The Moz vs. Marr books

A

Anonymous

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Yeah, I know its been much commented on and many reviews already, but I thought I'd chirp in with my two-penneth.
For me, I was expecting some big revelation in the Marr book on why the Smiths broke up. Something that we weren't expecting. Moz touched on it in his book, when he referred to the car ride after they broke up, and Marr goes something like 'Stephen, don't you know, even after all this time, why it happened?'. Moz couldn't give a definitive answer. We were all waiting with baited breath for Marr's version, and the REAL reason!

So, I was expecting something revelatory, a curveball we didn't see. Something like 'I saw the way you looked at Angie, and Stephen, I couldn't continue' (of course, with the benefit of hindsight, that would have been an eye-opener on so many levels...).
Or even, 'ok. we had all that new material we wrote for the follow-up to Strangeways, I needed to take 6 months, and then we could have recorded it, but Rough Trade screwed us over, and Creation never came running our way and it just fizzled out....'. (The rumours of further Smiths material never released is the subject of another thread....)

But what we got was 'oh, I was so tired and stressed, I couldn't do this anymore'. Ok. We get that. But......its so mundane. And for me, there lies the problem with the book.

I don't know if Marr would be as famous or accomplished if it wasn't for The Smiths. What he did with The Smiths was amazing - we all get that. but his booked suggests it was just part of the journey to musical greatness anyway. Hmmm. I don't know. Would we care about Electronic or Modest Mouse if it wasn't for The Smiths (and some would argue do we care about them anyway)? The Smiths were the cliché of greater than the sum of the parts, of which Marr was a key figure. Don't dismiss this Johnny. it's important, and if we're honest, its the only reason we bought the book. Don't trivialise your time and creative genius for those 5 or 6 years. Set The Truth Free.
 
Yeah, I know its been much commented on and many reviews already, but I thought I'd chirp in with my two-penneth.
For me, I was expecting some big revelation in the Marr book on why the Smiths broke up. Something that we weren't expecting. Moz touched on it in his book, when he referred to the car ride after they broke up, and Marr goes something like 'Stephen, don't you know, even after all this time, why it happened?'. Moz couldn't give a definitive answer. We were all waiting with baited breath for Marr's version, and the REAL reason!

So, I was expecting something revelatory, a curveball we didn't see. Something like 'I saw the way you looked at Angie, and Stephen, I couldn't continue' (of course, with the benefit of hindsight, that would have been an eye-opener on so many levels...).
Or even, 'ok. we had all that new material we wrote for the follow-up to Strangeways, I needed to take 6 months, and then we could have recorded it, but Rough Trade screwed us over, and Creation never came running our way and it just fizzled out....'. (The rumours of further Smiths material never released is the subject of another thread....)

But what we got was 'oh, I was so tired and stressed, I couldn't do this anymore'. Ok. We get that. But......its so mundane. And for me, there lies the problem with the book.

I don't know if Marr would be as famous or accomplished if it wasn't for The Smiths. What he did with The Smiths was amazing - we all get that. but his booked suggests it was just part of the journey to musical greatness anyway. Hmmm. I don't know. Would we care about Electronic or Modest Mouse if it wasn't for The Smiths (and some would argue do we care about them anyway)? The Smiths were the cliché of greater than the sum of the parts, of which Marr was a key figure. Don't dismiss this Johnny. it's important, and if we're honest, its the only reason we bought the book. Don't trivialise your time and creative genius for those 5 or 6 years. Set The Truth Free.

agree with a bit of your post,particularly the last paragraph, but who's 'Stephen'?
 
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