But the Smiths weren't Morrissey-plus-some-musicians, despite what he'd later try to suggest. They had a magnificent rhythm section in bassist Andy Rourke and drummer Mike Joyce, who were unflashy, tough, and supple. And they had guitarist and writer Johnny Marr, who was responsible for at least half of the Smiths' glory. It's hard to neatly describe what was so great about Marr, because he didn't have a particular gimmick or a signature sound; there are virtually no audible guitar solos on Smiths records. Instead, he worked up a different sound and technique for nearly every song in the band's discography--the breadth of his inventiveness is a good part of what's important about him.There's probably no band for whom I had a stronger affection to whom I am now more indifferent. The breadth of the technical accomplishments is still there, and astonishing. But the emotions now strike me as, well, adolescent. Which was fine when I was 16, but would be strange and off-putting at near 30.
It's safe to say that nobody else, before or since, has opened a significant rock album by hammering the bejesus out of the capoed, open-tuned chord that begins "The Headmaster Ritual"-- Marr has called his riff what Joni Mitchell "would have done had she been an MC5 fan." There also aren't a lot of new wave classics with guitar lines inspired by Ghanaian highlife (and a rhythm section that's basically just playing "You Can't Hurry Love"), but then there's "This Charming Man" to prove the rest of the world wrong. To have come up with the tone and riffs of "What Difference Does It Make?" or "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" or "London" would be a coup for any guitarist; to have come up with all of them is astonishing.
(Incidentally, and I can't remember if I mentioned this in writing about Belle and Sebastian a few weeks ago, but one of the critical factors in that band's second wind (i.e. the reason their albums started to be good again, and then excellent, after a fallow creative period) is that they stopped writing songs that centered around school. Morrissey was never able to do this--not in the Smiths, and not since--and that's why his solo career is so notably unsatisfying. Johnny Marr has no such excuses: he has always seem too much the technician to be as great as he might've been.)
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