British indie-rock icons The Fall [ tickets ] have sketched out their first full-fledged North American tour since 2004, as they continue to build support for last year's "Fall Heads Roll" album.

Sporting its most stable lineup in years and still led by the iconoclastic Mark E. Smith, the group will kick off its latest attempt on these shores May 2 in Austin, TX. North Carolina's The Talk (whose most recent album, "The Sinners of Daughters," was released in 2005) will provide support on all currently scheduled shows.

If The Fall is able to complete the entire tour, it would mark one of the few times in recent years that the band has managed to get through an entire American slate unscathed.

2004's tour was cut short when the band and Smith (still recovering from a broken thigh suffered earlier that year) decided it didn't feel like crossing the deserts of the US Southwest; the group offered 50% refunds to unhappy ticketholders in West Coast cities. In 2002 the band was forced to cancel its entire US tour because of visa problems.

The band's 1998 tour was marked with controversy when Smith sacked the entire band after a performance in New York. Smith was also arrested the following day and charged with assaulting his then-girlfriend and bandmate, Julia Nagle. The pair resumed playing together only a few weeks later in London with a cobbled-together Fall lineup.

Released late last year, "Fall Heads Roll" is the band's 25th official studio album of a career that dates back to 1979's "Live at the Witch Trials." Aside from the constant presence of Smith, the band has gone through countless lineup changes, with an unofficial count placing the number of Fall alumnus at approximately 30.

The current lineup has remained mostly firm since 2001's "Are You Are Missing Winner."

A six-CD compilation, "The Complete Peel Sessions 1978-2004," was released last April, collecting every studio session the group had recorded over the years for the late British DJ John Peel.