PregnantForTheLastTime
Hideous trait.
Uncriticized art isn't art. It's background noise.
I'm not talking about criticism, I'm talking about unsubstantiated whining and pining for things that can't happen twice.
Uncriticized art isn't art. It's background noise.
I've finally had a chance to listen to it a few times through. I love it. Some of the songs really grab me, and some don't. But I see the way they fit together, and I can tell that further listening will reveal more little hooks and surprises and alternate interpretations, as they always do. I have questions that will never be answered, and that's the beauty of it.
But I'm really frustrated with all the armchair quarterbacking here. You don't walk up to a painting in a museum and say, "Nice, I guess, but I think he should have used more blue." or bitch about what brand of paint or brushes were used. It's art. Walk up to it, admire it, hate it; project yourself into the story, or watch from afar, but it's not yours. If you want to write songs, then do it, but Morrissey's work is his own, and if you constantly second guess everything he does then you're totally missing the point. He isn't going to make Viva Hate II, or Vauxhall & I, Still Together After All These Years. Not everything has to have a damn sequel.
Real art in music is rare enough, you should appreciate what we have.
Ok, sycophantic (I will be accused) rant over.
Hi Preggers!
The only problem with your otherwise excellent rant is that we come to this site to discuss Morrissey's records. By your logic we would simply love Morrissey's art and not give a damn about arguing its merits one way or the other. You don't want to drink, don't go to the pub.
Had Morrissey not become the greatest singer, like, ever, he might well have become a music critic. So criticism of his records is okay I think.
I read lots and lots of, "Vauxhall was 89 times better! This sucks! Jesse needs to go!". That's not really interesting or useful criticism, is it?
So if ROTT was "the sex album", then YOR is "the death album".....And I am only saying this jokingly!
Your colloquial English is really natural. There was another thread where this was mentioned but is seems to be a reference to oral sex (of a non-gentle nature) in the back of a taxi, enhanced by the movements of the car.
Have to ask -- have you by chance met Bozman in Portugal? He has a house there. Hope to visit your country one day.
I would say the opposite. YOR is much sexier to me.
Who said it was yellow ? Do you know something we don't ?Yes, nothing says "sexy" like getting blown in the back of a yellow cab!
Who said it was yellow ? Do you know something we don't ?
Besides, black cabs are sexiest of all.
Horny in a Hackney Cab
Last night I had dinner with a friend who, long ago, was in an very unpleasant relationship with a Morrissey-obsessive. She knows Morrissey's solo work, but never really cared for it. She loves The Smiths.
As I was driving her to the train I put on YOR, just as background music. She didn't say anything for a while and, when I went to turn it off, she insisted on hearing it through. She LOVES it, and thinks it is some of his best solo work. She also thinks the current band sound fantastic.
There you go.
Since we're going anecdotal, I have tried in vain for a long time to get my significant other to listen to Morrissey and YOR is making a believer out of her. Go figure.
So if ROTT was "the sex album". . .
well, I've actually heard the album now so can finally contribute to this thread! having said that, I've not really made up my mind. been focusing on the six 'new' songs.
'Carol' was the first song to jump out at me (and seems like an obvious second single choice) and I'm slowly realising what the 'It's Not Your Birthday' fuss is all about!
One of the things I'm relieved about, with the new album, is that there is no mention of Moz's kegs! As I said way back when (in discussions of Ringleader), it was like a teen-aged experience of sex filtered through a middle-aged man, and, IMO, it often wasn't pretty. On the contrary, some of Morrissey's discussion of sex, now that he's actually having it, is cringe-inducing.
At any rate, I think YOR is a very well put-together record, with the possible exception of that flamenco nonsense. I love the rockers, so I'm happy that (and forgive me for repeating what I posted in the "favourite song from YOR" thread) even the epics are under 5 minutes long, and thrilled that most of the songs clock in under three minutes. I like that not every song is about the same subject, and that not every song's subject is Morrissey (although many of them are, I still hear some iamgination/story-telling in it).
Jerry Finn did everything right that Tony Visconti did wrong (I am no fan of Visconti as Moz's producer--sometimes you need someone to say, "'ang on a minnit!" and clearly there was no such person in Visconti's studio). The vocals! Are front of the mix! Can I get an amen?!
I will need to have a couple more listens before I can talk more specifically about the tracks, but so far I am pleased. Even "Throwing My Arms Around Paris," is a pleasant surprise (I always thought that, live, it sounded like two different songs jammed together willy-nilly, but now I get it--another credit to Finn's production).
ETA: Oh, and anyone care to back me up that "Black Cloud" is a 2.0 version of "Heir Apparent"?
--jeniphir
ETA: Oh, and anyone care to back me up that "Black Cloud" is a 2.0 version of "Heir Apparent"?
--jeniphir