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[side_show]

Help me out here:

I was introduced to The Smiths about five years ago.  I was given/borrowed and never returned "Strangeways here we come."  And I thought - wow, Morrissey's really funny.  Then I talked to a few people about The Smiths and everyone seemed to take the music pretty seriously - like maybe I had totally misread the context?  So are The Smiths actually a "goofy" band, or are they seriously that melancholy?  Cause all The Smith fans I've encountered look at me really funny when I say I find the Smiths humorous - and also they tend to dress in black.  Seriously – no one could possibly be that pretentious without it being a big joke, could they?  I have a lot of doubt about The Darkness because they actually seem to take themselves pretty seriously - are The Smiths in the same boat or what?  I'm hella' confused over here.

[slink]

Morrissey honestly is that pretentious.
I've had the misfortune to see him on a few things in the past few days and been reminded quite what an offensive fuckwit he is. The guy's big in with the BNP and shit and it's just not cool in my book. I was always amused in my youth by The Smiths. Finding them amusing and whatnot. But then came the discovery that there were people who took it that seriously. One of whom leapt out of a third storey window in Edinburgh, so drunk he broke only a rib.

[V-Adore]

I have always taken "Girlfriend in a Coma" seriously, but I'm not entirely sure if I'm meant to. So there.

I also have the capacity to be massively self-righteous and pretentious re: "How Soon is Now," especially with its modern commercial uses. ("Why is this the 'Charmed' theme? WHY?! Did they actually LISTEN TO THE WORDS?!")

[Bozack]

I like the Smiths, in a sort of "I like them in a comical wink-wink manner except when I get really sad and then I listen to 'Strangeways' kinda drunk" way. Morrissey I find massively hilarious, simply because of how much shit he talks. He's like a little greasy English Steve Albini. There's an interview with him from a few months ago in Tokion, where, in one part, the interviewer reads a bunch of old quotes from the Moz, where he essentially shits on rap and hip-hop as means of musical expression (calling them "a musical stench" among other things), and then asks if he still agrees with his previous statements. His response was, "Yes, only more strongly."

God. Morrissey, you are DELICIOUS!

[andalucia]

I agree with Bozack on this one.  Usually I just get a kick out of the Smiths, but "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" is the epitome of teenage-angst anthems as far as I'm concerned, so I guess I do take them seriously on occasion.  Not window jumping seriously, or even "OMG Morrissey totally expresses my pain" seriously, mind, but nevertheless I shake my proverbial fist at adolescence for making me emphasize with 80's rock.

[AlohaDawg]

Morrissey honestly is that pretentious.
I've had the misfortune to see him on a few things in the past few days and been reminded quite what an offensive fuckwit he is. The guy's big in with the BNP and shit and it's just not cool in my book. I was always amused in my youth by The Smiths. Finding them amusing and whatnot. But then came the discovery that there were people who took it that seriously. One of whom leapt out of a third storey window in Edinburgh, so drunk he broke only a rib.

Was that his rib?

[jough]

Well, I'm a big Smiths fan so I don't know if I'm the right one to ask, but I'll say that much of Morrissey's lyrics are funny and clever - his idol is Oscar Wilde, and Moz is a bit like a singing Wilde, so however seriously you take Wilde is about as serious as you should take Morrissey.  I find him deadly funny, but then again, I laugh with him, not at him.

But honestly, no one can possibly take "Unhappy Birthday" as anything but a comic piece - and don't even get me started on "Vicar in a Tutu."

I find the Smiths sublime - whether serious or humourous they're probably a mix of both.  I'm sure they took themselves very seriously, even when they were being funny.

Still, if Jesus played guitar, he'd play like Johnny Marr.

[palm trees]

Morrissey honestly is that pretentious.
I've had the misfortune to see him on a few things in the past few days and been reminded quite what an offensive fuckwit he is. The guy's big in with the BNP and shit and it's just not cool in my book.

? eh... i didn't know that.
boo to morrissey.

[jough]

Does the two-party system work for you?  Are you pleased with either the Torries or Labour parties?

Honestly?

The guy's big in with the BNP and shit and it's just not cool in my book.

? eh... i didn't know that.
boo to morrissey.

[slink]

Does the two-party system work for you?  Are you pleased with either the Torries or Labour parties?

Honestly?

Honestly. Fuck no. I hate the Tories, and New Labour are no different.
But that doesn't mean I support, or would leave on the Earth had I the choice, a party full of racist, bigoted, offensive, right-wing, violent, neo-fascists!

[jough]

Well, I don't think Morrissey would support such a party either, from what I know of the man.

[slink]

OK I will admit, I have gone and looked into it more and it's certainly questionable.
There have been vague muttering for a long time that Morrissey was basically a fascist. A strange fascist...
Anyway, there are still wonderings as to whether he very nearly joined the BNP, which is a Nationalist party to the extent of killing immigrants. Fuck not even immigrants, but generations who are English! So anyway, not only is there question as to whether he nearly joined, but there is question as to whether he signed a petition against them. Apparently NME were about to print that he had, but were told they couldn't.
Then there's the fact that apparently he's a strong supporter of PETA. Damn fascists again!
And well, no one knows if he's gay or not. Or straight or not.
Oh and I discovered he feels the same way about Cromwell as I.

[St_Zartan]

I'm not going to weigh in on the "are they serious or satirical" question because I genuinely feel that the Smiths' body of work can be many, many things to many, many people. The Smiths made music that meant, at a pivotal time in my life (and, by extension, continues to mean) a hell of a lot to me - so who am I to say? Clearly there's humor in it, but it's certainly not all "we sound like this to make fun of those who sound like this"; who was doing what the Smiths were doing at the time?

As far as Morrissey's alleged racist / fascist leanings: I just don't see it. Knowing what little I know about the British music press, I wouldn't be surprised to read that rumors had, over time, grown into their canonical status. I remember reading two of the biggest indictments against Morrissey were (a) his use of the Union Jack imagery and (b) for a while, contingents of skinheads were turning up at his shows. The latter I've got no explanation for, but the former doesn't seem out of character; Morrissey has always seemed Intensely Concerned with the English Condition.

That, and he's just the sort of character to play with the press and Give Em Enough Rope, so to speak. From what I've read (and this was years ago), he became intensely cynical about the music press in general after one of the songs off of the first Smiths album (Hand That Rocks the Cradle, I think) got a lot of sensational ink as a song about / condoning child abuse. After this whole incident emerged the Morrissey we're familiar with, whose interviews were witty, vague, and provocative.

[Choop]

Seriously: When are you going to write your book? Put me down for ten copies.

[side_show]

This all makes me even more squeamish.  

I was hoping you'd all tell me the whole "taking The Smiths seriously thing" was a big joke on me.  I have a strong memory of back in my university days: a girl in my class very snidely looking at the copy of Douglas Coupland's "Girlfriend in a Coma" falling out of my bag during a lecture in The Fundamentals of Literary Study and saying "you know that's a song by The Smiths, don't you?" Me, already puzzled by the whole Smiths enigma, responded: "Yes, I know that," and the girl rolled her eyes in overt disgust and then just sat there staring at me.  My response to her question seemed to shape her attitude toward me for the next four years of University where our paths regularly crossed.  Every class I was in with her she made a point of talking me down, even if we essentially agreed on an issue.  Now, unlike V-Adore, I've always thought "Girlfriend in a Coma" was one of the funny ones- I mean in the song the boyfriend veils his desire to finish the girl off so thinly, and he's the one who supposedly put her in the coma, now lurking around the hospital waiting for another chance.  

Now, humour is personal, and admittedly my sense of humour is very dark, very cynical.  Yet if, as almost everyone seems to agree, that The Smiths are supposed to be taken at least partially seriously, and that Morrissey actually takes himself seriously, my enjoyment of them is decreasing with a great deal of speed.  I don't take any enjoyment in pretension -yet, I'm intrigued as well: public image is not the true self.  Intentionally played out pretension is sort of different.  Jough raises an interesting point in noting that his idol is Oscar Wilde.  After having spent two years deeply immersed in Wilde as a director, an actor, and a student I came to the conclusion that Wilde is a genius, but that I hate him and never want to be involved in another Wilde production in my life.  I have a great deal of suspicion toward anyone who doesn't communicate on a human level.  Being "clever" is far too often a tool to build a false sense of superiority over others.  Which makes the whole "Morrissey was a fascist" argument believable to me.  But then I don't really have a sense of the person Morrissey presents himself to be other than through the music itself.  Depending on the work alone I don't get the definite sense of what is being presented, it's far more enigmatic than the image that I've taken away from the few articles and sound bites about The Smiths/Morrissey that I've encountered.