Have a little respect. This is Morrissey. He’s a musical institution and I’m damned if I’m going to give him less than ten out of ten. He’s a true blue hero and you’re getting no fancy liberal revisionism from me. The freedoms we enjoy today are because of the likes of Morrissey – that golden generation who fermented indie music in a big vat of Thatcherism, post-punk and cardigans. He fought in the indie wars of the late ’80s so that we could sit around listening to Interpol and reading Naomi Klein and going to art school and having ridiculous haircuts, all without a care in the world. Today’s indie music stars are insects dwarfed by the man’s musical vision.
Some things Morrissey did:
He designed the electric guitar.
He saved the Queen’s life and then had a cup of Earl Grey with her and the corgis.
He invented toast.
He invented ‘Englishness’.
A more disrespectful reviewer might point out that this album is skewed heavily towards his (patchy) later career, that maybe there could have been more from Vauxhall And I (his best solo album, released around the time he discovered stem cells in the mid ’90s), and that live albums are easy (there’s a free live CD).
But that reviewer has forgotten that if it wasn’t for Morrissey, Thatcher would still be in power and he’d have nothing to listen to except the Band Aid single. And this record features evidence of his Mozjesty’s greatness – gems like ‘First Of The Gang To Die’, ‘Every Day Is Like Sunday’ and ‘The More You Ignore Me’. And the two new songs (‘That’s How People Grow Up’ and ‘All You Need Is Me’) may not be classics but by the standards of some of today’s young whippersnappers they’re bloody good.
So, have a little respect.