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A Smiths tribute album no less, and mighty fine with it. There was a time in the mists of time when the Smiths where the most crucial band on the hi-fi, perhaps the world, nights spent huddled in front of pre digitalised radio, hard to imagine as it may seem to today’s generation, but no internet by which to amuse ourselves.
The Smiths, were, all said and done, the first bed-sit band, in Morrissey they had a singer who spoke to societies supposed misfits / outsiders, a person who understood the dark depths of existence and whose lyric writing gave each passing release a sense of being a minutiae kitchen sink drama, innately aware that records were more than mere passing novelties and that you could touch people by the power of words alone, hence feelings of hate, loneliness, abandonment and maudlin musings of suicide / death often laced their early work all the time the miserablist undercurrents kept buoyant by Marr’s often delicately brittle atmospheric chord grooves; passionately English, Morrissey’s world was all Keith Waterhouse and Alan Sillitoe, a post war factory fuelled Northern England where drudgery met humour head on, the sleeves of each Smiths single adorned with monochrome images of actors and artists close to the lead singers heart simply bore out the attention to detail in every respect.
So to ‘Romantic and Square is Hip and Aware’, (the title taken from the run out groove of ‘William, it was really nothing’) a collection featuring 12 Smiths classics re-appraised by a generation they influenced, and when we say re-appraised we mean re-appraised, this isn’t some idle show of fan-dom at work here, each band, admittedly to differing degrees of success, has tried to make their chosen song their own.
Opening the events, the Pines, who lets face can’t do no wrong at our gaff tackle perhaps one of my least favourite Marr / Morrissey cuts, the dreaded ‘Ask’. In their own imitable way Brooker and Berry stamp their authorative folk magic on the whole proceedings to such an extent that they endow it with a warming pastoral presence that’s both crisp and endearing. Fools some would call them, but Pale Sunday take on the daunting ‘I know it’s over’ and completely decimate it by adding an almost tongue in cheek quick step dynamic that’s drowning amid the peppering of sophisticated string sections and shot through with the showering of sonic storms, still sounds miserable but it does have that feel of early Flying Saucer Attack eyeballing a Bontempi accompanied Bacharach. Now we’ve been marvelling at the latest Lucksmiths mini-album ‘A little distraction’ so there’s no surprise that they opt to re-jig one of the Smiths finest, deciding to take away it’s lasting sting by approaching it as an amiable male / female duet with the aid of Karen Morcombe and giving the whole process a lasting pop vibe that replaces the originals sense of desperation with a stubborn non-chalance.
And if this was a vote on Morrissey soundalikes then Slipside’s Graeme Elston would win hands down, covering one of my personal faves ‘Please please please let me get what I want’ which aside having everything including the kitchen sink (drama) only falls short of the original due to the absence of the stupefying flamenco style guitar lead out, equal fondness goes to the Pipas jaunty re-tread of ‘This night has opened my eyes’ which switches harrow for numbing dreaminess. Multi instrumentalist Dick Preece AKA Lovejoy pulls ‘Girlfriend in a coma’ out of the flames to give it a good life saving slap with heartbreaking consequences while the Would Be Goods get all dusty and lovingly misty eyed on the romantically revisited ‘Back to the old house’. ‘Sheila take a boy’ is given a Parisienne workout by the Young Tradition and firmly measured out by the Nico-esque vocals of Laura Watling. However perhaps the compilations finest moments come with the interpretations by Simpatico and the Guild League, the former tangle meaningfully with ‘That joke isn’t funny anymore’ and give it a froze through to the bone dynamic while the latter appear to completely strip ‘Panic’ to give it a seriously goofy music hall make-over and into the bargain providing the most original or at the least, interesting cover. ‘Sweet and Tender Hooligan’ is put through the fuzz box and tooled up with shiny Doc Martens and an energetically aggressive groove by Nottingham’s the Liberty Ship which leaves the Snowdrops to bring up the rear with the trembling laid back snoozing acoustic sweep they so indelibly cast over ‘Bigmouth strikes again’. All in all a beautifully gathered collection of long forgotten memories and a long overdue reminder of some of the greatest treasures to be found in pop’s crown.
MARK BARTON
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