Digitally re-mastered edition of the 1984 debut album from the legendary British quartet. Arriving in an era dominated by Synthpop and gloomy Post-Punk, the Smith's eponymous debut was the beginning of a new era. Johnny Marr's inventive songwriting and ringing guitars were catchy and melodic and were made all the more original by Morrissey's vocal style and lyrics. Although The Smiths continued to improve over the course of their career, the songs here are vital and alive, making sure that their debut remains startling and exciting to this day.
This self-titled opening salvo of the Smiths' four-year war with mediocrity stands proud as one of the era's most innovative and unique works. Flying in the face of the pomp and artifice that prevailed in pop music at the time, the Smiths raged against their makeup- wearing, synth-playing contemporaries and squarely put rock back on the agenda. Guitarist Johnny Marr married the tunesmanship and harmonic richness of his Motown heroes with the rage of punk, while Morrissey's bedroom confessionals were catnip to England's (and later the world's) disenfranchised youth.
THE SMITHS demanded, and received, instant attention, desirable and otherwise, making a reluctant guitar hero out of Marr and a poster boy out of Morrissey. The jarring juxtaposition between Marr's lilting, densely-layered guitar lines and Morrissey's lyrics and plaintive delivery makes magic of "This Charming Man" (whose theme of sexual ambiguity was to remain prevalent in the group's work) and the gentle major-seventh chords of "I Don't Owe You Anything." The tender "Suffer Little Children," a paean to a group of murdered children in the band's native Manchester, gave the band their first (though far from their last) taste of public controversy.
The Smiths: Morrissey (vocals); Johnny Marr (guitar, harmonica); Andy Rourke (bass); Mike Joyce (drums).
Recorded at Pluto and Eden Studios, Manchester, and Matrix and Strawberry Studios, London in the winter of 1983.
- Format: Vinyl
- Released: 04/03/2012
- Genre: Rock, Indie/Alternative
- Remember, for our lowest prices, always order directly from our official JocoRecords website!
Track Listings
Disc: 1
1 Reel Around the Fountain (2011 Remaster)
2 You've Got Everything Now (2011 Remaster)
3 Miserable Lie (2011 Remaster)
4 Pretty Girls Make Graves (2011 Remaster)
5 The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (2011 Remaster)
Disc: 2
1 Still Ill (2011 Remaster)
2 Hand in Glove (2011 Remaster)
3 What Difference Does It Make? (2011 Remaster)
4 I Don't Owe You Anything (2011 Remaster)
5 Suffer Little Children (2011 Remaster)
