Critical Discography - Louder Than Bombs

Originally a US-only, double Best Of drawn from the two UK compilations, plus the bonus of the stomping glam single, "Sheila Take A Bow", the elegaic "Half A Person" and the hilarious North/South travelogue, "Is It Really So Strange?", Rough Trade gave this a domestic release to combat overpriced imports flooding the shops. (****)
- Stephen Dalton, Uncut, 1998

"This well-sequenced double album collection of new recordings and single sides previously unavailable on a U.S. LP is the ultimate Smiths statement, as it compiles most of their peak moments. For the uninitiated, 24 reasons to go on living. For the fans, a reminder of why you have."
- Spin

"Oooooooooh people are rude and nobody loves me and you don't believe me and it's raining outside and no one understands me and don't eat that burger it was somebody's baby once and people don't care and my dear cat just threw up on me and go ahead and kick me and I'm too shy to make friends so I'm going to sit in here and rot and die, thanks, and nobody will ever find me 'cause they never knew I was alive in the first place (moan... groan) and I'll have a little whine with my dinner and ask me something before we all blow up and Lord, if it wasn't for the 27 [sic] little gems on this Smiths double album of real rare b-sides, singles and a few shiny newies, I might get depressed or something!"
- Suzan (sigh) Colon, Star Hits

How Will The The Thermos Survive?
"More musique maudit from the muezzin of melancholia. 'So if you have five seconds to share/Then I'll tell you the story of my life/Sixteen, clumsy, and shy,' mourns Morrissey, who captures the awkward angst of adolescence better than any songwriter currently working within rock 'n' roll. Call 'em morbid, call 'em pale, Morrissey and sidekick Johnny Marr have made the Smiths the leading contenders to follow U2 into the Next Big Thing arena sweepstakes.
Which would be gratifying on any number of levels, not least of which is Morrissey's doomed, hyper-romantic bard, a high-low brow blend of Shelley and Keats, Reed and Morrison and Laurel and Hardy. There's more gloom und doom here, boys and girls, but there's giggles aplenty too. What else can you say about a guy who sings, 'I was looking for a job, and then I found a job/And heaven knows I'm miserable now...why do I give valuable time/To people who don't care if I live or die?' That he loved the Beatles, Bach and Beethoven? And he's fully prepared for martyrdom?
How do I love the Smiths? Let me count the ways. 'Louder Than Bombs' is a double-album which gathers some of the band's U.K. singles and B-sides together with seven brand-new songs, but it stands as an epic work, coming as it does on the heels of last year's magnum opus, The Queen Is Dead. Rock or racist, gay or straight, fey or faking, the Smiths are a thinking fan's rock band. Morrissey is a postmodernist Hamlet, deciding whether he should live or die, and somehow the thought process becomes a slapstick meditation on the healing nature of art. 'Oh yes, you can kick me/And you can punch me/And you can break my face/But you won't change the way I feel.'
The set includes such controversial U.K. smashes as 'Shoplifters Of The World Unite,' 'William, It Was Really Nothing' and 'Panic,' the latter of which has been criticized as an anti-black diatribe on the basis of its anthemic chorus, 'Hang the D.J.,' which, come to think of it, is not such a bad idea in this age of tight radio playlists.
But the Smiths are not all Morrissey's sublime wordplay and mock morose mindset. There's guitarist/co-songwriter extraordinaire Johnny Marr, who creates a thick stew of multi-textured but sharply defined melodic pop to cushion his sidekick's prickly persona. Check out the lush, shimmering cover of the 1965 obscurity 'Golden Lights' (credited to one Twinkle) or the hypnotic, onomatopoeic instrumental, 'Oscillate Wildly,' to see what Johnny can do on his own. Marr does more with less than any musician this side of Peter Buck and Bob Mould.
The bottom line is still how you feel about the troubled troubadour himself, though. People either love Morrissey or can't stand his celibate, asexual longing, finding it insufferably pretentious. In the tradition of all great rock 'n' roll (in my book anyway), the Smiths make you draw the line and come out fighting. I'll take 'em over the P. Furs, Cure, Cult, New Order or any other current anglobands vying for the Yankee dollar and the vast teenage wasteland. Who said we won't get fooled again?
After all, how can you not embrace a guy who croons, 'Shyness is nice, but/Shyness can stop you/From doing all the things in life/That you'd like to... Ask me - I won't say "No - How could I?"' I second that emotion. There hasn't been a poet who articulated teenage heartache so effectively since Smokey Robinson. Would I lie to you?"
- Roy Trakin, Creem

Smiths-Speak:

"Obviously Geoff was staunchly against it because he thought it was a personal letter addressed to him."
Well? Was it a personal letter addressed to Geoff Travis?
"I never said it was a personal letter addressed to him. That's just a very very cruel assumption on your behalf."
- Morrissey on 'You Just Haven't Earned It Yet, Baby', NME, February 13, 1988

"... singles were one of the most important things that brought us together, a love of the classic 7" pop format. Those were the records I grew up with. A huge facet of what we were about was missed out on, because singles culture is so ineffectual in America. But I thought Louder Than Bombs, the singles compilation, was great."
- Johnny Marr, Guitar Player, January 1990