different officially-released edits/mixes of “Das Boat”:
“Das Boat”, credited to Smith/Barbbato [sic]/Pressley [sic]/Orpheo [i.e. Orpheo McCord]. Promotional copy version. Slogan Records (2007): SLOPR007. Timing: 10:30.
“Das Boat”, credited to Smith/Barbato/Presley/McCord. European CD version. Slogan Records (2007): SLOCD007. Timing: 10:06.
“Das Boat”, credited to Smith/Barbato/Presley/McCord. European vinyl LP version. Slogan Records (2007): SLODV007. Timing: 8:28.
The 10:30 promotional copy version was used on the US edition issued on CD by Narnack Records (NCK7044), as well as on their promo CD. The track was spelled “Das Boot” on this edition, and it was credited to Smith only.
In 2020 Cherry Red put out a 4 x CD “expanded Digipak edition” of Reformation Post TLC which included the original European CD version of the track, plus on disc 2 the European vinyl LP version. Both were credited to Smith only.
The transcription above is based on the European CD version.
Cover of the original soundtrack to Das Boot by Klaus Doldinger (WEA 58 366, 1981). See Discogs.
Footnotes
“Ee-ee, ee-ee” is chanted – by Eleni, I think – intermittently in the background throughout. I have transcribed it here it only when MES joins in. As noted in the commentary, the “Ee-ee” sound was inspired, according to Eleni, by a toy bird, see: the sound of the red-winged blackbird toy.↩︎
The German term for submarine is “Unterseeboot” (literally, “under-sea boat”). The German abbreviation is “U-Boot”. “U-Boat” is the English version, but it usually specifically refers to a German submarine (a First or Second World War submarine in particular), not to submarines generically: a British submarine would never be called a “U-Boat”. MES’ use of the title “Das Boat” messes with both languages. In the lyric, I think he says “Das Boot” and “U-Boat”, but it isn’t always clear. He may mix it up. ↩︎
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