Life on Marrs

Twenty six years after the breakup of The Smiths, the definitive British indie and alternative band of the 1980′s, iconic lead guitarist, Johnny Marr, finally breaks out of Morrissey’s shadow with his debut solo album Messenger. In just four short years from 1983 to 1987, the music industry’s most prolific odd couple, Stephen Patrick Morrissey and Johnny Marr teamed to compose and record unique post punk era music, which took England by storm. A Rock and Roll traditionalist, Johnny Marr would go on to become a guitar legend by creating beautifully searing riffs on Smiths tracks such such as How Soon is Now , The Queen is Dead, Ask and Heaven Knows I am Miserable Now. Whaling away on an electric guitar, Marr quickly became the driving force behind the edgy and intense Smiths sound. Marr was able to produce notes from his Rickenbacker guitar sounding like steel knives bouncing off of a slate roof or diamonds rolling down an aluminum slide. He looked like a refined Keith Richards, while his partner, Morrissey, was the classic “straight out of central casting” high school nerd. Shy and withdrawn, the eccentric Morrissey spent time indoors writing poetry, while Marr was buried in his parent’s record collection developing his musical tone. The unlikely couple would meet when Marr, just 18, was looking to hire a lead singer for his new band. The Smiths hit town like a tornado turning the British music world upside down before suddenly vanishing like a whirling dervish. Like so many great partnerships, each person was made infinitely stronger by the other, yet meteoric success obfuscated this dynamic to Morrissey and Marr, as it so often does.

While Morrissey went on to a successful twenty year solo career, which produced nine albums and over 100 songs, he was never the same without Marr who played in several bands, including The The, Electronic, Cribs and Modest Mouse after the Smiths implosion. Morrissey’s solo hits such as Suedehead and The Last of Famous International Playboys contain his quintessential macabre lyrics, which only the crooner from Manchester could belt out to an adoring audience. However sadly, Morrissey’s music post the Smiths is painfully lacking Johnny Marr’s incendiary guitar riffs, which when paired with the lead singer’s lyrics produced music in a fine Bordeaux and Stilton Blue kind of way. From The Last of the International Playboys a 1989 song reaching number 7 on the UK charts, which mythologizes the Kray twins, Ronnie and Reggie, vicious gangsters who terrorized East End London in the 1960′s,

“Dear hero imprisoned
With all the new crimes that you are perfecting
Oh, I can’t help quoting you
Because everything that you said rings true
And now in my cell
Well, I followed you
And here’s a list of who I slew”

The eponymous first single released by Johnny Marr on the album Messenger displays the guitar sounds of the old Smiths magic combined with Marrs vocals, which are surprisingly quite good. Softer than his old partner and more melodic, his voice conjures up the monotoned alternative sound of the 1980′s. Bernard Sumner of the band New Order comes to mind. When Marr sings, “Who wants to be a Messenger? Who wants to be the messenger?”, it sounds like he is making a statement to his old partner, Morrissey. Not doing your errands anymore is the apparent message, but one never really knows what percolates in the minds of rock stars. It may have taken several decades, but Johnny Marr has finally defined himself in non Smiths terms. Better late than never.

If you ever saw The Smiths perform live, you were fortunate to witness something truly special. Venturing into the George Washington Smith Center, of all places, in the 1980′s, I was not really not sure what to expect from the four member band from Manchester, England. Touring after the release of the their eponymous launch album, The Smiths, playing aggressive tunes like “Still Ill” and “Hand in Glove,” dazzled the several thousand unsuspecting fans. The album reached number 2 on the UK charts lasting for 33 weeks. Looking like a bad drunk at a roadside karaoke bar, Morrissey slinked and slithered around the tiny Smith Center Stage crying lines like these from the song Still Ill,

“Ask me why, and I’ll die
Oh, ask me why, and I’ll die
And if you must, go to work — tomorrow
Well, if I were you I wouldn’t bother
For there are brighter sides to life
And I should know, because I’ve seen them
But not very often …”

Supported only by Mike Joyce on a drum set which looked like a suburban kid’s Christmas present and bassist Andy Rourke, Morrissey and Marr produced a sound, which I had never heard before. I doubt many in the audience had either. At the end of their approximate ninety minute session, with the lights low, Marr played the opening to How Soon is Now, the song generally thought to be the Smiths greatest and the one routinely ranked in the top riffs of all times.

From Marr’s bio, “I believe that rock music, and pop music, is an art form and should be an art form, and it’s all about inspiration. I’ll continue to try to live up to it”. Besides playing in several bands, Marr has indeed lived up to his beliefs by serving as an inspiration to a long list of British musicians. Marr’s innovations lit the touch paper for a full scale renaissance in British guitar groups which has yet to wane. From The Stone Roses through to Suede, Blur, Radiohead, Oasis, The Libertines and Arctic Monkeys, all roads lead back to The Smiths. All roads lead back to Johnny Marr. Even Paul McCartney has worked with the guitar wizard.

If You Please British correspondent, “The Englishman Abroad” who was on the ground in England to witness the birth of the Smiths in the 1980′s firsthand, had this to say,

“The Smiths brilliantly hit a cord which had not previously been played. I liked the band and my hat is off to their legacy. However, being a guitar player myself, I tend to gravitate towards music, which I can relate to, understand and most importantly play. The Smiths were so unique, so etherial, that honestly I never felt that I could reproduce their work. Besides the lack of a meeting of the minds, Johnny Marr’s technique is quite intimidating to say the least. Morrissey’s lyrics are as well. Surely the song Girlfriend in a Coma has a special meaning to the band, however, not to me. All musicians, regardless of talent, need to embrace the material in order to perform”

The Smiths were heavily tied to the anti establishment movement of the 1980′s in England. Their songs were laced with negative statements about the Government, the Church, and business. Throw in the British educational system, meat eaters and of course their hometown of Manchester as well. Times are changing as it looks like Marr has one fan whom he would rather lose, none other than British Prime Minister David Cameron. Apparently the head of the English Government listed the Smiths tune This Charming Man on his hypothetical desert island disc. Johnny Marr put out a recent statement on Twitter,

“I think he likes the song. That’s probably sadder than if he didn’t know it, really. He’s entitled to like whatever he likes, as long as he doesn’t say it. It’s a good song. I do forbid him to like it. He shouldn’t like us because we’re not his kind of people. “

Morrissey has also called on the prime minister to stop proclaiming his admiration, saying in 2010: “David Cameron hunts and shoots and kills stags — apparently for pleasure. It was not for such people that either Meat Is Murder or The Queen Is Dead were recorded; in fact, they were made as a reaction against such violence.”

Apparently unfazed, the Prime Minister in Delhi for a diplomatic and trade building session last week stated, “When I’ve got the complete and full set, even then, I’m afraid, I will go on and listen to The Smiths.”

Regardless, quite a turn of events for the band that wrote the song The Queen is Dead back in the eighties during Margaret Thatcher’s tenure. In the song, Morrissey rails against, Prince Charles, The Daily Mail, The Church of England, the Prime Minister and of course the Queen herself. His acknowledgement that his views represent the minority is highlighted by the lines; “Life is long when you are lonely.” and “Has the world changed or have I changed.” Most hysterical verse has Morrissey breaking into the Palace for a visit with the Queen,

“So, I broke into the palace
With a sponge and a rusty spanner
She said, Eh, I know you, and you cannot sing
I said, That’s nothing, you should hear me play piano”

I guess things can simply always be worse as the song implies. But for Smiths fans, not much could be more unacceptable than the band’s sudden breakup in 1987. Imagining the number of great songs the duo could have composed over the past several decades leaves one feeling vacuous. Thankfully the music world still has the Manchester lads, but it is hard not to think, one plus one equals way more than the two we have.

The combination of Marr’s guitar playing and Morrissey’s eclectic lyrics created something which the music world had not seen before. In the 1980′s, Rock and Roll was searching for a new direction in the wake of the punk and disco movements and The Smiths delivered in spades. In order to create something new, by definition a unique perspective is required. Geniuses, like Morrissey and Marr, always look at the world differently. Possibly being from another planet may have helped along the way. At least we know now there is life on Mars.