John Peel: Craig, you've been to see Manchester City, how was it?
Craig Scanlon: Er, grim.
Peel: Grim? Really? Well once again, you see, because people always assume that I've got loads of technology available to me here and lots of people rushing about giving me bits of paper like they do on television. In fact I'm just watching the television, so, erm.
Peel: Oh right, yeah, okay go on, tell us all about it
Scanlon: Well, I mean the first half we were all over them, it's a typical City game, y'know.
We were like, kind of er, totally outplayed us, and they're rubbish anyway, West Ham, it's got to be said.
[ ] but, erm, no we were all over them in the first half and I don't know what he puts in the tea in the second half but, erm, we were like kinda zombies when we came back on.
There weren't any good players apart from er Rocastle 1 which I thought was, er.
Peel: [ ] that one little thing where he sort of er [ ]
Scanlon: He would just like roll the ball under his foot, didn't he, you know. 2
Peel: And got away from three defenders,
Scanlon: Yeah, brilliant, er
Peel: A good buy, then?
Scanlon: He was, well we swapped him for, er [ ] Leeds, they got the real rough end of the stick there, which is good.
But, erm, as I say we just kind of...
Well, we're playing really nice football at the moment, because Niall Quinn's 3 not there... We used to like kind of just boot the ball and he'd head it to, er, the opposing side's defender.
Peel: Right, now you have to do something else.
Scanlon: Well, yeah, and we do, we play lots of football, loads of passing, they're playing too much football. They're just kind of, er...
Everyone's like for a passing opportunity rather than like a scoring opportunity.
Peel: Not going to go down though, are they, Craig? 4
Scanlon: Er, I don't know. Everyone else in er ... everyone else thinks we're gonna go down, but they've just like suddenly come out of closets, y'know, they've like discovered their grandfather was a United fan
Peel: Right.
Scanlon: From years back. It's like the whole of Manchester at the moment anyway.
Peel: I was told you see, I was always told, er, the conventional wisdom was that, er [ ] that isn't the case anymore.
Scanlon: Well the true Mancunian is the Man City fan, I find. 5
I mean they're all reds really aren't they and er, as I say, erm.
Unknown voice: What I'm saying to you really is that the training that you must have in discussion, at your own level, regarding the existence of God is far greater than everybody that's ringing in tonight. 6
Commentary
… little more than a private joke made public.
Simon Ford, 2003, p.231.
On Saturday 12 February 1994, Craig Scanlon appeared on John Peel’s radio show on BBC Radio One, discussing the Manchester City v West Ham football match he had just witnessed.
At the time, Peel’s show was broadcast from 4:30 PM to 7:00 PM on Saturday (he also did a slot from 10:00 PM to 01:00 AM on Friday through to early Saturday morning) and had a feature where musicians were invited on to do match reports [link to source / archive].
“Symbol of Mordgan” is a heavily edited version of Scanlon’s match report.
Scanlon’s slot was preceded by Luke Slater’s “Sea Serpent” and followed by Bad Religion’s “What Can You Do?” (in session) [link to source / archive]. The match was a no-score draw.
The interview has music and noises in the background. “Yummy Yummy” by the Ohio Express has been suggested. There’s also what sounds like clips from a TV programme, and passages from Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music.
Symbol? Mordgan?
The track title is a bit of a mystery: we don’t know what “Mordgan” is supposed to mean, or what might symbolise it. Furthermore, it isn’t even spelled consistently.
The CD (Permanent Records PERMCD16 [Discogs]) and vinyl LP (Permanent Records PERMLP16 [Discogs]) editions all spell the track “Symbol of Mordgan”. But the cassette edition (Permanent Records PERMMC16 [Discogs]) spells it “Symbol of Morgen”.
On the original annotatedfall.doomby.com, user @MandrakeAnthrax pointed out (comment #6, 20/08/2015) that the ASCAP/BMI Repertoire Songview database lists the track as “Symbol of Mordingen” (see BMI Songview).
“Morgdan” is Bosnian for “morgue”, which tantalisingly suggests a connection to the odd 1974 Spanish/Italian film The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue (aka Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, see Wikipedia), given the references to zombies and Manchester. But, come on, Bosnian?
“Church of Mordingen” is a 1772 drawing/watercolour by the Swiss painter Adrian Zingg (1714-1816, see Wikipedia: Adrian Zingg).
“Church of Mordingen” (1772), by Adrian Zingg. Source: artprice.com.
The symbol of “Merdingen”, a place in Germany, is a red rose, which is also the historic symbol of Lancashire.
In the full interview (see transcript and audio file below), Scanlon does say (of people switching football team allegiances), “It’s a sign… it’s a sign of, er…” He doesn’t say what it’s a sign of, but maybe that’s the seed of the idea about symbolism.
Full Match Report Audio and Transcript
Clip of Craig Scanlon speaking to John Peel, on Peel’s BBC Radio 1 show, 12 February 1994.
Peel: We have another pop star match report for you now. Craig, out of The Fall, been to see Manchester City. How was it?
Scanlon: Er, grim.
Peel: Grim? Really? Well, once again, you see, because people always assume that I’ve got loads of technology available to me here and lots of people rushing about giving me bits of paper like they do on television. In fact I’m just watching the television so, er, the City score passed me by I’m afraid, so…
Scanlon: It was nil-nil. Er, kind of, we, er…
Peel: Who were you playing, I don’t even know?
Scanlon: West Ham.
Peel: Oh right, yeah, OK, go on, tell us all about it then.
Scanlon: Well, er, I mean, er, the first half we were all over them. It’s a typical City game, y’know. We were like kind of, er, totally outplayed ’em, and they’re rubbish anyway, West Ham, it’s got to be said, but, er.
Peel: There’s going to be a lot of people driving south who are going to turn their cars round and go back up towards Manchester.
Scanlon: Yeah, good, I hope Adrian Sherwood’s listening <chuckles>… but, erm, no we were all over them in the first half, and I don’t know what he puts in the tea in the second half, Brian Horton, but erm, we were like kind of zombies when they came back on. There weren’t any good players apart from, er, Rocastle which I thought was, er…
Peel: He was dazzling on that match on television.. well there was just that one little thing where he sort of, er.
Scanlon: He just sort of rolled the ball under his foot, didn’t he…
Peel: That’s right, and got away from three defenders.
Scanlon: Yeah, brilliant, but, erm.
Peel: A good buy then?
Scanlon: He was. Well, we swapped him for David White at Leeds, they got the real rough end of the stick there, which is good… but as I say we just kind of… we play really nice football at the moment because Niall Quinn’s not there… we used to like kind of like just boot the ball to Quinn and he’d head it to, er, the opposing side’s defender.
Peel: <chuckles > Right, now you have to do something else with it.
Scanlon: Well, yeah, and we do. We play lots of football, loads of passing. We’re playing too much football… I mean they’re just kind of, er, everyone’s like looking for a passing opportunity rather than like a scoring opportunity.
Peel: Not going to go down though, are they, Craig?
Scanlon: Er, I don’t know… everyone else in er, everyone else in the band thinks they’re going to go down, but they’ve just like suddenly come out the closets, you know, they’ve discovered that their grandfather was a United fan from years back… it’s like the whole of Manchester at the moment anyway. Peel: They’re all United fans?
Scanlon: Yeah, you suddenly see all the United shirts on and, er.
Peel: I was told, you see, I was always told, er, the conventional wisdom was that United supporters were people who didn’t live in Manchester, you know, they all came from around about and er the City, everybody in Manchester actually supported City, which isn’t the case any more.
Scanlon: Well, the true Mancunian is the Man City fan I find… I mean they’re all Cockney reds really aren’t they and er… as I say, the bass player and the drummer they’ve suddenly discovered they’re United fans.
Peel: That’s shocking that, isn’t it… how can people do that? I mean I just can’t imagine changing your allegiance like that.
Scanlon: Well, no it’s a sign, well it’s a sign of er. Well, following City you’ve got to be some kind of a masochist because they can be brilliant one week… I mean the Ipswich thing when Franny Lee came was really good, he came last week.
Peel: What did you think of Ipswich, by the way, because I see them fairly regularly.
Scanlon; Er, fairly good, er, fairly good football, you know nice passing and everything.
Peel: You don’t score against them.
Scanlon: They’re quite like City in that they can’t finish off.
Peel: That’s right… you don’t score against them. Another goalless score they were involved in today.
Scanlon: Yeah.
Peel: You got any Fall stories for us, Craig, before we go?
Scanlon: Er, not really. We’re just finishing an LP now, erm, and then er there’s like a kind of tentative thing, we might be going to Russia.
Peel: Oh, right…
Scanlon: Doing a tour and that, but er..
Peel: Okay, well listen thanks very much.
Scanlon: All right then.
Peel: And if you feel like doing this again please do, you know always nice to hear from, well, anybody from The Fall of course. Always gives a particular frisson on this programme.
Scanlon: Try and get the BBC to get me a season ticket though.
Peel: All right, I’ll see what I can do.
Scanlon: All right, thanks John.
Peel: All the best.
Scanlon: Bye.
Peel: Here’s another one from Bad Religion, “What Can You Do?”
Transcript of Craig Scanlon’s match report. John Peel show, BBC Radio One, 12 February 1994. Other transcripts are out there, but this is the most accurate!
“David Rocastle Skill Man City” (Ipswich Town v Manchester City), Posted to YouTube by Manchester Is Blue – The Man City Channel, 31 March 2016. Link to YouTube.
Footnotes
David Rocastle, midfield player who played for Arsenal from 1985-1992, for Leeds United from 1992-1993, for Manchester City from 1993-1994, for Chelsea from 1994-1998 and for the Malaysian team Sabah from 1998-1999. He died of non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, aged just 33, on 31 March 2001. [Wikipedia: David Rocastle]. ↩︎
This seems to be the moment Peel and Scanlon are referring to: YouTube: David Rocastle Skill. It happened during the previous week’s match against Ipswich Town on 5 February 1994. ↩︎
Niall Quinn, striker from the Republic of Ireland who is the second highest goalscorer of all time for the Irish national football team. He played in the English football league for Arsenal, Manchester City (1990-1996) and Sunderland. At the time of the match report he was sidelined due to a cruciate ligament injury which meant he missed much of the 1993-1994 season. [Wikipedia: Niall Quinn]. ↩︎
There are two rival football teams in Manchester – Manchester City and Manchester United. ↩︎
This last bit is not from the Peel Show. It’s a clip from a radio phone-in of unknown provenance that was first used at the beginning of the single version of “Lucifer Over Lancashire”.
It has been widely assumed that the caller was Craig Scanlon, a theory apparently given credence by its juxtaposition here with Scanlon’s match report.
f.a.l.l.o.u.t.p.o.d.c.a.s.t. @falloutpodcast1 @Stephenhanley6 Who is Craig phoning at the start of Lucifer over Lancashire? (or is it a secret!) 8:09 AM · Jul 30, 2022
Hanley responded:
Stephen Hanley @Stephenhanley6 Replying to @falloutpodcast1 That’s not Craig. 9:08 AM · Jul 30, 2022 ↩︎
Sources / Links
The Annotated Fall: “Symbol of Mordgan” [Archived]
Ford, Simon (2003). Hip Priest: the story of Mark E Smith and The Fall. London: Quartet Books.
