submitted by Michelle Jouan
from The San Francisco Bay Guardian (Aug. 13, 1997)

Morrissey
Maladjusted (Mercury)

Since he often sings about alienation, it’s cruelly apt that Morrissey himself is misunderstood. In America, his miserable-mope rep has obscured the fact that he’s one of rock’s few political voices. Criminal celebrity, drug-induced escapism, child-abuse hysteria, racism and nationalism --- whatever the subject, he digs beneath dogma to articulate truth. His last album, Southpaw Grammar, was worth buying simply for "Reader Meet Author"’s ruthless portrait --- a personality profile in reverse --- of a software-era armchair journalist.

Morrissey makes a true drama queen’s grand entrance seconds into Maladjusted, announcing, "I wanna start from before the beginning." His most provocative solo material trades a terminally unsatisfied "I" for an unseemly "we," and Maladjusted continues this tradition with a hymn to population control sung from the perspective of lurking kidnappers. Overall, though, the album is a solitary affair, Morrissey’s most committed relationship isn’t with a person but with trouble ("Trouble Loves Me"), and his final, fatal attempt at friendship is with the devil ("Satan Rejected My Soul").

Since familiarity breeds contempt in fickle critics, Morrissey’s talents probably need restating. His vocal cords match his malcontented words, and only Jarvis Cocker shares his talent for slipping asides into rhyme schemes. His mannerisms still defy masculinity" with falsetto harmonies, "He Cried" achieves the pathos of the Shangri-Las classic that shares its name. And his mash notes to male sex objects keep getting better: "Roy’s Keen" ogles a window cleaner (!) with an inspired series of silly-sexy double entendres. Maladjusted’s problem is the music behind Morrissey; his guitarist sounds like Johnny Marr with a case of arthritis.

Most artists melt into society as they age, but Morrissey still charts those moments when everyday comforts and human connections break down and one is left facing isolation. In a culture gripped by don’t-worry-be-happy groupthink, trend-obsessed reviewers label him depressed and chastise him for not changing. But he has changed, subtly --- on tracks like "Ammunition" he shifts his attention from growing up alone to growing old alone. Like it or not, to one degree or another everyone is familiar with solitude. But few people have the guts to make art, however flawed, about it.

Johnny Ray Huston