The Smiths: Classic or Dud?

Anyhow, I can't stand the Smiths, save a handful of songs. It's just so....I don't know. Something for Anglophiles.

Dud. I can't 100% explain why, but dud.

Really!?! :) Sadly I'm a big Oscar Wilde fan, and it just doesn't help one bit in liking The Smiths. Oh and The Manics are next! ;) After which The Cure get a thorough look.

Morrissey's solo career has been crap, but for 4 years he was everything a pop star should be - irreverant, controversial, cutting, often wrong, sexually ambiguous and never boring. The impact of The Smiths on TOTP in 1983 is something I'll never forget, along with headlines in the SUN about 'Handsome Devil' ('A Boy in the Bush..'), and 'Shakespear's Sister' on the Oxford Road Show one wet Tuesday.

Johnny Marr's guitar playing - fucking genius. If you don't see it you have cloth ears. Or alternatively just try and play, say 'Nowhere Fast'.He could make the impossible sound easy, but never in a conventional rock and roll sense. You can tell that he had a background in funk as well as rock.

It might be a Northern thing - hailing from there myself (although I've been in London for a long time)I always enjoyed the references to Northern things, but probably it is also very much a British thing. Classic times fucking 10 anyway.

later smiths lyrics are fabulous. ("is it wrong not to always be glad?/no it's not wrong but i must add/how can someone so young sing words so sad?" is one passage that springs to mind. "frankly mr shankly" and "stop me if you think you've heard this one before" are two other great lyrics.) great wordplay, irony, and wit. earlier lyrics are hit-and-miss but i like them with the music. the voice is a matter of taste. there is a real playfulness and irony in the affected queen's-english thing (morrissey is after all a working-class manchester guy).

and johnny marr was great. if you're not into the voice i can see why you wouldn't listen to the guitars but they are subtly intricate, ethereal when they need to be, rocking when they need to be. "what she said" (another great lyric: "what she said: i smoke 'cos i'm hoping for an early death and i need to cling to something") is a great example.

and i'm canadian, albeit a self-pitying student canadian. though i suspect i'm less of an anglophile than ally (won't catch me with pulp or manics albums!).

Dr.C brings something up that I always supected, that M's wit is full of little in-jokes you'll only get if your British or even a Northener, or maybe only if you grew up in the same street as M.

Two of the finest singles of all time.

The Queen is Dead - is nearly 15 years old! was their best album and the height of their achievements for a full album, after that it was downhill.

In 1983- 87 what The Smiths were to the UK, what The Go Betweens were to Australia and what REM were to the USA. They were a high profile way out from FM rock muck of Dire Straits/Phil Collins, Men at Work/John Farnham and Chicago/ Toto/ Journey etc.

I remember some years ago, MM/David Stubbs retraced the history of MM into different phases.

Back in 1983 the editor was away on his holidays the deputy editor stood in an decided to put The Smiths on the front cover, and also REM were in the same edition - instead of going for a Kajagoogoo front cover. At the time MM was going through a pop phase covering lightweights such as Kajagoogoo, Paul Young etc. So this was a significant departure.

How many bands last only 4 years, and then have a South Bank Tribute Show on Television. (a high art show for non British readers)

How many people could appear on the TOTP with a flower hanging out of their trousers, and march around the stage in a manner we never saw before. On the positive side Morrisey did encourage individuality and the believe that you did not have to follow the crowd.

However it was probably a good idea that they called it a day then, lets be honest they had run out of ideas, if they carried on they would have been as ordinary and dull as James, could you see morrisey being produced by Eno though? Neither can I.

On the negative side did The Smiths influence anyone significant - Raymonde? The Railway Children? Bradford? The Bodines? the Chesterfields? The Shop Assistants? I rest my case, by 1986 there were many bands that were the bastard offspring / a cross breed between Lloyd Cole, The Farmers Boys, Bluebells and The Smiths. The NME was full of them, C86 scene was born and gormless bands were breeding like music inbred rabbits and it was full of shambling duds like Mighty Mighty, whose achievements would get to say number 21 on the indie charts and a session on the Janice Long show. Dull. And can we blame The Smiths for the gormless Housemartins and even the Proclaimers - who mirrored the ordinary anti fashion statement of The Smiths - or is that going to far?. How I hated the NME in 1987! nothing much has changed I still hate them in 2001!

Only 1, 000 Violins added something to the johnny marr guitars and the wit of Morrisey - and they were only minor indie chart/ Peel session favourites and now obscure band only remembered by a few. The first Bible album and June Brides are the only artists I can think of.

Also have you seen the new Mojo magazine - The Smiths on the cover! Even Mojo have left the 60s/70s.

Anyway thanks for How Soon is Now, This Charming Man - and The Queen is Dead LP, I also have Louder than Bombs on tape somewhere to. I am not obsessive about them, but release they played a significant part in music between 1983-1987.

Over-written lyrics are an interesting subject (probably good for a seperate thread) You could maybe seperate lyrics that are simply over- written (those Manics lyrics that JDB had to fit in somehow into singable lines) and lyrics that are just too thought out, too clever for their own good (too clever being of course subjective, but I can never escape the impression of Morrisey being in love with his own wit). It still isn't the complete picture for me since Stuart Murdoch's lyrics are overwritten in that way and I just lurve Belle & Sebastian (there I've said it).

One final note: Wells of course stops being funny if he zones in on one of your favorite bands. No harm done in the end since the man has such crap taste in music.

I've been through pretty much all the phases mentioned. The first time I heard them - "Panic" - is one of the most powerful memories of my entire life. After that, abject worship: they defined my adolescence. Then into getting a bit annoyed with Morrissey and liking them for the music. Then into the ex-indie eclectic bit referred to above. Then rediscovering them and settling into my current attitude, which is: not everything they did was great, but I'll love them forever nonetheless.

THE SMITHS “Panic” I can hear people shudder that this is here: after all these years and even given the current state of Johnny Marr’s sideys there’s something about the Smiths that still has an unhealthy hold over people you’d love to love. Get the facts straight though: the Smiths were about nostalgia, they were about destroying any black trace in pop, when they emerged they were pretty much a rights-for-whites insistence that nothing since punk had mattered.

“Panic” is a letter to Melody Maker spun into a song and Morrisey is a Ted-fixated pre-immigration-fantasizing Granny of a man. This laid the groundwork of morose retrospect that Lad-rock would later find it’s spiritual motivation. Blame and shame them every chance you get.

I really DON'T have a problem with the Smiths' lyrics, for all the fighting round here about "overwritten lyrics". I mean, yeah, Morrissey has written some ridiculous crap, but overall he's not a lyricist I mind. It's his overblown voice and the actual music that I hate. Someone mentioned Frankly mr. Shankley, which is a song I loathe, but not because of the lyrics, because the music is so jarringly godawful to my ears that it makes me want to murder everyone involved. It comes down to that, for me.

*yawn*

It's usually one of those sad little attention seeking things: "Hey! Aren't I opinionated! I'm such an iconoclast!".

Again, *yawn*.

Now let's throw in something interesting: surely The Smiths influence was felt most where you wouldn't really expect it. I say their true heirs are Nine Inch Nails and Korn. Discuss!

However it's clear that Kulkarni is as bigoted and stupid as those he trashes. The comments on 'Panic' make that plain enough.

Anyway, one of the greatest bands ever, definitely. And no, I am not some pasty-faced wussy who will cry when Morrissey is insulted either!

Of course, their best song is "This Night Has Opened My Eyes", but that wasn't the question. Morrissey's voice is certainly a matter of taste, as he's one of the few in the genre who consistently sings on pitch (first album aside). I find a lot of his lyrics alternately hilarious and devastating, even on songs I don't particularly like (see "Girlfriend In A Coma", which may be the most inappropriate song he ever approached outside of "Bengali In Platforms"). As A solo artist, Morrissey is a screaming failure, but as part of The Smiths he managed to create some breath-taking stuff that I'll never let go of.

Sadly, Morrissey does have a punchable face.

Where does everyone get the idea that Smiths fans have to cry when you tell them Mozzer is crap?

But yes Tim I just don't know what the big deal is about Marr...the guitars just don't really stand out, they're there and they're not. And if you really want to know: my favorite guitar players are J Mascis and Kevin Shields.

2. But Dr C is of course quite correct: Marr was (let's leave the present out of it) utterly outstanding, spellbinding and inspirational. At an extraordinarily young age he had perfect facility with the guitar: and he developed a signature sound he was unafraid to play on extensively (I mean, he played the same way on lots of records - rightly), while also pushing the envelope and trying out different things. Examples: his interest in acoustic and folk playing; his piano playing on 'Shakespeare's Sister' or 'Asleep'; his sonic wizardry on 'How Soon Is Now?' and 'That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore', which was eventually enough even to win over the really avant-garde people who are usually interested in bleeps, strange noises, textures, dripping taps, trains etc. Despite his virtuosity, though, he didn't play the Virtuoso, didn't 'go out there and go wild on six strings', as he put it to Melody Maker in 1989: he was content to be an accompanist, to play for the song and not for himself. And to talk about his *playing* this way is perhaps to understate his achievement as a *writer*, as the man who wrote, so to speak, half of one of the very greatest canons of songs in pop history.

I have made all that sound duller than it is. It's the reverse of dull: it's maybe the most exciting thing that ever happened, anywhere.

3. Funnily enough, I don't quite agree with what Dr C (?) said about the difficulty of playing Marr's songs. OK, it's pretty much impossible to play them *like he does*, but I guess that goes for any great musician. The basic structures, chords, rhythms, arpeggios, riffs, etc are not so hard to pick up.

Anyway, I read that Neil Kulkarni Cigarettes & Alcohol article, and I have a question. Is the "lads" culture that allegedly surrounds that music really *that* pervasive in the UK, or is Kulkarni just dealing in hyperbole ? If it is, then it's pretty amusing, 'cause over here, most of the people who would be aware that that music even exists would be anglophile fops and music geeks, pretty much lads' cultural opposites. I might make fun of England a lot, but I don't think I'd mind living someplace where the local equivalent of frat boys are into Pulp rather than Limp Bizkit.

"Is the "lads" culture that allegedly surrounds that music really *that* pervasive in the UK,

Five years ago it was, but less so now.

or is Kulkarni just dealing in hyperbole?"

I agree with pretty much everything he says about its malign cultural influence in the UK, but it's a soft and easy target by now. If he'd written that in 1996, though, it would have seemed much more relevant (and would have been seen in certain circles as almost blasphemous).

Kulkarni's a much-underrated writer, and his musical universe was far wider than any writers on the specialist hip-hop press (where some of the more narrow-minded indie kids would demand he fucked off to) - I remember in his euphoric review of The Brotherhood's "Elementalz" he alluded to Richard Thompson and Kevin Ayers, which might be seen as a refusal of the retro-orthodoxy of '96 and as a statement in favour of a completely different kind of "canon" (sort of what Ultramarine were working towards a few years before). That said, Tom, you're right; he has his hobby-horses and there are times when he goes too far, and I'd agree with you entirely that, if I want to hear a beat after I've been listening to The Smiths / Morrissey, I'll put on a dance or hip- hop record. I wouldn't want to hear them trying; that's not what they're there for.

Oh, and the answer to the question? Very similar to Tom's; despite everything, classic.

I understand criticism of the pretension that runs rampant through many of their songs, but the music up until _Strangeways, Here We Come_ is mostly impeccable.

Oh my, Dr.C don't say it's true :( Alas, even it were true, if something is easy to do it doens't necessarely make it less brilliant (jeez, did we go through punk for this!). Now although I've heard a lot of The Smiths, one eventually will come up with one track that I don't know on which St. Marr plays really loud.

And luckely I'm cool too in Nick's worldview, somewhere burried deep in my collection is "The Queen is Dead" (yes I really tried ;). Then again try to remember that 99.9% of the worldpopulation that don't own a stupid record by The Smiths are wankers.

Pinefox has expressed this far better than I can, and I agree with all he has said.

The fact that the guitar doesn't scream on every song doesn't mean that it isn't there or that its presence isn't felt. I mean, "Back To The Old House" without the guitar would be worthless. "Rubber Ring" would be nothing. No one would have remembered "How Soon Is Now?" As Morrissey's solo career shows, there was a synergy going on there that produced some amazing music.

if the smiths really are as obscure around your parts as you suggest (you've only met *one* fan?) you've certainly taken great pains to study a band that doesn't interest you.

As for the Korn connection, Tom gave a very clear response. There's a kind of narcissistic self-loathing with that singer that somehow reminds me of Mozzer, although instead of a hearing-aid he has a bagpipe and really crap hair (I'm almost certain that if you ask him he'll say 'The Queen is Dead'is one of his favorite albums). Actually Reynolds made a far bolder claim recently by comparing Eminem and Moz. He's right by the way.

I have sometimes spent the night at Stephen Troussé's house.

And I did always like the Moz interview -- I also really liked the amusing bit at the beginning regarding how lyrics come up with in a semi-drunken haze get taken as tablets of truth by fans. So true, so true!

Anyway, you could say "nobody can play those songs quite like Hendrix played them, but the basic chords, arpeggios, etc. are easy". You could apply that to any great guitar player cause a guitar is a guitar and rock music is rock music. Anybody can learn the notes too and get 90% of the way there, but its that last little bit that seperates guys who can finger chords well from guys like Marr and Hendrix.

Btw, yes, my dad likes eggs. What's your point?

THE VERY BEST OF THE SMITHS: CLASSIC *AND* DUD??

The cover - how long did it take them to come up with Charles Hawtrey? It's lazy,dull-witted hackwork.

Okay, from 1983 - 1987 I probably had the biggest case of Smithsitis in North America. I hounded the staff of a now-defunct record store in my hometown to drive me 500 miles to see them in Chicago - they complied. I bought everything I could lay my hands on, had people make me PAL- converted videotapes of all TV stuff from the UK and augmented my film and reading lists with every single piece of Angry Young Man filmmaking and writing available to me - in many ways, this 'bands with a syllabus' thing was the Manics' province in the '90s, but it was a great ladder upstairs to places like university, especially for a lot of people who were not from comfortable backgrounds (I'd do you a great big list of European, UK and US musicians and writers but I'd be here a while). There was also a huge radical feminism component to Morrissey, which sat well with the stuff he liked oustide the kitchen sink canon. He also linked me up to Kenneth Anger, Truman Capote, Warhol everything, Derek Jarman, other Manchester bands and oddly enough, this brought me eventually to House music.

To sing (in weird half-step vocals that people like Ofra Haza would later drop into the charts) that the music on the radio had nothing to say to him about his life in 1986 was pretty spot-on considering what actually played on daytime R1 in the days before Detroit and Chicago impacted on the British charts and before the invention of MIDI. How this made a Tamla-Motown lover a racist in the eyes of the press I'll never know (it's borderline reductive to say this, but I'd never be so facile as to call my black friends who only listen to hip-hop racists because of the music they're into).And as much as he hated his one remix, at least it was by François Kervorkian!

People I know now, such as the gay A&R who signed the Smiths to EMI, agreed with me when I posited the theory that Morrissey was one of those closet cases who fancied, but never touched, the men most likely to bash him: beery lads, Latino boys, skinheads, etc. This has become more pronounced the older he's become. If you look at the reccurring fascination for those styles in the fashion world, it's also down to ageing gay creatives literally flirting with dodginess...

Since you guys are dropping Reynolds science to justify your own C or D arguments, I should maybe remind you of something he wrote for Spin in the late '80s. It was about the concept of the pernicious influence, the group a band loves that doesn't let them move forward if they try to emulate them. I seem to recall Smiths being top of the list!

And Johnny Marr? Although he's partially responsible for Oasis being here now (legs-up, same management, yucch) he made the guitar cool in the face of my favourite synth stuff simply because he played it beautifully and never once went for the cheap cock-rock option!

As fer the last stereotype -- when I was an undergrad (early- to mid- nineties), the IT guy where I worked was a big-time metalhead -- though he liked a lot of eighties cheesy hair-metal as well as the good stuff. Big strapping country boy from the mountains of Pennsylvania, even had a pick-up truck. The only alternative/indie/whatever band he liked was the Smiths. Go figure.

As we were driving up to the Aragon in baking late-afternoon sun the group emerged; I went all 'driver, STOP THE CAR!' and rushed over to meet my heroes. Luckily, I managed to be blasé about this despite a complete freakout in the car - and weirdly, found Morrissey a bit slow on the uptake. Johnny Marr was hilarious, though - a bit like a chipmunk on speed. Calm in the face of the experience, when I returned to Mininoplace I had to be scraped off the ceiling or forced by my friends to SHUT THE FUCK UP. But I learned:

1. People in groups are not always as clever as you want them to be - or, indeed, as intelligent as they think they are.

2. I possessed the unique ability to perfectly apply liquid eyeliner in a moving vehicle.

The gig was great, by the way.

The fact that John Peel does the voiceover is even more predictable than everything else. Strange to hear his voice again on the old Radio 1 medium wave frequency, though.

Since I bought all of the Smiths albums on cassette *far too long ago*, I keep thinking of getting decent replacement copies of them on cd. It would be nice if the albums were all reissued nicely with the b-sides, etc. instead of forcing yet another illogical Best Of on the public.

I live in Canada, but my cousin is Adam Clayton. Now there's an over-rated band. Not to mention Daft Punk, you Punky-ass bitch!

Hahahahahahaha yes, this is actually quite true!

(This is not to justify what the fellow upthread says about anything else.)

The Smiths

These Things Take Time is, apparently, a Smiths documentary on Friday 8th November. It's on ITV but only in the Granada, Border and Tyne Tees regions

Don't know about other regions? buy the TV supplements in the Saturday
/Sunday papers to check.

Also, either way, they're one of the gayest bands ever.

I thought that was the formula of the Smiths.. they have ever known for what reasons they have been into music arena. And I also am thinking same thoughts for Manics and the other leading combinations of British Pop. They have always shown the same point, from the direction of every groups own artistic catches and daily routine . So they wanted to show us how capital city could be alianated people by prisoned the person into money based relations, the objection of no-mistake, obeyance for survival and etc. which are not illustrated with the ' freedom of reality '. For these reasons The Smiths and others couldn't have been Punk ever, because i believe they show everyone how to survive as humans in big cities. So new ones are using their terminology as proggressing its argument by placing it to more positively speak-out platform, because new indie-pop generation has much comformitted lives through post-modernism but they (also we) have much complicated future problems. I am offering ' The Queen Is Dead ', to who can't be introduced with The Smiths. It should also be given a chance to Cocteu Twins, Bauhaus, Joy Division and all other post-punk voices of British Island .

This Charming Man
What Difference Does It Make?
Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now
Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want
How Soon Is Now
Shakespeare's Sister
The Boy With the Thorn In His Side
Bigmouth Strikes Again
The Queen Is Dead (Take Me Back To Dear Old Blighty)
Cemetary Gates
There is a Light That Never Goes Out
Panic
Ask
Shoplifters of the World Unite
Half a Person
Sheila Take a Bow
Is It Really So Strange?
Girlfriend In a Coma
Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before
Suedehead
Hairdresser On Fire
Everyday Is Like Sunday
We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful
The More You Ignore Me, The Closer I Get

(81:26 overburn! chronological by first appearance, missing key classics, but a decent single disc survey)

Then, along came Stone Roses, and UK indie was saviored.

Geir, you make my head hurt.

So, classic, then.

for a long time I have said "Geir's not so bad, give him a break".

but now I say GEIR MUST BE DESTROYED.

It means his pop life (from my POV) is irreversibly impoverished as a result, but it allows all manner of other material through for him to enjoy without the contextual baggage that might put other people off.

I don't have a problem with him at all - he just doesn't experience pop music in anything like the same way I do.

but when he disses the Smiths - that's out of order.

can't wait!

I can't get excited about this Mojo thing, though. I mean, 1995? It all sounds kindof far fetched, or yeah, probably overblown.

x-post

Why does this make me think of Our Friends In The North?

there, i've always wanted to say that in a public place. i'm going to run away now and hide.

you know it's true, though. you KNOW it's true.

NOOOOO! No one is allowed to call that song to mind in my brain! OUCH!

I want to have surgery, pluck the cells involved with that song out of my brain forever please. I swear I'm innocent. I didn't know that was lurking in my memory. I'll even take...well no, I won't take "shiny happy people", it's not that bad, but..

How can The Smiths be a poor man's Wedding Present when the guitarists and their sound are so completely different? One would NEVER imagine Steve Albini producing The Smiths, for example. I wouldn't care to hear the grunge Smiths, come to think of it. Or the hardcore Smiths. Even if you hate the Smiths, let's just leave them as they are shall we? They're in a land quite a few hills away from the Wedding Present.

A major, major understatement.

Now if they had only ever made a song as beautifully melodic and harmonic as "Made Of Stone" or "Bye Bye Badman"...

Few bands evoke such strong feelings of loathing in me -- maybe it's just because I've had to have this argument so many times with incredulous fans who can't fathom someone not liking The Smiths. There is no band that I like that I can't at least fathom someone else not liking. But I cannot fathom the utter reverence for The Smiths. Dud Dud Dud Dud Dud.

Classic duh duh duh

it's more to do with the emotional milieu in which the bands work: the poor indie loser out of step with the world. mind you, even that's not much of a comparison, i admit. i'm not sure where my patented "poor man's weddding present" comparison came from, but it certainly winds people up in the pub. perhaps that's the only reason i came up with it, actually ;)

Now if they had only ever made a song as beautifully melodic and harmonic as "Made Of Stone" or "Bye Bye Badman"...

GREATEST. TROLL POST. EVER.

I say Classic.

could someone explain bo diddley in how soon is now (according to the nyt)? humming would be okay.

the rotochorus (or whatever it is) on the main guitar kind of does a bump babump babump babump-bump thing

that's less cringey than reuters' subhead of 'influenced rockers from elvis to u2'

yeah the accents resemble the Bo Diddley beat with all the swing taken out

one of the greatest bands in history. not just for the mystique or their singularly unique sound, but for the quality and depth of the songs.

haha i'm gonna hear them in a brand new way now that you've said that

was morrissey really that good a writer? or did he just have a distinct persona/writing voice?

NO/YES

eyeball,
look no further than 'i know it's over' when re-evaluating the smiths' work :)
listen for when those big drums enter and morrissey's delivery builds in intensity. it's that cascading, restrained guitar line that keeps everything in check and prevents the song from collapsing under its own weight. really powerful stuff. the song is really poignant and introspective with a sort of resigned, sad sense of humour underpinning it... one of many examples of the band's multi-dimensional approach to songwriting.

Morrissey was a good writer, yes. Why he doesn't seem to be such a good lyricist anymore, I don't know.

he's just lazier these days. still has some poignant insights every now and then

is he actually that funny? (in a good way) or is he still funny (in a bad, hahah, oh god that is so terrible but i cant believe he just said that old-timey bingo hall entertainer kind of way)?

(am debating this after listening to the song about americans on quarry).

For all the praise Morrissey and Marr get, it was quite often the Rhythm section that made The Smiths interesting. Morrissey's lyrics are intermittently quite witty, but he's not much cop at writing melodies, he just kind of wobbles up and down.

sometimes hes witty. other times his humour is just ropey.

i think he's a lot funnier (even when he's not trying particularly hard) than your average wordy joe schmuck fishing for laughs

I went to see Andy Rourke do a DJ set tonight. I had a great time. At the end of the night he let me put on his glasses! He has the coolest glasses, I'm sorry. They're prescription he said, but they're sortof...half sunglasses, half not. They make him look sortof Lennon-ish or Liam-ish from far away I guess. Just slightly square in shape. I love them. He played two Pixies tracks (both from Doolittle), Devo's "Whip It", T-Rex's "Telegram Sam", a mashup of Blondie's Rapture and Doors' Riders On The Storm, ended the set with Stone Roses "I Am The Resurrection" and Doves "M62". There was also a new-ish song I liked and didn't know and went to his computer screen to find out what it was. It was by The New Young Pony Club called "The Get Go". He also played a bunch of other dance music I didn't recognize but was fun to dance to.

Oh also, I asked him what was on his T-shirt because he had a sportcoat and you couldn't see it. So he showed me and it was an arty colorful silhouette pic of Betty Page with something else on top of it.

There were some pretty cool bands who played as well. That is all.

Also the only Smiths song he played was Bigmouth.

What I fail to understand, though, is Morrissey's new arrangement of some of the old Smiths songs. I don't even want to *link* to the new version of This Charming Man I heard the other day on youtube. It sounded like the fucking Jonas Brothers.

Hahah. I dunno, man. I can't help you. I tried his new album one time and I couldn't even get through half of it. Sorry.

;)

I went to see Andy Rourke do a DJ set tonight

Jealous of this. Didn't know Rourke was DJ'ing now. I assume he's financially secure (despite hostilities between the band members on money-matters), so maybe he's just having fun.

Yeah, he's doing this in other cities as well, and what was more interesting to me was learning that he actually came out here two years ago to this Brit Pop thing my friend DJ'd at.

Oh yeah I forgot to mention he played two Clash tracks, too. Maginificent Seven...and...was it Train In Vain?

http://bandwidth.wamu.org/there-at-a-special-time-a-d-c-punk-on-her-teen-years-touring-with-the-smiths/

http://www.studio1469.com/events

In 1985 and into 1986 then 17 year-old DC photographer Nalinee Darmrong traveled with and captured The Smiths during the height of their : the Meat Is Murder and The Queen Is Dead tours.

Now she has a book out with photos and ephemera, and a gallery exhibit

I love arguing with Morrissey fans about how The Smiths would've had a perfectly satisfactory career with any other singer in Moz's place because the musicians in the band were good at their jobs and Marr was/is something of a guitar savant. They're not having it, of course.

depends what you mean by "satisfactory" I guess

w out Moz there's none of the iconography, no foregrounding of transgressive gender/sexuality, no ridiculous song titles/lyrical hooks. Marr needed a co-writer/lyricist, as his solo career has borne out.

Would they be legendary? Unlikely. But they would have fared perfectly fine in that mid-80s London guitar pop climate. Morrissey contributed fuck all to the actual music of The Smiths, that's all Marr. Plenty of other singers could have stepped in and done a capable job with those songs.

probably true, but they'd have been on the level of Heaven 17 or Aztec Camera or something.

Morrissey's vocal melodies run all over Marr's songs in really strange and unique ways, I don't think that's "fuck all" - it's just one more thing that makes them interesting. He doesn't structure a lot of his melodies in standard verse-chorus-hook ways, things repeat (or don't) at odd intervals, etc.

christ on a fucking something

What a tsunami of wank

Shakey, uh, otm

we know Moz is a doddering loon now, but curb your revisionism

yeah that is a ridiculous thing to argue

i assume it's only a matter of time till ppl start saying "the beatles would have been just fine without john lennon"

lol yeah Smiths would have been huge without Morrissey just like Chapterhouse

perfectly satisfactory career

You guys have totally twisted my position, but ok.

they would have fared perfectly fine in that mid-80s London guitar pop climate.

why would they have even moved to London without Morrissey's lyrics, drive, and personality

Dud

Morrissey and Marr clearly needed each other and complimented each other perfectly. And they would be forgotten by now without Morrissey.

The musicians in most canonical rock bands are probably accomplished enough that they could have had "perfectly satisfactory careers" with different lead singers.

i assume it's only a matter of time till ppl start saying "the beatles would have been just fine without john lennon"

― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Wednesday, May 23, 2018 12:07 AM (six hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

There have been TV dramas framed around answering this question already.

The other three could've carried on as the Smiths with a different singer. Marr is the greater of the two. Would've been fine.

Morrissey’s most important contribution as an individual was his lyrics, not his voice. Together he and Marr were better than apart. Anything else is laughable revisionism.

Marr has worked with other singers/writers and the results are as good as the Smiths. I don't think that's true of Morrissey.

they would have fared perfectly fine in that mid-80s London guitar pop climate

not sure who we're talking about here (the primitives? the darling buds?) but you could argue that it was the success of the smiths in the first place that enabled those bands to sign to majors and enjoy a level of success

Also what does London have to do with it?

What's London but a secondhand emotion?

Marr has worked with other singers/writers and the results are as good as the Smiths. I don't think that's true of Morrissey.

― everything, Wednesday, 23 May 2018 08:09 (fifty-two minutes ago)

this is bullshit too imo. Moz's stuff with Vini Reilly on Viva Hate is as good as the Smiths

The other three could've carried on as the Smiths with a different singer. Marr is the greater of the two. Would've been fine.

Second sentence does not necessarily follow from the first.

X-Ray Spex lost their front-person and they got a new one and carried on. With a new name, obv. Doesn't mean Jak Airport was greater than Poly.

I don't think that's true of Morrissey.

A lot of Morrissey solo is patchy but Vauxhall & I is up there with my favourite Smiths stuff.

Perhaps David Quantick could have been the lead singer

John the Postman, surely.

https://img.discogs.com/ju7i1NrmtQ7XIwXj0EbFAPCQ7Vo=/fit-in/600x360/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/A-1274814-1468321622-2023.jpeg.jpg

Well, Marr made all the music and the 3 piece band could have made as good instrumentals for another singer but a lot of the Smiths fans (not all, of course) worshipped Moz and he was the star of the band (also the importance of his stage presence) so they definitely wouldn't have been as popular without him (not talking about his lyrical/melodic/structural input in the songwriting, as mentionned already).

Check out Bryan Ferry's "The Right Stuff"

There's an old bootleg live encore of Barbarism Begins at Home with Pete Burns, where M & PB give up (and I presume leave the stage) halfway through and the other three proceed to reveal themselves as a superior jazz funk band, which I guess they felt they couldn't do with Moz around. They could've been a great second division Factory band.

if Marr wanted to to do jackshit that anyone remembers after the Smiths besides Getting Away With It and whatever Modest Mouse minor hit he played on he sure has had the opportunities

Morrissey has a ton of iconic solo songs

i mean I'm all for reevaluating his career, the recent mark s post someone linked was great and thought provoking about how the press and audience willfully ignored his racism

but to compare their post Smiths careers is so silly

I am a huuuuuuge fan of Marr the session man, love his playing so much, but yeah, no way, Morrissey has a ton of iconic solo songs and Marr remained best at being one of the best support players (for The The, Electronic, Pet Shop Boys, Talking Heads, Bryan Ferry, you name it).

Morrissey's vocal melodies run all over Marr's songs in really strange and unique ways

Did someone post that "Sing the Fifth" video here? That was illuminating.

Electronic's first album is better than the sum total of Morrissey's solo career, don't @ me

sing the third! xp

ha, yeah, the third?

Sorry, bad punctuation, on phone.

I agree the first Electronic album is better than any Morrissey album, and you can make a case that is better than the sum total of his career, but given it's the product of Johnny Marr of The Smiths, the singer and guitarist from one of the few other British bands that really gave the Smiths a run for their money, and the Pet Shop Boys thrown in as guest ringers, it better be!

Electronic's first album is better than the sum total of Morrissey's solo career, don't @ me

― Neil S,

I don't disagree!

fuck me, I'd rate a Chas + Dave b-side kazoo version of Flight of the Valkries as better than the sum total of Morrissey's solo career + The Smiths!

This is blown way out of proportion!

Is it me or is Morrissey's odious late output/persona seriously distorting some people's judgement? IMO, some of his solo stuff is on par with the Smiths at their best.

That been said, The Smiths would've still been pretty good without Morrissey, sure. I imagine with a good singer they would've been the Oasis of the 80s.

They would probably have been about as successful as the Chameleons

Or the Woodentops

Is it me or is Morrissey's odious late output/persona seriously distorting some people's judgement?

Otfm. Seriously angry I’m actually being forced to defend him!

Also, Electronic were overwhelmingly full given the members.

electronic were great but only on the first album.

Electronic's first album is better than the sum total of Morrissey's solo career, don't @ me

― Neil S, Wednesday, May 23, 2018 8:12 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

@ u bro

xxp DULL, jfc @myself

Morrissey's 'iconic' solo songs after the 80s, please do list them for me here.

Horst Wessel Song
Tomorrow Belongs to Me
Rule Brittania
There'll Always Be an England

We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful
First of the Gang to Die
November Spawned A Monster
The More You Ignore Me the Closer I Get

that's all I got

also Seriously angry I’m actually being forced to defend him! otm

Suedehead

lol fuck that came out in 1988 nvm

Morrissey's 'iconic' solo songs after the 80s, please do list them for me here.

I mentioned Vauxhall & I already - I skip fewer tracks on that than The Smiths, so.

"Now My Heart Is Full" is my favourite Morrissey song.

It’s a beaut :)

Good chance that's my most-played Morrissey song. As far as later-era stuff goes, I love "Life is a Pigsty."

Why Don't You Find Out For Yourself, Speedway and Spring Heel Jim are great, plus loads of good stuff on Your Arsenal.

i used to like more morrissey songs

but i guess i've just narrowed it down to vauxhall and i, which is a pretty standard choice for a best morrissey album

, and the Pet Shop Boys thrown in as guest ringers, it better be

the PSB are only on one track on Electronic

also Mind Bomb & Dusk are better than all of Morrissey's solo career. Dusk is a better-recorded band than anything else in Marr's career.

Morrissey has always been so over-rated. Morrissey's lyric-writing/band-leading peers in the 80s were like Robyn Hitchcock, Shane McGowan, Kirsty MacColl, Nick Cave, Mark E. Smith, Paul Heaton, Michael Stipe, Paddy McAloon etc. It's a matter of taste but imo they're all better lyricists than Morrissey.

the PSB are only on one track on Electronic

well, two if you count Tennant on "Getting Away With It."

Shane McGowan

lol def a good substitute of yr wanting to get away from problematic Moz

well, two if you count Tennant on "Getting Away With It."

non-album singles added to CD re-releases as bonus tracks don't count

(or in foreign territories)

Kirsty MacColl fronting The Smiths is like dream level perfection. Wish it could've happened.

As close as you're gonna get: https://www.discogs.com/Kirsty-MacColl-The-Real-MacColl/release/2324631

This is a great EP.

Johnny Marr played on half a dozen tracks on Kirsty MacColl's album Kite. Brilliant stuff.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfvVslecjwI

And he's playing on her version of You Just Haven't Earned It Yet Baby.

Forget how good Kite is. Need to get a copy as I think I only ever listened to my Dad's

non-album singles added to CD re-releases as bonus tracks don't count

― we used to get our kicks reading surfing MAGAzines (sic), Wednesday, May 23, 2018 12:59 PM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

sure, dude

Marr is on Walking Down Madison and Children Of The Revolution on Electric Landlady too (with The The's David Palmer on drums).

Morrissey is an utter thundercunt, but it's difficult for me to imagine The Smiths without him. It would depend on the vocalist and what they could come up with over the backing tracks.

Doesn't Marr still call "Dusk" the best album he's ever played on? Definitely the best sounding!

a good bit of Kite is the core of The The's band. James Eller, David Palmer, and Johnny Marr.

Didn't The The have ABC's rhythm section for a while? That's Palmer, right, and ... ?

Also:

"Get the Message" is consistently cited as a defining track by Electronic. Allmusic picks it as a highlight of the Electronic album in a 4/5 review,[14] while bbc.co.uk states that "the excellent 'Get the Message' still holds its own alongside the best of early '90s Mancunian tunes".[15] In 2007 Johnny Marr said it was "...maybe the track I'm most proud of out of my whole career",[16] and in June 2009 reiterated that it is "the best song I've written".[17]

This is my favorite version of "Walking Down Madison," the one I heard on college radio:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Irgsx58SkJI

The demo is better https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9JHeKyCoTw

a good bit of Kite is the core of The The's band. James Eller, David Palmer, and Johnny Marr.

Eller and Palmer are on four tracks together, Marr is on eight* overall (writing on two), they're all together on three: Free World, Mother's Ruin and Don't Come The Cowboy.

*nine for Alfred: three of the four Free World b-sides are bonus tracks on the 1989 CD

(the fourth, a Kirsty original, isn't even on the 2005 CD, which had NINE bonus tracks including remixes and demos, but is on the 2012 one, which has 17 on a second disc)

Marr is paired with Guy Pratt a bit on Kite and on Madison: good team, especially for that kind of deceptively tasteful pop.

And he's playing on her version of You Just Haven't Earned It Yet Baby.

Never realized that, but I've never owned a physical copy of the song. That really *is* about as close as it could come.

Morrissey really does lift a lot of MacColl's vocal quirks and melodic ideas, and I think she took a bit from him later on. Not really a symbiotic existence, but game recognizing game.

She didn't really cross paths with them until toward the end though, right? 1986/Bigmouth?

Yeah, she's on "Golden Lights."

And "Ask".

and those are all 1986.

Get The Message is a decent tune, but the actual song over it is pretty woeful. Awful words.. that chorus! And i mean get *what* message can i ask?

https://www.throwbacks.com/content/images/2017/06/Barney-the-Dinosaur.jpg

I have been particularly interested in Eletronic but went back to it following this thread and... I still don't really like it.
I don't hear much of Marr's greatness and input in the songs, including "Get the Message".
In a way, I find the album less interesting than it should be considering all the quality musicians/songwriters involved.
And nothing in it is better than New Order, Joy Division, the Smiths and PSB...
I guess it's just not for me !

Kirsty and Moz were great mates at the end. Heartbreaking bit in his book where he receives a postcard from her a week after she was killed, from the same holiday as.

Good old school ILM thread. Anyway, dud. Sounds like some tone deaf bar patron karaokeing over an overcompressed demo.

best English band of the 1980s no question

At this point Morrissey can go jump in a fire

xp: dude - Maiden?

Johnny Marr has gotten much better looking with time

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0783yB5_V4

He was pretty in The Smiths and beautiful in The The, that’s just a bad look for him

(his wellend / LG sideburnsy looks in the early ‘00s were p hideous too

he has weird hairdos

He's a British indie guy of a certain age, of course he has weird hairdos.

Does he, particularly?

I mean ... I'd be impressed with myself if I had *hair* at "a certain age".

Marr was the ideal straight boy whom his best friend crushes on.

Has anyone read his memoir?

xp one might even say the platonic ideal.

and may even return the devotion with a hand holding or kiss or three

I listened to his memoir on audiobook, as read by ... Johnny Marr! It was totally worth it. His refusal to throw Morrissey under the bus is kind of deep. And I will never understand why people take Oasis seriously. But I highly recommend it for every other reason (and maybe even for those).

Cool! Have you also liistened to Lol Tolhust's memoir, as read by ... Lol Tolhurst?

How about Bob Dylan's memoir, as read by ... Sean Penn?

Pete Townshend reading his.

Bits where you hear he's not taking things quite as seriously as the printed word seems.

Morrissey's memoir is read by the actor David Morrissey, which I hope is a nod to Spinal Tap.

Maybe Johnny could read Andrew Marr's memoirs when they're published.

This came up this last weekend on the baseball thread and wanted to share:

joe panik

― mookieproof, Friday, May 20, 2022 7:19 AM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Hang the DJ.

― clemenza, Friday, May 20, 2022 9:53 AM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

That double pay in Game 7 of the 2014 World Series will live for infinity for us Giant fans. Good luck in life Joe.

― Bee OK, Friday, May 20, 2022 3:32 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Panik on the street's of London...

I was a pretty big Smiths fan and even saw them three times but always hated that song. Yes, they were bonkers live, an experience of a lifetime.

― Bee OK, Friday, May 20, 2022 4:24 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

this remains one of the better fielding plays i've ever seen

― mookieproof, Friday, May 20, 2022 4:27 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

That was an outstanding play, I have never seen that before. He's was a great second baseman but his bat only lasted like rwo seasons. The Giants had to move on.

― Bee OK, Friday, May 20, 2022 4:48 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

The only Smiths song I love!

― clemenza, Friday, May 20, 2022 5:54 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

(I believe he played in Toronto for six or seven minutes.)

― clemenza, Friday, May 20, 2022 5:54 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Ya they got a decent return for him too iirc - Dickerson and Cimber

― FRAUDULENT STEAKS (The Cursed Return of the Dastardly Thermo Thinwall), Friday, May 20, 2022 5:59 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

i've been watching a dickerson this year. he got yepez'd

― Bruce Stingbean (Karl Malone), Friday, May 20, 2022 6:01 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

The only Smiths song I love!
Tastes, huh. To me it was the first song where it was the Smiths by the numbers. No originality to it and he is being a huge dick (with those lyrics). This was the same band that did brilliant songs like "Still Ill" and "The Queen is Dead?" No wonder they broke up, garbage.

― Bee OK, Friday, May 20, 2022 6:25 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

retire, morrissey

― Bruce Stingbean (Karl Malone), Friday, May 20, 2022 6:28 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

he played about 20 miles away from me last weekend in Pasadena for two nights via Cruel World. Yes, he needs to go away.

― Bee OK, Friday, May 20, 2022 6:32 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Bottom line is that I hate "Panic" in its paint by the numbers way mostly, best thing about that song is that it only lasts two minutes.

They were lightning in a bottle. My own personal experience, they were the band that spoke most directly to me at that particular time in my life (I was 18 when the first album came out). The Morrissey/Marr tension was what really made it work, and of course was also what made it all implode. None of them, including Moz, has done anything as great since the breakup, and now Moz and his big fucking mouth have come perilously close to trashing the legacy of one of the great bands of the age.

One thing, as noted several times upthread the rhythm section did not get nearly enough love. I still remember being joyfully astonished when I saw Sinead on her first U.S. tour and they were in her band.

Recently listened to some Smiths and the bass lines have an amazing musicality that you just don't hear that often.

Was a massive fan but it's not just Morrissey having a "big fucking mouth" - many of his current opinions are abhorrent.

Oh, no doubt, but with Morrissey you're never quite sure whether he really means what he says. I remember him saying all kinds of provocative shit back in the day, although, in the current context, I suppose that's irrelevant.