The Miracle of the Smiths

Also what was The Smith's legacy? Twee-core? C-86? (I think mainly not), Jarvis Cocker/Pulp?

Legacy? The Smiths were immensely popular amongst the people who would become the twee end of indie, and were a central inspiration for a generation of sensitive kids to form bands and write sensitive songs. You could argue whether that meant twee-core was the legacy of the Smiths either way. I think it's *a* legacy of the Smiths. Pulp another, without question I think.

I did love the Smiths very dearly once upon a time, but I balk at talk of them being a miracle. I can't remember thinking "that sounds like nothing I've ever heard" (except perhaps on first hearing "How Soon Is Now"). I can remember thinking that some of their records were unbearably exciting. (If this comment bears the 'taint' of my not being a raving Smiths enthusiast, PF, please feel free to ignore it).

>>> I do think the band's relationship with / musical break from punk is crucial

OK - I'll buy it, though I'm not sure I get it yet.

>>> and the reading of "Panic" which various people seem to be reaching for above can be thought of as a punk story too: in the lyric you see a wave of unspecified panic crystallise into a musical battle, the fear and confusion of the initial verses collapses into the safety / sterility of a polemic reaching no further than the DJ booth.

This is a fine argument.

Weird complicating Pulp fact = Pulp started before Smiths? - or sth absurd like that?

>>> I did love the Smiths very dearly once upon a time, but I balk at talk of them being a miracle.

I meant 'miracle' in a non-evaluative sense - which I know sounds oxymoronic. I'm sure you think that my attempt to be non-evaluative is 'tainted' by evaluation. Probably it is, and possibly you think that's OK (possibly inevitable) anyway. I don't mind balking at (talk of) miracles, but in pop terms I can't think of that many things that deserve the term better than this lot (but possibly nothing does), whether in evaluative or non-evaluative terms (assuming that either category exists).

>>> (If this comment bears the 'taint' of my not being a raving Smiths enthusiast, PF, please feel free to ignore it).

Oh, I did.

Also compare Devoto's famous "I am angry, I am ill, and I'm as ugly as sin" line from Magazine's "Song From Under the Floorboards" with Morrissey's later preoccupations with illness and ugliness.

I go for 'a major incident in pop history' to describe the imapct of The Smiths rather than any definition of 'miracle'. Yet, I'm still struggling to understand what of consequence, if anything, they left behind. Here's my best shot at asking the question - "What did the advent of Morrissey allow artists to now do (which no-one did before)?" 'Scuse the bad grammar.

Doc C says, what did M leave behind? - etc. It's a very good question - BUT, can't a band / artist / whatever (in any medium) be 'great' and still NOT have a great influence? (cf, as always, Eliot's review of Ulysses, on this point.)

My feeling is that he made possible a more conversational style - he opened the door to new kinds of verbal awkwardness. But that is not meant to imply that there was no conversation or awkwardness pre-M.

Damian - I agree re. the chronology, but not re. musicianship. Marr was very much a 'musician' - not just a three-chord hack. There is always a sense, I think, of him 'doing what's right for the record'. You may have a point re. lyric-determines-length-of-track - but then, what about all those records where that doesn't apply? = That Joke / HSIN? / Queen Is Dead etc. I don't know - your argument is good, but I think Marr *could* easily have gone on and played fabulous 5-minute outros - *and I wish he had...*

Is that YOU over there in the gloom, Pinefox?

it's presumably a glancing sideways allusion to William Wordsworth, and it says a lot about the culture Morrissey came from: romantic fantasies of pre-industrial Britain, while superficially appealing, ultimately unsettle him as much as the erosion of the Industrial Revolution legacy and its replacement by rootless consumerism, because both present a vision of a parallel universe in which the culture he came from would never have existed (Manchester is often cited as "the first industrial city" and it was certainly an irrelevant backwater before the flight from the land enabled it to rapidly become an economic powerhouse). visions of the pre-industrial world erode and threaten Morrissey's urban-socialist-collectivist past, and the creation of a deunionised Manchester where Janet Jackson is a more important cultural figure than J.B. Priestley (the mortal fear which drives the main narrative to "Panic") presents the clear message of NO FUTURE. it's as if, amid bleak premonitions of his future, he's dismissing a possible solace because of the threat it poses to his pride in his past.

why don't people focus on that line in particular? it's pretty much the epitome of a deeply conservative Old Labour mindset, as though he sort of wants to find solace in an unchanging, utopian, monocultural vision of the countryside as a place to escape his hated deindustrialisation and decollectivisation and consumerisation and all-pervasive cultural hybridisation in the erstwhile socialist heartlands from whence he came, but that very Old Labour tribalism stops him (all the neo-ruralists in the last 35 years of pop culture came from pretty middle-class backgrounds AFAIK, and I find it very hard to imagine Fairport Convention coming even from the more salubrious parts of Greater Manchester, the equivalent suburbs to the Wimbledons and Muswell Hills from whence they actually came. as for such a band coming from Sheffield or Newcastle? utterly unthinkable, certainly in that generation, before the Industrial Revolution legacy crumbled and the new pick-and-mix rootlessness set in.)

a few contenders:

Wham!, "Bad Boys"

Bros, "When Will I Be Famous"

Happy Mondays, "Step On" (also Mancunian of course so probably the most obvious)

The Brotherhood, "Punk Funk"

Clipse, "Grindin'" (Westwood: "CHEETHAM HILL MASSIVE!!!")

"Panic" is a *weird* record, isn't it? Bloody weird, to be honest. Bizarrely, its emotional extremity and call-to-arms reminds me now of Eminem's "Lose Yourself", but ***from the opposite starting point***. It's almost an anti-pop pop record, in that it's an explicit refusal of the cultural exchanges that were already, by 1986, forming 90% of the Top 40. In fact, it's probably the best possible candidate for Tom's "Berlin WHAT?" thread, not in terms of actual reference points per se, just the ethos that formed it.

I recently said (not on here IIRC) that Wham!'s "I'm Your Man" was to Thatcherism what something like Elgar's "Dream of Gerontius" was to romantic Toryism: the epitome of the ethos expressed in music. If pure Thatcherism said "fuck you, High Tories *and* puritan socialists" ... well, it was revulsion at hearing "I'm Your Man" in a thoroughly inappropriate context which inspired "Panic" in the first place, so I always imagine Prince Charles hearing Diana playing it and getting TOTALLY PISSED OFF (remember his expression when she dragged him along to see Michael Jackson at Wembley in 1988? something like that).

I'm waffling, aren't I? But "I'm Your Man" and "Panic" = the Thatcher and Scargill of pop, surely, the radical of the right and the desperate nostalgic dreamer of the left.

Hey Pine! Are you going to the ILX Christmas thing?

God ... I loved that period of ILM, even if it went over certain heads :).

oh, and Gareth to thread!

Robin C: can't seem to remember what heads you mean - not that I expect you to mention them by name.

Mick Middles' book (yes, I know it's terrible) insists that when Morrissey & Marr started out, their plan was to become a songwriting team, not a band. Does anyone know if that's true?

This may be part mythology, but according to both "The Severed Alliance" and "The Songs that Saved Your Life" Marr went and knocked on Morrissey's door to introduce himself because he was fascinated with the Leiber/Stoller story/ethos (which mentor and later manager Joe Moss introduced him to) and wanted to carry on in that tradition. Of course there was a go-between, Stephen Pomfret, who had been in a band with Morrissey called the Nosebleeds, who was at first allotted a space in the new band and then dismissed once his work was provided. Marr was five years younger than Morrissey, so they traveled in slightly different circles, though they had met once before, at a (Buzzcocks?) concert. Morrissey was also very interested in the great songwriting tradition, Brill, and especially 60s girl groups, and at their meeting Marr was sure to play up his interest in that area also. Marr later disdained Morrissey's girl pop covers as the worst things they'd ever done though. I think the thought was that, if they couldn't make it as a band (because they couldn't find the right other members), they could at least write songs for others. This is evidenced in their frequent pleas/campaign to Sandie Shaw to let them write a song for her. But it didn't seem to go much further than that.

When I played a Smiths bootleg that I had just picked up, Gareth said, "The Smiths sound like they're all playing a different song at the same time." I had never thought of it that was, but given their background it makes sense. Marr had a dilettante background, tons of different influences, but had been most recently in a funk band with Rourke called Freak Party. And Joyce came from a punk band. These influences had to be stifled to an extent to please Morrissey. Toward the end, Marr was even fed up with their "jangly" ethos. At the time Marr was working in at X clothes shop and meeting a lot of people, creating a lot of opportunities for himself. His previous bands hadn't worked out so he set off to find himself a lead singer. Morrissey was sitting at home collecting unemployment and writing fanzine type books about The New York Dolls and James Dean. In progress were books about 60s girl groups and "Exit Smiling," a book about underrated Hollywood movie stars. These latter were shelved once the Smiths began. Apparently the songwriting process worked like this: Marr, and later his producers, would work out the tune, and then Morrissey would add music. But it wasn't that simple, if Morrissey wasn't pleased, he would ask for the melody/mood to be more like "this" and Marr was left guessing at and then striving for what would please Morrissey. One song, apparently, "Draize Train," Morrissey regarded so lightly that he could never make lyrics for it, so this was left as an instrumental. As others have mentioned above, Morrissey's very unusual phrasing would have the band revising the tune even more.

Morrissey was also apparently jealous of any of Marr's relationships outside of their own. This led to first manager and Marr friend Joe Moss leaving the group, and seemed to affect their management throughout. Morrissey didn't trust anyone in control of his business, nor was he comfortable executing the decisions himself, as much as he was making them. This left Marr in the unfortunate position of doing all of Morrissey's dirty work. Morrissey did seem to have a very crafty business head: the deal he worked with Rough Trade was 50/50 (with only himself and Marr as beneficiaries of course. He was also apparently stingy in paying his roadies. The only way Joe Moss got paid after he left was from Marr's pocket. The Smiths were virtually unmanageable, and this may explain their haphazard single/record releases. Though Rough Trade must have something to do with this also. Certain songs that should have been released as singles never were, or were too late, as "How Soon is Now," and tons of single were thrown out to the public, and then collected on a compilation to the hold the fans over until the next proper album. I don't know if this is common in the UK? This may have also reflected Morrissey/Marr's
reevaluation of the 45 as superior to the album and their belief in the themselves/desire to be foremost pop chartists. The band also had serious problems with their producers. Marr bonded heavily with John Porter, and the two of them got very into adding guitar upon guitar into the mix, which Morrissey wasn't very happy with. They were guitar geeks and spent tons of time in the studio messing around. Morrissey was a purist and wanted to tone down any technological influence, "Hand in Glove" was given it's clubby sound purely by distortion, a trick the band used to get around Morrissey's edicts. Morrissey preferred Stephen Street as a producer, who he later worked with at the beginning of his solo career, and I think Marr just learned how to be a producer himself to get around Morrissey's jealousy.

What I'm trying to get at is the all-consuming fear and loathing of women and heterosexual acts on that first record. Most explicit in "Pretty Girls Make Graves," but hinted in the squalid depiction of sexuality in "Miserable Lie" and pretty much all over the place

I think the loathing isn't specific to "heterosexual" acts, just sexual. The "Pretty Girls Make Graves" is another plundering--this time from Jack Kerouak's "Dharma Bums" and probably appropriated for its sense of futility and poetic drama rather than a specific misogyny. Morrissey was extremely "pro-feminist" as a youth -- he went to meet Patty Smith (through fanzine connections) wearing a button that said "Women's Liberation." He apparently also walked around Manchester with a button reading, "Lesbian Liberation," which could not have gone over well in those days. Morrissey was very influenced by the "Fourth Sex" regarding Jack Nichol's "Men's Liberation" as his Bible. Elizabeth Brownmiller's "Against Our Will" and similar pro-feminist books as Suzy mentioned above were also very influential. "He wanted to get beyond stereotypical male and female roles. I think "Miserable Lie" addresses the futility of relationships in general. The singer said a very interesting thing on the recent doc "Importance of Being Morrissey." This is just a paraphrase, but his interviewer asked him, "Would you ever consider living with somebody?" M.: "No, I can't imagine how that would even happen really." Interview: "Have you ever considered it?" M: "No, I don't think human beings are meant to live together. I don't think people get on really."

Side note: When Marr left the band, the Smiths asked Roddy Frame to replace him. He refused.

It is the next logical step.

"Yes, I'm THAT good."

(Actually, regular reader/sometime poster Melinda Mess-Injure is going to be presenting at this!)

Yes they were a miracle.

I'm gonna have to kick your arses in a minute with Smiths talk. Just warning you.

"The death of a disco dancer
Well, it happens a lot 'round here
And if you think Peace
Is a common goal
That goes to show
How little you know

The death of a disco dancer
Well, I'd rather not get involved
I never talk to my neighbour
I'd rather not get involved "

Prescient, yes?

Just read this thread, really quite something, anyway there's a couple of question I would like to ask relating to the issues raised in this thread, there is talk of Morrissey and The Smith's "legacy". I was wondering how peoples view had changed taking into account his perhaps nostalgia based comeback and obviously Smiths / Moz indebted yet achingly conservative bands reclaiming the indie / NME world. There's a notion put forward here that provincial Britain as Moz understood no longer exists but these bands seem like a studied attempt to speak to / about provincial Britain in the way Moz did. Though The Libertines who I am thinking of her got derailed by their own myth pretty quickly without bring anything particularly interesting to the table. Whilst perhaps someone like The Streets does talk about provincial Britain in a way that doesn't reek of conservative nostalgia though of course it could be argued he is part of a very different tradition and a completely different vision of Britain. The lyrics of many You Are The Quarry songs suggest that Britain no longer exists for Morrissey as anything but memory and pastiche (Come Back To Camden, Irish Blood, English Heart)? But was it ever anything but that? This is reminding me of the thread on Bob Dylan if Dylan is the link between two eras is Morrissey a sort of link between two significantly different epochs of British cultural history, from mining to malls or something. From tin mines to Tescos? Corner shops to Co-Op?
― elwisty (elwisty), Saturday, 19 February 2005 19:06 (3 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^so glad this guy stopped posting

elwisty a villa fan by any chance?

It's the other one, but I get them confused all the time as well tbh.

the miracle of this thread. best ilm thread ever?

One of those great old threads where I look through it years later hoping, "Man, I hope I didn't say something really stupid during this terrific discussion." And I didn't say anything at all, thankfully.

TBH I only recently started watching footage of early Smiths concerts. It is kind of incredible that this man was a pop star:

Not even like charmingly Michael Stipe-ish geekiness.

(Like, speaking as someone who's pretty awkward and unco-ordinated but harbours no ambitions to pop stardom.)

Just academic stardom.

This thread was also amazingly self-renewing -- it had Nabisco, Dr C and Carmody writing great screeds early on, but years later the marvellous Mary could still pop up and write an even bigger one.

I think elwisty got the return and ? keys on his computer confused.