Ask
"...unavoidably single of the week." - British Critic
"I'm not frightened or impressed... just bored." - British Critic

AskCemetry GatesGolden Lights
Released in October 1986

Yea-Sayers:

"The guitars fill my head with a rising, golden bliss that never peaks or bursts. And then - major shock, this - enter Morrissey with something approaching a pro-sex statement: 'If there's something you'd like to try/Ask me/I won't say no/How could I?', although 'If it's not love/It's the bond that will bring us together' must be the chastest plea to be molested ever. 'Nature is a language/Can't you read it?' How is it that so many can be so fascinated by the state of one man's, er, physical being? With its chugging beat and Kirsty McColl harmonies, this is perhaps their closest approach to commercial lusciousness. I prefer their moments of reproachful, avenging misery myself, like 'How Soon Is Now' - this is a little unfraught, a bit too sunny. But then, as someone who can be brought to tears by 'The Queen Is Dead', I'm beyond impartiality and detachment. Pop has always been about such infatuated, mad allegiance. 'Ask' is unavoidably Single Of The Week. Out in a fortnight."
- Unknown Critic

"The word is gnomic. Perhaps I should join all you thousands in pondering those inscrutable epigrams. 'Ask' sounds lovely in the kinda-folk, kinda-high-life manner we know and love so well and that's enough for me."
- Mat Snow, New Musical Express, October 18, 1986

"I don't know... is this one of those skinny white English junkie bands? Am I hip enough to like this? Ooooooh, nice chorus: 'If it's not love, then it's the bomb that will bring us together.' Gee, I'd sure like to hang out with these guys - I bet they're a laugh a minute. On a scale of one to ten, I'd have to say this record is swell."
- Weird Al Yankovich, Guest Reviewer, Star Hits

Nay-Sayers:

"No, Morrissey, you tell me. I've never been able to figure out why you and your merry men did so well. 'Ask', your latest, hovers reasonably, but when it dissolves into silence, why is there no feeling of warmth left behind, nothing to let me know that I've spent a couple of minutes in your presence? I think Smiths records are lonely places to be. I'm not frightened or impressed by the solitude they conjure up, just bored."
- Unknown Critic

Smiths-Speak:

"... it was quite crucial to release a single that was a slight antidote to 'Panic', because if the next single had been a slight protest, regardless of the merits of the actual song, people would say, 'Here we go again.' That's why we put out 'Ask'. The idea there is... Well, restraint is a decent thing really, but it's nice to throw caution to the wind as well -- to jump in at the deep end."
- Morrissey, Record Mirror, 2/14/87

"Yeah, that [recording 'Golden Lights'] was another low point. Those are the two low points of our recording career, certainly. They're really inferior, and don't deserve a place alongside our own material."
- Johnny Marr discussing "Golden Lights" and "Work Is A Four Letter Word", Record Collector, November/December 1992


"On 'Ask,' Craig Gannon and I are playing Martin acoustics. I play the G-Am-C-D progression on a Rickenbacker 330. The highlify part is played on a '63 Strat. I'm also vamping on a G harmonica through a Urei Boom Box, an early '70s piece of outboard gear that we also used a lot on guitars, as well. It's like one of those vulgar 'loudness' buttons on a hi-fi. It pushes things slightly out of phase, but gives them a bottomy, dense sound., It's a big chrome box with one knob: 'intensity.' Hey, maybe one of the readers can write in and tell us about it."
- Johnny Marr, Guitar Player, January, 1990