by Nymphetamine » Mon Dec 14, 2009 12:14 am
I was one of the first people I knew to get into The Smiths, there was one chap before me who had been listening to them a year or so before me, but he never to my knowledge branded them his favourite band. He did tell me about them, he recommended them to me, but at the time I was into my Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit, Papa Roach and Disturbed phase, not too mention Metallica, Pantera and ZZ Top. I was very americanised thanks to Kerrang TV and Kerrang Magazine.
I was a misfit at school, the quirky child who never reached his full potential in anything, who wasn't popular and often mocked, who refused to stand out from the crowd. The Smiths intrigued me and I remember listening to them for the first time. I listened to This Charming Man and thought it was "rubbish", it sounded too pop like and was all coy and cutesy, it wasn't like the NU Metal and Heavy Metal genre I was used to listening to. I remember listening to The Boy with a Thorn in his Side and I could relate to the lyrics and it wasn't until I listened to Unhappy Birthday that I got it. I remember sitting in my room on my pc with this playing through headphones and I had it on loop for hours during the evening and I could relate to the bitterness and pain from rejection within the song and it started from there. My love of The Smiths was born, my idolisation of Morrissey was born. In the coming months, I stopped listening to Linkin Park and Papa Roach and in the coming years become more interested in British music, The Beatles, The Cure, The Stone Roses, David Bowie, Joy Division, Oasis, Pulp and Blur etc.
I never received a harsh time for liking The Smiths from friends and people I met, but my family suggested I seek counselling when they heard me playing Asleep and Unlovable at 2am in the morning while revising for a mock English test. I guess The Smiths are no longer controversial, society has changed completely since 1982, so much so that Morrissey came under fire for saying a few years ago in the NME where they tried the failed hatchet job on Morrissey painting him out to be a member of the British National Party.
I get more stick for being a Cure and Joy Division enthusiast. I remember wanting a tattoo of a segment of The Cure's infamous song "Pictures of You", it reads:
"If only I'd thought of the right words
I could have held on to your heart
If only I'd thought of the right words
I wouldn't be breaking apart.
It would have been a highly personal tattoo, but I decided against it. Everyone has a tattoo and I just couldn't possibly conform.