Track #42 - “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out” by The Smiths (1986)
From the album The Queen is Dead
Music by Johnny Marr; lyrics by Steven Morrissey
Performed by:
Morrissey – lead vocals
Johnny Marr – guitar, synthesized strings
Andy Rourke – bass
Mike Joyce - drums
Take me out tonight
Oh, take me anywhere, I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care
Driving in your car
I never, never want to go home
Because I haven’t got one, la-di-dum
Oh, I haven’t got one
Oh, oh
And if a double-decker bus crashes into us
To die by your side
Is such a heavenly way to die
And if a ten-ton truck kills the both of us
To die by your side
Well, the pleasure, the privilege is mine
The street I grew up on in Long Island was tough to find if you were driving to our house for the first time. On a sunny day it was hard; if it was nighttime, or raining, forget it…you’d need to drive at a crawl to find it. My parents would tell people of our little street, “It sort of sneaks up on you, so slow down and you’ll see it.” I told my friends the same thing, to tell their parents to watch for the street sign, which was set back off the road a bit, and to take things slowly coming down the double-line road leading to our street. But people would pass it all the time, even if they’d been there already. In a suburban neighborhood of winding through streets, I lived on one of the few dead-end roads, right at the end of it, on a cul-de-sac. Living on a dead-end road was great in terms of safety and playing outside, but there was only one way in and one way out, adding to the challenge of finding the road. When we first moved to Long Island and I was granted the freedom to ride my bike anywhere, I suddenly had to learn my way around. I would ride somewhere once and try to imprint the route on my pre-adolescent brain, but I would inevitably get lost the next time, unless I was with friends. The important places were easy; Grillo’s candy store on Grundy Avenue, the 7-11 in town on Union Avenue, and Good Shepherd Church, where I played hockey. But riding to and from the church parking lot where we practiced had its challenges. The first time I rode there alone (hockey stick across my 10-speed handlebars and equipment bag over my shoulder), I made a wrong turn (or so I thought) and ended up on a long, paved road that I was sure was a path to oblivion. When I actually ended up in the church parking lot practically on the verge of tears, and saw other boys assembling for practice, I realized I had accidentally found a shortcut. All I had done was make a left too soon, but I ended up where I needed to be. So, it all turned out OK, but not before a considerable amount of panic, and a vision of me riding my bike until I fell off the Earth. Anyway…this has been, more or less, the story of my life. I’ve made a lot of wrong turns; some have turned out OK, but others have seriously gotten me lost. It’s not like I have no sense of direction at all; I just need to drive somewhere several (dozen?) times before I have the route down. And that’s fine, I own it. I eventually get to where I need to be, everyone is safe, and isn’t that all that matters? But I do have memories of a much younger me using written directions I had hastily scrawled on scrap paper and threw on the passenger seat, disheveled behind the wheel and saying to myself, “Wait, was that the 2nd light? Did I miss my turn?!”, or driving past someone’s house three or four times and having the person ask me when I arrived, “Why were you driving back and forth?” When I got into the recruiting industry and I had to go visit clients, I would study the route on the MapQuest website, print out directions and leave myself 15 extra minutes in case I couldn’t find their office. I even received a Nassau County atlas for Christmas one year, which I kept jammed in the door of my car, just in case. I still made a lot of wrong turns and drove past many low-slung industrial park office buildings back in those days. Hmmm…. yeah, so not good. But that all changed in early 2008. No more getting lost, no more written directions, no more missed turns. In fact, it was almost like there was a personal assistant in the passenger seat next to me, telling me when to turn, even how many miles I had left to go. I had an Eagle Scout next to me, a navigator, a literal cartographer making sure I arrived on time so I could confidently step out of the car with a smile, instead of a look of relief that I found the place. Yes, in 2008, my new friend was GPS.
GPS, or Global Positioning System, was first invented for military use in the early 1970s. By the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan had authorized GPS to be used for civilian purposes, predominantly for civilian air travel. The first handheld GPS units were available in 1989, manufactured by a company called, appropriately, Magellan Corporation. The units weighed just over one pound, had a very short battery life, and would set you back about $3,000. Various luxury car makers began installing GPS in their higher-end models, and in 1998, Garmin produced the StreetPilot, the first portable unit you could install in your car. By 2007, Garmin had perfected the technology for consumer use, and that Christmas, the handheld GPS unit was one of the hottest tech gifts on the market. You can read about the rush on the Garmin GPS unit that holiday season in this NPR piece. And of course, we all know that in 2008, Apple basically made Garmin devices obsolete by installing GPS on all their 2nd generation iPhones. There is a wealth of information out there about the history of GPS, and if this were an engineering or science blog, I could write pages about it, but since we’re talking about music, just type “GPS” into Google and have at it if you want to explore. So, back to 2007. Sometime that summer, my dad got his hands on a Garmin Nuvi for his car. To say he loved that thing would be an understatement. He used it all the time, even testing it to give him directions to places he had been to hundreds of times, just to see what it would tell him. To his credit, he hung onto his Garmin till the bitter end, years after GPS was on his smartphone, until he was literally unable to download updates for it. Besides hearing about it from my dad, I read about Garmins everywhere and had seen them in at least two of my co-worker’s cars. I knew that I had to get my hands on one; if anyone needed an electronic map and personal navigator in their vehicle it was me. Unfortunately, I would not get one until after Christmas in 2007, thanks to a BestBuy gift card my parents had given me. That Garmin would definitely help from that point forward, at least until I acquired my first smartphone a couple of years later. But I really could have used it a few months earlier, at least to show me what direction I was traveling in. You see, I was driving with someone, but we weren’t actually going anywhere; we just decided to take a drive. It was October, the air was crisp, but still warm enough to take a drive with the top down, at least if you were wearing a hoodie. And let’s just call this drive to nowhere what it was…it was a date. When Christine and I decided to start seeing each other outside of work, we did it cautiously; plus, neither one of us were ready for anything too serious at first. So, we’d meet for lunch or coffee or take a trip to the mall; nothing fancy, just some time to get to know each other better. When Christine suggested we take a sunset drive in my Jeep Wrangler with the top down, I was pleasantly surprised. As I said, it was October, not the summertime. The sun was beginning to set earlier, and once those breezes off the ocean and Long Island Sound cooled things off, it would be chilly. But Christine thought this weather was a perfect time to be outside; I would soon learn that she loved being outside, no matter what the weather was like. And we took that pre-GPS drive to nowhere, and wouldn’t you know it, I was indeed capable of getting lost on a drive with no destination. But more on that later. I learned two things on that drive: one was that Christine was someone I needed in my corner, in my life for that matter, for a lot of reasons…including the fact that she had the most amazing sense of direction I’ve ever seen. I also learned that she was not familiar with one of my favorite bands. When I quoted one of their best songs on that October evening, I got a blank stare. Oh boy. “OK”, I thought, “I’m driving in the wrong direction, but I can distract her by telling her all about The Smiths!”
In the early 1980s, MTV was awash in synthesizer-driven pop and new wave, products of the second British invasion which included bands Duran Duran, Culture Club, and Human League. Post-punk acts like The Police, Talking Heads, Blondie and Elvis Costello had paved the way for these bands by achieving mainstream success in the late 1970s, and they began to dominate the airwaves and be put into heavy rotation on MTV because of their distinctive aesthetics and videos. When guitarist Johnny Marr literally knocked on the door of Steven Patrick Morrissey in May of 1982 looking to form a band, neither man was looking to sound nor look like the bands from the post-punk era or the second British invasion. Marr had briefly met Morrissey before at a Patti Smith show in 1978, and Marr remembered Morrissey’s love of poetry, and that he had written a book about glam pioneers, the New York Dolls. When they met again on Morrissey’s doorstep in Manchester that day in spring 1982, their chemistry was instant, and they soon began writing songs together. By the end of 1982, Marr had brought in schoolmate Andy Rourke to play bass, and Mike Joyce would later join on drums. Morrissey had also chosen a band name: The Smiths. Morrissey would later say that he wanted the “most ordinary name, and I thought it was time the ordinary folk of the world showed their faces.” The Smiths performed their first show in late 1982 and quickly gained a following in their hometown of Manchester. Morrissey’s introspective, often self-deprecating lyrics framed by Marr’s jangly guitar chords and the beautiful arrangements of the songs earned them a rabid fanbase. They were becoming an alternative to all the synth-driven pop that was currently on the radio and MTV. They recorded their first single, “Hand in Glove” for Rough Trade Records, and the success of that one single earned them a recording contract. Two more singles followed in 1983, “This Charming Man”, and “What Difference Does It Make?” which both charted in the UK. “Hand in Glove” and “What Difference Does It Make?” would both end up on The Smiths, the band’s debut album released in February 1984. The album was a critical success, and was followed by more non-album singles that same year, including “Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now”, and “William, It Was Really Nothing”. This pattern would continue during The Smiths’ musical career; non-album singles not on studio releases that performed well critically and on the charts. Both of those songs are two of their most revered tracks but only appear on compilations. In fact, the B-side of “William” is “How Soon is Now?”, arguably the song they are best known for; it would appear on the US release of The Smiths’ second album, Meat is Murder. More political and pointed than its predecessor, Meat is Murder was released in 1985 and almost cracked the top 100 on the US Billboard Album Chart, reaching 110. By now, the band was worshipped in the UK and had a large underground following in the US. Two more studio albums followed; The Queen is Dead in 1986, and their fourth and final album, Strangeways, Here We Come, released in September of 1987, after The Smiths had gone their separate ways. The Queen is Dead is often considered their masterpiece, and one of the best albums of all time, certainly of the 1980s. Other compilation albums were released in between studio releases, with “B” sides of singles becoming more iconic songs than actual singles. Louder Than Bombs, an early 1987 collection of singles and “B” sides not previously released in the US is ranked 369 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time, if you can believe that. The Smiths were considered an enigma, and one of the greatest indie rock bands of all time, a bridge from new wave to the guitar rock of the 90’s. Eventually, the genius that was Morrissey and Marr was not sustainable, and the partnership did not end well; the two have vowed never to play music together again. And since they were mostly on college radio and stations that didn’t reach Suffolk County, I never heard their music in the 80’s. In fact, I had never even heard of The Smiths, until 1990. Remember those guys I worked with at the mall, who ridiculed me for continuing to listen to 80’s hair metal, and not knowing anything about alternative music? Well, you should have seen their reaction when I told them I didn’t know who The Smiths were. They literally laughed at me. Apparently, since The Smiths were so underground, it was the pinnacle of being cool if you knew their music, so to these guys, I was way out of touch. Kerry, the nice guy who lent me a bunch of alternative CDs to check out (Nine Inch Nails, The Pixies, etc.), didn’t have any Smiths CDs with him to lend, and Rich, the guy that made me borrow New Order’s Substance, just shook his head. “Can’t believe you don’t know who The Smiths are!” He advised me to just start with The Smiths Best I & II and then move onto their proper albums. So, I dutifully ordered them from the Columbia House CD Club (man, thank God for them, huh?) and spent an afternoon just listening to both discs over and over. And from then on, I was hooked. I listened to both discs on repeat for most of the fall of 1990, and I eventually purchased their entire studio catalog. I loved all of it; the lyrics, the ethereal guitar riffs, the bouncy basslines, the whole atmosphere The Smiths created in their songs. And I felt that Morrissey was singing about stuff that you thought about, stuff that was buried, and that you might be afraid to say out loud. He sang about unrequited love, desperate love, repressed feelings, his disdain for the music industry and politicians, all framed with black humor and sometimes violent imagery. There were a few songs though that I played more than the others; “Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now” (“I was looking for a job and then I found a job…and heaven knows I’m miserable now…); “Half A Person” (“And if you have five seconds to spare, Then I’ll tell you the story of my life…); and “William, It Was Really Nothing” (“Would you like to marry me? And if you like you can buy the ring…”). I had never heard lyrics like these before, words put together to say these things. There was even one song with an over-the-top sentiment; Morrissey singing and begging the driver of the car he’s in to not stop driving, to never bring him home, telling the driver, “…if a double-decker bus crashes into us, To die by your side is such a heavenly way to die…” That is a bleak way to tell someone you might care about them, but I understood Morrissey’s ironic and dark sense of humor coming through; or did I? Would I really say that to someone, even in jest? Especially if we were driving at the time? Would I quote Morrissey’s weirdly sincere lyrics to someone I was beginning to fall for? Hmmm…turns out I would.
One of the first things I noticed about my wife when I first met her was that she seemed to always be doing things with a purpose. Christine looked determined all the time, whether she was walking to her desk, on a call, or if she was typing out an email. She was never just filling time with idle chatter, leaning back in her chair and staring at the ceiling in frustration if things didn’t go her way (like I often did). She simply pivoted and made a new plan and figured out a way to move forward. Nothing rattled her, at least as far as I could tell when we first began to work together. And people listened to her. I worked with several strong personalities at that job, for better or worse, but Christine had a way of making things happen with sheer will and getting people on board with whatever she was proposing. Her energy was impossible to ignore and still is to this day. It’s one of the reasons our relationship works after all this time. Christine is the “Today is going to be awesome!!” person I need when the day isn’t going in the right direction, and I saw that in her almost right away. Shortly after I started my new career and began working with her, Christine was given one of the new lines of business to manage and we began to partner up more and trust each other. I believed in what she was trying to build, and wanted to be part of it, so I supported her business by giving her quality people to place at her clients and we both made money. My new team didn’t share my enthusiasm but looking back now, I think that was the whole point; I saw how hard she was working, and how badly she wanted this new division to succeed, and it was infectious. I was drawn in by all that positive energy and determination Christine was putting out into the world. Why am I telling you all this? Because at some point, and I couldn’t tell you exactly the moment this hit me, I began to think that I wanted this energy in my life all the time, not just at work. Dating someone you work with is tricky, to say the least. If it ends, it’s usually bad for at least one of the parties involved and your job is never the same. If it lasts, you eventually must tell the people you work with, and then everyone knows your business. If you’re coming out of previous marriages, it gets even trickier. And if one of you has kids from that previous marriage? Yeah, it could get scandalous. So, if Christine and I were even going to try and get to know each other outside of work, we’d have to be deliberate and discreet, and we tried to in the beginning. Yes, there was an attraction, but we were not looking for anything serious, since both of us were just coming out of long relationships. As I mentioned before, we’d meet up for coffee or lunch, maybe a drink here and there, but we’d always arrive separately, and at a place that was kind of out of the way. This sort of worked for most of the summer, but if I’m being honest, I think a lot of people we worked with were starting to figure it out; we tried to pay it no mind. We ignored the side-eyes, and knowing smiles, and the whispers. If this all worked out, we’d just laugh at all the naysayers. And as the weather started to become chilly that September, I started to think that maybe this had a chance at becoming something bigger than discreet meetings for coffee and grist for the rumor mills.
When I agreed to that sunset drive in October, it felt like we were doing something, like an adventure almost; it felt like a big step, in other words. So, we made plans to meet in the office parking lot off the Long Island Expressway. It was a Saturday, and the building was empty, with no risk of running into nosy co-workers. I arrived first, top down but hoodie on, in anticipation of the brisk fall temps once the October sun went down. When Christine pulled up, she had two Starbucks drinks in hand: iced vanilla chai lattes. I had no idea what that was, but I was just told that I should just drink it, and that I’d like it (she was right.) To this day, that drink reminds me of that night. She jumped in the car, and I felt that familiar energy she brought with her everywhere; that “This is going to be great!!” energy. She had also smartly worn something warm, and had her hair pulled back, ready to go, unfazed by what could turn out to be a windy drive. I was excited and nervous at the same time. But I also got this feeling that even if it was cold or we got lost, or even if it rained, that everything would be just fine. I was beginning to get this feeling the more time I spent with Christine; I sensed this was a big deal, to feel this way about someone. Anyway…you might be asking yourself if a directionally challenged person like me had planned out a drive to nowhere before taking that drive, and the answer is YES. There was no way I’d risk getting lost with this person I was still trying to impress in my passenger seat; the last thing I wanted was to get lost. But of course, as you will see, that plan backfired. The route was simple: jump on the Sagtikos Parkway about 1/4 mile from the office, head north and go all the way up to Route 25A, which runs east-west, and take it east, into Port Jefferson, which was very familiar territory for us. Sounds easy, right? This was a drive I had taken many times when I lived in Smithtown; 25A right into Port Jefferson. Tonight, it was just a longer drive. I let Christine know the plan, and soon we were off. Once we were off the parkway and on Route 25A it got easier to talk over the wind blowing all around us. I don’t remember what we talked about on that drive, but I do remember Christine finally asking me where we were headed. I told her we were going east, into Port Jeff; nothing crazy.
“Are you sure we’re going east?”, she asked me.
“Well, it feels like we’re going east,” I replied.
“And what does going east feel like, exactly?”, she asked.
Can you just feel the sass dripping off the page? This has continued for almost two decades, by the way. Anyway…now I started to doubt myself and where I was going. I thought I had planned this so well; two turns, head east towards familiar territory, easy enough, right?
“No, we’re definitely going the right way. This feels right”, I said.
“John, I really think we’re going west.”
So, we kept driving and I ignored her suggestions to turn around. We had to be going east; there was no way I could have f***ed this up. And then, on the side of the road, as if it were pointing at me and mocking me; “Haha, you are literally driving in the wrong direction, and this girl thinks you’re a dope!”, was a giant sign:
Welcome to Oyster Bay
There it was; the unequivocal proof I had driven 30 minutes and 24 miles in the wrong direction. Oyster Bay, a quaint little town on the north shore of Long Island, was indeed, well west of where I wanted to go. In fact, any further west and I would have ended up in western Nassau County and approaching Queens. Wow. And then I heard from the passenger seat, “Does it still feel like you’re going east?”
So, I turned around. Of course, after finding a safe place to do it, I turned around. My face felt flushed, and I was embarrassed to fail like this in front of someone whose opinion meant everything, but what could I do? I laughed, and told her she was right all along, and apologized for not listening to her. She seemed unfazed. However, if she had a crystal ball and could see into a future of driving with me and having to correct my sense of direction, her demeanor might have been different. But, for that moment we were OK. I asked her how she knew what west “felt” like, and she just told me that she has always had this uncanny sense of direction. She told me you could drop her into an unfamiliar place and that she could quickly figure out where she was and how to orient herself; and as our relationship unfolded, I learned that she was not kidding. It blows me away to this day how my wife just always seems to know where she is, and where she is going. So, we kept driving, and at that point I said something like, “Well at least we weren’t literally going in the wrong direction, like in the wrong lane.” Hey, I needed to say something to re-assure myself, and it was all I could think of. “Oh, you mean it’s a good thing a bus or a truck wasn’t coming at us?” was Christine’s reply.
That sounded very familiar; double-decker bus, ten-ton truck. The Smiths? Was that on purpose? So, I went with it and invoked one of my favorite bands.
“And if a ten-ton truck kills the both of us
To die by your side
Well, the pleasure, the privilege is mine”
I said the words; I didn’t sing it (I’m not that crazy). And Christine asked me, “What is that? Is that a song?”
“Well yeah, it’s The Smiths,” I said.
“Who are The Smiths?”
Whoa, who are The Smiths? I should mention that Christine is seven years younger than me, and The Smiths were not exactly on mainstream radio, so it’s not impossible that The Smiths flew under her radar; they flew under my radar after all, and I was not going to make her feel bad like those guys did almost 20 years before. Still…we’d have to remedy this. I told her all about The Smiths, and their four albums and how amazing and groundbreaking they were, and how I completely missed them when they were underground popular, but how important they were to me now. And she probably commented on how ironically dark those lyrics were, and I probably had a moment of regret that I quoted them while we were driving on a two-lane road as the sun was setting, but in the end, it became an early moment in our new relationship that we still talk about. I told her I would make her a new mix CD with some Smiths songs on it, and I gave it to her the next week. I also played one of my Smiths compilation CDs for her, and while she never became a huge fan, she grew to appreciate their music. We went back and forth like this, introducing each other to music we liked, talking about our musical memories from when we were younger. The age gap meant we were listening to a lot of the same music, but at different times in our lives. She was still in college when I was starting my career and adult life; the music hit us differently. I also learned she worshipped Dave Matthews (she still does; she actually met him at a SiriusXM event and gave him a hug last year), loved Tribe Called Quest, Biggie and all the boy bands in college, and felt the same way I did about Nirvana (that they changed everything). I also learned she loved Led Zeppelin, Billy Joel, the Eagles and Fleetwood Mac, and that her dad used to play a lot of the same music my dad played. We talked about and listened to a lot of music that first year we were getting to know each other, and we still do. It’s one of the best things about sharing this life together. Does Christine listen to heavy metal with me? Haha…no way. I’d never put her through that. But would she happily buy me tickets to a metal show? Yep, she would. I knew after our drive to nowhere that if I had Christine in my life that I’d always be going in the right direction. Is that corny? It sure is…but it’s 100% true. She just always makes me feel that no matter what happens, everything will be OK. Of course, now when she tells me I’m driving the wrong way, I don’t even question it. I just drive where she tells me. And when I’m driving by myself, you can bet my GPS is on!!
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There are a lot of performance videos of Morrissey and Johnny Marr performing “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out” separately, but I only found one of the original Smiths playing it. They’re obviously lip-syncing but at least it’s them. There’s a pretty good performance by Eddie Vedder playing the song with Johnny Marr at the Ohana Festival in 2018; you can see that here. Enjoy! 😊
Next time…the song that started my obsession with that power trio from up north. Time to head back to Canada for some odd time signatures and prog rock.
P.S.
The Smiths had already split up by the time their final album, Strangeways, Here We Come was released at the end of September of 1987. There was always a certain amount of tension between Morrissey and Marr, and you can blame their breakup on a lot of things: Marr’s exhaustion, Morrissey’s disdain of Marr’s side projects, lack of stable band management or just disagreeing about the band’s musical direction. But by all accounts, there was no way their relationship was made for the long haul; their personalities were just too different. The needy, want-it-his-way Morrissey and the soulful Marr fell out of love, and hard. The two have vowed never to play together again, despite being offered literally millions to reunite over the years. Morrissey himself said of Marr, “We are not friends, we don’t see each other. Why on earth would we be on a stage together?” To me, this deep rift and breakup after five years and four brilliant albums just adds to the mystique, legend and almost exclusivity of their music. And look, I’m not claiming to be a member of the early fan club, seeing I was way late to The Smiths party. But, when I mention The Smiths to this day to some people, they will give me a blank stare, and in a twisted way, it kind of makes me feel good they remain relatively underground. Still, at least we’ve got those four brilliant albums, and all those compilations. I know I’m saying this as a fan, but those records are as near perfect as you can get. The Smiths remind me of The Police in that way, who were together for a short time, and produced five amazing albums, with no songs I would skip. Granted, The Police did reunite in 2007 for a tour and were way more commercially successful in the US than The Smiths, but can you think of a bad Police song? Like the Smiths catalog, I cannot. If you’ve never listened to The Smiths, just find a playlist on Spotify or Apple Music, then graduate to their proper albums like I did. You will not be disappointed. The Queen is Dead is still my favorite Smiths studio album, and I have most of the compilation albums in my CD collection. When I started researching The Smiths and their music, I learned that “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out” is considered their best song, and it’s their most streamed song on Spotify, by far, with over 770 million plays. In 2021, Rolling Stone ranked it #221 on their revised “500 Greatest Songs of All Time” list. Morrissey claims that the song came together easily in the studio and that recording the song was “magical”. I can totally see that; the song has a very airy quality about it. Like most Smiths songs, the music floats and weaves itself in between the heavy subject matter of the lyrics. The chorus where Morrissey sings about the “double-decker bus” and the “ten-ton truck” is accentuated by the string arrangement and makes the morose lyrics almost beautiful. Another song I considered is the B-side “Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want” (these titles, I know). It’s less than two minutes in length, but the acoustic guitar and mandolin arrangement is haunting and uplifting at the same time and surrounds more mopey lyrics: “So for once in my life, Let me get what I want, Lord knows it would be the first time.” You can hear an instrumental cover of that song performed by 80’s band Dream Academy in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off; remember when Ferris, Sloan and Cameron are in the art museum with the kids on the field trip? Check it out below. You can hear Marr’s amazing ability to write and arrange music captured in those two minutes. Listen to the instrumental version and then the version with Morrissey’s despondent lyrics and you’ll hear what I’m talking about; how could these words work with such beautiful music? Somehow they figured it out. The combination of Marr’s jangly guitar and Morrissey’s sad lyrics is something I don’t think has been heard since they did it. The Smiths remain one of the most influential bands of all time, with bands The Stone Roses, Oasis and Arctic Monkeys citing them as inspiration, especially Marr’s guitar playing.
Morrissey has released thirteen solo albums since The Smiths split in 1987. The first one, Viva Hate, released in 1988, remains one of my favorite albums, and contains two songs I can listen to on repeat: “Every Day is Like Sunday”, and “Suedehead”. Critics have remained divided when reviewing Morrissey’s solo efforts through the years, but that hasn’t stopped fans from buying the albums or seeing him on tour. He remains intensely private, anti-meat, anti-British monarchy, and finally abandoned years of celibacy when he revealed in his autobiography that he’d had a relationship in 1997. Morrissey is complicated, to say the least, but is generally regarded as one of the best lyricists and frontmen to come out of the post-punk era. Johnny Marr has had several projects since The Smiths. He formed Electronic with Bernard Sumner of New Order, and Neil Tennant of the Pet Shop Boys, and they released three albums over 10 years together. He also recorded two albums with The The, and has worked with Beck, Crowded House, and Talking Heads, among others. Marr has also contributed to film scores (Inception, No Time to Die), recorded several solo albums and most recently toured the UK to support Spirit Power: The Best of Johnny Marr. The rhythm section of Mike Joyce and Andy Rourke worked with Sinead O’Connor in the late 80s and early 90s, and they each toured and supported various artists for years after The Smiths split.
In 1989, bassist Rourke and drummer Joyce sued Morrissey and Marr in a royalties dispute, contending they were entitled to more than the 10% they each received from songwriting credits. Rourke settled, but Joyce moved on with the lawsuit and was eventually awarded £1 million in back royalties, and 25% going forward. It left a scar on an already damaged relationship for the four band members. Rourke died in May of 2023 of pancreatic cancer in New York. Despite the strained relationships, all three surviving members of The Smiths paid tribute to Rourke. Marr wrote that he was known as “a beautiful soul by those who knew him and as a supremely gifted musician by music fans.”
Garmin is now a $5 billion company with over 20,000 employees in 34 countries. They still make a portable navigation device for your car, but they now have a larger presence in marine navigation, and their smartwatches compete with the FitBit and Apple Watch devices. My wife has a Garmin fitness watch, and she really loves it; you should see what it can do in terms of monitoring fitness levels, sleep, heart health and mapping running routes or bike rides. It seems Garmin did not skip a beat when Apple put a fully functional GPS navigation feature in their Maps app and later Google Maps on their smartphones. I held on to my Garmin Nuvi for about two years until I got my first iPhone. I’d be lying if I said I don’t 100% rely on Google Maps to get me around, even to places I’ve been to a few times. But, if Christine is in the car, I almost never need it, unless I’m looking for a way around traffic. Christine and I were married about three years after that drive to nowhere. And she has kept me on the right road ever since. Again, is that corny? And again, yes. But it’s true; she’s been my light that’s never gone out.
See you next time…
JS
3/7/2025