You should know...

[The Seeker of Good Songs]

...time's tide will smother you...


but my question really is:
What changes the singers mind that
"... I just might die with a smile on my face after all..."

 

[ThomasB]

Sex

 

[Peppermint]

...time's tide will smother you...


but my question really is:
What changes the singers mind that
"... I just might die with a smile on my face after all..."

'It was dark as I drove the point home'. One of Morrissey's countless cheeky euphemisms for sex. He is shagging in a car with someone.

 

[Ragdale Road]

'It was dark as I drove the point home'. One of Morrissey's countless cheeky euphemisms for sex. He is shagging in a car with someone.

For years, I thought he was singing 'boy' not 'point' which would have been worrying.

 

[Peppermint]

For years, I thought he was singing 'boy' not 'point' which would have been worrying.

Yes, no wonder he felt sympathy for Kevin Spacey

 

[The Seeker of Good Songs]

'It was dark as I drove the point home'. One of Morrissey's countless cheeky euphemisms for sex. He is shagging in a car with someone.

That sounds like it could be, does it really flow with the theme of the song.
To me the song was about an outcast or a bullied person. The singer wishes he could laugh at the downtrodden (but is one himself) so he can't.

 

[nicky wire's legs]

dammit I thought he was gonna murder the other person

 

[Mr. Jackpots]

...time's tide will smother you...


but my question really is:
What changes the singers mind that
"... I just might die with a smile on my face after all..."

Because he's happy to die. He hates being here. How is that hard to glean?

 

[Mr. Jackpots]

'It was dark as I drove the point home'. One of Morrissey's countless cheeky euphemisms for sex. He is shagging in a car with someone.

Uh...no. Nothing contextually in the song or in interviews from that period or in his Autobiography suggest this. At all.

He's in a car arguing with someone, or conflicted about the dynamics between himself and the someone he's driving with. We see this "driving around with a crush/ambiguous person of interest" trope in multiple songs throughout his career:

Late Night, Maudlin Street
Break Up The Family
This Charming Man
There Is A Light That Never Goes Out
Driving Your Girlfriend Home
I Started Something I Couldn't Finish

...probably several others as well.

 

[Peppermint]

That sounds like it could be, does it really flow with the theme of the song.
To me the song was about an outcast or a bullied person. The singer wishes he could laugh at the downtrodden (but is one himself) so he can't.

He is shagging in a car, while bemoaning that the person he is with makes fun of him for his 'depressive' persona. Can't remember where I read it (Mozipedia??) but
the alleged backstory was that this referenced a journalist Moz was secretly dating (rumour is he wasn't as celibate as the legend would have it).

 

[Mr. Jackpots]

He is shagging in a car, while bemoaning that the person he is with makes fun of him for his 'depressive' persona. Can't remember where I read it (Mozipedia??) but
the alleged backstory was that this referenced a journalist Moz was secretly dating (rumour is he wasn't as celibate as the legend would have it).

Obviously anything's possible but I take rumors with a grain of salt. Anyway it's not how I interpret the song; I've always seen it as a rejoinder on his part to the person he's driving with who is painted, in the song, as particularly insensitive to the plight of the lonely "(why do you kick them when they fall down?"). The point he's driving home is merely his side of the argument in the car. And in the car, amidst those cold leather seats, it occurs to him that the only way to seek reprieve from persecution and loneliness is through death...which will come, when and if does come, as a relief. You see this sentiment echoes 10 years later in The Teachers Are Afraid Of The Pupils: "to be finished would be a relief."

 

[Peppermint]

Uh...no. Nothing contextually in the song or in interviews from that period or in his Autobiography suggest this. At all.

He's in a car arguing with someone, or conflicted about the dynamics between himself and the someone he's driving with. We see this "driving around with a crush/ambiguous person of interest" trope in multiple songs throughout his career:

Late Night, Maudlin Street
Break Up The Family
This Charming Man
There Is A Light That Never Goes Out
Driving Your Girlfriend Home
I Started Something I Couldn't Finish

...probably several others as well.

Anotella Black Interview, 1985 https://www.morrissey-solo.com/threads/1985-antonella-black-interview-with-moz.102632/
'What do you find highly erotic at the grand old age of 25?
"Highly erotic? Mmmmm... I can't give you a satisfactory reply. I do find many things erotic, but I can't give you a satisfactory reply. As a child ofthe Sixties, when the seats of cars were made of leather, to me there was something highly erotic about actually being in a car. I have always found cars highly erotic - not the driver's seat ... there was just something about the old leather seats ... '

"It was dark as I drove the point home
And on cold leather seats
Well, it suddenly struck me
I just might die with a smile on my face after all"

People can think whatever alternative meaning they want but for me, this is pretty well-referenced.

 

[Mr. Jackpots]

Anotella Black Interview, 1985 https://www.morrissey-solo.com/threads/1985-antonella-black-interview-with-moz.102632/
'What do you find highly erotic at the grand old age of 25?
"Highly erotic? Mmmmm... I can't give you a satisfactory reply. I do find many things erotic, but I can't give you a satisfactory reply. As a child ofthe Sixties, when the seats of cars were made of leather, to me there was something highly erotic about actually being in a car. I have always found cars highly erotic - not the driver's seat ... there was just something about the old leather seats ... '

"It was dark as I drove the point home
And on cold leather seats
Well, it suddenly struck me
I just might die with a smile on my face after all"

People can think whatever alternative meaning they want but for me, this is pretty well-referenced.

Yes I understand he fetishizes car seat leather but to me, regarding that particular song, the car seats are just contextual.

 

[Ragdale Road]

Morrissey said that the 'kick em when they fall down' refrain, and the 'I've seen this happen in other people's lives and now it's happening in mine' ending, were aimed directly at journalists at that time.