Scot and Jeff talk to Michael C. Moynihan about The Smiths
Introducing the Band
Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) with guest Michael Moynihan, correspondent for Vice News Tonight on HBO and member of the Fifth Column podcast, Follow him on Twitter at @mcmoynihan and read his past work both here and here.
Michael’s Musical Pick: The Smiths
“Is it wrong not to always be glad?” This is the question Jeff poses as the gang launches into Lucky #13: the long-awaited blockbuster Political Beats tribute to The Smiths, legendarily reputed as one of the ’80s most literately mopey bands. (Jeff also pays tribute to a classic Mystery Science Theater 3000 bit in passing.) But Michael is immediately at pains to argue with The Smiths-as-miserabilists rap, and he explains that one of the reasons he loves them like no other band in the pantheon is Morrissey’s remarkable wit. Michael talks about getting into music as a kid, discovering postpunk in 1987, quickly finding his way to Newbury Comics in Boston and acquainting himself with the pride of Manchester: The Smiths. Like many a budding Smiths fanatic from the late ’80s and early ’90s, this involved a copy of The Queen Is Dead and an older brother questioning his heterosexuality. The rest is history, including Michael relocating temporarily to England and imbibing the mythos firsthand.
Jeff’s intro to the band came later: college and a chance encounter with an eccentric friend who refused to lend her Smiths CDs to him because she valued them like other people value family heirlooms. Jeff emphasizes his love not only of Morrissey’s literate, playful lyrics, but actually elevates Johnny Marr’s contribution above it: even if only by a 51-49 margin, Jeff argues, this was Marr’s band, and his love of the eternal verities of melody, production, arrangement, and rock and pop are what make nearly every Smiths track from their beginning right up until the end worth hearing.
KEY TRACKS: “The Queen Is Dead” (The Queen Is Dead, 1986); “William, It Was Really Nothing” (A-side of single, 1984); “Rusholme Ruffians (alternate version)” (unreleased, originally from Meat Is Murder, 1985)
Morrissey meets Marr: The Formation of The Smiths and the Troubled Debut Album
For an album as hailed as The Smiths (1984) is, it had an exceedingly troubled genesis and to this day gets mixed reviews from hardcore fans. The story goes thus: Johnny Marr (guitars, music) introduces himself to local scenester Stephen Morrissey (vocals, lyrics) and says they should form a band. Andy Rourke (bass) and Mike Joyce (drums) are then inducted into this inchoate group and the so-called “Smiths” record a single in a local studio on spec: without a recording contract in hand, but confident enough in their talent to pay out-of-pocket and send it around to various labels in search of a record deal. The name of the label that bit was Rough Trade; the name of the song is their legendary debut single “Hand In Glove.” But the obligatory album follow-up was a much bigger problem: after recording a full version of the debut LP with Teardrop Explodes guitarist Troy Tate producing, The Smiths scrapped it and re-recorded the entire thing from scratch with John Porter.
And nobody in the gang can agree on its merits! Scot grants Jeff’s point that the Tate version of “Reel Around The Fountain” is magisterial, but he thinks this is the worst of The Smiths’ four proper studio LPs. Jeff thinks it’s their best studio LP, even better than The Queen Is Dead, and explains why in detail. Michael is in the middle: he loathes “The Hand That Rocks The Cradle” with eloquent passion, but praises the obscure B-sides from this era like “Accept Yourself,” “Wonderful Woman” and “Jeane.” How deep does the rabbit-hole go? This deep: Michael spends time praising Sandie Shaw’s (Smiths-produced) covers of “I Don’t Owe You Anything” and “Jeane” (and Jeff agrees)! Michael also calls out Andy Rourke’s follow-the-bouncing-ball bassline on “Prett