Ah yes, pop figures, tis true - I indeed implied the existence of a three-part emissary on all things Mozness, and it was not a miserable lie. Au contraire, chums, and here we are again on the crazy, draizey train (make that the gravy train!) that was 80s alternative music - Manchester style.
Ol' Doc Morrissey is having a smashing kick-off to 2014, what with his autobiography riding high on serial put-downs, and now the announcement that he is back in the saddle once again, so to speak, with a spanking new two-record deal inked with prestigious Capitol Records of Hollywood. Not a bad start to the new year at all, and one can just picture the handsome devil prancing around his country estate with armfuls of gladioli, singing "Oops, I did it again" by our Britney!
The book is actually a very stimulating read, though one does tend to get bogged down a little by all the Frank McCourt-like elaboration on the poverty and hopelessness of life in those times, notwithstanding the fact that Manchester was not the Ireland of McCourt's upbringing. It was almost inevitable that Moz would paint a purposefully wrinkled canvas and weave an image-rich tapestry of an almost other-worldly dystopian Manchester; one that made the word "bleak" seem all warm and cosy in comparison. As fun as that is, my dear boy (Mr. M), I can quite guarantee you that we have all flicked forward several pages at a time to see when we were getting to sink our teeth into the meat of the matter - Der Smythes.
Along with the head of Elton John on a plate, this would also be a case of meat not being murder, apart maybe from the fact that Morrissey chopped up the meat of the band and spat it back out lifeless one hell of a long time ago. But the point is - the great majority of us loafing oafs (i.e. not who Moz wrote the book for) bought the book almost exclusively to hear about bigmouth's take on the entire Smythes affair - start to finish. Eventually, and sure enough, bigmouth indeed strikes again!
It takes some 145 pages to get to the mythic meeting of the big M&M, and even when it does, it's related in a somewhat disappointing but totally realistic fashion of how such things actually happen - i.e. there's no lightning bolt that hit Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall as His Miz and Mr. Marr shook hands - and you can't help but wonder if they ever did. Shake hands, that is.
Oh, I have a sudden flashback of a scary character in Alan Bleasdale's brilliant "Boys from the Blackstuff", who used to walk up to young men in pubs and demand that they "shake hands". It was always a total treat to see the hard men crumble to the ground, as "Shake Hands" shook them to within an inch of their lives. Hilarious! It's highly likely that Morrissey won't mind this interjection because it's precisely the kind of indisputably British working class TV production that he seems to remember fondly - and furthermore it was shown the very same year the lads got together: 1982.
Not to be confused with "that other 1982" which also ironically happens to be stamped with the Penguin logo, but is such a staggeringly inconsequential '82 in comparison that it will not in any way be associated with the musical cold fusion that was Morrissey and Marr; that was a spectacularly explosive synthesis of quite nuclear proportions. At the risk of being pilloried for a Moz-like nonchalance, need I also point out that one is published on the Penguin Classics imprint, and the other isn't? ;)
Trophy time? Again? Alrighty, I can oblige a second time, pop figures! It says something that a mere month from seeing Der Smythes at Westfield College in God-knows-where Square, that our next meeting was to be held in the much more prestigious and significantly more cavernous confines of the legendary Electric Ballroom in good old Camden Town. This venue is right next door to the Camden Town tube station and although perennially under threat of closure, I believe it has had a few reprieves and the doors still open to this day. As you can see, prices had risen steeply inside a mere month also, from two to three pounds to see them! Shocking, if only because it also restates how long ago we must be talking about! But this was another landmark early ('83) show by the band, commenced by Morrissey bounding on stage with a greeting of "Hello, chums!" to the many (new) faithful.
One of the reasons I have such fond memories of that show was that it was the only time I can remember hearing the divine "Accept Yourself" live. Unusually, at the first encore, Moz asked for suggestions, and there was this guy beside us who was about to burst a blood vessel screaming out the name of the song. It seemed so unlikely a choice and yet I had never heard it live myself, so I joined in, albeit in a less apoplectic fashion! I cannot believe that he could possibly have been heard above the fracas, but in a case of truly divine intervention, he got his wish. And I got mine. It was a great show, even if it felt a tad diluted in the prematurely large venue for a band still being seen in close proximity most of the time, and lest we forget, a band that had not yet released any album. Yes, my dear Smithsonians, all of this was before the technically flawed but artistically rich debut "The Smiths" was released, which was probably a very good thing!
Why? Well, because it allowed us insiders to hear these songs performed how they were intended to be heard, which was a Godsend because the studio versions of those songs were a sad misrepresentation of their live selves at the hands of one John Porter, whose muted, muddled, muddied and mangled recordings/mixes of them was nothing short of a disgrace; or that's how it felt to those of us in the know, us who had seen the live fire being reduced to nothing but a few bright sparks.
I had never heard what Morrissey's opinions on the debut fiasco were, and it was gratifying to read that we are in almost total agreement on it, as clarified by his comments on various songs. Porter committed many a sin on that record, perhaps the biggest of which (for me) was on a live favourite, the peerless "I Don't Owe You Anything". Live, it was all staccato guitar chords and punctuational drumbeats, overlaid by an aching, poignant and classic Morrissey lyric/vocal - irresistible if only by nature of it's relative tenderness and musical restraint, and the contemplative effect it seemed to have on us all.
"Too freely on your lips, words prematurely sad, oh but I know what will make you smile tonight...
Life is never kind, life is never kind, oh but I know what will make you smile tonight..."
The recorded version of this live showstopper was reminiscent of one of those jazz/country husband and wife duos playing weddings at the local hotel or doing karaoke versions of the old classics unnoticed in the local pub on a Sunday night, beside the dartboard. The song has this morose, coma-inducing keyboard playing that quite literally sucked out whatever life it had in it upon entering the studio to such an extent that someone should have told John Porter that "I don't owe you anything" - for destroying it.
As far as I am aware, Mr. Porter was never charged for his crimes, but in line with Morrissey's distaste for great miscarriages of justice, perhaps he could persuade the High Court to put Porter into the stocks outside Rough Trade Records, and allow the public to vent their displeasure via the time-proven punishment of rotten eggs? Morrissey would approve, I am quite sure, especially if his Lordship, Maxwell Carrington QC, would deem it necessary to put Geoff Travis into the stocks alongside Porter so that they could pay together!
But you know? At the risk of committing Smithsonian heresy, and perhaps even incurring the wrath of His Mizzery, it is my humble opinion that no one truly understood how to capture the phenomenon that was The Smiths live, in the studio. I can hear the screams and howls of disapproval, but I remain firmly in the belief that they rarely transcended the sterility and mechanics of the studio and got to the place where the songs got to, live. This problem was less evident on later records, but I personally feel that they still may not have recorded their best record.
Somewhat ironically, for they were not a classical stadium band by any means, I feel that The Smiths were too big for the confines of a recording studio. They were caged animals in the studio; Morrissey and Marr, at least, were designed to be able to stretch out and mark their territory, like the (musical) beasts they were, and they were meant to be in front of an audience of admirers. Studios just seemed to compress them, almost like taking their 16-track live sound and bouncing it back down to 4-track - details were lost.
Of course, this could be the curse of someone who saw them too many times, live, always pre-release for any given album, so all the songs had been heard in their live format beforehand. This is not always a good thing, and I am sure the same arguments come up for those who see a film before reading the book, as opposed to those who read the book first, and then see the film. There are inevitable shouting matches about which is best.
Anyway, there are rare examples of where it was captured perfectly, and my rather shocking example of that would be the sublime "This Night Has Opened My Eyes". A magnificent distillation of who and what they were, but perhaps shocking in that it is hardly one of their better known songs, and additionally it was not recorded on any official Smiths album. As far as I can remember, it was laid down at the BBC for a John Peel session, and I was one of very few who actually had it. Imagine! A Smiths rarity captured late at night when most were asleep, and in those days there was no easy way to get it, but all that was ruined by the "Hatful of Hollow" compilation release which jumped on the money-spinning bandwagon and published my bejewelled rarities. Yes, I want Geoff Travis in those stocks also, Mr. Morrissey!
In any case, it was somewhat comforting to know that Morrissey also felt the same way as me about various studio recordings, as outlined in the book, but the music soon takes a back seat to being taken to court by Rourke and Joyce. Once Mozzer does get to the legal shenanigans between himself and the others. well, quite typically it takes up some 40 pages worth of his life. The put-downs come thick and fast, and are razor sharp in effect.
Although other writers are credited for being his major influences, it's undeniable that the ghost of Wilde has passed through Morrissey's hallways on regular occasions. Yes, he may have gotten his two line non-sequitur lyrical style from others, but the barbs, and the sharp points, the cutting edge and the out-and-out put-downs are pure Oscar Wilde. In many ways, Morrissey's entire autobiugraphy, or at least the part dealing with The Smiths, is in fact his very own De Profundis. Morrissey's gaol (prison) being in his case, well, himself. He is incarcerated by being himself, with himself, for all eternity, it seems.
Although Mike Joyce surely was no Lord Alfred Douglas to Morrissey's Wilde, I think most of us know that it's all about Johnny Marr; he was the lost lover to whom Morrissey gave his heart and soul, which was then cruelly wrenched from within, and it was the loss of Marr that ripped Morrissey's world apart, and that ultimately led to the legal battle with the other two Smiths. Morrissey's professional life is in many ways one big (occasionally twisted) love letter to Marr, and you can just sense the age and regret bubbling under the surface. He won't admit that of course, but you can see it behind the eyes, if you don't get distracted by what's coming out his mouth.
It's highly telling that Morrissey frequently refers to The Smiths as 'The Smiths', when it comes to discussion of anything pertaining to legal matters. Meaning, the world knew them as a four piece rock band comprising Moz, Marr, Rourle and Joyce, but in Morrissey's mind the entity for all legal and contractual purposes was only Morrissey&Marr. In the pop world one could collectively call them The Smiths, but when it came to who controlled the money then the entity was known as 'The Smiths' - i.e. not the real Smiths.
There was an interesting and telling song by a very under-the-radar 90s outfit known as Red Lemon, which I think I first heard at The Hand & Cradle, near Covent Garden, but although it was not well known it is widely believed to have been a take on the big man, during those times. I include some lyrics from the song for illustration:
" Commonwealth Hall, Cartwright Gardens
Took me to the place
Where I first saw, your face
The one that would become
The face of the Eighties
The friend at hand, Square nowhere
I was just no one
But before that year was done
I knew you were the one
Face of the Eighties
But nobody could have guessed
That it was money
Not your shoes, or friends
With which you were concerned
Face of the Eighties"
Although it was (probably intentionally) rather vague, there was a lot of talk at the time about it being about Morrissey, and I think the line that clinches it is the reference to "...money, not your shoes or friends" - the apparently misplaced inclusion of "shoes" and its quite obvious juxtaposition beside "friends" is quite evidently invoking the big M, I'm afraid. You only have to listen to "Accept Yourself", where the singer introspectively examines (and/or suggests that one should) how he feels about his life, his past, and well, his shoes. The money being more important than shoes or friends is something that at least half of The Smiths, if not three quarterss of them, would smile wryly at (today, perhaps) and, you know, being realistic, who else could have been The Face of the Eighties?!
And yet, for all the exposed slimy underbelly and the money-grabbing side of his personality that he hardly tries to hide, there remains an affection for and magnetism towards the man that is unshakable to this day. Arguably, he not only remains as popular today as he was in the 80s, but in fact is a bigger phenomenon who is subject to the adoration of millions around the globe. He somehow became a modern day Elvis or Lennon, adored by many for work he did decades ago, but simultaneously celebrated for idiosyncracies or eccentricities that set them apart in the first place but which continue to make the news today.
This inevitably leads to another type of bandwagon jumper - those already "blessed" with a degree (some degrees are bigger than others!) of celebrity who want to hitch their wagon to a legend like Morrissey, if only in a rather obvious attempt to add in some "cool" to their brand. The most unlikely or even incongruous sounding of such types is J.K. Rowling, prattling on about how important my Smiths were to her, and how the breaking up of the band affected her greatly - said while giggling at the same time. How come Harry Potter was not a Smiths fan, then?! Why wasn't there a "The Wiz" equivalent known as "The Moz" in the story? How come she hasn't used any of her billlions to get the lads to play a one-off reunion show at Hogwarts Castle, on the big outdoor stage? How come?!
It's so easy to do, in retrospect - "Yeah, I was a huge fan of Joy Division, I have all their records!" - even though none are on vinyl, none are on cassette, and there are none of the seven or twelve-inch singles., which effectively dates their acquisition to, like, yesterday. You can just see ol' JK in a panic, after the filming of her fifiteen seconds of (musically cool) fame for "The Importance of being Morrissey", frantically racing around Virgin Records scooping up entire shelves labelled "Smiths". Well, no, make that screaming at a personal assistant down in London town from the tranquility of her country estate, "Go out and hoover up every single piece of music that was ever in any way associated with Les Miz, because I will be on tape for the whole world to see , they will see how cool I actually am, not just a studious old novelist, and we better have proof of that if the press comes-a-knocking. Let's go! Chop chop!"
The one great thing about having the trophies is that at least you can speak with some authority and conviction, because not only where you there, but you even have the proof that you were there! When I say that Morrissey strode onto the stage wearing nothing but a velvet tutu, an oversized pair of NHS spectacles, an NHS hearing aid stuck in one ear, and an armful of gladioli spilling over into the audience, well - you just know it has to be true, right? Right!
Once again, dear friends, I have overstayed my welcome and become rather verbose on one of my favourite subjects - Der Smythes. I will be forgiven in the fullness of time because my precious texts (at least in this case) will assume a degree of preciousness among the faithful, including those who never got the chance to experience Morrissey's heydays. I still remember various intro lines said from the stage as if it was yesterday.
"Hello, chums!"
"Hello, you cheery charmers!"
"We are The Smiths, how do you do?!"
"Now then, this is our rec-kord, which is still buy-able: Hand-in-Glove."
"A song for the delicate, it's true, I don't owe you anything."
"This is your new anthem, if you but knew it: Reel Around the Fountain"
That I am able to expound at such length (and who knows, a Part IV may surface yet!) is in fact huge testament to the impact that The Smiths (and Morrissey specifically) had on my life, at a time when as 23-year-olds, he and I were both figuring out life. Without a nanosecond of hesitation, it was clear that he was way ahead of me both in articulating life and in actual achievements in life. But that's one reason why he was a star and I was not. But we all need inspiration and maybe even heroes, and this young lad from Mancunia who easily "could have been a poet or could have been a fool" very luckily (for us as well as him) became the former; or at least a modern day pop version of a poet.
For anyone who has never heard of him/them, you only need to listen to perhaps the greatest love song ever written for the pop canon - "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" - to hear The Smiths in all their glory. And I mean The Smiths, not 'The Smiths'. For that song alone, Morrissey et al. deserve to be remembered, but when you peruse their sadly shortened but massive contributions to alternative pop rock, well, in a weaker moment you might say that he deserves a knighthood. Even if he apparently would prefer to send in a construction crew to demolish Buckingham Palace than enter the grounds to accept some honour.
My mind brought me back to JK Rowling for some reason, and you know, in retrospect, I can remember standing beside a studious looking blond girl with big glasses at one of his shows, and she may even have had a hearing aid in place, and when I asked her what her favourite Morrissey line was, she didn't hesitate to say "There's more to life than books, you know, but not much more!" - oh my God, I was standing beside the mother of Harry Potter after all? This changes everything! Morrissey? Who? - Kevin Mc ;)
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