The Frenz Experiment
| The Frenz Experiment | ||||
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| Studio album by The Fall | ||||
| Released | 29 February 1988 | |||
| Recorded | St John's Wood; Brixton; Manchester | |||
| Genre | Post-punk | |||
| Length | 42:20 | |||
| Label | Beggars Banquet | |||
| Producer | Simon Rogers; Grant Showbiz; Dian Barton | |||
| The Fall chronology | ||||
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| Singles from The Frenz Experiment | ||||
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| Professional ratings | |
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| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   |
| Robert Christgau | B+ |
| Pitchfork | 7.4/10 |
The Frenz Experiment is the tenth studio album by English post-punk band The Fall. It was released on 29 February 1988 through record label Beggars Banquet.
Smith originally intended to call the album Gene Crime Experience, until he realized that it spelled "GCE". The phrase does still feature on the back cover of the CD.
A strong similarity between "Athlete Cured" and Spinal Tap's "Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You Tonight" has been noted. In his autobiography The Big Midweek, bassist Steve Hanley confirms that the resemblance was not accidental, admitting that the group had been jamming the Spinal Tap song in soundchecks and that Mark E. Smith had decided to make use of the results. Hanley also states that producer Simon Rogers had been so annoyed by the lift that he came close to walking off the project.
Brix Smith co-wrote a number of the tracks, but is however largely omitted from the song writing credits.
The Frenz Experiment was released on 29 February 1988. It reached number 19 in the UK album chart, making it the Fall's first Top 20 album. The group promoted the release with a live appearance in HMV's Oxford Street store in London. They opened the short set with "Cab It Up!", a new song that would appear on the group's following album, I Am Kurious Oranj.
Like the group's other albums with Beggars Banquet, Frenz has a different track listing across various formats (LP, CD and cassette). A number of tracks are credited exclusively to Mark E. Smith, but the album also incorporates two cover versions (or one, depending on the format): "Victoria", originally by The Kinks, and "There's a Ghost in My House", a somewhat forgotten northern soul track first recorded by R. Dean Taylor in 1966. The Fall's version of "Victoria" was released as a single, making it to No. 35 in the British charts. The latter cover only appears on the CD version of the album, having been issued as a single in April 1987, reaching number 30. This was the group's highest singles chart position to date and remains so.
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