Bandsplain - The Smiths: Part 2 with Naomi Fry

Episode Date: September 28, 2023

Welcome back to the Bandsplain episode that doesn’t see a good reason why it should smile. We join our heroes once again, to find them restless in Manchester (for now). Things move quickly for the quartet and as quickly as they rise to deserved prominence they just as quickly begin to see small cracks in the foundation of the band. Naomi Fry is back to grace us with her knowledge and wisdom, in the face of all those rolling basslines.  Follow Naomi Fry on Twitter @FryNaomiFry Listen to songs we detail in the episode HERE Host: Yasi Salek Guest: Naomi Fry Producer: Jesse Miller-Gordon Audio Editor: Adrian Bridges Additional Production Supervision: Justin Sayles Theme Song: Bethany Cosentino Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Learn more about the albums you love with Dissect, a music analysis podcast hosted by me, Cole Kushna, a lifelong musician. Each season of Dissect dives deep into one album, examining the music, lyrics, and meaning of one song per episode. We've covered albums by Kendrick Lamar, Tyler the creator, Frank Ocean, just to name a few, and our brand new season just launched all about Radiohead's 2007 masterpiece in rainbows. Listen to Dissect on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast, because a great art deserves more than a swipe. This episode includes discussion of suicide. Please keep this in mind when deciding if, how, and when you'll listen. For resources on these topics, visit Spotify.com slash resources.

What's with this band anyway? I don't get it. Can you please explain? Wait, like, Bansplain? Hello and welcome to Bandsplaine. I am your host, Yassie Salick. This is a show where I am. invite an expert guest on to help me explain a cult band or iconic artist. Today's episode is the second part of the Smiths. When we last left, Morrissey was chatting away, talking to the press, and you guessed it, babe, we're back and guess what? He, this man still be talking to the press. I think in any alternate timeline universe, 90% of them, Morrissey is talking to someone, himself,

maybe, the press, whoever, this man be talking. Anyways, let's get into it. Morrissey does the lion's share of the interviews, as we know. He's, you know, he's really good at it. He's a good talker. Johnny Marr was more than happy to let Morrissey speak. And also, I think he said, I'm paraphrasing, but like the whole political stance of the Smiths comes from Morrissey's politics. So he wants Morrissey to speak to them.

And Morrissey does. He goes off speaking all the time. It would have to be a separate podcast for me to read all of his most. choice quotes to the press. But there's tons. There's like a funny bit in smash hits in like February of 1984 where they ask him about the New York dolls. And he's like so over it at this point. So over being asked about it? I think he's over the band. Like he says, I thought that one had been well and truly buried. Five years ago, I would have lain on the tracks for them. Now I could never possibly listen to one of their records. Sir, you had a fan club. Yeah. He turned his

He turned his back on the New York dolls. I thought that was kind of surprising. There's a couple of things that I've gleaned from my absolutely still mentally ill. I'm still mental ill. I'm still a time with the Smiths. One is that they made many choices that worked against them in terms of being a more successful in real time band. Like of course, now we look at them as like, oh my God, they're iconic. Like they're the fucking Beatles of 80s or whatever. But in real time, but in real time, band, like, of course, now we look at them as like, oh my God, they're the fucking Beatles of 80s or whatever. But in real time, they sort of were just under being that big. Like, they never were U-2. They never were other bands that had number one singles and massive amounts of money. So here's one of the first reasons. And again, it's not a reason. It's just a choice. And it's probably a good choice.

But I mean, when I think about myself and all of these bands that I started liking around the same time, you know, so it was like Smith, Secure, YouTube. sure. It was what made the Smith's, like, more... Appealing, right? Attractive to me, you know, vis-a-vis you, too, which I kind of, I liked, but I liked the Smiths way more, and the reason was that they weren't as popular. It felt more like a club, you know, like a secret, relatively speaking, you know.

I mean, it couldn't have been any other way. I think they were arguably making outsider art. that appealed to outsiders, that's an overstatement of the term, but you know what I mean. Like, while it was like functionally pop music in every other way, in presentation, in thematics, in Morrissey, being like the first, you know, front man of a pop group who was not trading in sexuality per se, more like in sensuality and in politics, when they were trying to be pop. it was just never really going to be, he's never going to be Bono. Like, it was never going to be, you know. Like a miraculous occurrence. Yeah, that they even were as popular as they were.

And that they were able to be as central, you know, top of the pops level. Exactly. Yeah. But I think Morrissey, like, he's very, I want my kakin to eat it to vibes. Yeah, he was like mad that they weren't more popular. Yeah. Like, in his sensibility, he's obviously so punk. He never wanted to turn over any control of anything.

He wanted it exactly his way. He wanted to be able to criticize whatever he wanted to criticize in the press and not have ramifications for it. Like, all of that stuff. But on the flip side, he also was like so brutalized and upset that they never, in his estimation, were as successful as they should have been. But I don't think he could put the two and two together. Yeah. Like perhaps it was related. Jeff Travis said in one of the documentaries I watched that he was like, he was just so insanely not willing to deal with any of the consequences of his own actions.

Like he just couldn't see the, he couldn't see the connection. Yeah. Anyways, that being said, they got asked to go on tour with the police after this first time. And this is like, this is 1983, babe. We're talking synchronicity. We're talking every breath you fucking take. Okay. The police are massive.

And they said no. And Marcy said, we just didn't want to be associated with them, which sounds quite brutal. But we'd come a long way. Nobody had helped. And we didn't want anyone like the police to feel like they had a hand in helping us. He didn't want Sting to say, I help the fucking Smith. Yeah. An insane way to think.

He does like a joint interview with Ian McCullough of Echo and the Bunny Men. They put them together to have this like sort of two front men who are in competition, chit-chat. I only wanted to bring it up because of you know me. because they bring up Lou Reed, the sort of moderator. They're talking about, like, doing a conversational tone in songs. And the guy's like, yeah, very few people can achieve a conversational tone in songs. Lou Reed springs to mind. And Morrissey says, yeah, trouble is there's a gap of a decade between each good song.

Wow. I'm just saying, remember what he said about Lou Reed before? Like, the glowing. Like, as if Lurie changed his whole life, he couldn't even believe someone would be like that. Same with the New York Dolls. and then you get one little bit of fame, so you turn your back on your idols. Wow.

Brutal. The other thing, though, he says in this interview that I actually thought was really great was he's talking about pop music, popular music, and he's like, to me, popular music is still the voice of the working class, collective rage in a way, though it's seldom angstridden.

It does really seem like one sole opportunity for someone from a working class background to step forward and have their say. It's really the last refuge for our particular but penniless humans. I like that. He's a real populist, you know? Yeah.

It doesn't surprise me some of the more controversial things that he said as of late, given, it's like the DNA of it is all kind of there. But they ask him, do you want to be rich? They're like, well, do you want to be rich? And he's like, yes, I do. But more importantly, I don't want to be poor. Right. That's my answer, too. Yeah, which is like, you know what?

And he was poor and it's like he should say it. Yeah. Okay, so after this, Sandy Shaw's version of hand and glove comes out. What I have an insane move, you had two hit singles, an album, and then you took your first hit single and gave it to someone else, like less than a year later and had them do it. Her version was much more successful. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. Like it charted.

Really? It charted higher. They played it on the radio. Yeah. I mean, she was quite famous. I think that might have had something to do with it. Apparently this is a very bad experience for Morrissey because, you know, he idolized her. He kind of, like, is mad because she doesn't spend any money to make this.

Like, they use their studio and all the Smiths play the music on the backing. And then she still gets 40% of the money. And he's like, okay. And then he says, she telephones me. We're going to Germany to do some TV for hand and glove. But rough trade won't pay for you to go because they say you're not. necessary. And I said, I had no intention of going to Germany because as thousands of nice people have rushed to point out, I am not necessary. I said in my best not necessary voice.

He's so funny. This is all after the fact that's in the autobiography. At the time, he absolutely was singing her praises, posing with her in magazine spreads where he's like looking up at her holding a rosary. She talks about this. She talks about this in the South Bank show where she's like, It's actually so crazy what she says. She's like, I'd been admired from afar, like many times, all the time, but I had never been worshipped from so up close. It's great. Morrissey also said, I vomit profusely when I discover the album has been pressed in Japan with Sandy Shaw's version of Handing Club included. I am so disgusted by this that I beg people to kill me. Many rush forward. It's dramatic. Okay.

I think it's an overall good thing for them. It raises their profile, you know, but there's some negative feelings, but not Johnny Mar. John Mark thought it was amazing. Love to work with Sandy. She brought a positive spirit to the band. She educated him about Buddhism. He was stoked.

So then the next single comes out, 1984, May 21st. Heaven knows I'm miserable now. It's the first top 10 single for them. The Smith also did something really cool, which all of their seven inches had etchings of words in the... Oh. Yeah. And this one said, Smith's indeed on one side and ill forever on the seven inch.

And then on the 12 inch, it said Smith's presumably and forever ill. Iconic. Iconic. Do you feel like when you were a teen, like this was like, you were like, yes? Yeah. Although, I mean, I love this song and I've always loved this song. But there's something. A little heavy-handed.

Oh, yeah. Almost too. It's like melodramatic. It's like almost the act. Like heaven knows I'm miserable now. Like I mean, Jesus. You know, it's almost like making a point of it, right? Whereas paint a vulgar picture or like, you know, stuff that's like more realistic.

Or like is talking about like sitting in the, you know, sitting in your bed. bedroom, talking about feelings that felt more graspable to me. And heaven knows I'm miserable now seemed almost like an opera or something. Yeah. It's almost like a joke. It's like so. It makes light almost of the, of the unhappiness to a point that you're like, do you really mean this? Like, yeah, it's like in my life, why do I smile? People would much rather kick in the eye. You know, it's like, it's like, okay. The best part is probably. Probably all the, like, once again, simply do not dream of labor. Like, I wanted a job and then I got a job and heaven knows I'm miserable now.

That's pretty good. I guess it's more a song about like general misery rather than romantic misery. And I think probably at that age I was identified more with romantic misery. Totally. It makes a lot of sense. This song was like a play on. a Sandy Shaw song, 1969, chart hit,

Heaven knows I'm missing him now. So it was also, it was a little jokey, bit of a joke. Okay. Yeah, it's not my favorite either. I think there's like several genres of Smith's song, and this falls into like a dramatic, mid-traumatic.

This had stuff for little children on it. We already talked about that one. And then another B-side that is one of my fucking favorite Smith songs, which is Girl Afraid. Oh, I love Girl Afraid. First of all, melodically, it really hits. Because it's one of their bang. Like, they have, like, that's one of the three categories.

I feel like it's like, banger that, like, actually they, they set out to make sort of a harder, faster song. And Girl Afraid is one of those. Yeah. And then also just lyrically, too, it's about, it's again, and again about, like, romantic misunderstanding. He's, like, ventriloquizing these characters. And it's like, you know, she says he never really looks at me. Yeah. Totally.

He's writing a little short story. Yeah. It does feel like one of those songs to me were like the man read too much of those rape books, do you know, those feminist rape books? Right. Because it's absolutely sort of a song that seems about, like you said, romantic misunderstanding and girl afraid. I also love like the ending of it.

Oh. Yeah. It's a great song. It's super simple. But yeah, maybe there are no underrated Smith songs, but I feel like I don't hear about this one as much as I want to, because it is a really great song. He said about it, I think Girl Afraid simply implied that even within relationship, there's no real certainty and nobody knows how anyone feels. People feel that just simply because they're having this cemented communion

with another person, that the two of you will become whole, which is something I detested. I hate that, that implication. It's not true anyways. Ultimately, you're on your own, whatever happens in life, however you go through life. You die on your own. You have to go to the dentist on your own. It's like all the serious things in life that you feel are on your own. I mean, the thing about him is, is he's so black and white, right? Because obviously, this is ultimately, yeah, you die alone. Like, we all know that. Like, you're your own person, but it's like, you can have someone come to the dentist with you. Like, yes, you will be the one whose jaw is, like, wired or something. But, like, but you can have someone there, like, holding your hand.

You know what I mean? And he wants. And he wants to be the one. And he wants to be the one. And he wants to justify his choice, which is that he does not want to engage in human relationship because, again, I'm simply fanficking here, but to me it seems out of fear, fear of losing control, fear of being hurt, fear of being rejected. And in order to solidify his own stance, he's taken on this posture of this is a inferior way to live. I judge. romantic relationships. They're so pedestrian. They're so stupid. You don't get what you want. And it's like, sir. Yeah.

I mean, just say you're scared and go. Just say your boy afraid and go. Yeah. Okay. Just amazing singles. The next single is William. It was really nothing. August 20th, that's good too. Ooh, gorgeous. It's one of my favorites. It's like one of the jangly, upbeat ones. I love the Yeah. Upbeat Smith songs. Right. Even though the lyrics are, of course, like the rain falls down on a humdrum.

I mean, and this is like the, this is, again, it's more so being like marriage is stupid. This is like the peak marriage is stupid. Yeah. For my guitar heads. Johnny Marr used something called Nashville tuning on this where he replaced the bottom four strings of a regular guitar with the strings from a 12 string to get that ringing sound. You're welcome. Who are welcome?

It's the shortest Smith single they've put out to date. There's shorter ones after this, but it's only about 129 seconds because Johnny Marr put a little challenge for himself. He was like, I want to make a perfect pop song under three minutes long. He fucking did. It has a very like crisp black line in it. How can you stay with a fat girl? Again, a very body negative. Very body negative.

No, Morrissey was super not body pause, babe. He was buddy-neggs. Yeah, I bet. He somehow brought up how Oscar Wilde was fat, like a thousand times. It's also in a song. We'll get there. So there's a lot of stuff in this song that we can, like, unpack, which is kind of interesting. One is that there's another movie that he loved called Billy Lyre from 1963.

And in this movie, the whole thing, this Billy character has proposed to two different women. And he's given them the same engagement ring. And it's constantly lying to get one back to give it to the other or whatever. So, you know, if you want to marry me, if you like, you can buy the ring. Yeah. It's also, this is the part that is the goss and tea. So he had a very close friendship with the singer of the band, the Associates, this guy, Billy McKenzie, who was gay. It ended badly.

Again, we never know why, but William, Billy, it was really nothing. Also, this is further strengthened by the fact that the associates, put out a song called Stephen, You're Really Something. Hmm. That was recorded in 1993 as a response to William. Oh, interesting. Yeah. And they ask in the face in 1984, how did your dream date with the associate's

Billy McKenzie Fair? And Morrissey said, he walked off with one of my James Dean books, which is a persistent cause of anxiety in me. I was quite speechless. I watched him walk out the door. It wasn't my favorite book, but these things are sacrosanct. Billy has got this sense of uncontrollable mischief, though, and I think that's exactly how he wants to be seen. So I'm just saying, here's the Gossin T. William was really a thing.

Morrissey said that it occurred to me that within popular music, if ever there were any records that discussed marriage, they were always from the female standpoint, female singers singing to women. There were never any song saying, do not marry, stay single, self-preservation. This is again, Morrissey, I think, considering himself a feminist. I thought it was about time that there was a male voice speaking directly to another. male saying that marriage was a waste of time, that in fact it was absolutely nothing. Wow. Wow. The etchings on this seven inch were the impotence of earnest.

That's an allusion to Ernest Hemingway being impotent. Really? Yeah, that's right. I don't know if he was impotent. I'm not spreading that rumor. I'm just saying that's what the illusion was. And then romantic and square is hip and aware, is the other one. Interesting.

Anigmatic. That is a line that was said by John Lennon to Hunter. Davies. Okay. I love how much thought is all Morrissey, obviously, and how much thought he puts into like all these little hidden Easter eggs and gems. He was just such a lover of history and culture and like the lineage that he's putting himself in. I just, I think it's cool. This is also the, William, it was really nothing is that iconic. Have you ever watched the top of the pop's performance where he, I don't think so. Oh my God, it's so great. He rips his shirt open and it says, will you marry me an honest chest or marry me I think it just says it's pretty fucking cool

also okay here's an insane thing do you know what the first I don't know it's the first B-side there's two B-sides on here is B-side a B-side that you buried on a fucking seven-inch how soon is now again another choice in the history of the smith right had it been the other I mean like listen is William it was really nothing a goddamn gorgeous beautiful song obviously would how soon as now have blown the fucking shit out of the water? Probably if it was the single, you know, but it was buried as a B-side. And you know it would have gone because even though it was put on the B-side, the nighttime British radio, which, you know, the John Peel is the cool ones, they picked it up almost immediately and that's what they started playing. And it became the most requested song on all these nighttime radio shows. Seymour Stein called it the stairway to heaven of the 80s. I mean, that song was inescapable in my youth. Yeah. It became very popular I read on through college radio, which then led to it becoming very popular on alternative rock radio, which was sort of shifting in the 80s is when it sort of emerged was in the 80s, thanks to like Depeche Mode to cure all this stuff.

They moved from like corny sort of hard rock into what they ended up terming alternative rock. And it was really big on that. And it was just huge. But Johnny Moore was a crazy stoner. Did you know this? It's pretty cool. He no. Oh my God. He's a huge stoner. Smoked weed all the time while writing music in the studio. Actually, I think all of the Smiths, except for Morrissey did. Morrissey famously didn't do any drugs. He was very anti-drug. But he rolled a joint and decided, I want to write something like the Gun Club. And he was particularly, I think inspired by the gun club's cover of Run Through the Jungle by Creedens Clearwater Revival, which is an amazing cover. I was like, I like their style of swampy blues. This demo was called swampy for a long time. He also wanted to, like, add a bunch of tremolo, which is vibrato or whatever.

It's like most associated with Bo Didley. And here's how they did it again. Guitar Center heads, listen close. The rest of you can fast forward. So instead of using one amp, they used two amps for stereo. And then they were like, actually, let's use four amps. four Fender twin reverb amps and send the sound through all of them

and they would go into the room him and John Porter and manually control the speed of the tremolos for them to stay in perfect timing with the track. It kind of explains why that song has so much depth. Yeah. Like when you, it really, like of all the Smith songs, it just sounds so, it stands apart.

So the lyrics, I am the sun in the air of a shyness that is criminally vulgar. I am the sun and air of nothing in particular. A, was often heard incorrectly as sun and air. The elements. The elements, yeah.

I am the son of the air. Yeah. Jeff Travis was like, there he goes, fucking writing about the goddamn elements. What the hell is this? But actually what it was is a reference to George Eliot's Middlemarch. Huh. Yes, the line is to be born the sun of a middle march manufacturer, an inevitable air to nothing in particular. Huh.

That's right. The title of the song comes from that book, Popcorn Venus, that I mentioned, the feminist study of women in film. The line is, how immediately can we be gratified? How soon is now? Okay. Then the third song on this single is, again, maybe in the canon of heavy-handed that we talked about, but I still love it.

It's hard for me to listen to. This has been harrowing, you guys. I need you to understand that I've been going the fuck through it this week. Nobody should listen to this much smiths while also having sort of emotional dealings in their life because it is, it's dangerous, honestly. I mean, this is like me from age, like 13. That's what I'm saying, but like, I can't go back there. And I had to go back there this week.

Oof, rough. Yeah. The song is, please, please, let me get what I want. Just me sitting in front of the computer, just like tears streaming down my face, typing, I haven't had a dream in a long time. In a long time. I haven't had a dream in a long time. Honestly, the sickest part of this song to me is the mandolin.

The mandolin is so emotional and beautiful. Johnny Marr plays it on a lot of other songs, but the choice to do that, I think, really, like, makes this song fucking hit you right in the guts where you're like, please, please. It's a very short song. Please, please.

Let me get what I want. It's less than two minutes long. Huh. I think it might be the shortest in the song of all. Interesting. Rough trade kept asking them like, where's the rest of the song? And Morrissey said, but to me, it's like a very brief punch to the face. Lengthening the song would to my mind have simply been explaining the blindingly obvious.

He's very right because if this song was three minutes long, I think it would have been too heavy-handed. Yeah. Right? Because it's emotionally harrowing to listen to. Mm-hmm. It's rough. Johnny Marseid he was inspired for the music by the Burt Backerack song, The Answer to Everything, but the version sung by Del Shannon. They decide to put out hat full of hollow as their second full-length release.

It is a compilation, right? There's not really new music on here, I don't think. Besides, these things take time, opens with line paraphrase from the battle. of the Republic. My and I have seen the glory of the Sacred Wonderkind, which is of course in the Battle of the Republic. I don't really know what this song is about. Do you

have any sense? It's a vibe. I don't know. I mean. No, you're right. It's not that complicated. It's one of Morrissey's yearning songs. As producer Jesse said, I put it in the yearning Smith's bucket. It's the it's another non-

realized relationship. Yeah, it's another example of like the when we sat in your room. It's another sort of bedroom song where nothing happens. Yeah. Which makes sense how much that speaks to teenagers because that happens so much when you're a teenager. Yeah. You know, you can as a girl identify with a male singer because the male singer is also not getting any or either doesn't want to or is unable to, which is kind of like obviously you can get it. as a teen girl if you wanted to, but it's never exactly what you want, you know, because you want

more. It's true because honestly, a great majority of other love songs as sung by men, straight men, while they have this, like, beautiful quality to them, if you kind of listen to the lyrics, tend to seem to be imploring you for physicality. That really is like the undercurrent of a lot of the songs, right? Whereas like Morris is the complete opposite. He has absolutely does not want that. Please don't give him that. No, thank you. But also, there's this other yearning. And it occurred maybe to us teen girls that they were, like, it didn't even, it never had

maybe crossed our minds that men could have the same kind of more opaque and, like, nebulous yearnings that we did. Yeah, like tortured relationship to it. It's like we're, it's not going. Things aren't necessarily. I mean, again, if you, to go back to those. like two roads diversion award that I brought up at the beginning of sort of like the smiths and guns and roses.

Guns and roses was basically like, I'm going to rape you. You know, I mean, it's like for not to be not politic, but like quote unquote for better or worse. Right. Like you're going to like whether you like it or not. It was the ravage. It's the ravaging, which is a great. You're going to get ravage. It's a great genre of music, but it is.

Yeah, which is like I love that too, you know, obviously. and that feels like an important role as well when you're a teen girl, but like it's, but it's also like fucking scary, you know? Because you also know that you're also not going to, like what you're going to measure up. You're not going to.

It's not giving. It's not going to happen. I'm not going to. It's not giving. I'm not going to get ravished. It's not giving. And I'm not getting. And I'm not getting.

I was in the eighth grade. I was just remembering this. Remember Sadie Hawkins dance? Sure. We're like the girls. You have to ask. Was I turned down thrice? I don't think I've ever fully recovered. I think I've still, I think it's still somewhere buried.

The body has kept the fucking score, babe, of Sadie Hawkins' dance of the eighth grade. I know. Oh, it's so terrible. In a recent notes up private letter, I did say something to the effect of like, I refuse to become cynical. Like, you can't make me because, you know, like that, that audacity of hope is actually something that I very much cherish. It's really hard when the world is telling you that you need to look a certain way or

need to act a certain way or you need to be just like, no, I'm like I'm an adult. I can decide. I know it feels like we've gotten on a tangent, but I really don't think we have because I think that there's like glimmers of this audacity of hope in the Smith's music. And of course, it's in the actual music. which was why it works at all, because if the music didn't have this, like, really hopeful tone, it wouldn't work at all. It's not really in Morrissey's heart and mind. But I think that's the thing where it's like, yeah, can we all agree that most people are fucking trash?

Sure, Morrissey, we're on that page with you. But that doesn't mean you have to change. That doesn't mean you have to be like them. You don't have to change yourself to be the way that people who are hurt and traumatized and can't be open. You don't have to do that too. you know. Yeah, but it's true that the music has these glimmers, yeah, for sure, of like optimism or buoyancy or something. It's the only reason it works. Yeah. Because Johnny Marr's a buoyant and optimistic person for like through and through. And his music really reflects that and it just pairs really well with Morrissey's sort of absolute misery. The Hatful of Hollow, the whole thing of it was that Morrissey hated the first album so much. that he basically brings up to rough trade. Why don't we put out an interim collection before the second album

just to have a better body of work out more, more explaining who we are and what we sound like. And it does really well. It hits number seven on the UP chart, which is much higher than the Smith's debut album. Like we said, it has these things take time. It has a lot of songs that have been put up appeal session. So like what different doesn't make is a peel session?

This Charming Man is the Peel session. They put How Soon Is Now On Here, because it hasn't been on an album, still Ill Appeal session. They also put, This Night Has Opened My Eyes. I love it. Yeah, yeah. It's pretty beautiful. Morrissey, one thing he's so good at is these little, I keep pulling them refrains. I don't know if that's the right word, but he's just like, oh, you did a good thing.

Oh, you did a bad thing. It's so effective. There's just something so, he's so good at that. It's crazy because that's all him, right? The whole thing about the Smith is like a lot of the way they would write music is like they would deliver to Morrissey the finished music and then he would write every, he would just put his vocals on top. So it's like they weren't writing along with his melody or him right along with their melody. Also, she could have been a poet or she could have been a fool. She could have been a poet or she could have been a podcaster, babe.

And look what happened. She was thrice rejected for Sadie Hawkins and then she became a podcaster. And the jokes on them. Oh, you did a bad thing. You became podcaster. This song is literally the plot of A Taste of Honey, paraphrased. Again? Yeah, the whole thing.

Dump her on a doorstep girl talking about the baby. You kicked and cried like a bully child. A grown man of 25 said he'd cure your ills, but he didn't and he never will. It's talking about the Jimmy, the sailor that she had the affair with. The dream has gone with the baby is real. That's the dream of the love is gone, but you have this baby. It's real. We're back to Taste of Honey.

You know what? Thank God for Taste of Honey. The song fucking slaps, and I love it, and oh, you did a bad thing, all of it. So this album does really well. The reviews are even a little bit better. It's cheap. They make it really cheap because they are like, oh, it's a compilation. It's not a real album, blah, blah, blah.

There's one bad review where it ends with perhaps Morris who should be read and not heard. That's not nice. Not nice. It's also not true. After this, we start to get into manager bingo. Of all the red strings should I did really tracking the managers, wasn't one of them because I don't find it that interesting, the like granular nature of it. But it's broadly worth talking about because it reinforces the main takeaway of this episode, which is that Johnny Marr was the great love of Morrissey's life.

I'm not even talking about romantically, simply soulmate wise. Joe Moss was effectively probably pushed out because Morrissey felt him and Johnny were too close. Again, I'm fanficking, but this is backed up by many sources. including Johnny Marr, who says it sort of veiledly after the breakup, they bring in another manager here. It's their radio and TV guy who kind of like sees this opportunity and also sees that they need the help. I mean, Johnny Marr is literally a teenager and he's trying to do it all. He's like 19, you know, or 20 or whatever. So this guy, Scott Peering, he comes in, tries to help them. Then their American PR person, this woman, Ruth Polsky, flies to London,

and also uninvited to appoint herself manager. She tells Johnny Moore that Morrissey said it was okay. Morrissey was like, I did not say that. Not that long later, she was tragically killed by a runaway taxi in New York City. Oh, no. I know. Okay. 1985, the year has turned.

Dyer Straits have put out brothers in arms. It's a big album. Whitney Houston gets really big this year. That's the self-titled album. Tears for Fears, Songs from the Big Chair, great album. It's a very 80s, Phil Collins. Collins, no jacket required. The car's greatest hits.

The door's greatest hits. Big year for greatest hits. He's hot. He's cool. He's dead. You know, that's the rolling stone cover with Jim Morrison? Yeah. But like the resurrection of the interest in the doors.

So mental. Yeah. He's sorry. He's hot. He's sexy. He's dead. Who allowed that? Who was like, that's fine.

Put that, slap that on the cover. Yeah. It's, I don't know. But it's. Sorry, this was 1981. So it's, uh, it's, uh, it's, okay. And then like within the, the milieu of the Smith's, what's happening is like head on the door by the cure comes out. It's kind of important because that is an album that sort of breaks them out in America.

The replacements Tim, also on Sire. Jesus and Mary Chain Psycho Candy. A lot of, basically like a lot of alternative music is sort of making its way into the world and indie as they called it. then I guess, or maybe they didn't. I'm not really sure. Wisely, they're like, oh, yeah, we should put how soon it is now out as its own single, even though it was already the B-side of another single. So they put it out January 28th.

The B-sides on this are Well I Wonder, which is pretty good to me. It's maybe a little mid as far as Smith's songs go. Yeah, I agree. And then oscillate wildly. I do like that. Yeah, it's a instrumental. I'll just tell a quick little personal anecdote. which back in like 2003, when I was one of the first 2,000 people on MySpace.com,

I did go on a date with a sort of nebish glasses hipster boy from MySpace, much in the vein of what we were talking about, sensitive, was giving sensitive. I said yes, it wasn't really my type ever, including then, but I said yes because his MySpace profile song was oscillate wildly. Anyways, it didn't go. But having the obscure instrumental. of the Smith song is it won my heart over for to at least to get me a go on the date. There's a great interview right after this with smash hits where I'm just going to read a little

bit too because it's really funny. The guy goes, are you feeling better? Morsey, it's quite a struggle. What's the matter with you? What's the matter with you is good? Yes, literally. Oh, just a general mental decay. So many things.

The list is fascinatingly long. I look ill, don't I? He's so. It goes so hard. It a little bit reminds me of what you just said about being able to be like vulnerable in public because it's a performance. Oh, totally. As opposed to being able to be actually vulnerable with yourself. Yeah.

Oh my God. No me, Brian Morris. You have actually a lot in common. Oh, the unsuspected alliance. You were like, I did not come here to be abused like this. I'm simply theorizing. So he goes, I look ill, don't I? And the guy goes, yes, you look terrible, actually.

Are you under the doctor? I love the British press. Me too. I literally wanted to be a music journalist. I've told this story before. But the only reason I wanted to become a music journalist was because of British music journalism and what they let the people in the 90s get away with, like spin. And that soon proved to be not a thing ever again.

And when I was finally doing, I hated it. I was like, this sucks. This is not that. You don't have to have any personality. It's like, but yeah, just literally the guy's like, are you under the doctor? He basically says, I don't believe in going to doctors. He reveals himself to be a cat man, which I don't know if anyone's talked about this. Yes.

For us, it's important. What does he say? The guy's like, did you have any pets when you were young? And he said, yes, I had a pet, which I still have. In fact, I have a cat that is 23 years old. No. He's actually older than the other members of the Smiths, which is remarkable. His name, and I'm not responsible, is Tibby. Keep in mind, Morrissey still lives with

his mom. So this is his cat. Again, this is a very horrible thing, by the way. The cats and the mom. He lives with his mom for a long time. And even, I believe, he moves to London and then moves back in with his mom. It's like a whole thing. Wow. You know, he's 24, maybe here, 23, is living with his mom. I get it. So Morrissey in particular, like we talked about, does not want to fucking work with John Porter again. He hates the work that he's done. They basically are like, Johnny, why don't you produce the album? I think Johnny's flattered, but I want to just stress that like Johnny is 22 or like and 21 when they're like making the album. So he's 21 years old, babe. He, this is a lot. Like he's already doing a lot of managerial stuff because no one else will do it. He's overextended.

Yeah, he's producing, he's writing all the fucking music. Yeah. And he's a super go-getter. But like, just to point out that like there's a lot on his plate. This guy, a young engineer named Stephen Street, comes in to help. He had worked on Heaven Knows I Miserable. Now the single, so they liked him. This album, Morrissey, contributes a little musically, not by playing anything, but he had

these copies of BBC sound effects records that he loved. And he brought them in. And they would sample them on a lot of the songs. And I'll talk about it. But it's kind of interesting. They get into like sort of sampling these weird sound effects. They record in a studio in Liverpool that Morrissey will later call predictably cheap. He speaks very happily about it.

He thinks that it's being away from John Porter is huge. Everyone's relieved. He says, Mike at last was free to play to his drums in his own way, rock steady, yet with a horse race pace. Andy's brilliance flourished without the school masterly ear of John Porter, the key to everything. Johnny made his finally made his first album. He called him the key to everything. They love of his life. They were obsessed with each other.

It's really sweet. They were so taken by each other's talent. You know, it's like, it's really, I've never come across this level of pairing. And there's so many of them in rock. Yeah. You know, Maas comes from the press kept calling Morrissey miserable. And so Johnny Marr started calling him miserable Morrissey. then it became miserable mauser.

Oh, is that what it's from? Yeah, and then that's how he got his nickname Maus. That's really sweet the key. I have to point out that before things go south, which they do really fast out of nowhere, they were all very close. Like even Johnny Maher and Morrissey were the closest, and Morrissey wasn't super close with Andy and Mike, but they were still friends. Like they would hang on tour.

Like they were, there was a very good feeling between them. There was never like an animosity. Yeah. There was like a bit of, I think, weirdness around the money splitting, but it doesn't seem to come up until much later. Okay. I think now we look at an album called Meat is Murder and we don't even bat an eyelash. But it was actually quite an insane and controversial album title for the mid-80s. Yeah.

You know, it's like everyone was a vegetarian back then. No. Aero-1 had not opened its stores. I don't think Aero-1 opened its stores until 1990. But yeah, in England, it's one thing. I think it was still pretty controversial in England. But in America, it was even more aggressive. Because, you know, America was like, absolutely not.

We're fucking having hamburgers and steaks, babe. This is America. Yeah. I just want to point. But Morrissey was extremely dead serious about his beliefs, as you know, in terms of vegetarianism and not killing animals. For the love of Tibbs. For the love of Tibbies, babe.

That's probably the most iconic album cover also. Would you agree? Yeah. with the soldier. The quad photo of the soldier with his helmet. The helmet says meet his murder. Yeah. This guy is actually, he was an actual Marine Corporal Michael Wynne.

The photograph is from Vietnam in 1967. His actual helmet said make war not love. Oh, okay. So it wasn't the original. No. They changed the wording. He was 20 years old when the picture was taken. He had only been in the Marine Corps for a year.

The image is from a 1968 documentary. called In the Year of the Pig. Oh, wow. They asked him, Sergeant Wynn, because they didn't get his permission. And he said, I first learned of it when my sister happened to see the album while she was shopping. I wasn't real happy about the Smith's changing the wording. Yeah. He wasn't.

He didn't like it. He didn't love it. I get it. He was more pro-war and less pro-vegetarianism. Yeah. Unless anti-meat. Meade's murder does hit the charts at number one in the year. UK, which is a huge deal because it knocks off born in the USA.

Wow. Yeah. Not in America. Radio still doesn't play it in the UK, which is kind of crazy, given that they are number one on the charts. Sometimes you're like, Morrissey is paranoid and crazy. And sometimes you're like, damn, Morrissey kind of right. You know?

Like, why is this at number one and they're not playing it? Yeah. It only hits 110 on the Billboard 200. In contrast, that cure album that I mentioned had on the door did get to number 59. So The Cure is outperforming at this point, the Smiths in America. They have a bigger foothold in America. They've also been around longer and have put out more albums, so that's possible. Yeah.

The headmaster ritual. As far as album opening lines go, belligerent ghouls run Manchester schools is pretty fucking iconic. Like pretty godtier. This is obviously the song about how much he hated that school. It even caused the former headmaster from St. Mary's school to come out and be like, well, I Well, Morrissey himself was never hit. I'm like, well, I mean, is that really the point? This was a very sadistic school, very barbaric.

And by some strange miscalculation of nature or whatever, I ended up here. I don't know why. And five years of education here proved to have no effect upon me whatsoever, except in certainly in a very adverse sense. Do you remember when we talked about the part in the autobiography where he talked about the teacher, like watching them in the shower? Yes, yes. So there's pretty definite, I feel like definitive lyrical reference to that words.

Please excuse me from Jim. I've got this terrible cold coming on. He grabs and devours. He kicks me in the showers. Kicks me in the showers and he grabs in devours. It's giving basketball diaries. Right? Oh my God.

Totally. It's giving Epstein airplane. Okay, let's get into fucking Rushland Ruffians. I think it's one of my favorite songs. I would put in the top five. I had a real hard time. I don't like to rank things. but I had a real hard time trying to think of like, what are my top smith songs?

There's just so many. It's so swingy and just like it has this like energy to it. It's a carnivalesque energy. It's like onomatopoeia or whatever, right? The music literally sounds like a fair. Like it sounds like a carnival. Yeah. The song basically literally came from Morrissey saying to Johnny Marhe,

hey, we should do a song about the fair. So that's why the music sounds so much like that because Johnny Marr did have an idea of what it was going to be about lyrically before he wrote it, which usually wasn't the case. He said he basically ripped the riff off of him from the Elvis song, Murray's the name, his latest flame. I mean, it's very Elvis. It's very Elvis, totally. It's like very Elvis.

Again, my favorite refrain, but my faith in love is still devout. It's just perfectly placed. It's not heavy, you know, it's not over the top. And I love the bridge. The bridge. So scratch my name on your arm with a fountain pen. This means you really love me. It's so sweet.

Okay, a lot of the song is inspired. Marcy had a favorite comedian named Victoria Woods. She did like musical comedy, so she had songs. And she had this song called 14 again, which is literally about fairground romances. And she talks about the last night of the fair when I was famous, I was funny. When I was funny, I was famous. I was never ignored. She is famous.

She is funny. And also the lights. reflected in the brille cream in his hair. Because, you know, his thing is like the grease and the hair of the operator, you know, is all the tremulous heart requires. Also, the faith in love is still devout. She has a lyric in her song, Funny How Things Turned Out, that says, My Faith in Myself is Still Devout. And then some of it comes from his own memories of going to the fair. And guess what, bitch, he hated it.

He hated the fair. This part. The last night of the fair by the big wheel generator, a boy is stabbed and his money is grabbed and the air hangs heavy like a dulling wine. He told the observer in 1992. In the 60s, Manchester was a very violent place. I remember being at a fair at Stretford Road. It was very early about 5 p.m. And I was just standing by the speedway. And somebody just came over to me and headbutted me. He was much older than me and much bigger. I was days for at least five minutes. What I find remarkable is the way you just accepted it. That was just the kind of thing that happened. I don't think. it was even that I looked different in those days. There never needed to be a reason. Yeah. Morrissey was just the kind of person that you wanted to fucking punch in the face. He just had that, he had that vibe to him. I got head, but he's not funny.

Yeah. I'm sorry, I know it's not funny, but it's violent. And someone falls in love and someone's beaten up and someone's beaten up. Someone's beaten up. And you know who's beaten up? It's Morrissey. Yeah. He's head butted.

Someone falls in love. That's not him. Someone's beaten up. And the sense is being dulled. mine. They're like, oh, were you happy for a second, bitch? Well, fuck you. Here's I want the one I can't have. Go back to your misery, bitch. We let you have a second of happiness and joy and now it's I want the one I can't have. But honestly, why is that song so fucking good? His adeptness at opening lines that fucking grab you on the day that your mentality decides to catch up with your

biology come round. So good. And it's also very teenage as well. And it's very him, right? He appeals because he's so teenage. No, but the forces of biology, like taking precedence over your kind of like mental faculties or your emotional faculties. 100%. It's the opposite for him, though, I think, which is really interesting. Like I think his mentality is far overdeveloped and his biology never caught up, you know?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And he's, there's a little aside in his autobiography about this, the woman Gil Smith. She was their rough trade publicist. And he says, Gil Smith suddenly wound her way in as a haughty of blouse ripping biological urge. But I take too long as I measure chemistry against meaning. And she moves on like a hot-blooded goat in search of a running ram. But that's basically what he, what he's talking about.

So what's he saying? She was trying to fuck him. And he, and he basically. I basically couldn't figure it out in time. You know, like I think, like, what he's saying is, like, I take too long as I measure chemistry against meaning because his mentality takes precedence over his biology. It's like the whole thing, which I just thought that was really interesting because that is really one of his main problems.

He's too cerebral. It is, again, also the why him and Johnny Marr is kind of a perfect juxtaposition because, like, for my readings, Johnny Marr just seems touched by the hand of God. Like he's writing music from a purely body place. You know, it's not, it's not overthought. It's not really cerebral. He is truly just, it comes out of him, you know? Like, whereas Morrissey is almost exclusively using his brain and thinking and rational faculties, you know?

I mean, clearly there's an emotion behind it, but this is his talent, is wordsmithing and thinking. I just find it so interesting that that's the, there's such a perfect union. there. Yeah. Obviously one of the main lyrics on here is a double bed, a stalwart lover for sure. This is once again his anti-marriage propaganda where he says, that came from a sense that I had, try it as it may sound. When people get married and are getting their flat, not even their house note, he said

apartment, bitch, not a house. The most important thing was getting the double bed. It was like the prized exhibit, the cooker, the fire, everything else came later. In the lives of many working class people, the only time they feel they're the center of attention is on their wedding day. Getting married, regrettably, is still the one big event in their lives. It's the one day when they're quite special. And the interviewer was like, isn't that a mite condescending? And he goes, yes, it does sound condescending, but it is a fact I have observed.

The other thing Morrissey hated was not being special, right? That was all he was afraid of in life was to be average. it couldn't have been. Oh my God. Me and Morris here are exactly. He's just like me for real. He's just like me for real, bitch. He's just like I used to be for real for sure. So it makes sense to me that I was very, I'm still stuck in. I'm still stuck in the mire of that. I think frankly, I would prefer to be average at this point. But that ship has sailed because I am mentally ill and insane. But I think I think he's missing out. I think the average. But yes, he's. He's. He's missing out. I think the average. But yes. He's. But yes. He's. He could not. And I think marriage ties into that, right? For him, marriage is so average. It's like a thing that is available to everybody.

It's so average. It's so boring. He doesn't want anything to do with it. Right. Yeah. So it does sound condescending. Okay. Okay.

So the next song is what she said. I just learned about somebody who has a what she said tattoo. And I was like, that's got to be the worst Smith's tattoo I've ever heard of. That's really bad. Because it's like what she said. First of all, what does it mean? Secondly, I think it's been ruined by the, that's what she said.

So like, you have a that's what she said tattoo. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. And the best way to start is to hit. Start. And up comes the toolbar. That's what she said. But love and respect to him.

I love this song. Oh, my God. I learned to smoke because I need something to hold on to because I'm hoping for an early death. Oh. Yeah. I love that. That's also so teenage. So teenage.

It comes from a. Elizabeth Smart wrote a 1945 novella called By Grand Central Station, I sat down and wept. And in hers, it says, I have learned to smoke because I need something to hold on to. So that's where this lyric come from. I think this is also one of those propulsive songs you were talking about. Totally. Yeah. It goes harder a little bit.

A darker quality almost. The other line that he paraphrased is in that novella, she says, I wonder why no one has noticed I am dead and taken the trouble to bury me, which is, you know, what she said. How come someone hasn't noticed that I'm dead? So good. How come no one's noticed that I'm dead? It also has that, well, my favorite. This is about me and Sadie Hawkins' dance, what she said, but then all the rejection she's had to pretend to be happy could only be idiocy. That's about me in the eighth grid. Johnny Marr has often called this his favorite Smith song. It's so fucking good. Jesus Christ. Fuck me up, bitch. Like, it's crazy. It's too close to home and it's too near the bomb.

The emotional depth of this song has then put up against the actual content of the lyrics, which is truly literally about Morrissey talking to the journalists. When I wrote the words, I was just so completely tired of all the same old journalistic questions, this contest of wit trying to drag me down and prove I was a complete fake. But again, he does such. He has this brilliant. way of still writing such beautiful lyrics about his martyrdom that they still are somehow relatable to people. Like, I've seen this happen in other people's lives and now it's happening

in mine is broad enough that you can apply that to anything. And then, I mean, kick them when they fall down the bridge. It's about himself. It's about himself being kicked when he's down by the fucking enemy, basically. So, like, relax. I'm sorry to do this to you guys because this is what happened to me in the Dave Matthews band episode when Grayson explained to me that my favorite Dave Matthews band song number 41 was about their lawyer suing them, which to me it was like the most beautiful heart-wrenching love song. I know, I know. And then it's like, oh. But it can still be a heart-wrenching lot song. And again, to Morrissey, this was the worst thing that was happening to him. Yeah, it's loyalty is big with him. He was very preoccupied by how he was perceived. Yeah. He didn't want people to think he was

fake, which is an interesting thing when you're constantly relating to people from a stance of ironic detachment. It's like, what do you think they're going to, you know what I mean? Right. Two other things that are so amazed by that song. First of all, just Morrissey's vocal performance. You really get slapped in the face with how beautiful Morrissey's voice is. It's just a stunner. He also didn't do many takes. He didn't like to. So he almost always got it within like two, maybe three. And the producer would point out that after the third one, he just got worse. So like it had to be within the first three because he just like don't want to do it anymore.

The end has that fake fade out, which I fucking love, where you think it's about to end and it gets quieter and then comes back, which is like a nod, Stephen Street did this. It was a nod to that it happens also in suspicious minds by Elvis Presley, that same sort of fake fade out. It's so cool. I love it because it really, because then it brings it back and then it's so. emotionally, like this crescendo that you thought was going to end. And it comes like, I like nowhere fast a lot

too. I think it has like a rush home ruffians vibe, right? It has an echo of that sort of jangly but then it's like get in loser. We're criticizing the monarchy. You know, that's kind of the vibe of this song. I'd like to drop my trousers to the queen. Every sensible child will know what this means.

The poor and the needy are selfish and greedy. Probably the queen did call the poor people selfish and greedy, and that's what the lyric is in response to. Every once in a while, we've talked about this, but here's another example. Morrissey will show his whole ass with his lyrics where it's like really, this is how he really feels. Yeah. And this one is, and if the day came when I felt a natural emotion, I'd get such a shock. I'd probably jump in the ocean. It's like so Morrissey, right?

Like he can't be vulnerable and natural. It's too hard for him. It's too hard for him. I find the last two songs on this album, the weakest. Like, I... Barberism begins at home is, first of all, seven fucking minutes long. Yeah, no. These are not my songs.

They tried to make it like a sort of like dance song. It's got some freak party vibes. Good baseline, but it's too long and it's a who cares. Yeah. And like, I'm sorry, there's just no way to write a song called Meita's Murder. Where you say things like the heifer wines could be human cries and it's going to be a good song. It's just not possible. I'm so sorry.

It's so heavy-handed. It's so like preachy. It's just not good. No, I know. No, it's not. Okay, and then here's what happens. Some goss and drama and tea. Sire is like, well, how soon as now is fucking banging in America?

We're just going to slap that on the end of the American release. They just slap it on at the end. Last song. Who cares? Who cares that you sequenced this album? Who cares that you wrote it as a body of work? We don't care. We're putting how soon as now on it.

and we're putting a little sticker on the front that says it has as how soon as now. The Smiths were so fucking mad, dude. They were so mad. Not only that, the Smiths made a video for them with like found footage and like a weird. And they were like, what the fuck is this shit? We didn't. Sire was just like, we didn't do it without their permission, but they didn't exactly applaud us. We needed to do it for promotion.

Probably they never answered. Again, they didn't have a manager. So like, but they were so pissed. They were so pissed that at the New York show, they took Seymour Stein off the guest list. They didn't allow him to come. Wow. But then he came to the L.A. show and took Morrissey to the Ivy and introduced him to Phil Collins. So maybe.

That's really funny. Yeah, the hatchet was buried. It got good reviews. People loved Me as Murder. Sounds gave it four and a half stars. Cream didn't like it that much. I wanted to ask you this. Cream says, I'm not even going to bother making the by now cliched comparisons between the Smiths and the

Velvet Underground or television. If you really want to meet these guys' musical cousins, you do well to check out the much neglected soft cell. Huh. I could see it maybe vocally with the sort of like a theatrical sort of fey, trick and, you know, sort of. Totally. But otherwise, I don't know. I mean, I don't know that I know.

Yeah, it's kind of a crazy, especially because more. Morrissey famously hated synthesize. He hated electronic music. They were like the death of the fucking pop music industry. They thought they were disgusting, lazy, horrible. I mean, every name under the sun. So like if Morrissey read that, he probably was fucking like once again asking people to line up to kill him.

Yeah, that's a weird comparison. Robert Criscow, babe, he gave this shit a C plus. Huh. Dean, are you okay, sir? What the fuck? Hmm. He says, these guys impose their post-adolescent. sensitivity, thus inspiring the sneaking suspicion that they're less sensitive than they come on.

Passive aggressive, the pathology is called. And it begs for a belt in the chops. He didn't like it. Yeah. They play shows endlessly. They're touring endlessly. For these five years, the Smith are a band. They are workaholics. They're working all the time. Around this time, Morrissey stops showing up to some stuff. He loves to do this. He loves to simply not go. TV appearance. They're all in the green room. It does not show up. People magazine interview. I'm not coming. And there was a like docu BBC thing that I saw that I can't remember who it was, was saying that everything stopped. I mean, there's nothing without him. So they were about to go on some European tour at some point.

I don't think it's this early on. But they're literally at fucking customs at the airport. And Morrissey comes. And he's like, I don't want to go. Oh, no. And he was like, we wouldn't even get mad. We wouldn't even question it. We'd all just turn around and be like, okay, well, I guess we're not going.

And this without a drug problem even. No mental illness. Yeah. Yeah. Mental sickness. No, I don't know. I mean, whatever. I'm not diagnosing. We're not doctors. We're not doctors on this program. You know, some of it might have been a power play. He was sickly. Sometimes he just would decide that it wasn't a good move for the band. Could he have decided earlier? Probably. But he would just like have a feeling at the airport and be like, we're not going. So in March of 1985, they put out their next single, Shakespeare's sister.

That's good. Slaps. The song Slops. Morrissey was very obsessed with this song. He thought it was like the best song they had ever done. Johnny Moore pulled the riff from the Rolling Stone song 19th Nervous Breakdown, which is also the same riff from Bo Didley's Diddy Daddy and Chuck Barry's. So again, very rollicking, very like old R&B rock. The title is of course inspired by Virginia Woolf, Room of One's Own, where she tells that story in it about the, she makes up a face.

sister for Shakespeare named Judith, who's gifted and just as brilliant. But she's basically like, oh, if Shakespeare had a sister, she would never be able to be famous and be a writer because she's a woman. And then she imagines that Judith is trained in women's work and then runs off to London and killed herself. Poor Judith. Poor Judith. A fake person, but yes. Remember the band Shakespeare Sister? Yeah, they were, they've named themselves after the song. They were okay. Morrissey called this The Song of My Life. And also Marr loved it too. He said for me, Shakespeare's sister was like pulling an odd star out of the sky. I had imagined this strange song and strange sound.

Morrissey encouraged me and then we captured it. It didn't do well, though. It didn't chart very well. They thought it was going to be very famous, but it wasn't. The B-sides are what she said, which we already talked about, and stretch out and wait. I love stretch-ed and wait. I know. That's an underrated song, I think.

You don't hear, people don't talk about it that much. Weirdly, this song seems to be talking about sex. in a different way than he usually does. He said in the song, Stretch Out and Wait, there's a line, God, how sex implores you. To make choices to change and to be different and to do something and make a stand. I always found that very, very encroaching on any feelings.

And I felt that I just wanted to be me, which was somewhere between this world and the next world, somewhere between this sex and the next sex. To me, I remember listening to it and feeling like it was optimistic when he says, like, all I do know is where he's, here and it's now. Yeah.

It's like, yeah, that's like living in the moment. Yeah, yeah. Right. Being present. All I do know is we're here and it's now. So stretch out and away. All I do know is we're here and it's now is from this book about men's liberation. It was called a new definition of masculinity by this gay American activist named Jack Nichols.

Oh. But apparently he was in that book taking it from the planet of the apes. Nick Kent covers them a lot and he does a profile in an interview for the face in May of 85. And there's just one really funny moment where. So Mark E. Smith of the fall and Morrissey had kind of a rivalry. There's just a little detail that Jeff Travis talks about and he says, I remember one incident when Mark was present in the office. And quite by chance, Morrissey appeared to talk business.

Mark just fixed him with this very sardonic look and said quite clearly, Ah, hello, Stephen. Morrissey was quite shaken by it because he knew him from back, you know, they're from the same town. Yeah. And he knew each other. And it is very funny. We didn't really talk about it how just one day he decided, I'm Morrissey. Don't call me Stephen or Stephen ever again.

Yeah. And everyone went along with it. I mean, these people that have known him forever are just like, okay, now you're Morrissey now. He's talked about multiple times why he did it. I think he just, he believed himself to be reborn in the Smiths. and he had not seen anyone go by just their last name to date. And he thought it was, you know, it was just a new version of himself. Divorcing himself from that pathetic loser.

I think that he saw himself as. I'm not saying that. He saw himself as when he was like hold up in his bedroom, writing endless letters to the music magazines and being alone all the time. It's very sweet. Johnny Marr says he's painfully shy. You've got to understand that. We all look out for Morrissey.

It's a very brotherly feeling. when we first rehearsed, I'd have done anything for him. And then he kind of talked about it. He's like, as a person, Morrissey, is really capable of truly loving relationship. Every day he's so open, so romantic and sensitive to other people's emotions. Personally speaking, I don't know this. But yeah, I think. I don't think he'd turn away from the perfect opportunity.

But try and imagine the hangups most people have in bed. All that is she enjoying it? Is there something more than this? Confusion. Now magnify that a hundred times. and you've got the beginning of Morrissey's dilemma. And then he says something really funny. He's like, but I must say that when he gets really upset, frankly,

I think it's just because he needs a good humping. Oh, yeah, you just need some release. It needs a little release. Okay, so they go right on tour in America. This is particularly brutal this tour. I mean, they're like 21 years old, you know, except for Morrissey is 26. They are partying. They have a really insane reaction.

in America, it's not the same as in England. People love them in England, right? But in America, it's like worshipful. It's like beetle media, like people screaming. Like, it's very passionate, right? And they're playing, you know, in L.A., obviously, L.A., who loves sad goth music the most out of any other city in America. They're playing, selling out the Universal Amphitheater. That's like, I think, eight or 10,000 cap and a huge crowd at Irvine Meadows, which is now called the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater. Huge, right? They're playing these huge shows. So Johnny Marn, Angie get married on this tour on a women in San Francisco. But they're partying, dude.

I mean, they're drinking. They're doing drugs or some cocaine in the mix. Again, not Morrissey. Cochene. He did drink. Morrissey did drink, but he was not, he didn't do drugs or party. And often, I believe he, when everyone went out after the show, he would, like, go read or whatever. Then they find out, I'm not a fucking contract lawyer.

I can't get to the heads or tails of this, but basically there's a dispute with rough trade that's going to come up. They come back from tour and they start recording The Queen is Dead, right? While they're doing this, their lawyer comes to them and is like, listen, I've been talking to EMI about signing you. They really want to sign you. Should I just get that going? And they were like, hmm, yeah, let's do that. let's go to the major label. So that starts happening.

I believe that Jeff Travis gets word of this. He is not down. He first says that Hatful of Hollow doesn't count as one of the albums in their contract. Morrissey is like, being what then? A bountiful gift from the land of the fairies, random sweepings from the flagged floor of the rough trade workshop. Oh, my good. He's so funny. I have to guess it's probably because, I mean, obviously, A, they are sort of breaking their contract or they're going to go to EMI.

And once Jeff Travis thinks they're going to go to EMI, he's getting even more what the fuck. You can't. And by this point, it seems pretty clear that the Smiths are the main cash cow of rough trade. Like if the Smiths leave, it's real bad news for rough trade on all levels. So it gets a bit contentious here. It's such a hard dynamic. I know. There's something really funny.

Morsi hates Jeff Travis. So he says, he says, Jeff had approached me after Mita's murder had entered number one. And he leaked a little touch of sentiment that almost verged on the human. As he said, I've dreamt of this happening all my life, which seemed to me to be unlikely, since Rough Trade had never even remotely been in the running for a number one album. He was like, you dreamt of what bitch? That was never going to happen until we came along. And then he said, and with this gush of acknowledgement, Jeff handed me a bag of biscuits

bearing a two pound 75 pen sticker still affixed. I gave no answer. How could there be one? I assumed and hoped I was mid-dream. A bag of biscuits. He gave him a two-pound-75-pens bag of biscuits. He gave him his heart and he gave him a pen. Again, I don't know if this is true, but it really sent me to the moon that idea that made me laugh so hard.

They got taken to court. Jeff Travis serves the writ, I guess that's what it's called in England, directly to Morrissey. Not to the manager, not directly to Morrissey about going to court about this stuff. They go. It's very vendor pump rules. Like send it to Darrell. I'm aware of to send it to Darrell. I'm aware of so much Vanderpump rules against my will, even though I've literally not watched the show.

But I'm aware of that that's Lala's lawyer. Yeah, Lala complained that Raquel's lawyer. sent her a season desist rather than to her lawyer. She was like, bitch, why are you sending it to me? Send it to Darrell. And then she made merch and then she made merch and I made a lot of money off of it. Yeah. Yeah.

What a dream. What a dream. Send it to Darrell. Send it to Darrell, bitch. Mim Morrissey was also like sent it to Daryl bitch, but there was no Daryl to send it to. And Johnny Marr went to court and they lost. It did not work. Okay.

So they put out another single. I'm not really sure what's happening here. they put out that that joke isn't funny anymore. July 1st, 1985. The Smith's really, mostly Morrissey, really wanted this to be a single. Jeff Travis was like, don't do this. This is not a single. This will not do well.

And he was right. It flopped. It didn't even break the top 50. It was like their first big flop. But it is such a fucking good song. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, but I guess it's,

not really like, it's a little too dower to make it as a single. It's a little folksy kind of. Yeah. It's like a little bit too dirgy folksy maybe. I don't know. I think you're right. Well, it didn't do well. That was a bummer.

Then they're like, okay, let's put out a fucking goddamn gorgeous beautiful banger single, September 25th, 1985, the boy with the thorn in his side. Ugh, what a song. another one by the way that is literally about Morrissey and the press which once again I wasn't aware of so sorry I'm so sorry to bring that to your attention so much more limited than I imagined it to be you're like wait this was about me and my high school unrequited this is about me and my Sadie Hawkins rejections Morrissey called this his favorite Smith song in 2003 I don't know if that still stands but he did say this explicitly on television there was like a he had a

an interview on the tube, which was a famous, you know, Polly Yates, that whole TV show. He was interviewed by the actress Margie Clark, and he said that this was a metaphorical expression of the Smith's status within the press and the music industry. He said, I think the mission of most journalists is to expose me because they have this notion I'm totally fake, as though I'm some secretly some mad sex monster. I know. They're trying to unravel me. The thorn is the music industry.

and all these people who just would never believe anything I said tried to get rid of me, wouldn't play the records. So I think we've reached a stage where we feel if they don't believe me now, will they ever believe me? What more can a boy do? What a great song. I'd rather not think about the British music press when I listen to it.

How can the British music press see the love in my eyes and still they don't believe me? A thorn in the side does evoke some. Jesus thorn crown. I know. Like, relax. It's a bit, it's a bit much. So the etchings on here,

Arty bloody farty. And the other side, is that clever J.M? Johnny Marr. Johnny Marr. Because is that clever? Why? Because rubber ring bitch.

Fucking banger. I love rubber ring so much. It's again one of those hard songs. I'm going to bum you out. This is not as bad. No. Is it about the press? It's not as bad as about it being like the press is persecuting me, but it's kind of sad because it's really this like depressing song about Morrissey sort of pondering the idea of the Smiths and namely himself one day being forgotten.

I love the ending of it. Okay, I'm going to talk to you about the ending. You are sleeping. You do not want to believe. Sleeping. You do not want to believe. When you're dancing and laughing and finally living, hear my voice in your head and think of me kindly. Do you love me like you used to? That's literally me decrepit to the bandsplay in Reddit in 10 years. I'm just going to pop in there. Do you love me like you used to? So, it's so, oh, it's so much. Hear my voice in your head saying, God damn,

gorgeous people's song. And think of me kindly. Okay. But again, this is like so passive aggrat. It's like, it's like, it's, I mean, not enough. Babe, you're on your second album. No one's forgotten you. You're literally not even at the peak of your career yet. What are you talking about? Relax. Relax. No one has forgotten You. Yeah. Okay. So I'll talk to you about all the weird shit and that's so awesome. That makes this song so awesome.

It also gives it sort of that, again, a grittier feel that I think is really effective. Yeah. There's a spoken word sample from this 1969 EMI Music for Pleasure recording of Oscar Wilds, the importance of being earnest. Two excerpts of dialogue from that are spliced together. Is that clever and everybody's clever nowadays? That's where that comes from. And then Morrissey's own voice is echoed, so it makes it have that weird haunting sound. There's a sample, it's echoed on the sample, which is called from this obscure EP.

This is crazy. Okay. It was distributed with this book by Dr. Constantine Radeve in 1971 called Breakthrough, an Amazing Experiment, Experiment in Electronic Communication with the Dead. It's electronic voice phenomenon. So these were apparently, they're called Roddy voices. They were recordings allegedly of the deceased that he said he collected on special lab equipment. And so the woman's voice that you hear on Rubber Ring is this woman Naudia Fowler.

Okay. And the other one is from this recently deceased parapsychologist, a Swedish person named Gebhardt Free. And it is being translated to English. And the message is a mix of Swedish and German. Oh, my God. Do sovus will nikt globe. You are sleeping. You do not want to believe.

That's what that is. Oh, wow. Isn't that insane? I can't believe I went down that fucking rabbit hole. But yeah, that you are sleeping. You do not want to believe is from this crazy weird book of this, like, fucking guy who thought he was or maybe was recording the voices of the dead. Wow. It goes so well with the hear my voice in.

your head and think of me kindly and the idea of being dead. It's just like, goddamn, Marcy. Even when I want, I want to hate you, I can't because you're so clever. You're so clever. Well, it's like it's sort of this power differential, maybe in the different direction than like in paint a vulgar picture where like, you know, I walk this step. You know, at the sound check you had no real way of knowing in my heart, I beg, take me with you. I don't care where you're going.

So it's like the fan that's like the star doesn't pay attention into and doesn't need and here it's sort of like the forgotten star. Totally. No, exactly. Yeah. He's so preoccupied. He's so preoccupied with that, right? Don't forget me.

Because he loves those people. He's the one that doesn't forget them always, right? It is so interesting that he, and he probably identifies with them. So he is already projecting into his own future that he will also be such a thing. Little does he know that don't worry, no one forgot. And you have an army of insects. fans who say the most fucking insane-ass shit I've ever heard. Actually, you know what?

This is a great time for me to read it to you. Sometimes my research takes me to the darkest places. I found this, I think it was on Reddit or on, maybe it's on a Morrissey fan page from 2019. I'm just going to read it for you in full. Let's get into specifics. A large portion or even a majority of Morrissey's music is about loneliness. No matter if a woman is a 10 out of 10 or a 1 out of 10, there will always be plenty. of horny men who'll want to have sex with the femoid.

With men, that isn't the case. There are literally millions of attractive men who can't get girlfriends because they are antisocial or poor. There is not a single woman who could connect with the lines. Two lovers entwined past me by and heaven knows I'm miserable now. Oh, isn't there, bitch? Women aren't also as into music as men. Don't get me wrong.

Women do like music. But generally speaking, only playlists and top 40s. He said women only like playlists and top 40. Listen, I'm the first to be misogynistic on here. You know that. The feminism, again, you guys all know, left my body long ago. But really, women only listen to playlist in top 40. It's very rare to find a woman who explores deep into music and will listen to an entire discography by an artist.

Really, bitch. It's my whole fucking job. Anyways, his whole thing, he goes on and on. We're bringing back feminism. We're bringing back feminism. You know what, actually, this post made me want to bring back feminism. No, I'm bringing back feminism. It's like my new thing. I love it. Let me know how I can help because this, this radicalized me right back, right back over. But yeah, anyways, that's what, don't worry Morrissey. These are the, this is, this is pretty much the bulk of the remainder of your fan base. They still hear your voice in their head. They do think of you kindly, the N-cell community. There's also, okay, so that just being great. It's just perfect. Even if you don't think of it in terms of Morrissey's like delusions. It's such a perfect capturing of what it feels like to be a teenager and listen to music and the songs that saved your life.

As you lay in on your bedroom floor. I just got the chills. It's just that is exactly what it is. So then the next B-side on here is asleep. Oh, God. That song should be literally outlawed. Sing to me. It should be illegal.

I think it's dangerous. The amount of times I've fucking ugly sobbed to this song. Uh-oh. There is a better one. This is the most explicitly suicide song of the end of the Swiss catalog, I think. I mean, he touches on it in a more veiled way in some other songs, but this one's like pretty straightforwardly. Don't you feel bad for me? I want you to know deep in the cell of my heart.

I really want to go. I'll be so glad to go. God. It also, the music. makes it so much depression music dude full like full it's over music like full like institutionalize me music like this is like rubber grip socks music the wind noise that they added to it like as if it needed to feel more haunting and sad and bleak and lonely like that doesn't want to wake up on his own anymore don't feel bad for me closing that

The ending the song with a music box version of odd long sane or whatever. Bruv. Sir. Brub. Sir. It's too much. A year later, Morrissey apparently volunteered the fact to the press that six people, in his words, who were alarmingly dedicated to the Smiths, had taken their lives.

Their friends and parents wrote to him, I guess, after they died. And then NME did this special news story about the growing number of suicides and amongst young people. And they talked about two people who had written to Morrissey on a daily basis and then afterwards killed themselves. And they asked Marcy to comment on it. And here's what he said. I don't want to be a nurse. I'd rather say in essence, well, the despair you feel is true and it's common. Not enormously common, but common.

And then he said that he felt a sense of achievement in touching those people. because quite largely people in such situations are untouchable by the human race and nothing makes sense to them. So I think it's quite remarkable. In a way, I like respect what he said because he's basically being like, well, their feelings were real. Yeah. But he's like validating their feelings, you know? Yeah. He's the only person that would have ever said that.

You have to like fucking tip your hat to him. You know what I mean? Like no other person. But it's like throw us a bone. Throw us a bone. No other pop star would have been like, yeah, they did the right thing, basically, because they felt that way. I think there's like this ability to touch people, this ability of art to touch people. Yes, totally.

And the ability to both be touched and touch people in that way is something that like not maybe always, but it's something that makes life worth living, you know? Oh, 100%. Or just that feeling that you're, that it isn't just you, that you're like, you're not alone in these feelings. and it's reflected. Right, right, right. There's a lot of things, positive things to say about, like, having your music touch suicidal people. But yeah, he's hardcore. One of the books I read pointed something out really, that was really sharp.

I thought, which they were like, you should have put rubber ring second in the sequencing of this seven inch. If you put asleep first, but then you followed it up with actually music can save your life. You know what I mean? Like, it might have been a more hopeful message, which, I mean, we can't know. But yeah, that song will fucking decimates me. I, like, can barely listen to it. I think I will listen to it maybe one time to do this episode.

And that was more than enough. Okay. It's September 1985. Andy Rourke is on drugs, babe. He is heavy into heroin at this point. He didn't inject it. He only smoked it. It just feels relevant.

So they're touring a bunch and I guess like there's a date. They have a couple of dates in maybe Germany and he's not able to smuggle it into the country. It just knows that it's not possible. So instead he goes to a doctor and they give him a shitload of volume and sleeping pills. So here's what he said. The problem was that I'd take a load of volume to ease the withdrawals from the heroin and then I'd get so wasted on the value. that I'd forget I'd take in the Valium and then I'd take some more

and then I would go on the stage. So if you can imagine what a man on too much Valium trying to play base on the stage might have gone like, it went like that. He fucked up a bunch of times. It was not a good scene and they basically asked him to leave the band.

Here's how they did it. I didn't know this. Apparently they, he doesn't know which member did this, but put a postcard under his car windshield wiper outside his house. Oh, my God. And he thought it was a parking ticket.

He said, I woke up, and there was what I thought was a parking ticket. But my car was parked in the driveway. There was an envelope with a postcard from Morrissey. It said, Andy, you have left the Smiths. Good luck and goodbye. He never found out who placed it there, but he did say Morrissey wouldn't have had the balls. So it might have been like just a prank or something? No.

Morrissey probably made someone else come do it. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. And he talked about that night, he went to visit Johnny Moore and cried in his arms. Oh, good. They were very close. That's the other thing that isn't talked about much. I mean, they were friends since they were 10 or whatever, 8 or, you know, 12, I don't know, whatever, children.

They were super, super close. And, yeah, it was very sad. So Johnny Moore chooses a replacement because obviously they need a bass player. It's this guy Craig Gannon, who had played in the band Aztec camera. He was actually a guitar player, but they were like, whatever, he can play bass. this is before they go on any horror shows and then shortly after

Andy gets busted for heroin like by the cops and Johnny is just like I can't fucking abandon my oldest friend he's clearly having the roughest time he's getting fucking arrested I have to put him back in the band he needs to be back in the band

or he's gonna slip through the cracks you know so they bring Andy back to the band but they were kind of like oh we already just told Craig he'd be in the band And I think also Johnny Marr was, you know, the music's getting more complicated. The Queen is Dead album is done. It hasn't come out because it has an injunction from Rough Trade.

But the music is more complicated and it's getting harder and harder for him to play it by him. He's the only guitar player, right? The Smiths were a four piece. So he has the idea to keep Craig Gannon in his second guitar player. And Johnny loves this. Morrissey does not like this. Morrissey does not like outsiders. He does not like anyone disrupting the insular nature of the Smith.

and he does not like Craig Cannon. The band moves to London, mostly because Morrissey moves to London, because he apparently wanted to be closer to all the TV and interviews he's constantly doing. And Johnny Marr says in his own book that he wasn't into it and he didn't want to move to London. And that was the first time he thought maybe he and Morrissey had different visions for the band. This is a crack. Trouble in Paradise has seeped in. Rough rate is still holding.

the queen is dead hostage, so it hasn't come out. Johnny Marr gets an invitation to record from Brian Ferry. Huge deal, right? Brian Ferry, in Mars words. One of my favorite artists since I bought Roxy records in the glam days. They're not touring and the album hasn't come out. So he goes to air studios and works with Brian Ferry. They become friends, blah, blah, okay, but then Goss T. Trouble.

He invites Brian Ferry, just innocently. Why don't you come down to the studio? for a Smith session and meet the band. So everyone's there except Morrissey. Everyone's excited to meet him. But then Morrissey, here's Morrissey's version of events. Back in London, John Porter surprisingly springs out of the bushes to mix a new Smith strip.

He hates John Porter. I arrive much too early at the studio in Chalk Farm, and I find shrewd John huddled with both Johnny and surprisingly, Brian Ferry. I walk into the room and all three freeze with Colonel Mustard Unease. Ferry, the bogus man, immediately rises and grabs his belongings, and John Porter turns away, unable to look into the eyes of Mazur, a Beckett. Johnny splutters a few surprise compliments, but minus any deafness, saying nothing at all, fairy smiles an unhappy smile and leaves, as if jealously guarding a can of sardines. I don't even know what he's talking about. I don't have to stop this because he's talking about some weird metaphors.

Basically, he's talking about it, like he walked in on his girlfriend with another man. or boyfriend, whatever, his partner in a compromising situation, as if they were trying to hide Brian Ferry from him. But Johnny Marr was like, we just wanted him to meet everyone. But Morrissey was so paranoid, I guess, that he was like, oh, you're going to replace, this is where it starts, right? We haven't seen it too much yet, except a little bit with John Porter. I think that's, and obviously with Joe Moss, it's starting a pattern, right?

Morrissey does not like other people being involved in the Smith, particularly people who get close to Johnny Moore. He doesn't like it. It makes him freak out. Well, February of 1986, just a quick footnote, John Hughes, the goat puts the song, please, please, please let me get what I want in pretty and pink. I did not remember that. Yeah, it's in the scene where Ducky, poor Ducky, a big Smith fan, is in his room crying. over Andy. But that was like a big deal. I think there's a big thing where that song, The Simple Mind song. The Simple Mind song is made massive by Breakfast Club.

John Hughes was really into like kind of new way of music. And then the manager of the Simple Minds was this guy, Ken Friedman. At some point, that manager gets involved with the Smiths. So I don't know if it was pre pretty and pink. I don't think so I don't think he had anything to do with that. But he does get involved and he becomes their like last. manager. There's also another guy who's their manager. They have a rotating cast of managers because Morrissey just will not allow anyone to manage the band and sort of like pushes them out. But this Ken Friedman guy who was responsible for the Simple Mind's big moment does come into the mix. Anyways, that's all. I just wanted to point out. They're getting, they're getting big in America,

particularly with jocks, especially when it's when Ferris Bueller's Day Off comes out, which I think is a little bit later. But that has another version of please, please, please, please let me get what I want. want played by like an orchestra. Hmm. Anyways, now it's 1986. It's the 80s. We know what's going on. Master of Puppets has come out.

Paul Simon's Graceland. The police every breath you take the singles. Peter Gabriel, so. R.E.M. Life's rich pageant. Fucking banger. Big mouth strikes again comes out. May 19th, Yossi's birthday. Yossi's fourth birthday.

My fourth birthday present was Big Mal Strikes again. Let's talk about it. Okay, I love that song. It's top tier, right? We put this top ten. Top Ten Smith songs. Yeah. Johnny Morris said he set out to write his version of Jumpin Jack Flash, the Rolling Stone song.

Interesting. I wouldn't have thought it's minor key. Yeah. And I associate jumping Jack Flash with major key, no clouds on the horizon song for me, just in the way I think, just, you know, intuitively. No, I think that's a good point. I think it is, it's worth. mentioning, because you're so right, it just is very interesting how Johnny Marr has all, always has, almost all of these songs have for him in his mind a place where he started that was

another song. And it's almost always unrecognizable, which is very cool. That's like kind of the genius of Johnny Marr. Like in his mind, he has made his version of Jumpin Jack Flash. But obviously, it's absolutely nothing to do with Jumpin' Flash because maybe it's a feeling. Maybe it's like, you know, sometimes it is a direct like chords or whatever. But I think, here, he said I wanted something that was a rush all the way through without a distinct middle eight. Yeah. I mean, there's also another thing that I don't

know that we've really talked about is how much violence there is in Smith's and Morrissey's lyrics. Sure. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Tons. Like, I'd like to smash every tooth in your head. You should be bludgeoned in your bag. Yeah.

No, I think it's a good point. And this is a good place talk about it because there's a lot in here. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. It makes sense to me, given what we know about Morrissey, that he's such a shy and sort of repressed person, the expression of any sort of physicality at all, I mean, given that he's also celibate. Yes. Yeah.

Is mostly through lyrics of like imagining or fantasizing about. I mean, because also violence is. It's visceral. It's of the physical world, right? Whereas it is not a real place that Morrissey traffics in his real life. So it is kind of interesting that it fall. I feel to me it falls in that same category. Originally they had asked Kirstie McColl to do harmonies on this song, but they didn't like what she did. So they didn't use it. Instead, Morrissey used that chipmunk vocal of his own, which is very really works. It works. He's once again talking about himself talking to the press. It's Big Mouse strikes again? I think so. At the very least, he's talking about himself being annoying to other people. But, you know, it's pretty explicitly about himself talking to the press and them misinterpreting it.

When N.M.E. asked him about the song, he said, I can't think of one sentence. I regret saying we're still at that stage where if I rescued a kitten from drowning, they'd say Morrissey Mall's kitten's body. so what can you do? And now I know how Jonah Barth felt. He's so... That's me in the Bansplan Reddit, you guys. And now I know how Jonah Barth felt. You guys don't even understand.

They're murdering me in there. The walk... You know, I mean, it's one of the greatest. Even though it's so fucking over the top. Now I know how Jonah Barth felt a literal martyred saint. Yeah. Also, I believe, famously celibate. But it's funny, obviously.

It's funny. Like, it's funny. Yeah. Apparently the Walkman and Hearing Aid reference have to do with how Joan of Arc heard voices. So it's pretty clever. Oh, interesting. And also Morrissey used to wear a hearing aid on stage, which was a, I think it starts around the time of this song's release on top of the pops, but it was partially because

they had a hearing impaired fan that would write him a lot of letters. And he said, I did it to show the fan that deafness shouldn't be some sort of stigma that you try to hide. That's really cute. I know. I know. It's really sweet. Oh.

I know. He's a complicated person. Stephen Morrissey. Just to finish out this single, Money Changes Everything, second ever, Smith's instrumental. I like that, yeah. It's good.

It's very notable for the fact that he later reused the exact music for a Brian Ferry song because he's working with Brian Ferry. It's the song called The Right Stuff, which was in 1987 hit single by Brian Ferry, which Johnny Moore is in the video. And I think when Morrissey saw that, he nearly killed himself and was like,

you're disgusting. It's like dancing with supermodels. And then unlovable. Just so beautiful. Nina, as you know, my daughter, my 12-year-old daughter has now been, has begun to listen to the Smith, which is a point of contention with my husband. In her split household. And my split household, yeah. But she sent me a text recently with the line I wore black on the outside because black

is how I feel on the inside. And then she wrote Emo Morrissey. Literally, invented emo. Yeah, invented emo. Yeah. Oh, Nina, that's so cute. The thing is, like, this is going to appeal to legions, right, of teens who feel unlovable. But when Morrissey's saying it, I think he's being quite literal.

He's so annoying. Is he talking about his relationship to the press? No, no. I think he's, once again, talking about just his relationship to everybody else. Right, right. Well, actually, nobody likes me. And again, we don't know if that's true or not, but that's how he felt. I feel, and we're getting to Queen is Dead in a second, but I feel that it was a mistake to not include this on the album.

Unlovable. Yeah. I think it's a really strong song. And there's one song on Queen of Dead, which to me is kind of weak, but we'll get there. I wonder which one. Should I guess? You can. You can guess.

Is it never had no one ever? To me, that's the week. How did I guess? Because it's the, you guess because it's the weakest song on the album because everyone knows that. That it's not even a hot tang. Anyways, I'm so sorry to Maline. If it's that your favorite song, then be my guest, love it. Or the listener, if that's your favorite song.

Okay, so this album is produced by Morrissey and Johnny Marr. It's engineered by Stephen Street again. The cover is the French actor Alon de laun in the 1964 film. I'm not, can't pronounce it. Sorry, Le ensumi. Leung Sumis. Bange. Oh, okay.

Bange, guys. Originally this album was supposed to be titled Margaret on the Guillotine. Like from the, from Vueva. Yeah, he later kept that for a solo song. But they went with the more, I guess a little bit less viscerally violent title, The Queen is Dead. It's so hardcore. It really, again, we can't overstate that at that time, that was extremely controversial. Yeah.

You didn't joke around about that. Like, I know that I read, I don't think I wrote down, but like their parents, like Johnny Marr and like Andy Roark's parents were like, why did you name the album? They were like upset. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's right.

I mean, it's a monarchy still, you know. It's crazy. They were not pleased. Being pun. Yeah. So Morrisy said in his autobiography, the album title worries Johnny. His parents are upset to think that anyone would call an album, the queen is dead. And Johnny asks me if I would consider switching the title to Big Mouth Strikes again.

I stand my ground and knowing nothing of the kind, assure him all will be well. I like that little soul. War moment. It does really well. It spends 22 weeks on the album chart. It hits number two. And even in America, it hits number 70 on the Billboard top pop albums, which is kind of a big deal for a independent new wave band from England. Again, I think bolstered by the two inclusions in the John Hughes movies, which were obviously huge films, Ferris Bueller's Day Off and pretty in pink. A huge turning point musically for The Queen is Dead is that Johnny Marr discovered this new keyboard. called the emulator, which was a digital synth.

Okay. That can make orchestral sounds, right? Because he could never do that before. A, he can't play them, but B, they didn't have the budget to go higher orchestras or anything. Yeah. And the first thing he said he did with it was the strings on there is a light that never goes out. And he kind of realized, like, wow, I can do so much other stuff. It's actually kind of interesting because Morrissey stays very quiet about this,

even though he spent his entire career. up to this, like denouncing synthesizers and electronic music. But it adds so much. And we'll talk about it in individual songs. But like, once I understood what parts of the songs it was, I was like, oh, my God, I couldn't imagine these songs without these. They add so much.

Okay. The album starts with The Queen is Dead with the intro of Take Me Back to Dear Old Blighty, which is he took it from another film, literally lifted the audio from a film called the L-shaped room. And the person singing it as the actress, Cicely, Courtney Ridge. I mean, again, this is, you know, talking about violence. Like, her very lowness with her head in a sling. I'm truly sorry, but it sounds like a wonderful thing, you know?

On every level, this song is crazy because the violence already, but then about the queen. Like, I think I might have read that, I don't know if it was this song or Margaret Guillautein song. I think it might have been this song. They were, like, investigated and, like, interviewed by, like, yeah, yeah. The authorities. Yeah. Because it might have, it might have been viewed as like an actual, like, threat to the monarchy.

I mean, I'm literally, I think about this song and I get a delicious chill up my spine. Not a delicious chill. I love that. Yeah. No, it is. It's so. Well, also, it's hard. It goes hard.

Yeah. The song goes fucking hard. It's, again, I just, I wasn't around, but, like, I think to, to give some context for how big the monarchy was. at this time, like, this is five years after Charles and Die got married. Yeah, yeah, yeah. People love the monarchy at this point, you know, like, yeah. I mean, obviously not everybody. Yeah. But it was sacred. It was beloved. Yeah. Morrissey said, an enemy, when one looks at all the individuals within the royal family, they're so magnificently, unaccountably, and unpartumably boring. I mean, Diana herself has never

in her lifetime uttered one statement that has been of any use to any member of the human race. I kind of miss this attitude. I just mean in general, not towards the monarchy. I mean, just in general, this sort of like absolute, like this kind of full hater energy where you're not supposed to consider the other side at all. No, people have become so lobotomized. They have absolutely, the things that they're accepting as good, which are the most made things in the entire planet, and like fedding them.

and everyone's just like, okay, that's fine. Is mind-blowing, I'm not going to name names, but we know what we're talking about? Yeah, no, I really miss someone just saying it like it is. Okay, here's another quote for him. I didn't want to attack the monarchy in a sort of beer monster way, but I found as time goes by, this happiness we had slowly slips away and is replaced by something that is holy gray and holy saddening. The very idea of the monarchy in the Queen of England is being reinforced

and made to seem more useful than it really is. That was in 2016. But I feel like this song, low-key, completely reveals that Morrissey was always kind of conservative. How, in what way, do you mean? There's this part of the song, right? Great part.

Oh, has the world changed or have I changed? Has the world changed or have I changed? The thing that comes after that is some nine-year-old tough who peddles drugs. I swear to God, I swear, I never even knew what drugs were. He's lamenting crime rates rising and like the breakdown of community and all this stuff.

You know, like he might hate the monarchy and that is, you know, not conservative in that sense. I don't think he was, he's like a patriot in that way, but I think he is, he's kind of conservative, you know, like all of the stuff he always talks about is like bemoaning a lack of values. He's anti-drug, he's anti-crime. Like, he's quite, he's from the beginning been quite conservative, you know, and I think what this is interesting, given his later, obviously, political leanings. I really, I'm obsessed with the part in the song where he imagines breaking into the palace. I wonder if because you know how there was this guy who broke into the- It was in 1982, yeah, Michael Fagan, Michael Fagan, who broke into the palace. And like got in and

like, like, was able to, like, yeah, yeah. But his version, so I broke into the palace with a sponge and a rusty spanner. She said, A, I know you and you cannot sing. I said, that's nothing. You should get me play piano. No. That's nothing. You think I can't sing? You should even play piano. That's pretty fucking funny.

Yeah. Pretty fucking funny. L. That's good. Great song. Amazing album opener. Just, we're off to the fucking races. Frankly, Mr. Shankly, babe.

Another iconic. Yeah, I love this song. Iconic entry into this, again, anti-labor canon. He's conservative and then he doesn't believe in jobs. So, again, this is what I'm telling you. Right. The heads are tail. else have tried to make home. He's like, I'm very concerned. I believe in old values, except as long

as one of the values is not that I have to go to a job every day or anyone else has to because it's soul sucking and it crushes you. Yeah. He really believes jobs corrode your soul. And that's what he says. And it pays my way and it corrods my soul. This song works on a lot of levels. He's kind of talking about being famous, right? And being a musician. Because the genuine take on this, or the general take, rather, on this is that it is about the rough trade boss. It is about Jeff Travis. Like, that's who that's who he's dressing. Although Morrissey has denied it, but I think he was lying.

You know, so I want to go down in musical history. I've got the 21st century breathing down my neck. I must move fast. You understand me. I love this line. I love this line. It's a lot about fame, right? And he says it, fame, fame, fatal fame.

It can play hideous tricks on the brain. I like the line. I want to live and I want to love. I want to catch something that I might be a sure. ashamed of where it's like again, can I finally have sex? Yeah. I mean, and again, you can, babe. That's on you.

You can. I want to love. That's something that I might be ashamed of. I do love the line, though, after the fame, fatal fame, where he's like, still, I'd rather be famous than righteous or holy any day, any day, any day. Really shows Morrissey's like value system, right? Even though there's no one more righteous than him, you know. Or is there?

What is he ever even saying? He'd just be saying stuff. He has a difficult relationship to the press. Much like myself, podcaster Yossi Salick, he'd just be saying stuff. Sometimes we'd just be saying stuff. I love the song. It's also just such like an upbeat. It's the same as girlfriend in a coma kind of like the beat of it.

Totally. You know. Like kind of a bouncing little beat. Like it's so fun to dance too. Morrisy said, I was reaching for the rubber. but I thought, well, no, I do want to complain. I do want to moan. Complaining is so unmanly, which is why I do it so well.

Amazing. L.L. Morrissey, you know, he blogs. He has a blog. He said that this was not about Jeff Travis. Jeff Travis has said basically proving that it was because you know what is the best lyric on here? For me, the best lyric on here is I didn't realize you wrote such bloody, awful poacher. Every time I hear it, I laugh because it's so. so fucking funny.

It was sort of corroborated that Jeff Travis had given him a poem that he had written. Oh, really? Yes. Mike Joyce said Jeff kind of saw himself on the same level intellectually, but I don't think Morrissey saw it that way at all. You know what's really funny that I learned in my deep research that, It doesn't come up very often. Actually, Johnny Marr hated Jeff Travis the most, and they never spoke.

Huh. Because he hated him. It doesn't really come up. You always hear about Morrissey. Johnny Marr, I think, didn't really go on record talking about how he hated him, but he absolutely hated him. And they just did not talk. And that's why he would mostly go through Morrissey, but Morrissey also hated him.

Interesting. Just a little bit less than Johnny. The ending of this song, though, also gorgeous. Oh, give us money. That's why it's like, of course it's about your leg, give us money, you know? All right. And then we're having fun, but now I know it's over. Oh, I like the song.

Can you imagine it was supposed to have trumpet on it? In what part? The refrain at the end, I guess. Oh, my God. But apparently Morrissey felt uncomfortable having someone on the record who wasn't in the Smiths playing anything. He said in 87, like later after the breakup, they asked him in Q magazine, what are you driven by? And he said, hate largely. This will sound almost unpleasant, but distaste for normality.

I've never really liked normal people, and it's true to this day. I don't like normal situations. I get palpitations. I don't know what to do. But then it's like he's so, once again, a man of contradictions because it's like, you know, it's so easy to laugh. It's so easy to hate. It takes strength to be gentle and kind. One of the best lines ever, you know?

That's probably, oh, I love it. It takes guts to be gentle and kind. I think it's goots. I know. Like every once in a while, his northern accent really comes out. It's so fucking beautiful. The sea wants to take me. The knife wants to slit me.

And then the part that's dragged me, drag my clown ass straight to hell. If you're so funny, then why are you on your own tonight? Oh, good. And if you're so clever, then why are you on your own tonight? If you're so very entertaining, Yossi, then why are you on your own tonight?

If you're very good looking, why do you sleep alone tonight? I know. Because tonight is just like any other night. Like any other night. It's so, oh, Morrissey sees love as like a human right, right? He says it in Hussunus now too, right? Like, I deserve to be loved just like everybody else does.

But he does, he's not willing to do, it's not just giving you, right? Yeah. It's an exchange. It's a vulnerability is the currency that you use to buy intimacy. Like, that's the trade, right? You don't get to just have intimacy foisted upon you without giving up. something. And I think he's unwilling or unable to do that, but then is so frustrated because he wants this other thing so bad. Yeah. Yeah. It is hard, but what a fucking beautiful song.

It's like one of those songs where his, it's sort of Sinatra-esque, like those songs where he has like a crooner's voice. And he loved that, right? I mean, he loved Elvis. He really embodied that. Yeah. Yeah. I know the other lyric really always gets me. I know it's over, but it never really began. But in my heart, it was so real. Again, something I think that would really speak to teenagers because so much of like, I mean, I literally remember listening to this. As a teenager's full fantasy, just like staring, mooning over some person in your school that like maybe doesn't even know you exist or like passed you a paper once in class or whatever, you know. Yeah. Or just full fantasy where you just invent a person in your head. Who amongst us has

done this? Not I. Yeah. Never had no one ever. It's not a bad song. It's just like, to me, the weakest. Yeah. Because it just feels like a repeat of like the other ones kind of. We're retreading.

Retredding territory. 50 and clumsy and shy does this better, you know. Yeah. It's just, listen, it's good for as songs go, but for a Smith song amongst the other ones, it just doesn't really hold a candle. Yeah. Morrissey said it was about the frustration that he felt at the age of 20 when I still didn't feel easy walking around the streets on which I'd been born where all my family had lived.

I'm fine. Apparently there's a part at the end. You can hear him laughing a bit because he had done this late at night, which he usually, he usually never came. He kept daytime banker hours where the rest of them, like, were regular rock stars that came in at like five and stayed all night. And he literally was like there at night in the morning and left at five. But this time he was doing it late at night.

And Andy Rourke said, you can hear him laughing at the end because he thinks he had a couple of shandies. Shandy. Yeah, that's right. A little British drinkie. Yeah. A little British drinky. Yeah.

Okay, the next song, the origin of my Heddy Smith statue. Cemetery Gates. It's for whatever reason spelled wrong, forever spelled wrong, the cemetery. Yeah. There's no, I fucking love this song. Oh, I love this song. It's about the importance of art. It's about the importance of art for sure.

This is, obviously, Morrissey does nothing but take in books and film. It's also about. I'm so sorry to say this. It's also about the press. No, not about the press. Well, it was inspired by, I think, the press constantly pointing out where he had lifted certain lines or been inspired by books and plays in his lyrics. Yeah. And it's also about something more beautiful, too, which is Linda Sterling confirms this much later in like the last piece of documentary about the Smiths, but like that he and her would.

go to the cemetery together and like run around and also they were both like really bookish and would like quote passages and stuff together. So it's about that too. But like it really is like biting back at the critics and podcast or Yossi is all like for constantly pointing out these inspirations in his lyrics. Because he says if you must write prose and poems, the words you use should be your own. Don't plagiarize or take on loan. There's always someone somewhere with a big nose who knows. That's the critics. And who trips you up and laughs when you fall. He'll trip you up and laugh when you fall. The first one that he says, you say, ere thrice the sun done salutation to the dawn. That is from Shakespeare's Richard III. The other one is just a made-up thing. When young

Stephen Morrissey was writing his show reviews and stuff for the, was it record mirror, I can't remember, the one that gave him the job, he had a pseudonym and it was Sheridan Whiteside, which is a character in the 1942 film, The Man Who Came to Dinner. There's a line in that movie that goes like this. It's about Anne Sheridan, the actress visiting Pompeii. And she said, all those people, all those mummified victims, here was a woman like myself, a woman who had once lived and loved full of the same passions, fears,

jealousies, and hates. And what remains of it now? I want to cry. You know, the first time I went to Pompeii, I cried all night. All those people, all those lives, where are they now? All those people, all those lives, where are they now? I love the end because, once again, Morrissey, known body negative icon. So the end is, Keats and Yates are on your side, but you lose, because whale blubber wild is on mine.

And the last thing he says is sugar. Sugar. Also, early keto adopter. But yeah, because he was constantly said that Oscar Wilde was fat. So whale blubber wild. And apparently linked that with sugar. Weird. It's really funny.

I don't know why it's so funny. But it's a beautiful song. For me, it's in like the William. It was really nothing family of music. Johnny Marr had written it on the bus, I guess, on a train back to London from Manchester, and he thought it wasn't very good. And he was going to throw it away and it just happened that Morrissey heard it and was like, no, no, no, this is like so good. Like, you need to do this. Oh, wow.

Yeah. He said he was trying to capture the spirit of the kinks, namely the songs, Days and Dandy. Now it's time for Vicker and a tutu. What a fucking banger. Yeah. And I like it, both this and Cemetery 8s, I really like the live version of rank. Oh my God. Yes. Yes. I like that every once in all, you can tell Morrissey gets tired of like plumbing the depths of his like soul and psyche to display them out for you and also his embitterness about the press to just write like a funny weird song that doesn't super mean anything. And it's just like for fun, you know. Yeah. I love in the live version where he goes, you know, he has. You know, he has.

has these like little kind of roared as sides. There's a naturalist man in the canister. This natural is trying. You dance is again. My God. The Smith sound guy, Grant Showbiz. Grant Showbiz. That's right, babe.

Grant Showbiz. That's sort of like the guy Kate Winslet is married to Ned Rock and Roll. He's the nephew of Richard Branson. Oh, is he really? Yeah. Maybe that's why his name was Ned Rock and Roll. Well, Vickering, Grant Showbiz. Back to Grant Chubis.

The Smith Sound guy. He has suggested that this Vickeringa Chutu song is also a thinly veiled job at Jeff Travis. Okay. At least it's out of both the pros. Yeah, I can't confirm or deny. But this is the song that pushed unlovable off the album, which again, this is a great song. This should stay. Yeah.

Never had no one ever. Could have gone, though. Could have gone. Yeah. Could have gone in the bin. Yeah. Bro. Brough.

Bro. Bro. It's time for there is a white that never goes out. This is where the emulator really comes in, right? Because the strings on this song are so major and crucial to the song. And also that flute melody, right? To me, equally major and crucial, that was all done on the emulator. This song would not hit nearly as hard without those layers to me, especially at the end.

Do do, do, do, do. This was the song when I was listening to it in seventh grade that my sister sat me down and was like, I'm concerned that you're listening to this. Oh, yeah, because the lyrics are... I mean, it's like suicidal ideation. It's a little murder of suicide court totally. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, it's of all the Smith's suicide songs, this to me is the least problematic. I remember she said to my dad, listen to what she's listening to. Like, your parents had a teaser. I was listening to Lauddy-Dottie by Snoop Dog on my Walkman in the car once. And my dad made me give it to him to put it in the tape deck. And that was one of maybe the most traumatic moments of my whole life.

I'm probably still caring that. The body has kept the score about that one, you guys, because the part where he put it in, it was literally right when he was like, and with your wrinkled pussy, I can't be your lover. I was like, I was like 10. Oh, no. Oh, no. I'll never recover. I've never recovered. I said I am. Go ask my mother. And with your wrinkle pussy, I can't be your lover. So like at least it wasn't that. At least it was something a little. No, it was more like concern for my emotional state and life.

This is like in middle school where we had to fill out some sort of personality survey and they asked what your favorite animal was. And I said lemmings and then I had to go see the guidance counselor every week for the rest of the school year. It was a popular computer game, but they were also known suicidal animals. God. Okay, so apparently the bridge of this, everyone thought, everyone said, oh, Johnny Marr stole the bridge from the Velvet Underground song, There She Goes Again. And he was actually like, no bitch. I stole it from the Stones cover of the Marvin Gay song, Hitchhike, which is also where the Velvet stole it from. Oh, interesting, interesting.

I just thought that was kind of funny. Morrissey suggested to Johnny Marr that they did not include this song in the album. He did not think it was that good. Can you believe that? No. He said the humiliation I live with because this suggestion is everlasting since the song became and continues to be greatly loved as one of the most powerful components of the Smith's canon. It is often a relief to be wrong.

He did not. He thought it was mid. I love you, Morrissey. Driving in your car, I never, never want to go home because I haven't got one anymore. That's a nod to the second verse of the New York Doll song, Lonely Planet Boy, which goes like this. But how could you be driving down by my home when you know I ain't got one? And I'm so all alone. We brought the New York Dolls back, babe.

Yeah. And also one of, I think, his second favorite film after Taste of Honey, which is Saturday night and Sunday morning in that Shirley Ann Field says to Albert Finney, why don't you take me where it's lively and there's plenty of people? Why don't you ever take me where it's lively and there's plenty of people? Always have pictures or a walk at night. Now that ain't true. Take me anywhere. I don't care. I don't care. I don't care. Okay. Apparently there is an earlier recording of this song where he sings,

there is a light in your eyes and it never goes out. Because there's been some debate over what that means. There is a light and it never goes out. comedian Russell Brand He is Apparently friends with Morrissey And he said that The line should be understood as He took it to be the light from the room of a lad

Who never goes out There's always a light on Because he's a teenager alone in his room Thinking take me out tonight Which is actually a really good interpretation Especially given that Morrissey spent his whole Teenage years in his room with the light on That's actually really brilliant interpretation

And I do like it There's a light and it never goes out Because I never go anywhere Take me out tonight. Morrissey would later say that those are lines I can never bear to listen to because I find them so close. I can't listen to those lines willy-nilly. I have to sit down. It's like somebody hitting me with a hammer.

But it's again, it's like this, it's such a public service to the teenage community. Totally. Because you are, you do find yourself alone in your room. Oh, God, of course. I still find myself alone in my house. being like, take me anywhere. I don't care. I don't care.

I don't care. Singing into the Amazon guy. It was the only person I see once a week or whatever. Totally. It was really giving voice in pop music to a unheard sentiment, which was loserdom. And I mean that with so much love in my heart. But the feeling of being a loser, which every young person feels, I think, regardless. And then especially, of course, some more than others.

And, you know, looking to. pop music for that. There was a lot of, I mean, punk had anger and alienation, right? For sure. But didn't have this deep sense of resignation, but yearning. You know, it was like, it's like this other thing that I can see why like it really captured the hearts and minds of people who hadn't heard themselves to be spoken to in that way before.

Never forget the Sadie Hawkins rejections thrice, thrice rejected. Yeah. And me, me singing, I am the sun. an air of nothing in particular and in my room just like, I go to the club on my own and I stand on my own and I go home and I cry. I'm literally 13 years old. What club have I gone to? What is over for me? You say it's going to happen now? When exactly do you mean I'm 13 years old? How soon as now? How soon as now? I'm demanding to know. Absolutely not even in high school. Yeah. Don't worry, Yossie. Don't worry 13 year old Yossi. You will date two pro skaters and then

a string of sad musicians. So you will do just fine. You will do just fine. You know, in Denver day to the skater. You didn't miss out, babe. Yeah, no, I'm sure. It's not something that everyone needs to do. Yeah.

I would argue, but you know what? I've done it. Okay. Some girls are bigger than others. Yeah. Some girls' mothers are bigger than other girls' mothers. I used to think that this was, again, body negative and talking about a crisp black son.

fat, Chris Box. But I actually think it's about specifically about boobs. I think it never occurred to Morrissey to care about breasts. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Memory glands. Yeah, exactly. Mamary lens. So he said in an interview, I do want to write about women. The whole idea of womanhood is something that, to me, is largely unexplored. I'm realizing things about women that I never realized before. And some girls is just taking it down to the basic absurdity of recognizing that. the contours of one's body. The fact that I've scuttled through 26 years of life without ever noticing that the contours of the body are different is an outrageous farce. I love that he's 26. 26. I know. Isn't it?

That really like shifts you back into fucking stark reality where you're like, and Johnny Marr's 21. Yeah. No, it's crazy. They were so young. From Ice Age to the dull age. There is but one concern. That's some girls.

I'm just, I mean, kind of a joke song, you know. It's totally, it's totally a joke song, but it does have, like, sort of feminist, like, you can really read it feminist wise, which is like, why do you guys care? It's like the preoccupation with women's bodies, which I did find kind of interesting.

Because he's saying, I've just discovered this concern. Like, why do these people care? But then you realize is everyone's, like, obsessed with it. Right. You know, man as well as women. It's like, oh. Yes, exactly, everyone. Yeah.

My favorite part of this song is, the end. Just that like beautiful little send me the pillow, the one that you dream on, send me the pillow, the one that you dream on, and I'll send you mine. It's just this like weirdly tender moment. It was apparently, again, a paraphrasing of a country song by Hank Lachlan called Send me the pillow you dream on. Again, my other favorite part about this song is that there's a weird fading in and out that starts and ends the song. If you listen, you'll almost think that like something's wrong with your headphones or things because it fades in and out.

And it, I think Stephen Street said that he just like wanted it to feel like the music's in a hall somewhere and then it gets closer and then gets back like closing a door and opening it. And just to give it a little more interest. And I thought that was really cool. Honestly, an almost a perfect album if they had put Unlovable on instead of in my My humble opinion. Get glowing reviews.

Here's what Melody Maker said. This is neither the time nor the place to indulge in trivial banter. Suffice to say that the Smith's peculiar career maneuvers, which have caused their audience much exasperation of late, are rendered utterly obsolete by the splendor of the Queen is Dead. An album which history will, in due course, denotes being the key work enforcing the group's Philistine opposition to down-chizzles and embrace the concept of the Smiths as the one truly vital voice of the 80s. Wow. That's right. No mincing words there.

Robert Crisgau gave it a B plus. But he liked it. He has good things to say. Okay. The single that comes out next is panic, July 21st, 1986. Just like a week before they go into the studio, Morris stays at Johnny Mars House. They're listening to daytime BBC Radio 1.

And there's a news report announcing the nuclear disaster. I'm not laughing about Chernobyl. Chernobyl's not funny, you guys, okay? I'm just laughing about what that comes next. So the reporting on the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. And then right after the DJ, did he put on I'm Your Man? I'm Your Man by Wham. He was like, you know what tonally I feel goes perfect with the nuclear disaster at

Chernobyl? This song by Wham, I'm Your Man. Great song, by the way. Great song, sure. It's just time and a place, you know? But Johnny Marr was like, I remember being like, what the fuck has this cut to do with people's lives, which becomes a lyric. Yeah.

We hear about Chernobyl, then seconds later, we're expected to be jumping around to I'm Your Man. So this inspires... Hilariously, this song does get on daytime British radio of all their songs, the one that is criticizing actual pop music and pop radio is the one that gets played. I know. That's interesting. Yeah.

Again, a very violent. It's very violent. It's a little overpunishment for playing Wham after the Trinobam after the Trinople. disaster announcement. But there's a bit of controversy that happens. So this actually, it's very interesting because this happened to the talking heads also in 1979 when they put out life during wartime. And that's, you know, this ain't no disco line was misinterpreted as being racist.

Because they sort of associated disco with black people and gay people. Right, right, right. And same in here where it's going against the disco. they were like, oh, this is, this is the Smith's being racist because, you know. Yeah. And like burn down the disco, basically. Right. Meanwhile, they were like, no, baby, we're talking like the club.

Like, not like, like, just like the plug where all the jocks and bros go or whatever you call them in England. Right. And also just like the Smiths canonically are against having fun, you know, against having a good time. Sure. Or having like a mindless, or Morrissey, yeah, but the voice of the Smiths is having a mindless laugh. So it's a colorblind complaint. Exactly. However, however, however, I must say however.

Yeah. Morrissey did not help the situation. Oh, no. Because then in Melody Maker, he was asked to name his favorite reggae act of 1984. And his answer was reggae as vile. Here's what he said in full. Reggae, for example, is to me the most racist music in the entire world. It's an absolute total glorification of black supremacy.

There is a line when defense of one's race becomes an attack on another race. And because of black history and oppression, we realize quite clearly there has to be a very strong defense. But I think it becomes very extreme sometimes. Okay, he didn't need to say that. But then also, he goes ahead and says, I don't have very cast iron opinions on black music other than black modern music, which I detest. I mean, famously, he obviously loves. Historically, I mean, black people invented rock and roll, that more than did not to R&B. And he does love all that music.

But he goes, he makes sure to say, I detest Stevie Wonder. I think Diana Ross is awful. I hate all those records in the top 40. Janet Jackson, Whitney Houston. I think they're vile in the extreme. Then he says something even worse. I'm so sorry to do this, but it's just my job. He says, obviously to get on to top of the pops these days, one has to be by law black.

Oh, just, uh, also. Just don't say it. You don't have to say that. Probably untrue. Totally untrue. Absolutely untrue. Once again, I don't know Morrissey's heart and mind. I don't know if this is from a deep place of racism or a deep place of once again.

I'd just be saying shit big mouth strikes again. Yeah. Haterism. Haterism, you know, again. But it didn't go down well, especially didn't go down well because then this is basically followed up where the guy. is like, you seem to be saying that you believe that there's some sort of black pop conspiracy being organized to keep white indie groups down. And he says, yes, I really do.

Oh, my good. And then he goes off about like this like sort of conspiracy theory. If you compare the exposure that records by the likes of Janet Jackson and the stream of the other anonymous Jackson's get to have level of daily airplay that the Smith's received, the Smiths have had at least 10 consecutive chart hits and we still can't get on Radio one's A list. Is that not a conspiracy? He's also so, yeah, it's just like, Blinkered and paranoid. Yeah. Yeah.

Then he says something kind of fair. They're like, at the end, he's like, it's just not the world I live in. And similarly, I'm sure they wouldn't care that much for the Smiths, like talking about the Whitney Houston and Jane Jackson in the world. He's like, I don't want to feel in the dock just because there's some things I dislike. That's fair. You didn't have to say all the other stuff, but that part is fair. Yeah. The interviewer, this guy, last name Owen, was later interviewed for the book, there's a light that never goes out.

And he said, I never thought Marcy was a racist. I always thought it was a big put-on, and it was just a way to wind people up the same way that Punks horse wastockes. That's what he said. Apparently, Morrissey, after this, did call up Melodymaker and threatened to sue and said, this is all fake. I didn't say that. And then Melody Maker was like, okay, well, we have it on tape. And then he was like, okay, just kidding. Never mind.

His lawyers were like, never mind. That's why we tape interviews, right? Known journalists, Nomi Fry. Yes, definitely. That's why you've got to get it on tape. The other song on here is the Drey's Train, which is the third and final. Instrumental. Yeah.

It's fine. Morrissey later said that he actually was asked to write words for it, but declined because he thought it was the weakest thing Johnny had ever written. Moving on, here's what happens. July to September, 1986. There are a pretty brutal touring schedule. They tour the United States again in the summer again. Tons of fans. The jocks have found them thanks to Ferris Bueller's Day Off. People are losing their minds. New Wave in general is massive. They're selling out huge shows. In L.A., people are going crazy.

It's particularly brutal because, A, they're partying, except for Morsi, they're partying really hard. And B. Morrissey won't let anyone eat meat. No, no. And so everyone is like literally malnourished because this is the 80s. So it's not like there's like tons of available non-vegetarian options. So they're literally just eating yogurt and beans and chips and then drinking a thousand drinks and doing drugs and cocaine and stuff every night. So they might be 21, but they're struggling. Like, they're falling apart. It's so bad that Johnny Marr apparently had like a borderline nervous breakdown on this tour. Like had to like, like several of the other band members talked about like coming to his room and he was like hyperventilating.

And then they cut the tour short. They're in St. Petersburg, Florida. Not St. Pete's. St. Pete's, babe. and they were supposed to play a fucking radio city music hall. They had never played it. Fucking iconic.

And they were just like, I don't think we can, we're not going to go anymore. What the fuck? And they decide not to. And then a miracle happens, which is that Andy Rourke goes in the ocean for a little swim

and gets stung by a fucking stingray, which meant that they didn't get sued for canceling the rest of the tour because they had a medical reason because he had to like, he was medically unwell, which is really crazy. Johnny Marr later said that he deeply regrets

never playing Radio City Music Hall because it was so iconic and it's really crazy that they did that. But I say this more to point out that like people are hanging on by a thread, you know, Johnny Marr in particular. October 20th, 1986, ask, comes out. Why is it so good? I have a little playlist of Smith songs that are in this vein. You know, like the William is really in the Russian morphine.

This is number one. I have it on there twice. I love it so much. I've been going on these long walks every day, about an hour. Oh, wow. How fun. It's pretty fun. The neighborhood crazy lady who's just walking.

And I'll be listening to The Smiths. And when Ask comes on, full dance down the street. Like full arms in the air, little jig down the main road. People driving past like, oh, cool, mentally ill woman. Watch out. But that's, you can't help it. You can't help it. It's so that vibe.

It's that bitch. This song is that bitch. It's spending warm summer days indoors, writing frightening verse to a buck tooth girl. A buck tooth girl. I love to a booktooth girl and luxembourg. I love it. It's a very loving song. It's very like, it feels to me aspirational for Morrissey, right?

Shyness is nice and shyness can stop you from doing all the things in life. That's him, right? Yeah. And if there's something you'd like to try, if there's something like to try, ask me, I won't say no. How could I? But he won't. Yeah. Also, given what ends up happening with the Smiths, I've now reinterpreted a bit of this song to be like, I think Morrissey talked to Johnny Marr a lot through lyrics.

Around this time, Johnny Marr admits that he starts really wanting to change the musical direction of the Smiths. He's like, he's gotten this emulator, think he can do cool new stuff now. He just doesn't want to do the same shit. And I'm wondering if part of this, if there's something you want to try, ask me, I won't say no. why wouldn't I, could be speaking to Johnny Mars, like, desires to do different kinds of music. That's all. Just putting that out there as a hypothesis. Yeah. And if it's not love, then it's the bomb.

The bomb. The bomb. The bomb. The bomb. The bomb. I will tell you, the Smith's one thing, best band in the world, worst music videos I've ever seen in my God given life. Part of the reason they didn't become bigger, I think, because in America, you really needed to have. Apart from I started something. That's a pretty good video. Which I love that. I love. Yeah.

But this one is like a bunch of teens dressed sort of 50s-ish, like hanging out and dancing by the pier. And that one part, the bomb part, they literally toss a bomb to each other. There's a bomb and they're tossing it back and forth. And then it's intercut with like live footage of this myth. Huh. No, I don't know it. It's not good. Derek Jarman directed it.

Oh, okay. No offense to Derek Jarman or talented man. It did not. It didn't work. RIP. Craig Gannon was still in the band. they wrote this song and he claimed that he wrote the chord

structure. And I think he sued and actually I think he did get money. But not for the song. He sued for like back pay for his touring and he did get money from them. This one actually has the backing vocals from Kirstie McColl. Okay. She was married to Steve Lilly White who is an iconic producer.

This is where a little goss happens. John Porter produced this. Morrissey. You know how he feels about John Porter. They do. He hates him. The story goes that Morrissey asked Steve Lillywhite to remix it after it was done to sort of a fuck you to John Porter. However, Steve Lillywhite said that Johnny's the one that asked him because he never even met Morrissey.

And then Johnny insists, I didn't give it to him. Now, I believe what actually happened was that Jeff Travis did it from Rough Trade. But people were mad. That's all I'm saying. I love the line, nature is a language, can't you read? I know. And repeat it twice. It goes kind of back to like the day that your mentality catches up with your biology, right?

It's like this whole thing about him not feeling like a natural person. If I ever had a natural emotion, I'd probably go jump in the ocean. You know, like he truly feels so unnatural. Cemetery Gates we already discussed. That's the B-side. Golden Lights. I'm going to go ahead and say it. The worst Smith song of all time.

It's a cover. Weird. A weird song. I'll tell you what happened because it wasn't meant to be like this. So it's a cover of a 1965 song by this artist known as Twinkle, who was like an eight-girl model who ended up doing music. The original version is just, it's nice. It's just like a normal cover, acoustic guitar, mandolin, normal singing, gorge. In the 11th hour, Morrissey comes to Stephen Street, tells him to remix it.

tells him to over-stress Kirstie McCull's backing vocals, puts this insane delay effect on his own vocals, and then it just sounds weird and fucking terrible. It's so fucking bad. It's so fucking bad. It's so crazy. Like, John Porter was like, Mazzar didn't have much of a musical clue. I remember him saying when we recorded it, can we not start with everything out of tune? Do we have to tune the instruments?

Absolute beautiful lead singer question. Do you guys, we have to tune the instruments? I'm like, yeah, we have tune the instruments. And he said, I remember thinking golden lights could have been great. We did a brilliant monitor mix of it and it was starting to sound really lovely. But he didn't like it. And then he fucked it up or whatever. So that's a bit of a smear on the Smith's otherwise gorgeous, untouchable legacy.

That song sucks. Okay. Now it's October. The single is out. We're touring the UK. They just basically came back from the U.S. canceled tour, Stingray, whatever, and then started touring right away again in the UK. Fun fact, Johnny Marr had taken to wearing only Yoji on motor suits at this point.

Pretty cool. He's getting a little rock star. Smoking Sigs on stage, pretty fucking sick. In the middle of this UK tour, Johnny Marr, who did not have a driver's license, did drive his car while drunk on wine and tequila and fully horribly crashed it into a tree. Like really bad. Like a miracle that he actually didn't get hurt. And he sort of like adrenaline pulled himself out. and just like walked home and he was like barely injured.

And then they called him into the playstation the next day. And apparently the cop was a big Smith fan and also a budding guitar player. And he just let him off. Wow. He was like, can you teach me how to play Cemetery Gates and then you can go, even though you were drunk driving to the point that you wrapped your car on a tree. I bring all this up, A, to point out that Johnny Marr's partying, babe, Johnny's partying. And that they have to cancel their next show, which I think was the last show of the tour,

which was an anti-apartheid benefit that was supposed to be at Brixton Academy in November. the rescheduled version of this show, December 12th, 1986, is the last ever live Smith show that ever happens. They didn't know that yet, but it does become it. Morrissey wore a Smith shirt. They played shoplifters of the world unite for the first time ever, and also some girls are bigger than others for the first time. And the last song they ever performed,

the last song in the set was Hand and Glove, the first song they released. Morrissey extended the finale for 20 seconds, and that means that the last line, of the last Smith's concert ever that were sung out loud were, I'll probably never see you again. Isn't that crazy? Yeah.

You'll probably never see you again. You won't know as a Smith's. I mean, we'll see a lot of more see again, for sure, against our well for the rest of our lives. But yeah, so that is the last ever show. Again, we don't know that yet. What comes out next before the album is Shoplifter's the World Unite. So we're going to talk about that January 26, 1987,

a non-album single. Again, bizarre. I know this was common. British people, older people love to... It's really weird. It's really strange. It makes sense. I think if you think about what the industry was like then, like, they just wanted to sell.

Singles were super important. That's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. In a way that they're not now. Right. I mean, now who don't even knows what the fuck is important. But, like, it was super important. And, like, you wanted to sell a bunch of them.

You wanted to get them on the radio. And then you would, like, almost not include it. because people were collecting physical artifacts. So maybe it's like, oh, they bought the single already. Let's put new stuff on the album. So when they buy the album, they're not repeating purchasing, you know? That's so interesting. Yeah.

This one hit number 12 in the UK. Elvis is on the cover of the single, a young Elvis Presley, who was taken, a picture was taken by his hairdresser. You know what I love the most about this song? Mm-hmm. That it starts immediately with vocals. Learn to Love Me, Assemble the Way is a really beautiful lyric. Yeah.

This is the first Smith song that has a Johnny Marr guitar solo. They had never done guitar solos before. This is my favorite part, the guitar solo leading into the pre-course, yeah. This is also top 10, top fucking 10. Obviously, the title alludes to the Marx, you know, Slows of the World Unite. Morrissey was forced basically at gunpoint, not actually gunpoint, but... He was working with Phil Spector.

He was working with Phil Spector. No, like Rough Trades Press was like, you have to go on the tube, the TV show, and say that it's not about, that you're not actually telling people to shoplift. And he was like, but the song is about shoplifting. And they're like, yeah, but you have to go say it because we're never going to get on the radio. So he goes on the fucking tube and he says, it does not literally mean picking up a loaf of bread or a watch and sticking in your coat pocket. It's more or less spiritual shoplifting, cultural shoplifting, taking things and using them to your own advantage. A great cover, but he's lying. It really is about actual shoplifting.

London is the first B-side on here. Very aggressive. This goes in the hard-rocking Smith's canon. It's once again sort of power inequality where like there's someone who's a star and there's someone who's not a star. There's someone that stays on the platform and there's someone who goes to London. You know, there's a girlfriend who's left back home. You'll never see her again. There's old friends.

You left behind. You think they're sad, but they're actually jealous. It's a very, like, literal song, too, about how often they would, I mean, again, we've talked about this, but the Smith are a very northern band. That's a big deal. And they would take the train often down to London. So it's like how that was very weighted for them to take the train down to London because it's like you're fully having a cultural. shift, you're going to the big city. You're like, you know, so in that sense, it's interesting.

And it's a huge, you know, anyone who didn't grow up in like the big city, you knows this is a huge thing. I love the chip on the shoulder, yeah. Yeah. I love how the song starts with like feedback. It's like kind of early on, like very like punky feeling. Half a person, babe, though. Oh, yeah.

Call me morbid. Call me pale. I love it. It's the days when you were hopeless and poor. I just liked you more. I just liked you more. I'm like, oh, my God, did someone say that to you? Because you probably, again, you were so annoying when you were poor and then you got rich.

You were probably even more annoying. Yeah, totally. That's lifted from real life. No, I don't know. But what a banger. Okay. The next things that happen are compilation. So I'm not going to go into the weeds about them.

I'm just going to tell you about them. The world won't listen comes out February 23rd, 1987. This is sort of the record label wanted money. I don't know. Right. Morrissey said, I pass away as the world won't listen compilation is released, and the artwork of which I am the most proud is repulsively reduced for the CD format to an absurd fraction of the larger photograph.

The side view of a blowfish face in black and white looks stingy and paltry, a cheapened impression of the album's sleeve, and I stormed the gates of rough trade in a now familiar, maniacal furor. In a state of homicidal seizure, I demand to know why the CD image does not repeat the LP image. But we couldn't fit the entire LP image on the CD because a CD is too small. is Richard Boone unhelpfully. And he goes, but they managed quite well with Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Heart Club band. It's so funny.

The title is a reference, again, to the conspiracy against the Smiths to not put them on the radio. Yes. The world just won't listen. Meanwhile, they're like super successful. Yeah, they're like the band of it. There's one song on here, though, that hadn't, we haven't talked about, which is you just haven't earned it yet, baby. I like this song, if you're one. It's another one of those bouncers.

Just haven't earned it yet, baby. It was going to be the single, but then they change it to shoplifters of the world unite. Thank God, because the shoplifters to the world unite, is like 10 times stronger than this song. It's the second time, I must point out that he admits to wanting to be famous and finding it unsatisfying. It says, if you're wondering why, when all I wanted from life was to be famous, I have tried for so long. It's all gone wrong. Beautiful. The lyric is actually a reference that he says that when he would constantly tell Jeff Travis,

why haven't we had number one singles? Why haven't we this? And Jeff Travis said to him, you just haven't earned it yet, baby, according to Morrissey. Guess what comes next? Weirdly another fucking compilation, louder than bombs.

This one was Sire just wanted to put it out in America. Actually, they might have known already that the Smiths were going to sign to EMI, and so they were like, well, fuck you, we're putting this compilation out and get more money or whatever. And then it did so well in the U.S. that rough trade released it as well.

It's basically on it is just everything that had never been released on an American studio album. Interesting. The one notable thing about it is that the woman on the cover is Sheila Jolani. So she finally gets some shine. And also, I don't want to talk about it now, but Sheila Take a Bow is on here. And so it came out in America basically one week before it came out as a single in the UK. So they signed to EMI. They each get like a $60,000 advance.

Morrissey played really hard to get. And weirdly, at the end, just was. like, okay, well, I'll only sign to you guys if you let us be on the HMV imprint of EMI, which had released Elvis's first UK single and was like very cool. Except at this point, it was a full on classical music imprint. Just put out classical music. And EMI was just like, yeah, fine, whatever. Fine. You can be on HM.M.V. I don't care. Jeff Travis finds out and goes ahead and tells the Guardian that the Smiths have signed to EMI for reasons of greed. Morrissey said, I found Jeff had zero appreciation for the songs that saved him from life's lavatory.

And he had no warmth for the songwriting duo, who was a lure would ensure his own success for the rest of his life. He's not totally wrong. The Smiths really did make rough trade what it is forever. Like, it forever just became the label that the Smiths were on and did cement its success. So he's not wrong. They also finally have a new manager. I don't really know when this new manager got involved, probably before they am ideal. I'm not really sure.

Again, timeline is fuzzy. It's Ken Friedman, that guy, who also, I believe, wasn't Ken Friedman later canceled? And he owned the spotted pig, remember? Is it the same Ken Friedman? It's the same kid Friedman. Yes. Yeah, definitely. Yeah.

He was like me too. He was like me too, yeah. Yeah, same Ken Friedman because he's American. Oh, wow. He was 25 when he started managing James Smith. Yeah, that's crazy. He managed, I told you, Simple Minds and also UB40. at the time. Oh, you'll be 40. Wow. That's right, babe. Yeah. It's the, it's the 80s. Yeah.

Okay, so they go to the studio to do the last album, Strangeways. Here we come. It's the last album for their rough trade deal before they go to EMI. And the first studio album of the Smiths that I ever bought. Yeah, it makes sense because you were of a buying records age. It's a really good one. Yeah. Morrissey has called this the most joyful and relaxed Smith's studio session to date. Johnny Marr remembers it differently. He said, in the middle of making the album, something suddenly changed. New Allegiance was formed between band numbers, and I was having to defend the merits of our new manager. I didn't understand why there was a problem. This becomes a huge problem. Once again, just like all the other managers, Morrissey does not want this man involved. He doesn't like it.

He doesn't really say that. Morrissey likes to make his points obliquely by passive aggression, I think. So that's what he starts doing. Poor Johnny Mar is basically just like, I'm 21. I'm so tired. I read all the music. I'm partying. I can't also manage the band. Can we please have a manager? And Morrissey's like, no, bib, no heart. So things are like kind of apparently in the studio not going great. I don't know. At some point, they are forced to make a video for Sheila take a bow. Okay. Stephen Baker from Warner Brothers said this. This is another place where we can point out where the Smiths could have been bigger, especially in America in real time, but weren't. He said we were limited in airplay because there were only so much.

many radio stations that were playing the Smiths. It was only these like burgeoning alternative radio stations, right? That wasn't really happening. And he was like, but MTV was really interested in the Smith. So that was part of our frustration. Here's a company that's an important part of the marketing of the groups, but we couldn't deliver to them the video that other alternative groups were making. Like in 86 New Order made a fucking video for Bizarre Love Triangle. Robert Longo directed it. And it's, it made that song huge in America because it was on MTV. Yeah. They also had launched 120 minutes in 86, the alternative music show. And the guy was like, anytime the Smith's got one video spent 120 minutes or one play on K-Rock, it turned into an immediate

reaction, like 100 times what another band would have gone. So they could have just done this. Anyways, so they force it. They're like, you are making a fucking video for Shilly Take About. They send over Tamara Davis. Oh, wow. She was 23 at the time, you know, amazing director who later married Mike D from Beastie Ways. she said it was this very bizarre thing. I spent two or three days with Morrissey sitting in his bedroom, sitting on his bed. And I had this feeling, is he really crazy and odd? Or is he just trying to convince me? I couldn't work it out if it was an act or not.

She said they bonded, though, over like old Hollywood and stuff. They decide, okay, we're going to make the video. She's going to shoot handheld footage around the studio where they're recording. And then she would also film a performance in London and intercut the whole thing with Hollywood movies, old Hollywood movies. So they show up to do the fake show at the Brickston Academy for the video. They do. They all show up except for Marcy, who does not show up. Does not show up.

And they're like, what the fuck? So Johnny Marr, Tamara Davis, and Ken Friedman go to his house. And he refuses to come out. And they're literally talking to him through the fucking door. Oh, Morrissey. And Johnny was, according to Tamara Davis's recollection, Johnny was like, that's it. The band is over and walked away. He was so pissed.

Johnny Marr said, and there is a light that never goes out, book later, he said, for me to be treated just like everyone else meant, why should I back you up? Because you're treating me like a camera guy you've never met. Yeah, yeah. Fair point. So then Marr finally goes over and has like a real talk with Morrissey, like I think a couple days later. The gist of it was Morris being like, I don't want to work with Ken Friedman and Johnny being like, dude, we have to, please, we need to have a manager.

And his suggestion then is like, well, what if you and I separate him? as business entities. Like we become separate business entities. Then I can have a manager. You don't have to have a manager, but we can still make music together. I think this is heard by Morrissey. As let's break up. Let's break up.

And you know what? It is really worth speaking of it in relationship terms because I think that's how Morrissey viewed it. Like this was a relationship, you know, like a part, like a real like girlfriend, boyfriend type relationship where he was like, I think, stung by that idea. Like he couldn't see that we could ever do that. And Johnny Morrow said he's like I was trying to break up the band. Like I just wanted to do that.

However, later, he said, Johnny Morrow said 18 different things about this. So I can't really understand what he was thinking. And maybe he's, I don't know what the truth is. But he said, I don't remember if I said I was going to leave the band or not. But I said that we needed a break and we need to rethink what I'm doing. So he kind of goes back and forth between did I say I wanted to leave or did I not take. So they have that talk. they filmed their last TV performance ever on top of the pops for Sheila Take About.

Again, they haven't officially broken up in that talk. The talk is just like when you... It's a, we need to talk. We need to talk. And you're young and you haven't arguing with your partner and no one is willing to say the truth. And so you both walk away with a complete misunderstanding what's going on. And instead of clarifying it, you just keep going deeper into misunderstanding. So they do this, Shilly Take About.

That's the footage they end up using for that music video. Poor Tamara Davis has to use that. then Johnny Marr calls a full band meeting at a chip shop, a fancy chip shop called Gilles Fish and Chip Restaurant in Notting Hill. It's an emergency meeting. Here's what Johnny Marr said. It seemed to be like the sensible way to deal with it was just to go and get some sunshine for 14 days. And when I got back, just to think where we're going to go with the next record. So he was basically like, look, we're tired.

This has been crazy. I need to take a vacation. Like, I'm going to take a break. Now, Mike Joyce was like, it was completely out of the blue. We were just in shock. think what Johnny really wanted was backup, but we couldn't give it many. So they heard his suggestion of a holiday. And he also said he wanted to rethink the Smith's musical direction, which I said earlier. Like he was bored of what they were doing. They heard that as you don't want

to be in the band anymore. You're leaving. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Morris, he remembers like this. One night we had a conversation about it. And he was saying, I think it's about time. And I've had enough. And I was saying, yeah, I understand. But I didn't really mean it. I didn't think you completely pull the plug. See, it's really sad. It really is like when you like, it's about communication. It's about communication. It's been really fucking gut punching for me lately because I've, you know, we've really recently experienced a Venus retrograde, which brings up all of your old patterns in love and romance. And I was really having to retread the hollowed ground of how often I was not actually vulnerable in relationship. And thusly, like things like this transpired were like. Because you didn't say what you really felt.

Exactly. Exactly. And then it sort of like becomes a breakup because nobody's honest, you know? Yeah. So anyway, so that's kind of going on. Johnny Mars, like, they could have sat there and listened to me being enthusiastic about a reinvention of my life in their lives. Or they could have heard me say those words as this is the end. I want out and I'm not coming back, which is what they did. Morrissey said years later, the Smithster broke down because of strain. I think Johnny simply had had enough of the intensified pressure and wanted to play music. He just wanted to play music and get on with it. That's why the Smith ended. He's forgetting to say the part that he wanted to play music and get on with it

and also not manage the band and you wouldn't let him have a manager, but that's fine. Johnny Moore also says he thinks that a big part of this was that his relationship with Andy Roark, who was his childhood best friend, had really deteriorated, and they had stopped communicating. And now it was like the three against one, and Marr was like the odd man out. And he said, some of it was my fault because I got too far away from him. My relationship with Morrissey got even more exclusive. But Andy created some of that by getting very, very distant because of his drug issue. Years later, I realized that his role in the band, my friendship with him, in being part of my roots, and in a way, my refuge was no longer there.

Had me and Andy not got so estranged, things wouldn't have gotten to such a boiling point. Okay. So at this point, we're only at deep misunderstanding. Okay. Nothing's really happened yet. Yeah. They put out the Shilatake of a single April 3rd, 1987. A jam.

Great. Amidst the care. amidst the dissolution and destruction. I love the take my hand and off the stride. La la la la la la la la la la. This hit the number 10 on the UK singles chart, so it became the joint highest chart placement. So two of their singles hit number 10.

That's the highest they ever got. This one, and heaven knows I'm miserable now. It's obviously about Sheila Delaney. It's an homage to Sheila Delaney. They spelled her name normal instead of the... How can someone? Someone so young sing words so sad. Yeah, or like right word so sad. You know, because Sheila Delaney famously was like 19 when she wrote that play or whatever. 17, 19. Sandy Shaw was supposed to sing backing vocals on this. She shows up at the studio and everyone's there and guess who doesn't show up. That's right. Morrissey. He's on, he's in his not showing up era.

Sandy Shaw was like very upset. I guess they got them on the phone and she was like, just hum me the tune down the phone that you want me to do. He later said he was very sick. He was always very sick in his way of excusing himself from not showing up to things. Johnny Marr said he was trying to go for Mot the Hoopal sound, but it sounded like Mot the Hoopal as performed by the Salvation Army band, which is very Smiths. That was a good little. It's a great song. The B sides are, is it really so strange? And Sweet and Tender Hooligan. Both great song. Sweetened tender hooligan fucking bangs. Johnny Marr said, I was a little sick of hearing.

that we were wimp rock. To this day, people who don't know their shit say that, ignoring the rocky ones like the queen is dead. So sweet and tender hooligan was another example of us showing people that harder side. Yeah. Great song. Great song. So what happens after the chip shop and stuff

is basically I think what in their minds, they're like, we have to get Johnny back in the studio or he's going to leave us. So they've tried to they're like, we have to make another album right now. And Johnny Warner's like, what are you fucking talking about to me? We literally just finished an album. Like, we don't have to make another I'm so tired.

I want to go on vacation. They're like, no, you have to. And he was like, we don't even have any fucking new songs, you know? So they go in the studio, ostensibly under the guise of making a B-side for girlfriend in a coma. Okay. So Johnny Marr's pissed. He doesn't want to do this. He's also really upset that Mike Joyce is coming to him and being like, we have to go in the studio.

I'm tired. I won't go. Fine. He goes to please everyone. Then he's told that they're doing a cover of a. a sila black song called work is a four-letter word. And Johnny's like, this is not going to be good. It's going to suck, but fine.

And it does suck. It's not a good. It's right up there with golden, whatever the fuck. It's bad. But you can see here in Morrissey is once again trying to sub, instead of just using his words and having a communication, he's trying to communicate through the song lyrics. Here's what the song lyrics are. If you stay, I'll stay right beside you.

and my love may help to remind you to forget that work is a four-letter word. But Marr took that as an insult. He was like, I defy anyone to think that my dedication and hard work was ever in question. No way. So you expect me to go along with that, not just perform it and produce it, but actually take that shit that I've been anything other than driven to an insane degree, my back just went up. Team Johnny Marr. Morris, see, babe, use your words. Use your words.

All men. Use your words. Let's talk it out. Let's talk it out. So the vibes are bad. Grant Showbiz produced these B-sides. He's back, babe. He said it was very spooky, very scary time.

Everyone was in bad, bad vibes. Apparently Morrissey was getting really drunk and, like, knocking stuff down. And I don't know, it was, the vibes were bad. Johnny Marr says it's one of the lowest points of my life. I hated that session more than anything. From the start, I was sleeping in the control room just to get it finished. And there was no need for that record to be finished. They had like a lot of time before girlfriend and a couple was coming out.

Okay. In spite of all this, Johnny Martin Morrissey write one new song. So this is the last song they ever write together. I keep mine hidden in this session. Johnny works fucking like a dog to mix this song through the night and then gets up and goes to the airport straight in the morning. He said the last night I was in the band, which was the last night at the cat house at the studio. I turned to Andy and said, you know the way this is going to end. and he looked up and said, yeah, I do.

And I took that as an approval. And it was outside of being in the Smith. It was just two people who knew each other very well. This is in there as a light that never goes out. Again, later, Johnny Marr said he didn't. He wasn't leaving the band, so I don't really know. That day was May 22nd. Morrissey's birthday, his 28th birthday, so he was not present in the studio.

So Johnny Marr finally gets to go on vacation, babe. He goes on vacay. Him and Angie pack up go to L.A. for two weeks. He does a radio interview with K. Rock where he, like, glowing, like not even a glimmer of there's a breakup. He talks about how excited he is about the Smith's, how hopeful. He talks about how amazing and marvelous Morris he is. He said, I really miss him. That's my best friend. Like, so again, who knows? After he gets back, he's basically like, well, no, I didn't hear from anyone. No one called me. Once again, full breakdown in communication.

Yeah. No one calls him. No one calls each other. I don't know what happens. No one's talking. And then two days after he gets back, there's a story in the NME that says Johnny Mara's left the smiths. Okay, sidebar. This is insane, you guys, because for a long time, they did not know who planted this story. Johnny Marr thought it was Morrisy, so it made him even more mad. Morsi probably thought it was Johnny Mar. Anyways, everyone thinks it's everyone else, right? It's a whole thing.

This is like Real Housewives of Beverly Hills level. Well, listen to this. So creating an even more of a strain in a rift. Grant Showbiz says that at the time, the consensus amongst everyone was that they thought Morrissey did it. However, here's who did it. I figured it out. Actually, Tony Fletcher figured it out. It's in his book.

There's a light that never goes out. It was a journalist. NMEE stringer named Dave Haslam, who was a longtime Smith fan. He's from Manchester, a DJ at the Club Hossienda, super tight friends with Andrew Barry. Andrew Berry is a very old friend of Johnny Mars who actually cut all their hair. And he was sort of part of Johnny Mars extended circle. So he knew it just from like being in the friend group. Yeah.

And then he was on the phone call pitching ideas to enemies' features editor, Danny Kelly in late July. And he basically, he was like, I'm not a cutthroat journalist. I'm not the kind of person who's going to ring up the enemy and say, I've got a scoop. I just remember a conversation where I said, you do know that Johnny Amar is not working with Morrissey anymore. And the general implication seems to be they're not going to be working together again in the future. And Danny Clay was like, hmm? What? I didn't know that.

And then they print this big story. Actually is really salacious, has a bunch of lies in it. Like it says that Johnny Marr had interrupted Smith's recording sessions to fly to the United States to record the Talking Heads and used rough trade money to pay for it, which is totally not true. Johnny Marr does play on the Talking Heads record naked, which, A, they made it in Paris. and it hadn't, I don't even if it had happened, it had been on a break. They can't get anyone to quote from the band on it. So Danny Kelly quotes Mike Joyce's girlfriend saying he doesn't want to talk about that on the phone, which they took as a confirmation that the breakup did happen. Morrissey issued official denial, but it's over.

You can't take it back. And Johnny Mars didn't care. Be like, fuck these people. And so here's what he said. I still hadn't heard from the others. And with everything that had happened, I just thought, fuck you. I face up to the inevitable and announce that I was leaving. the Smiths. The other band members issued

a statement on the same day. So he calls the enemy and says, yeah, I left. Even though he hadn't actually left. It's right? It's so crazy. It's all bad communication. Yes. It's a string of miscommunications that ended the best band in the world. Yeah. Okay, but there's more.

So then the other band members issue a fucking statement and they're like, they wish Johnny Marwell and other guitarists are being considered to replace him. And that just even pushes it even more. It's like you break up with this person because you're having miscommunication. Then you see they post a girl on their Instagram. No.

And you're like, well, now you're dead to me, bitch. But he was the heart of the Smiths. That's what I'm saying. So he was like, that was the final nail in the coffin. I couldn't go back if I wanted to. They weren't being vulnerable with each other. Here's what Morris said in his book. Strange ways, here we come.

We both knew was the Smith's masterpiece with everything in its perfect place. Johnny and I were both drained beyond belief. and there was no one around us to suggest that we disappear somewhere to rest and be apart. There would have been, babe, if you had let them have manager. The manager does that, but you wouldn't let them have a manager. You fired the manager. Anyways, he says, we do not telephone each other for two weeks, and then suddenly the press is rife with Smith's split stories. To obviate doubt, we hold off with communications, and I sit watching the situation as if behind glass.

Basically, he says the same thing. Like, we didn't talk to each other, and then the story comes out. Morsey also says, it was all too much, too sickening, and press reports tell us, confidently that Johnny has left the country to work with talking heads. Monogamous I. Polygamous he. Again, talking about it in terms of a romantic relationship. I really think Johnny Marr was the great love of Morrissey's life. He saved him. I'll get into that. There's a very deep and sad quote I'm going to read you. But the official legal end date of the Smith's May 31st, 1987 in court documents. Like that, when they dissolve the partnership retroactively, it's that date.

Okay, listen to this. This is so sad from Morrissey's autobiography. This is not a brought the breakup, but this is what he says about what the Smiths did for him. And like, as the Smith's singer, I consigned all my best efforts to conviction and all of my being went into each song. This can be embarrassing for onlookers, an embarrassment that makes us turn away whenever someone bears their soul in public. But for me, there could be no other way, because otherwise, there would simply be no point and the Smiths would be eminently average.

At the hour of the Smith's birth, I had felt at the physical and emotional end of life. I had lost the ability to communicate and had been clear. claimed by emotional oblivion. I had no doubt that my life was ending, as much as I had no notion at all that it was just beginning. Nothing fortified me, and simple loneliness all but destroyed me. Yet, I felt swamped by the belief that life must mean something. Otherwise, why was it there? Why was anything anything? I had become a stretcher case to my family, yet this made it easier for me to put them aside at those moments when the wretched either die or go mad. The water was now too muddy, and being nowhere in view, I am not even known enough to be.

be disliked. The wits had diminished, and I am sexually disinterested in either the male or the female. Yet I make this claim on knowing almost nothing about either. Life became a strange hallucination, and I would talk myself through each day as one would nurse a dying friend. The diminishment could go no further, and the face can only be slapped so many times before the slaps cannot be felt. I became too despondent for anyone to cope with, and only my mother would talk to me in understanding tones. Yet there comes the point where the suicidalist must shut it down, if only in order to save face. Otherwise, you accidentally become a nightclub act minus the actual nightclub. This then was my true nature as the Smiths began. The corpse swinging wildly at the microphone

was every bit as complicated as the narrow circumstances under which he had lived, devoid of the knack of thigh-slapping laughter. I mean, the Smith saved his life. Like he was born. Yeah. Rescued from what he amounted to being dead. And then it just ends like that with a bunch of miscommunications. Yeah, that's really sad. Well, we're not done yet because girlfriend in a coma comes out August 10, 1987. Shilla Delaney is once again on the cover of this seven-inch, and the single also features the additional credit, love and things to Angie Marr. Was it additionally very sad, which we haven't even mentioned, is that Morris and Angie were very close. Oh, my God, super besties, had their own separate friendship. On tour, they would often the two of them go off together and do

like cultural activities, like go to the museum and stuff. Isn't this? This is like besties. Okay. Girlfriend in a coma. I love it. Here's what's crazy. This song came out of, this is what Johnny Marr said.

Both mine and Morrissey's love Bob and Marsha's young gifted and black. That's a reggae song. Remember Morrissey just said all reggae is vile and it's racist or whatever? But he loves this reggae song. He says girlfriend and coma is trying to capture the spirit of that. If you listen to the string parts on both, you can maybe see it. There's actually an early. version of the song that I found that does actually have a reggae groove to it that you can really

kind of hear. It's one of those teen tragedy songs, right? Which was like that was like a huge genre in the 60s. Totally. The B-side. That horrible cover of work is a four-letter word. Oh, wow. Okay.

It's real bad. Real bad. And then the last song they ever wrote together, I keep mine hidden. It's really beautiful. Whistling on here. It's such a once again, Morrissey communicating with Johnny Marr through the lyrics. Like, hate love and war, force emotions to the fore, but not for me. Of course.

Of course, I keep mine hidden. I keep mine hidden, but it's so easy for you because you let yours flail into public view. Famously, Johnny Marr was like heartenously, a very open person. So he's really saying that. He's like, I can't express and you're always expressive. Yeah. I hate you, but I'm going to let you guess at that. And I'm going to sing it to you in the studio so fucking dramatic and weird.

Yeah. Anyhow, he's insane, meant to be mental. So true, Besty. In the end, Morrissey would point to this song as one that he loved so much. And Marr would say, I hated it. Okay, strange ways, here we come. Yay. Postomous, September 28, 1987.

Wow. Produced by Johnny Marr, Morrissey, and Stephen Street, hits number two on the UK album charts. The cover is the actor Richard Devalos from, he's the East of Eden actor. A rush and a push in the land is ours. I love this song. A rush. I'm telling you, it's rolling ours ours. Finally, he's freed himself to roll his ours.

This is the first Smith song with no guitars. It's only keyboards. Yeah. It's crazy how good. This whole album, but. Yeah, the album is great. I have the liner notes on my, up on my wall. Just the LP.

Oh, so sick. The way they always start the albums with these sort of like, m-f songs is so sick. Yeah, the same queen is dead is the same. Yeah, exactly. Mara said this is me playing the only key I could play in, really, but I was determined to have a track starting an album with no guitars on. I really had a B in my bonnet. See, you really wanted to change direction. I was so adamant about getting away from this jingle, jingle thing. Musically as a 23-year-old, I didn't want to be repeating myself. Somebody who'd lived and breathed music since the age of 11 to a freakish insane degree, repeating myself was like death. It's a little bit like it's like their Tromplamond or something.

Totally. Great picks and weapons. Yeah. Like we're shifting direction. Yeah. Shifting direction, but it's the last one. Yeah.

The Swan song. It's a little bit better than Trompelamond for being honest with each other. Yeah. But yes. Yeah, but it's like that thing where it's like if you like, you know, all the first,

the records that came before, you might have a problem with the shift. you know what I mean totally totally like you might be like oh it's like a keyboard song what the fuck bitch where's the jingle jangle jangle morning that I'm looking for the title of this song is a reference to Oscar Wilde's mother lady Jane Francesca Wilde who wrote Republican prose and poetry for Ireland's leading nationalist publication in the nation under the pseudonym Sparanza wow and she wrote this one bold one decisive move one instant to take breath and then there's a rising a rush, a charge from north, south, east, and west upon the English garrison and the land is ours.

He said, there's too much caffeine in your bloodstream and a real lack of spice in your life. Actually, that's a really funny lyric because famously, I read several times that people said, not only would Morrissey not allowed meat on tour, he was also very anti-garlic onion and spices. Oh, no. There's a lack of real spice in your life, babe. There sure is. Try some cumin. I love it.

Rush. And then also, this is the funnest where he does the thing where he plays with the pronounce. pronunciation of phone me. So it sounds like so funny, fun. So it sounds like fuck me. So it sounds like fuck me. Then it goes into I started something I couldn't finish. Love that song. Johnny Marr was inspired by Sparks, the song Amateur Hour on here. This song was apparently when it was real trouble in Paradise Hours because Morrissey kept like criticizing. I mean like, I don't like this part. I like that part. And Stephen would street would take it back to Johnny, like Mazer doesn't like these things and Johnny flipped. He snapped back. Well, fuck him. Let him think him think of something. Stephen Street said, I think Johnny was getting exhausted, always having to be the one to come up with the musical ideas. No shit. I think we did fine tune a few things after that to please Morrissey, but Johnny really took it as fuck him. It makes sense. Yeah. I mean, again, this is prior to all that talk and breakup, but still. Okay. The next song is death of a disco dancer. I like that song. But again, it's kind of different. It's definitely different. Apparently Johnny Moore was trying to do a little twist on Dear Prudence by the Beatles.

But you can kind of hear, right? Yeah, yeah. And it made me one of the rare songs that came out of an actual full band jam session. Like, they just, like, were jamming and then they just went nuts and freaked it. Wow. And that piano at the end, the crazy insane piano, that's Morrissey. It's the only time he ever played any instrument on any Smith song. Oh, interesting.

Also, might be an allusion to drugs because there was like a big drug nightclub thing starting. to happen and people were starting to die of overdoses. And this is like, we haven't quite gotten to Manchester yet, but you know what I'm talking about? It is like the rumblings of the beginning of club culture and people starting to do like club drugs and dying and stuff. Yeah, yeah. Morrissey has admitted that he still sometimes sings this song to himself when he's rolling out a pastry. Interesting. He's a very nice. He's like, very nice, very nice, very nice, very nice. Very nice. Very nice. Very nice. Very next world. Maybe in the next world. Okay. We talked about it. girlfriend in a coma. Stop me if you think you've heard this one before. God damn gorgeous,

beautiful swan song, if you will. Yeah. Yeah. Morrissey said I desperately, desperately wanted it to be released. Rough trades sent white labels along to Radio One, but they said they would never under any circumstances play it because of the line about mass murder. They said people would have instantly linked it with Hungerford and it would have caused thousands of shoppers to go out and buy machine guns and murder their grandparents. But like literally every Smith song is like, that. Every single song has like some reference to some sort of violent, you know, I guess saying the words actual mass murder probably was a step too far for the radio to play. And I think they actually, unfortunately, in August of 1987, like just

before this album comes out, there was literally a mass shooting by this guy, Michael Ryan in the Berkshire Village of Hungerford. And he killed 16 people. So it was just bad timing. Bad timing. Johnny Morris said on this song, he wanted to sound like, like a punk player who couldn't play. So he played the melody of the song using only one finger on one string. I like that.

Last night I dream, somebody loved me. This is Morrissey and David Bowie, both of their favorite Smith song. And this apparently, Andre 3000's favorite song ever. They asked him, MTV asked him, what song do you wish you had written? And he said,

I personally wish I would have written the Smith song last night I dreamt that somebody loved me. Genius song. Wow. Wow. Honestly, breathtaking levels of like bare naked sincerity in Morrison's voice here. And because there's no, this song doesn't have any like real jokes or like escapeism from that vulnerability of being honest. You know, like it's super affecting.

No hope, no harm. Just another false alarm. Yeah, it's that year and you tell me how long before the last one. Tell me how long before the right one. The story. Again, it's all the same. When's my turn? You know?

Yeah. I want it so bad. Why can't I have it? It's crazy. Johnny Moore wrote this on a tour bus. And he initially, you know how the beginning is a two minutes of piano in the beginning of the song? He had written that for another song. And then ultimately, what a genius move to put it together because it gives it so much gravity,

like having that two minute piano intro. There's also random bits of whale song on here that Morrissey. I'm just, yes. That's exactly what it sounds like. That's exactly what it sounds like. I'm losing it. The next song is Unhappy Birthday.

Okay, weird, unpopular opinion. I don't really like, this song makes me feel weird. It's like runaway train, which I know is it also a good song. I hate runaway train. It makes me feel icky. Why is that?

I can't explain it. Does it have to do with Sadie Hawkins? Does it have to do with being thrice rejected? Apparently, Johnny Moore, I'll point to this. He really wanted to move direction from electric to acoustic. That was one of the things he wanted to do with The Smith. And this is why he loved this song.

It was like his favorite song for a long time. Oh, interesting. It was closer to the direction than he was trying to go. I will say lyrically and like vocal performance wise, Morrissey actually genuinely sounds bitter here. Well, it's a very hateful song. It's a very hateful song. Who are we wishing an unhappy birthday to?

many people. Morsey has so many enemies. It's the enemy. I mean, if he should die, I may feel slightly sad, but I won't cry. Like, what a, it's a very bitchy song. It's, it's a buff. It's a rough song. Now we're cooking with gas on a song that we both love, Pina Volga Picture. I love this song. One of my favorites. Yeah. It's also a strange song musically, right? Like, from what we've done in the past, it almost like is a little vicar and a tutu vibes. Not, not, not, not, thematically, but just... Yeah, I mean, it's a little more lelting and lingering. It really paints a picture, not necessarily vulgar.

I mean, it's about a vulgar topic, but... I mean, this is the most navel-gazing song of all, where he's literally just talking of the music industry. It's just like the part where he, you know, I touched you at the sound check. I know. Like, in my heart, I beg, take me with you. I don't care where you're going. It's like so real, you know, but to you I was faceless, I was funny, I was born just a child from those ugly new houses who could never begin to know, who could never really know.

There's like the switching between the heartfelt feeling of the fan vis-a-vis the star, you know, which are very sincere and can never be reciprocated just by the nature of the-tort. Totally. That's what saves the song, right? from being just a boring diatribe. If it was just like, they're trying to repackage my music and resell it,

I don't think it would have the emotional resonance that they were going for. But the genius of it is interspersing that fan to beloved rock star. I was faceless. I was funny like you're saying.

And we talked about this. Like it might have been inspired by his own experience with the heartbreakers. Or it could be inspired by himself and the fans like, it's also. It's also really interesting how prescient at the record company meeting on their hands a dead star, how much that is like foreshadowing the 90s where like that's going to start to happen a lot.

Totally. Yeah. You know, and the ending is maybe the most beautiful. When it's like, they can never touch you now, they cannot hurt you, my darling. They cannot touch you now. But me and my true love will never meet again. So beautiful. I think to Morrissey, this relationship with the industry, and that's his whole life.

So even to him, like, that really is personal and emotional, you know, like, which is why maybe it works when he sings about it in song, because he really feels it, you know? Like, he's not, he doesn't have much distance from that. Okay. The next song, death at one's elbow. That's the one I was thinking of. That's a vicar in a two-two core, which is fun. Just a little lightness, breathed into a heavy album, I think.

It's a weak track, but. Yeah. It's a good mood lightener amongst the heaviness, I think. Yeah, yeah. And then, babe, are you fucking kidding? Are you fucking kidding? I won't share you. Talk about communicating with Johnny Marr through song lyrics.

Johnny Marr said, I just heard a lovely tune at first. I was happy that we had another unusual star in our galaxy or whatever. That's what it was like, this other little thing that just beamed down. The lyrics were brought to my attention by somebody, even before we got out of the studio. There were raised eyebrows, and what do you think of that then? But it was all in a day's work for me, really, still is. If I was bothered about it, I'd say, well, I ain't anyone's to fucking share me, but that's really the truth, in fact. If in fact that sentiment was directed towards me, then quite rightly, I feel good about it. It's nice. It's okay. I'm not arst about

it. I'm not arst about it. I mean, but like, I won't share, like, just imagine the creepy just staring Morrissey at John. I know. I won't share you. you. And the fact that the first Smith song ever is hand in glove, we fit together like a hand in glove. It's not like any other love. This one is different because it's us. And then it ends with I won't share you.

I wouldn't feel the same way about Johnny Marr. He was a little nugget. He has a little nugget. And he saved your life from the desperation of being in your room forever miserable. Yeah. Because he's the normal. one. Yes, I have compassion. I do have compassion. It's tough. Morrissey tried to use his words. He just used them in the lyrics of I won't share you with the talking heads or manager Ken Friedman or

Brian Ferry. Yeah. And Johnny Marr was like, right. Okay. It gets really good reviews. I'm not going to go into that. Who cares? Then to really twist the fucking knife, babe. They did try to make more music with another guitar player. They did? Yes. This guy, Yvor Perry, who was Morrissey's good friend and in this band that had opened for the Smith's called Easter House. And the guy was like not into it.

He was like, babe, you can't, you can't just replace Johnny Marr. This is weird. Obviously it didn't work out. Johnny Marr said, I was really, really hurt to be replaced so quickly by your friends before you've even had a chance to change your mind. That was the end of it. That was the sliding doors moment, bitch. Johnny Mar might have come back.

Oh, no. But that was it. It was over for him. You had another guitar player come? Imagine how that must have felt. That's like another woman sleeping in your bed with your husband. Oh, no. Morrissey later said in an interview, like right around the breakup,

Johnny wanted to make a name for himself, which he did. He wanted to be recognized as Johnny Marr. He was no longer satisfied with a secondary role of living in my shadow. He knew that if he stayed in the group, would always be the guitarist. That just wasn't enough for him anymore. I'm not sure that's true. Sandy Shaw, she said, from where I was standing, all Morrissey's problems started with himself. His insecurities in the way they made him behave. He seemed never to have learned the art of friendship. And I felt desperately sad for him, imprisoned in his self-imposed solitude. It is really sad.

Because apparently, oh my God, apparently they didn't talk for a while, right? But the first person to reach out was Morrissey. and he called, tried to break the ice, and suggested to Johnny that they do a farewell gig, like a Smith's farewell show at the Royal Albert Hall. And Johnny Marr said, no thanks. Even when he was doing press for his first album, Viva Hay, which comes out less than a year, by the way, before, after they break up, it comes out in March of the next year. Oh, that's crazy. Yeah. He says to NME, when he's doing press for Viva Haid, I'm totally in favor of a Smith's reunion. As soon as anybody wants to come back to the fold and make records, I'll be there.

You know what it is? It's like when a guy does that thing where they act so badly towards you that they force you to break up with them because they're too big of a pussy to break up with you. Yeah. And then they realize what they've done and they come crawling back because they always come back. And you're like, I'm all set, babe. Johnny Marr was like, I'm all set. You know what I mean? He was.

Yeah. It was too much for him. Yeah. Then in October, this big South Bank show documentary of them comes out, which is great. Oh, yeah. I need to watch that. It's so good. Yeah.

it was fully made before they broke up. So then they hastily have to like slap this like disclaimer on the beginning, like in the intro. Like anyways, they've broken up since. It has interviews with Morrissey, Johnny Marr, a little with Mike Joyce,

Andy Rourke is nowhere to be seen, but also Nick Kent, who I must say, it just seems. It's giving cocaine mouth, but who couldn't say? John Peel, John Savage,

Sandy Shaw and also Linder Sterling. They do this thing, though, something like sneaky in order to like force it to fit the narrative of the Smith's breaking up, where they end it with Morrissey talking really obliquely about, which is apparently a topic he really liked to talk about. Pop music will inevitably one day end,

the Smiths will one day end, blah, blah, blah. They sort of use that as the end. Right, right, right. The way I see the whole spectrum of popular music is that it is slowly being laid to rest. Ultimately, popular music will end. And I think these, you know, the ashes are already about us if we could but notice them.

An interesting thing about this, the Smith's invented Brit Pop because the first, I think, top of the pop's performance that they did, a young Noel Gallagher saw it, hand and glove. And it was hugely impactful and meaningful to him. And obviously, we all know what Noel Gallagher went on to Form and do. And in this farewell South Bank show, I'll tell you who saw these, who saw it, a pair of teenage best friends from Colchester named Damon Albarn and Graham Coxon. They were Smith's fans and they watched the show. And apparently they were offended by Morrissey's insistence that the Smiths were the last group of any importance.

And so Damon Albarn said he walked home that night and made plans. Nobody is going to tell me that pop music is finished and they made the band blur. But they also use Stephen Street as their producer eventually, which is why they used it because they were huge Smith's fans. Very interesting. Oh, that's amazing. Morrissey puts out Viva Hate. I said March 14, 1988. We're not going to get into it.

I'll just say it has a couple bangers, but as far as I'm concerned, it's very, we have the Smiths at home. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. I said what I fucking said. Okay. I like people, hate.

Yes, it's good. But is it the Smiths? Absolutely not. Yeah. Then they put out rank because everyone's trying to make back some money. Great fucking album. Which is when I enter the picture. Yes.

This is where, when, where, uh, nobie fry comes into the, into the story. When did, what date was it that? It was September 5th, 1988. Yeah, that makes sense because I just started seventh grade. Yeah, you had. It's great. Morrissey basically went through all the footage and picked the songs and it's great. It's awesome.

Being able to hear the Smith's live is, I think, super important in understanding them as a band because they were, they do sound different live and there is an energy and a, like, excitement and a just vigor to their live show that you do. don't hear on the recordings that are quite polished. And I think that's really cool. Yeah, 100%. We're wrapping up, but I need to talk about the trial. So in 1989, there's the royalties dispute. Because as you remember that we talked about much earlier, Morrissey and Marr had taken 40% of all the royalties and left 10% to Mike Joyce and Rourke. And they said they had all agreed upon this or whatever. So Mike Joyce is the one that sues them. He receive around

1 million pounds in back royalties and 25% going forward. The judge also gave character assessments. I'm sorry, this part is so good. Joyce and Andy Rourke, who gave evidence for Joyce, impressed him as straightforward and honest, whereas Morrissey, quote, appeared devious, truculent, and unreliable where his own interests were at stake. And Mar was, quote, willing to embroider his evidence to a point that he became less credible.

Johnny Marr was a people-pleaser. Yeah. The judge also ranked the band members by IQ. What? And he said Mar was probably the more intelligent of the four. You know that chapped fucking Morrissey's ass. While Rourke and Joyce were, quote, unintellectual. Babe, he called them dumb.

He said they were morons who couldn't have possibly understood a contract in the beginning. They were too stupid. So I shouldn't grant them. Well, it worked at their advantage. It did. And then this is so funny. And then Morrissey said, they were lucky. If they had had another singer, they'd never have gotten further than the Salford Shopping Center.

Oh, my God. Not the Salford Shopping Center. Oh, God. And he also said, the court case was a plotted history of the life of the Smiths. Mike talking constantly and saying nothing. Andy, unable to remember his own name. Johnny trying to please everyone and consequently pleasing no one. And Morrissey, under the scorching spotlight and the dock being drilled.

How dare you be successful? How dare you move on? To me, the Smiths were a beautiful thing, and Johnny left it and Mike destroyed it. Oh, my God, relax. I know. It's very sad. Here's the last thing I want to read, though, on a better note. This was in 1991, what Morrissey said in Select magazine.

He said, it was a special musical relationship, and those are few and far between. For Johnny and I, it won't come again. I think he knows that and I know it. The Smith had the best of Johnny and me. Those were definitely the days. I feel like crying. I know. It really is sad when you get down to the brass tacks of what happened and you're like, oh, this was so stupid.

Yeah. It's like you broke up because no one was willing to just actually grant the other, some good faith and some compassion and just be vulnerable. about what they wanted. But it also gave us just those crystalline, you know, those. Oh, yeah. Their legacy is preserved in amber. It's perfect. Which does happen.

And it's great. I mean, the pixies were like this. Yes. Yes. You know, there's a lot of bands like this that Johnny Marr said at one point, he was like, it doesn't matter. We would have probably broken up a year later anyways. He was like, it just wasn't working anymore.

I wanted to do different things. So I think it's imaginary, like, wishful thinking to think, like, if only like, they had talked differently. I would, like, I just, that's probably would never have happened. Yeah. You know, it's like a, you burnt, rather burn too bright than fade away or whatever. Yeah, yeah, I'm happy with what we have. You know?

I feel pleased with the, yeah. We have, they gave us a lot, honestly. They made a lot of fucking songs. They made a lot of fucking songs. They gave us a lot in the little time they had, relatively little time they had. Well, no me fray. What, the pleasure of the privilege was mine to speak to you. I was happy.

happy to be here. We did it, which is the important thing. You were like, I wanted a job and then I had a job and heaven knows I'm miserable. I was looking for a job. I wanted to go on a podcast and then I went on a podcast and heaven knows I'm miserable now. That's how I feel. Every day, I'm like, I wanted to host a podcast and then I had a podcast. I know. Okay. But before we wrap that, we have some incredible fan voices, including one of the voices you might recognize is Walter Shrifles from the band's. Don't a big deal. Gorilla Biscuits and quicksand. Anyways, here they are. Here's what they had to say. The Smiths are unarguably a band about mortality and nostalgia back when living was really living. There was a radio station in Long Island called W-L-I-R-R that used to be able to get in Queens and they played imports from England in the early 80s. And just this charming man came on and I listened to, I guess, the first 30 seconds of it and it just like knocked me out. I've jumped to the radio to the radio to. to press play and record, so I had this second two-thirds of this charming man to listen to.

And just would listen to the radio constantly for the next week whenever I could, just in the hopes that it would come on again so I could record the whole song. The Smiths to me are inextricably tied to a time in my youth when things weren't necessarily any better or simpler, but they're gone. and I think every human has this innate yearning for a time past, even though they may be looking back at those times through rose-colored glasses. Eventually I had a friend that went to England and told them to find any Smith's album, and they brought back Hatful of Hollow, which blew me away.

The Smiths can make the most innocuous things or the harshest truths seem incredible. incredibly beautiful after those times or those things have long passed. I got that album and just played it into the ground. There's just really nothing that sounds like Morrissey's voice, you know, it was kind of just so unique. It just wasn't macho. It was just like something else and the lyrics were so funny, and the music was just awesome and catchy and poppy, like 60's songs.

I mean, I'm just describing the Smiths, but when I first heard them, there was just like nothing really even close. It was just a sound that I had never heard, but I always wanted to and didn't know it. The Smiths lived. The Smiths died. And that's just how it's supposed to be. Ugh, gorgeous. Stunning, moving.

Smith's fans. We're all united. We're all united. We're all in this together. We're all in this together. We're all still ill, if you will. Never not ill. Never not still ill.

Much like Morrissey. We are eternally ill. Okay. Again, thanks, Nomi. Thank you, Yassi. What a journey. What a time. What a time. Do not really want to be alive. If you or someone you know is struggling emotionally or thinking about suicide, visit Spotify.com slash resources for information and resources.

If you liked what you heard today, subscribe for more episodes of Bansplain. Our guest today was No Me Fry. You can follow her on Twitter at Frye, No Me Fry. This episode was produced by Jesse Miller-Gordon, edited by Adrian Bridges, with help from Justin Sales. Executive producers for Bansblane are Gina Delvac and me, Yossi Solid. Huge thanks to the Smiths mega fans you heard on this episode, Walter Shrifles and Adam Rossiter. Our gorgeous and catchy theme song was composed and performed by Bethany Costantino and Jennifer Clavin and graciously recorded by Carlos Delagas in Los Angeles, California. Special thanks to our producer emeritus, producer Dylan, aka Dylan Tupper, and also Casey Simonson, Robert Adler, Leah Edwards, David McDonough, Dana Mears, and Jessica Hopper,

and the television program Rescue Me. Come back every Thursday for a new episode of Bandsplain on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcast. Sorry. Hello. I'm sorry, we're looking at a cat right now. Yeah, he just wants to speak to the, he wants to talk to the mic. I love him so much. His rags to Rich's story will never fail to warm my heart.

I know. Came in off the streets of New York City. Yeah. And now look at him. A member of the family. He's so robust.