Two Librans

And we’re back, concluding the trifecta of mediocrity, what will in time be surely remembered as the Divine Comedy of podcasts about obscure Fall hanger-ons. Well, now a little less obscure, because the character we first discussed in episode 20 (hell)…

…has since taken the helm of the so-called Fall Army, and released not only a terrible new Fall song, as covered in episode 24 (purgatory)…

…but also a terrible new Fall album (hell again), as covered in this episode. Yes, Post Script is here, and it’s unsurprisingly bad. We talk about the whole debacle, the final result, and take for a closer examination probably the worst song on the album, Final Position (more like Final Solution). You can listen to it here, if you must, or you can buy a test pressing of the album for just £75.00 GBP which will at least save you from the horror of its cover art.

ALSO DISCUSSED

A sample of Ed’s pre-Fall output

Mark plugging his mate on a mixtape

"Trigger Happy are a Manchester group who used to support us. They are currently undergoing a revival because they are suing the TV programme of the same name for copyright. It's Salford yob music and sounds like David Bowie done really badly."

One of the two glowing reviews for PS

Over on Louder than War, written by the same man who drove us to near-tears in the first Edcast.

Ed procuring Mark’s blessing for Post Script

Ed’s previous stint in Blues Hammer

Tom’s album picks of the month

^ This one is Tom’s album of the year so far.

Roman’s album picks of the month

Resurrection done right

PS.

Roman’s last book is back in print. Perfect holiday gift for depressed Fall fans with a sensitive side (attentive readers will notice that the story in fact takes place on xmas eve), absolutely unsuited for fans of Yob art.

Tom has nothing to plug, and I think it’s best you just ignore him.

Big news from the world of necromancy: Mark E. Smith is back from the dead, nonconsensually. This episode we’re covering the remarkably mediocre song that Mark was resurrected for, and the drama surrounding it.

Wake up! The song’s over.

If you are not familiar with E* Bl*in*y, the Fall’s greatest hanger-on was extensively covered in this episode, which you can listen to before this one, if you want to steep yourself in this strange man’s strange and mediocre lore.

ALSO DISCUSSED

Jamie Hewlett’s drawing of MES

Auctioned for 3400, not 400 as was stated on the pod.

Can you spot Mark having fun in his favorite place, India?

One-upping the worst Fall album artwork.

This is the summer fit you deserve.

Lady Maria of the Astral Clocktower

We got a new Fall song before a Bloodborne remaster.

The other Taliban

If you need even more heavy-breathing men engaging in Fall banter, check out the surprisingly entertaining F.a.l.l.o.u.t.p.o.d.c.a.s.t. which has a similarly futile and deranged premise—instead of dedicating an episode to every single Fall song like we do, they are trying to find out which one is the best by process of elimination.

The episodes on MES solos and collaborations have some inevitable Bl*n*y appearances, but that’s also where I found out about the strange and wonderful collaboration with one of the Mouse of Mars men, Molocular Mediatations. It’s quite a bit weirder than Von Sudenfen.

More horrible cover art

What the Toxic Avenger reboot could’ve been

OUR OWN STUFF

Roman has new adventures of Terrible Father. If you are in that there London, you catch him at ARC July 11-12th.

Tom has been working on the art for the game Actor RE: Actor, coming soon from Quack Quack games. You can wishlist it on Steam here, and sign up for play testing. It’s a lot of fun, and coming together quickly.

Tom also made the animations for this documentary from More Perfect Union, and a new one from them coming out later this week about the president’s Large Adult Sons.

We have decided that it’s time to discuss the Fall’s horniest and most earnest song, Bill is Dead, in which Mark E. Smith details the number of orgasms he delivered on at least one occasion. A atmosphere of uncharacteristic sensuality pervades not only this song, but this episode as well. We get very horny indeed, and at one point, Roman even details his discovery of the female orgasm. Listen with the lights dimmed and parents out of reach.

Mark washes his hands after relieving himself, and so should you.

ALSO DISCUSSED

Bookshelf backdrops

Norm vs MJ

Pa-pa-pa-paaaaa

Alison Bechdel’s AI goats

OUR OWN SUBSTACKS

Roman Muradov

Tom Van Deusen

And we’re back, finally and we finally finish covering a song for once, the dense and mutli-part Y.F.O.C. / Slippy Floor. You can catch up on the first part, but the lyrics don’t make a hell of a lot of sense anyway.

For our next episode, we have a sEcRet special guest 🤫 and it’ll be a bit of a soft reboot for the show. Till then, enjoy a classic digression-fest with two men bickering intercontinentally.

Since it’s the same damn song, let’s put in an alternative mix at least. It’s not very good, but it’s different.

ALSO DISCUSSED

Happy 100th birthday to the term “Late Stage Capitalism”

🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂

Black Seth

THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING

Is Slippy Toad a Furry?

Listeners, let us know.

The Man with the Fish

The surprising link between Roy Cohn, Lionel Trains, and Neil Young

Happy New Year from Club Z

PS.

Roman had a new graphic novel coming out from Fantagraphics last month and it’s already sold out, which has nothing to do with the publisher printing a very modest number of copies. You can still find it in shops, but hurry up. Guaranteed to be a collector’s item. Roman also finished the latest Resident Evil game and had difficult feelings about it:

Tom doesn’t have a goddamn thing to report.

In this episode we intended to cover the entirety of the Fall’s late-career banger “Y.F.O.C / Slippy Floor”. However, we went so off-course we can legally only say we covered the acronym. We’ll cover the eponymous “Slippy Floor” that somehow broke both of Mark E. Smith’s hips another time!

The song is still an absolute banger, and we do go a bit into the background, but this episode is pretty much all side-quest missions.

INCLUDING!

Joe Rogaine

Isn’t it nice when people you hate turn out to be bad?

“It seemed like a good idea at the time!”

The golden age of Boob Signing

That’s album art, alright

Amanda Palmer, Patreon Saint of the pod

PS.

Roman has a new graphic novel coming out from Fantagraphics. He’s doing an event for it at Desert Island in Brooklyn, and Tom will join and read some new comics.

Guaranteed to be the event of the century.

Tom has nothing to plug on his ‘stack, he’s still slowly working on his comic and his prints. Follow him on Instagram, why don’cha?

Today we are covering several terrible songs by probably the worst ex-member (although the membership itself is disputed) of the Fall, E* Bl*n*y. We censored his name because he seems like the sort of person who googles himself, and I don’t think there’s a single kind word said about him in this whole episode. So, E*, if you stumbled upon this, just walk away. You have a life, a family, and a career. This is just a tiny podcast made by practitioners of the lowest artform in history.

For everyone else, prepare to explore the wild world of this guy, as well as various forums and obscure musical review sites, where E*’s mates have gone out of their way to write something positive about his “skronking wonk bonk.”

Note: This video is age-restricted for pretty graphic real-life war footage. It should also be taste-restricted for being utter shit.

This is a bit of an unusual, ‘proper’ podcast, where we ‘do a journalism’ and go deep down a rabbit hole of mediocrity, instead of just endlessly derailing each other. It’s the NPR of Two Librans, except actually good.

ALSO DISCUSSED

Pascal Le Gras’s cover art

Honking Skronk Rock recorded at a rented house in Holmfirth

Another act from the Manchester Bl*n*y-verse

Seriously, who in the hell IS this guy?!

Mark hits a nadir

Proto-Blaney from Fast Show

Eric Clapton on his racist past: “I just thought it was funny”

PS.

Don’t forget to follow our personal stacks!

Roman has a new graphic novel coming up on Feb.24th from Fantagraphics. And if you’re in London, you can get it signed on Feb.26th at Gosh Comics.

Tom has nothing to plug on his ‘stack, he’s still slowly working on his comic and his prints. Follow him on Instagram, why don’cha?

We continue our European travelogue through our misadventures through Berlin and Leipzig last summer, and to accompany it we chose to discuss The Fall’s “Das Vulture Ans Ein Nutter-Wain”, a song whose title in German means absolutely nothing.

We also discuss our old bugbear Patti Smith (the bleeper had to do overtime on this ep), Jordan Peterson’s all-meat diet, and Roman’s dangerously truthful Trumpberg-trolling on Instagram. Roman is pretty trashed on this one after a full day of irritating his audience online for no reason. Probably not his finest performance, but the man was dealing with Society, give him a break, damn it! Tom is drinking too, but that’s pretty par for the course.

ALSO DISCUSSED

Roman’s Epstein moment

Jordan Peterson DESTROYS feminism by talking over woman

Patti Smith’s N-word pass revisited

Previously discussed in episode 11.

Beyond Bath and Beyond

Here she is confirming that she indeed is a n************. This might be the most irritating interview with anyone, ever. She uses N-word within the first minute (different times).

IYKYK

Other classics

Tom interrupting Roman’s “meditating”

Saul Steinberg getting a little flirty with the interviewer

(different times)

The Crumb bio

that probably desperately needs promo from our very popular pod

Roman’s cursed children’s book that brought him questionable new audiences

Friend of the pod Anna Haifisch

Friend and collaborator of the pod James Turek

Men sleep on layers of bedsheets and think it’s fine

Us

PS.

Don’t forget to follow our personal stacks!

Roman has a new graphic novel coming up on Feb.24th from Fantagraphics. And if you’re in London, you can get it signed on Feb.26th at Gosh Comics.

Tom has nothing to plug on his ‘stack, he’s still slowly working on his comic and his prints. Follow him on Instagram, why don’cha?

WARNING, INFANT!

If you came to the pod looking for informed Fall commentary, this episode might not be the best place to start. It was ostensibly to be about the Fall-filler “classic” Papal Visit, but things got badly derailed when we discussed our European adventure together earlier this year. If you’re looking for a decent introduction to our somewhat-Fall-related banter, check out our recent recent ep on Bonkers in Phoenix. Otherwise, enjoy the travelogue!

As a result, the least-deserving song in the Fall catalogue is a two-episode special, so stay tuned.

LADZ ON TOUR

We’re going over our first and last pub crawl pilgrimage to Manchester, and get derailed into discussing beastmodes, Leigh Bowery at the Tate, sensitive actor Pedro Pascal, early British indie games, bouncy castles and other worthy matters.

ALSO DISCUSSED

LS Lowry 360 experience

VR Colonoscopy

Leigh Bowery

SHUT UP, LITTLE MAN!

That egg gate

Dizzy

Roman’s scenic death march

A bouncy castle near a church (church was on the left)

The Mancunian Neckbeard

The semi-official MES pub crawl

Honey, we have Cuphead at home

Bank Holidays in Manchester

BEAST MODE

PS.

Don’t forget to follow our personal stacks.

Roman is back with an exciting new Terrible Father adventure:

Tom is still cranking away furiously on his comic, and you can read the last installment with its proper formatting.

PPS.

From one of the lavatories.

This episode we cover such festive topics as school shootings, Zohran’s waifu (who is definitely listening to the pod), and the prison industrial complex! Since this is the first episode we recorded and edited in a timely manner, we even talked about the newest Jeffrey Epstein “drop” and other topical matters—listen now, or feel irrelevant forever.

JINGLE BELL ROCK

Merry Mark E. Smith-smas, boys and girls, it’s the very first Two Librans Holiday Special! This episode’s Fall song is a bizarre cover of Jingle Bell Rock from a mid 90s John Peel session, with a wild story behind its improvised lyrics. We delve into the song’s history, and its many, many cover versions, almost all of them terrible.

For comparison, here is the original. We’ll go over all the missing and added lyrics, green M&S bags, Brussels sprouts, old beef, and all.

We’re a little drunk on this one. So sneak off from staid and awkward family time, lock yourself in the bathroom and spend some quality time with your real family.

ALSO DISCUSSED

The story behind the cover

From the new audiobook version of Steve Hanley’s the Big Midweek.

Roman’s exceedingly thoughtful gift for Tom

Gets yours here

NY post headlines

Prison

Just friends

Kurt Vonnegut farting around

River City Ransom US cover art

PS.

Don’t forget to follow our personal stacks.

Tom is still cranking away furiously on his comic, and you can read the last installment with its proper formatting.

Roman recently had a work trip and made some exciting drawings about office life. If you’re reading this before the end of the year, his annual subscription has a discount, and he’s pledging to put out more posts.

Howdy-ho, fellow and honorary Librans, to a brand-spankin’-new episode we recorded months ago! Now that we’ve crossed the threshold into winter, it’s a great time to release an episode that we recorded in late spring and said will “probably come out this summer.” When Tom heard that while editing the episode it made him very sad! He looked outside at the frosty gray day from his millennial gray apartment. He then looked back at Adobe Audition and started sobbing. Poor Tom.

But Tom was rapidly filled with cheer as he realized this was the episode where we discuss…

BRITISH PEOPLE IN HOT WEATHER

Yes, what better time to share a song about summer than in the middle of the winter of our diss-content? This banging tune will certainly warm you up, whatever cold region you might be currently inhabiting.

Mark brings himself to giggles singing about how poorly the British handle the heat in this weird B-Side released around the time he went through a divorce and recorded Extricate. It might be their most spite-fueled album, which is really saying something when you consider their catalogue, and it’s nice to hear Mark get a little silly in this pretty throw-away track.

ALSO DISCUSSED

Spending the summer with Tom Hank’s son (really.)

No joke, this is Tom Hank’s son

Fellow faux-Jamaican-Patoi lover, Adrian Brody

Sound of the Summer.

Kubrik’s scene compositions in Barry Lyndon

This great interview with Robert Crumb at the 92nd St. Y (if you listen closely you can hear Tom laughing in the audience!)

The intensely disturbing Claymation film The Adventures of Mark Twain

Here, watch the whole fuckin’ movie!

Roman’s very short career in Facebook games

PS.

Don’t forget to follow our personal stacks. Roman recently came back from France with some very French comics to show.

And whoa! Tom is writing comics again!

Holy shit, you’d better subscribe so you can READ THE WHOLE BOOK as he slowly draws it!