ALBUM REVIEWS
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ALBUM REVIEWS |
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Morrissey
YEARS OF REFUSAL POLYDOR 16.2.09 @www.vanguard-online.co.uk
As I listened to this I was filled with deep and profound thoughts about the passing of time and whether the self is eternal, unchangeable or merely a malleable construct created by the animal brain. It seems like only a few years ago that the almost-young Stephen Morrissey rose to fame, a young man in his twenties. A man out of time, he articulated the alienation every adult must navigate on that painful passage to adulthood. Yet, here he was, a man past that age but still tuned in to that time, perhaps to the echoes that resonate in all of us to our dying days – “why me”, “it’s not fair”, the world doesn’t recognise my genius”, “just you wait, they’ll appreciate what they missed when I’m dead”, and so on……. And here he is again, now a middle aged man. Should we be glad he remembers so well and still feels the pangs of such a vibrant time in his life? Or should we feel sorry for him, trapped in a proto-teen state through eternity, like a teenage Superman in a kryptonite prison? The album opens with an overture – Something Is Squeezing My Skull – which sums up all the themes you’re going to get over the next three-quarters of an hour – the incivility of modern life, a lack of love on offer and how people treat him badly. All contradicted by the solid pub indie-rock we have come to expect in recent years. Things bang and crash sturdily but without sparkle or joy. There is a frisson when Morrissey alludes to wanting sex in the back of a taxi – perhaps it is the acceptance of lust into his world-view that has brought us to this duller vision, less lightly hyper-charged than a Morrissey with his juices pent-up? Songs like Black Cloud (frustrated love) have that trademark Morrissey lift that make his songs instantly recognisable. I wonder if we keep buying his records because they are new yet always similar, hitting the comfort buttons while we feel we stay a little contemporary. I’m Throwing My Arms Around Paris is almost a Broadway show-tune and the Pet Shop Boys could make this tale of unwanted love into a whirling piece of pop kitsch. Mr M, however, does what he always does with a song. A number of songs touch on death and in a sadder way than the teen angst he made in his twenties, a knowledge is present that his friends can, will and do die. We all deal with that differently; the Flaming Lips make it into a reason to celebrate life. Morrissey makes it into a reason to let his band turn out more lumpen sounds. Bring back Vini Reilley or even Johnny Marr. I’m Ok By Myself howls out the album in a wail of distortion and drumming – Morissey has lived on his own and isn’t prepared to compromise now. If we stand it up against Sinatra’s My Way, the latter is a valedictory celebration and the former a sulky rejection. Morrissey has omitted here the grace that made his songs universal and touching, replacing it with a lumpen stroppishness. That’s How People Grow Up, he tells us as he recounts how “disappointment came to me and booted me and bruised and hurt me”. Seems to me if this is Morrissey grown up, then we have lost something from the charming swinging raconteur of the career revival of a few years ago. As All You Need Is Me thumps along, riffing nicely on a crunchy bass pattern, he tells us we’ll miss him when he’s gone. Stephen, we miss you now. www.itsmorrisseysworld.com |
