The FALL was one of those hard-to-like, easy-to-love rock bands that influenced 7,000 other bands, all of which were more successful and none of which were as good, and none sounded all that much like the Fall, but then again neither did the Fall a lot of the time. MARK E. SMITH, the band's perpetually irritable frontman (and only permanent member), didn't care a whit about any of that, and that's not why he was so grouchy, that's just how he was. A lot of people didn't like him, including some of his bandmates, and a lot of others adored him. He didn't want to be adored. Smith, who died Wednesday at age 60, was an astonishing observer of people and without doubt one of rock's sharpest, darkest, funniest, greatest lyricists. He was genuinely hilarious. His singsong bark fell somewhere between CAPTAIN BEEFHEART, late-period BOB DYLAN and RAKIM. Sometimes you could sort of sing along. He liked to drink. He didn't suffer fools gladly, or at all. He was a crotchety old man by the time he was 30. He oversaw a punk art dance project that lasted more than 40 years and went through more than 40 musicians, two of whom he married. The Fall's discography of 30-plus studio albums is maybe a little intimidating and—considering the band's revolving-door membership—remarkably consistent in quality, and if you were just starting out you could plunge in almost anywhere and find snippets of pop and disco and other such things among the minimalist sonic barrage. Mostly, though, you'd find the wonderful and frightening world of the Mark E. Smith and the Fall. His famously scrunched-up, contorted countenance belongs next to the phrase "sui generis" in the dictionary. No one ever sounded like him and no one ever will. Which is too bad for everybody else. MUSIC SET: "Wonderful and Frightening: Mark E. Smith Was the All-Time Greatest Mark E. Smith"... Oh, one more thing: Mark E. Smith reading soccer scores. You could meditate to this... The MUSIC MODERNIZATION ACT, which seeks to improve digital royalties for songwriters, was introduced in the US SENATE Wednesday with solid bipartisan support. But that's just republicans and democrats, no big deal. Will it continue to have bipartisan support in the real world of music companies and tech companies?... If you want a master class in how to conduct an interview with a celebrity who has just expressed empathy for ADOLF HITLER, read DAVID MARCHESE's exemplary chat with ERYKAH BADU for VULTURE. (Badu: "Hitler was a wonderful painter." Marchese: "No, he wasn’t!") If you want a master class in how not to talk about Hitler in public (or in private), just read Badu's answers. The ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE weighs in... ELTON JOHN says he's quitting touring so he can spend more time with his kids, who will be three years older than they are now when he finishes playing the 300 (!) shows he just announced for his farewell tour... MILLI VANILLI svengali FRANK FARIAN paid "GIRL YOU KNOW IT'S TRUE" rapper CHARLES SHAW more money to shut up than DONALD TRUMP paid STORMY DANIELS to shut up... I am shocked, shocked, that JACK WHITE hates your IPHONE.