The Rise & Fall (1982)

The Rise & Fall is the fourth studio album by English ska band Madness, released on 5 November 1982 by Stiff Records. This album saw Madness at their most experimental, exhibiting a range of musical styles including jazz, English music hall, and Eastern influences. NME described it at the time of its release as "the best Madness record". It has often been retrospectively described as a concept album.

Though the album was never released in the US, several tracks were later placed on the compilation Madness (1983), including "Our House", the band's only top 10 hit in America.

Content

Initially conceived as a concept album about nostalgia for childhood by secondary vocalist Chas Smash, the concept was eventually dropped, though the original theme is still evident particularly in the title track and the album's major hit "Our House", as well as tracks like "Rise and Fall" and "Sunday Morning." This theme was also mentioned recently when interviewed as part of T in the Park highlights, where their lead vocalist Suggs claimed that all the band members were told to write about their childhood memories for The Rise & Fall (although he did say that their keyboardist Mike Barson got the wrong idea, and went off and wrote about New Delhi).

Although the band had previously been avowedly apolitical, the track "Blue Skinned Beast" was an overt satire on then-UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and her handling of the Falklands War, paving the way for more political comment on subsequent Madness albums.

The album cover photo was shot just west of Camden Town at the Primrose Hill viewpoint, looking southeast towards central London with the BT Tower on the horizon. In the cover photo, the band members are each dressed to represent one the songs on the album, with Barson notably putting on brownface to represent "New Delhi".

Retroactively, bassist Mark Bedford has explained that the band rarely plays songs from the album as the arrangements of the tracks are "so f---ing complicated".

Critical reception

In a retrospective review for AllMusic, critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote that despite the evident influence of the Kinks and Ian Dury, "The Rise & Fall is recognizably Madness in sound and sensibility; faint echoes of their breakneck nutty beginnings can be heard on 'Blue Skinned Beast' and 'Mr. Speaker Gets the Word', the melodies are outgrowths of such early masterpieces as 'My Girl', there's a charming, open-hearted humor and carnivalesque swirl that ties everything together." He further noted that its songs possess a uniform "wit, effervescence, and joy, capturing what British pop life was all about in 1982, just as Village Green Preservation Society did in 1968 or Blur's Parklife would do in 1994."

The album was included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2005).

In an interview with Popular 1 Magazine, guitarist Kavus Torabi of Cardiacs named The Rise & Fall as one of his favourite albums.

Personnel

• Madness
• Graham 'Suggs' McPherson – lead vocals
• Mike Barson – keyboards, harmonica, piano
• Chris Foreman – guitars
• Lee Thompson – saxophones
• Daniel Woodgate – drums
• Mark Bedford – bass guitar, double bass

Cathal Smyth – backing vocals, trumpet, lead vocals on "Madness (Is All in the Mind)"

• Additional Personnel
• Geraldo D'Arbilly – additional percussion
• David Bedford – brass and string arrangements
• Production and artwork
• Clive Langer – producer
• Alan Winstanley – producer
• David Wooley – engineer
• Jeremy Allom – engineer
• Arun Chakraverty – mastering
• Laurie Lewis – front cover photography
• 2010 reissue

Madness – producer on "Don't Look Back"

• John Sparrow – producer on the Kid Jensen session
• Mike Robinson – engineer on the Kid Jensen session
• Miti Adhikari – engineer on the Kid Jensen session
• Tim Turan – remastering
• Martin "Cally" Callomon – art direction, design
• The Stiff Art Department – original graphic design

Nik Rose – artwork ("re-jigging and fettling")

• Virginia Turbett – photography
• Gavin Martin – liner notes