Lyrics
Sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker 1
No stars in the zone 2
I stay at home
I live on snacks
Potatoes in packs 3
I like to blow
I like to blow
I like to blow
Concentration zone
The years go in circles 4
The years go in circles
Hope goes, I'm gone
Smoke comes, I go
I like to blow
I like to blow
I like to blow
Concentration zone
A Spurs fan 5
A warrior
Happy no-hoper
Dull, manage
I think slow
I like to blow
I like to blow
I like to blow
Concentration zone
Sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker sucker blow
Commentary
Credited to Mark E. Smith and Martin Bramah, this is another song from The Fall’s debut album which had been dropped from the live set several months before Live at the Witch Trials actually appeared. There are gaps in the record, but it seems that the song made it only to the end of 1978, it’s last documented appearance being at the Marquee, London, on 17 December (two days after the recording of Live at the Witch Trials). It was revived only once (at any rate there’s only one documented occasion): on 4 April 1979 at the Stowaway Club, Newport, Wales. This was probably because Una Baines was standing in for Yvonne Pawlett who was unwell. This was Baines’ penultimate performance with the group. She also played the next day’s gig at Knights Grange Barn, Winsford, but no setlist or recording has emerged. Bramah left The Fall shortly afterwards, which likely prevented any future revivals.
“Like to blow what?” is probably the question a lot of people ask when hearing this song for the first time. “Blow” is a slang term for marijuana, and it does seem likely that this is the intended meaning, at least if we can take Smith’s words at face value (which is, admittedly, a risky thing to do): at the Prestwich Hospital Social Club gig on 25 November 1978, MES introduced the song with, “The next one’s about the old marijuana…”.
Peel session
< post in progress >
Footnotes
- Presumably an intentional suck/blow pun on “sucker”. “Marvellous opening to a song about a sucker who likes to blow”, notes Tommy Mackay (2018, p.19). ↩︎
- Not even frigid ones? (see “Crap Rap”). ↩︎
- Crisps, presumably! ↩︎
- The circularity of time and history is a recurrent theme for Mark E. Smith. ↩︎
- “Spurs” is the shortened form of Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. Their official nickname is actually The Lillywhites after their traditional white shirts. Tottenham Hotspur were originally named in tribute to Sir Henry Percy, AKA the rebellious Harry Hotspur of Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1, whose family – the Northumberlands – were land-owners in the area. Harry Hotspur was supposedly named for the enthusiastic way he used his spurs to urge his horse on during battles. The club’s emblem is a cockerel, and fighting cocks are/were cruelly fitted with spurs (see Wikipedia: Cockfighting). ↩︎
Sources / Links
- The Annotated Fall: “Crap Rap 2/Like to Blow” [Archived]
- Mackay, Tommy (2018). 40 Odd Years of The Fall. Place of publication unknown: Greg Moodie.
- Pringle, Steve (2022). You Must Get Them All: The Fall on Record. [paperback edition]. Pontefract: Route Publishing Ltd. [Online store]
- The Track Record: “Like to Blow“
- Wikipedia: Cockfighting
- Wikipedia: Tottenham Hotspur F.C.
Here I am again with a couple of my game-changing suggestions…..
I am pretty sure I hear an extra syllable before the word ‘dull’ – I hear the line as “The dull manage, I think slow”
And, for what it’s worth (i.e.. nothing) I don’t think MES actually says ‘blow’ right at the end of the song – to me it sounds like sucker x 8 followed by “Bo!”