some questions about The Smiths

[oh oooh]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'?

What's your favourite Smiths' song? and your least-favourite?

Did they manage to put out a great album?

Where would you rank them with the other Manc greats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)?

How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say?

[loveless]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'?


I heard "How Soon is Now" in 1984. Saw it on MTV and heard it a couple more times 'in the wild'.

I absolutely fucking loved it - it's a really intriguing track, sonically. 


What's your favourite Smiths' song? and your least-favourite?


Oh, jeez - probably something like "Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want". Something like "There is a Light..." would be a close runner up. I'm mad for them, so - the top tier houses a lot of songs.

Least favorite? You know - they have some real dreck in there amongst the gems. Virtually anything from Strangeways (and that era) is unlistenable for me. They got slick in a really unappealing way. Morrissey's solo career seemed like just more of that "low mojo bullshit", minus Marr's jangle. 

Let's say "Girlfriend in a Coma" for "worst".


Did they manage to put out a great album?



I think the debut is a bonafide classic. It has a real sort of either springlike or autumnal feel - I picture a long country drive on a lovely, leafy day. There are some gorgeous moments there - "Pretty Girls...", "Suffer Little Children".

I don't think any of the other records (comps included) come anywhere near it in terms of mood/consistency (though Queen.. is close)




Where would you rank them with the other Manc greats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)?


Top of the heap. Right up there with Buzzcocks. The others you mention somewhere below.


How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say?

For sure. They aren't going anywhere. I meet people all the time from different areas of music (death metal, hip hop) who are awed by them. Young people? I don't really know - but...fuck...in a world where we've got "the whole history of music at our fingertips". I would surely think that they are nearly as heavily exhumed as, say, Led Zeppelin or Prince.

[Reactionary Rage]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'?

I bought the Singles compilation in 1995 so I would have been 16. I must have been aware of them before then but I don’t recall too much prior to this. As a, yawn, sensitive, shy, socially awkward teenager you can imagine the impact it had. To use a hopelessly work out Smiths cliché these songs absolutely said something to me about my life and like all adolescent crushes/obsessions/loves it was heady and consuming.

What's your favourite Smiths' song? and your least-favourite?

I don’t know about favourite but one that I always come back to is the Hatful of Hollow version of Back To The Old House. I think it’s absolutely beautiful and as a perfect synthesis of Morrissey and Marr as there ever was. Marr’s circular, repeated guitar part not only perfectly mirrors the singers desire to revisit the past but also how such memories and romantic obsessions can trap the person in a perpetual, unsatisfied loop of their own creation. Morrissey returned to this theme of unrequited love a lot – in fact nearly all of his love songs have this dynamic - but also the idea of love as illusion is important here too (There Is A Light…. Is another obvious example of this)

Morrissey’s lyrics represent an invocation, at once personal (the boy/girl who cycled by and beget all their dreams) but also represent something deeper and more elegiacally profound: the nostalgic longing to revisit ones past. But there’s a mature sting in the tail that stops the song from falling into maudlin regret. It also implicitly understands the pain of revisiting the past and the need to leave such memories, as imperfect and unsatisfactory as they may be alone. There is a very human beauty in that that has always resonated with me in a profound way.

It’s a simple song but one that cuts deeper than much of their work for me. Marr’s acoustic guitar too simply sounds wonderful and the combined effect is incantational almost, weaving the songs magic spell on the listener in the same way the person who cycled by all those years ago cast their unwitting spell on the singer. You’d have to assume that all of this is very much by design rather than chance.

The songs magic is even more affecting for me personally because at some point it became associated in my head with a girl I used to fancy at school. Her name was Lindsay and she was a year younger than me and I thought she was absolutely beautiful. She used to live near a friend of mines so I would see walking to school in the morning and I would sigh in that way you do as a lovestruck teenager. I would have been about 14. Anyway, whenever I hear this song I always think about her.

Some other personal favourites:

Reel Around The Fountain
Well I Wonder
The Boy With The Thorn In His Side
There Is A Light….
 
Least favourite? Golden Lights is utter fluff.

Did they manage to put out a great album? 

I don’t think so although they certainly came close. It annoys me a bit that they never quite managed to produce that one stellar work they could comfortably had done at most points in their career but as the years have gone by I view artists more and more in terms of songs rather than albums and they had enough great songs to justify all the hype. Sometimes in my head though I do imagine The Queen Is Dead minus fluff like Mr Shankly and including, say, Rubber Ring or summat but you can’t have everything. It’s funny how Hatful is seemingly seen as a genuine“album these days, maybe as a consequence of this dissatisfaction with their actual albums. It’s a stellar work anyway. 

Where would you rank them with the other Manc greats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)?

The best by a distance.

How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say?

I have no idea.  Maybe Morrissey's antics have removed some of the shine for younger people. 

[Deleted]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'?:
Heard 'Hatful of Hollow' when I was eleven and was hooked...They were totally different than anything else I had explored up to that point...

What's your favourite Smiths' song? and your least-favourite?
Favorite: "Cemetry Gates" Least: "Golden Lights"

Did they manage to put out a great album?
All four proper releases are great...

Where would you rank them with the other Manc greats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)?
JD and The Smiths rank in my top 10, so...

How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say?
Not a clue...

[DarknessFish]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'?
No idea. I was 7 or 8 when they first came to prominence, so they probably didn't impinge much upon my consciousness. I guess I'd have been aware of them. I never really paid them much attention after, either, Morrissey's voice was too annoying, and jangle-pop never interested me much.

What's your favourite Smiths' song? and your least-favourite?
I guess "There is a Light...", it's got that genuine bit of wit and sparkle about the lyric. "What Difference Does it Make?" also really appeals for it's twanginess.

Did they manage to put out a great album?
Nah

Where would you rank them with the other Manc greats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)?
Joy Division would be top of that tree, by a distance, and I guess the rest are of a level. All have done songs I like, but not enough to really delve particularly deeply into their back catalogue.

How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say?
I think they'll always be there in the critics lists and things, so anyone young intending to delve through the history of indie bands will likely get into them at some point. They're not likely to strike a chord with those less interested in music geekery. Morrissey's continuing solo material is so piss-poor as to be wrecking a lot of chance of anyone delving backwards though, and his being a fey Farage isn't helping much either.

[rayge]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'?
going purely on what was written in reviews and interviews, I bought Hand in Glove when it came out and subsequently bought everything they released the week of release of them the week of release. I was a big fan throughout their existence, but have not really listened to much in the last quarter-century. I was in my thirties, so never identified with the lyrics, although I enjoyed the writerly aspect of them, and Morrissey's dry wit and stage persona (as seen on TV), but enjoyed the music the three others made - Joyce and Rourke got a really rough deal in my opinion.

What's your favourite Smiths' song? and your least-favourite?
This is tricky. I liked the IDEA of them basically more than distinguishing between songs, and this grew more pronounced as their output grew. This process tends to apply to a lot of prolific acts that I like, which is why I tend to value most their early material, because I lived with it longer in isolation, pored over it, rather than play it three ties and file it, so I'm going to say my favourites are probably Hand in Glove, This Charming Man and Reel around the Fountain. There's a fair few album tracks that should never have seen the light of day, could be any of those for the worst, or least good, but Frankly, Mr Shankly comes to mind.

Did they manage to put out a great album?
I don't think there have been 30 albums I've ever heard that I would consider great, and none of the Smiths' efforts come close. The first album and HoH I thought were pretty good, the others, not so much. But, as I may have mentioned before, singles, or tracks/songs if you prefer, have always been the currency of my listening pleasure, so what do I know?

Where would you rank them with the other Manc greats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)?
What, no Freddie and the Dreamers :-)?

I like all of those bands, plus a few others, quite a lot. Only London has produced more fine English bands over the five decades I've been paying attention. At one time or another, all of them have been favourite bands. Nowadays, ranked on whole single tracks legacy, I'd say
New Order
Buzzcocks
Joy Division
Smiths
Fall
Stone Roses

but it's very close.

How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say?

Haven't a clue. I don't know anybody in their teens or early twenties. L9ke others here, I do think that Morrissey has shat on their legacy.

[Reasonable good Nick]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'?

In high school, I'd have been 14 I suppose - so that would have been 1987, towards the end of the time they still existed as a working band. There were a couple of lads I knew who were obsessive Smiths fans, one of them gave me a C90 to try and convert me. It didn't work, I was too into metal at the time and they didn't appeal to me at all. It wasn't until 1991 that I got into The Smiths and Moz's solo stuff. But at that point they quickly became one of my favourite bands.




What's your favourite Smiths' song? and your least-favourite?

There are so many great ones, but This Charming Man and The Boy With The Thorn In His Side have always been favourites. And the first lp version of What Difference Does It Make? - that one is a monster tune.

Least favourite? I've always loathed Shakespear's Sister, a pointless dog of a song.




Did they manage to put out a great album?

There's not one that I love unconditionally, but you could easily make four album's worth of great songs out of their whole oeuvre.




Where would you rank them with the other Manc greats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)?

Below Joy Division and The Fall, but a fair way above anyone else.




How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say?

I see the odd student around the campus wearing a Smiths t-shirt, but not all that often, and perhaps strangely, you don't seem to see them much around Manchester these days - certainly not compared to the frequency with which you saw them when I was a student, but then that's 25-30 years ago. But who knows what people listen to at home?

I don't think either of my kids listen to them, and they're aged 14 and 19, both into music in a fairly big way.

[Reasonable good Nick]

On general Smiths-related stuff, I saw Johnny Marr at a Kraftwerk gig a couple of years ago. Tiny little bloke.

Also, my office is about half a mile from Salford Lads' Club, and I live in Stretford. The house where Moz grew up isn't far away from our home. It's far nicer than he makes out, quite a decent-sized semi-detached place with a garden, on a quiet suburban road. To hear him whinge on you'd think he'd lived in a Dickensian slum.

[Reasonable good Nick]

Oh yeah, and I work in the building where this gig took place.

The Smiths at the University of Salford 1986

[guye]

I actually bought the first single, based on the buzz... I didn't like it much, but This Charming Man impressed.  I never saw them live.

I followed them through their career. I liked the singles better than the albums. For the life of me, I don't know why The Queen is Dead is rated so much higher than the others, although it may be a tad more consistent.

I don't have any real favorite songs by The Smiths.  I don't know how lasting they are.   I haven't listened to anything by The Smiths in ages and if I put them on my wife would probably give me some shit about it.

[Reasonable good Nick]

Jan 29, 2019 14:14:09 GMT guye said:

I haven't listened to anything by The Smiths in ages and if I put them on my wife would probably give me some shit about it.

Mrs C read Moz's autobiography not long after it came out, and every couple of pages, when he'd written something especially egregious, she'd slam it down and give vent to a few choice obscenities, usually involving the word 'twat'.

I said, "you know you don't have to read it, don't you?" 

[Deleted]

Tell us when you first heard them - how did you react? was it in 'real time'? TOTP, some dickhead who needed some brylcreem, waving some flowers or roses about in the air.

What's your favouriteSmiths' song?  How soon is now.

Did they manage to put outa great album? I guessing they did, they seemed lauded enough.

Where would you rank them with the other Mancgreats (JD, Fall, Buzzcocks, Roses...)? Probably in the top 3 i'd imagine. Wankers.

How do you think (or maybe you know) they're regarded by young people today? are they a 'lasting' band, would you say? Hardly known Iwould imagine. Ionce asked a teenager about stones roses, and hey looked at me blankly. Little uneducated shit.

[Deleted]

Kind of an interesting note. I bought those first Smiths albums, and my brother who's a very good guitarist, and was a devotee of Jimmy Page, Eddie Van Halen, Brian Robertson, Angus Young, and guitarists of those sorts, was really impressed by Johnny Marr.

It surprised the heck outta me when he told me how much he liked the guitarist in the Smiths.

He really was an inspired guitarist during that time.

[Admin]

Yes - Marr really was incredible. The number of really clever and memorable riffs - and the variety of styles he managed (it wasn't all "jangly indie") - in just four or five years was staggering. I think he's up there with Page. And he's a good sort, too.

He's been touring his latest album recently, which is supposedly his best as a solo artist. A mate saw him in Newcastle and said he picked out the opening bars of 'This Charming Man' at one point and the crowd went absolutely fucking WILD - and then he stopped. It's such an intricate piece that he couldn't manage the vocal and the arpeggio at the same time, understandably. He's good, but he's not that good!

BUT - apparently on the night AFTER my mate saw him, he pulled that one out of the bag again and actually played the song all the way through, his second guitarist taking over when Marr sang. And his version beat the version that Morrissey's been blustering through over the last few years by some distance.

[loveless]

Jan 29, 2019 13:41:02 GMT Reasonable good Nick said:

 I've always loathed Shakespear's Sister, a pointless dog of a song.

Yeah, I was stunned to learn that this was an actual single in the middle of an otherwise fairly incredible run.

Makes me think "They must not know the difference between killer and filler."