Morrissey A-Z: "(The) Ordinary Boys"

[ZOOM FROM GLOOM]

Yeah, I think he's a very universal writer.

But that prat from Gene cited this song as the moment Morrissey turned on ordinary people - I think it was more likely to be the other way round. If anything.

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He said this in 84 - which might be relevant:

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It's from an interview with The Advocate.

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“So, goodbye
Please stay with your own kind
And I'll stay with mine”

 

[That's Enough For Me]

The great realisation lyric of VH. 'And you knew, that it had to be so...avoiding ordinary boys'

For me this was about him deciding to leave home and if he wanted to be anyone in life, these people couldn't be the extent of his social circle. There was simply more to life.

Certainly true in the town I come from.

A wonderful 8/10 song from me.

 

[ZOOM FROM GLOOM]

He was always fringe.
The "Kevin" thing was real at the time.
It was a huge social sub-group and he would be aware of "Kevins & Sharons" (terms to "designate a working-class or lower-middle-class youth without taste or sophistication").
The majority of 'working class' people would eat up anything on the PWL.

Him being on the periphery and making observations about such 'ordinariness' is exactly why I gravitated towards him.

Exactly. Anyone on the outside feels knows what M is saying. Don’t think it’s so much a critique on the class system, it’s more “Kicking away from the mundane everyday ..”

I believe Rossiter is conflating two different types of people to sustain his 'outrage'.
Regards,
FWD.

Together with his later comments, it seems he never got Morrissey.

 

[ZOOM FROM GLOOM]

The great realisation lyric of VH. 'And you knew, that it had to be so...avoiding ordinary boys'

If they didn’t know and listen to the New York Dolls, then he probably wasn’t interested.

For me this was about him deciding to leave home and if he wanted to be anyone in life, these people couldn't be the extent of his social circle. There was simply more to life.

Certainly true in the town I come from.

A wonderful 8/10 song from me.

Agree.

It’s a wonderful song and I don’t feel it’s fair to pull it out of context of the album, in order to be judged. It’s an important detail in a much larger and beautiful picture, which is Viva Hate.

 

[Mayfly]

No one on earth would remove a good, solid album track for a rough, not bad, demo on a reissue. The answer lies in the lyrics, imho. Ordinary Boys never bothered me. It belongs to that start-up period, it's lightweight but enjoyable.

Wat do you say that the answer for its later exclusion is in the lyrics? I always took it as a song to be true to yourself and accept your difference, even if that imlpies putting up with insults and comes with a sense of not belonging. I still like those word. But I might be overlooking something.

 

[Vegan. Cro. Spirit. 444]

YIP! A MASTERPIECE!

🇭🇷>

 

[Phranc & Open]

Wat do you say that the answer for its later exclusion is in the lyrics? I always took it as a song to be true to yourself and accept your difference, even if that imlpies putting up with insults and comes with a sense of not belonging. I still like those word. But I might be overlooking something.

It was a guess. Nothkng more. The exclusion of this song still is a mystery.

 

[Anonymous]

One of my favourites on the album. I love the wistful, dreamy mood of it, and it works perfectly balanced next to the frantic mayhem of 'I Don't Mind if You Forget Me'. The lyrics are great too, it really captures that teenage depression feeling when you just don't fit in, yet see all the regular folk around you happily living their lives and being 'normal', and wonder how they do it.

It's removal is insane, but this is Morrissey we're talking about. God knows what butchery he'd have inflicted on the Smiths albums if he'd been allowed to be in charge of the reissues. New covers, instrumental bits chopped out of songs, random songs replaced and tracklistings altered: we dodged a bullet there.

 

[ZOOM FROM GLOOM]

It was a guess. Nothkng more. The exclusion of this song still is a mystery.

I think .. 1. He doesn’t care for it.

and 2. It’s a way for him to reclaim the album as his own, doing with it, his work, as he pleases, knowing full well that it would irk many of his fans.

 

[Mayfly]

I think .. 1. He doesn’t care for it.

and 2. It’s a way for him to reclaim the album as his own, doing with it, his work, as he pleases, knowing full well that it would irk many of his fans.

Well, he obviously didn-t connect with this song anymore at the time of the reissue for a reason that we don’t know.
unfortunately, the reissue of VH wasn’t an improvement and I didn’t invest in it, the song Treat Me Like a Human Being also being available as a b-side to the Glamourous Grue single anyway.

 

[Gregor Samsa]

Omitting this one from the VH reissue is really an unpardonable offense. This is one of Morrissey’s greatest outsider anthems. f*** the nobody from Gene who claims Moz with this song turns on the very people he used to champion. He champions the oddballs, the sensitive and the alienated, and condemns those who makes them miserable - just like he did in the Smiths.

 

[Erik]

This may be me favorite Morrissey song, and I just can't explain, so I won't even try to

 

[skull]

I've always loved this

 

[marred]

Love the song. Can't work out why he'd remove it.

 

[NealCassidy]

Not on Spotify at all

 

[Watson]

An amazing song. Like so many on Viva Hate it's steeped in a sense of nostalgia and it conveys that sense of feeling different so beautifully. The melody of this still rattles around in my brain regularly, 31 years later.

Could not have put it better myself - I adore this song and every song on VH. It was the best of times...

 

[Erik]

An amazing song. Like so many on Viva Hate it's steeped in a sense of nostalgia and it conveys that sense of feeling different so beautifully. The melody of this still rattles around in my brain regularly, 31 years later.

So so true. This song brings emotions out of you, transporting you back in time