The Smiths

With Morrissey's increasingly violent lyrics you'd think the Smiths' swan song would be a downer, but it's lit through with the joy the band takes in experimenting with their signature, multilayered guitar sound (which they recreate on the opener, sans guitar). Greatest cut and shoulda-been kickoff single: "Stop Me, If You've Heard This One Before. They went out on top.

"This story is old – I know/But it goes on," bleats Morrissey on the Smiths' fifth album.
Perhaps it will, but not in this form. Recorded last spring, before guitarist Johnny Marr left
the band (followed in turn by Morrissey's announcement that he would pursue a solo
career), Strangeways, Here We Come stands as the Smiths' unexpected swan song.
Ironically, it also stands as one of their best and most varied records: much like... More >

Having conquered my wimpophobia to where I reflexively enjoy the supple smarts of their sound, I bore down anticipating even tastier goodies, and now I must face facts. In three of these songs somebody's dead or dying, in three more somebody contemplates murder, and in the rest somebody's in a selfish pet of the sort that led to the aforementioned threats. So the liveliest tracks are where somebody's dead or dying: AIDS song, biz song, song about how selfish and petty you feel when somebody you've raged at actually dies. (Grade - B)