Revisiting "Your Arsenal" 27 Years On - New Article on Eject Music by Fiona Dodwell

I bought it on release day up in Skellefteå in Sweden on release day as me and my mother and my grandfather were there visiting family on my mothers side. My grandmother passed away on the morning of Midsummers Eve a month earlier and I remember my grandfather being with me in the store when I bought the cd.

Feels like yesterday when you think back to memories of old. The Skellefteå music festival ironically named Trästocksfestivalen (witty translation of Woodstock into swedish) had a general that was a huge Morrissey and Man United fan.
 
There might be one consolation: The Smiths would have turned into a shit band if they'd kept going. Moz's voice and look only got better but Marr's output has been very patchy. I'd say they had one more great album in them. Anyway we can't complain: Moz gave us Viva Hate, Arsenal, Vauxhall, Quarry, and Ringleader and a suitcase load of great singles.
Ringleader?
Most weren't. The band was sloppy as hell, not to mention Boz duckwalking all over like a twat.
A ‘twat’ like Chuck Berry?
 
Saying that,, when you watch live in Dallas some of them song from kill uncle were very good in a live setting

Really? Live At Dallas is the only Morrissey DVD I ever watched only once, because it's just awful. Awful video quality, awful quality of the band. Alain and the lads got much better when they were playing stuff they had written (anything from Pregnant For the Last Time onwards), but they butchered the good songs from Kill Uncle, and butchered everything else that came before Kill Uncle, even when they got better playing as a band.
 
Your arsenal at number 4?? I thought it got to number 1. ?? Well I wonder what the top 3 albums were, and more-interestingly were are they now??? Anyone know?

Your Arsenal did only get to number 4, which seems astonishing now as it is clearly Morrissey's best solo album.

Viva Hate, Vauxhall & Ringleader all reached number 1.
 
Your Arsenal did only get to number 4, which seems astonishing now as it is clearly Morrissey's best solo album.

Viva Hate, Vauxhall & Ringleader all reached number 1.

You spelt ‘arguably’ incorrectly. Again.
 
A pointless exercise. Who celebrates a 27 year old release? 20, 25, 30 etc. It's a distraction. An attempt to get some good press from past glories. Trouble is .... he had Dodwell write it - the brownest tongue in all of show business. Next his granny will be selling t-shirts at upcoming shows. Nonsense.
 
I bought it on release day up in Skellefteå in Sweden on release day as me and my mother and my grandfather were there visiting family on my mothers side. My grandmother passed away on the morning of Midsummers Eve a month earlier and I remember my grandfather being with me in the store when I bought the cd.

Feels like yesterday when you think back to memories of old. The Skellefteå music festival ironically named Trästocksfestivalen (witty translation of Woodstock into swedish) had a general that was a huge Morrissey and Man United fan.
Just to add if someone was unsure, I bought it on RELEASE DAY.

LOL

I slept for 14 hours so I have energy to type it over and over again.
 
Well the problem with this is that it is tainted in having been written by Morrissey's best friend on the payroll. It stinks of diversion from the current controversies. In other words, I wouldn't be surprised if the Genesis of this smoke-blowing was "Hey, Fiona - here's a few quid - go write something to divert and take off the heat for a while. There's a good lass"

I'll tell you what's going on here. Remember when Boris Johnson was interviewed and he said his favourite hobby was making model London Buses? That was a genius stroke. Because now when someone searches for Boris an Bus they'll get that, rather that the £350 million per week lie on the side of the Brexit bus.

I see this as the same effort to get a different result when you search for Fiona Dodwell and Morrissey. They're not stupid. Just paid to do a job.
You have to admit that the barrel-scraping being done by the Guardian is becoming tiresome as that dog has been beaten...over and over, again...don't you think that even the Liberal Brits they aim to jerk off are becoming bored with the same old story being trotted-out....Morrissey cost Jonze his job at NME...just admit that this is all a revenge plot.....
 
A ‘twat’ like Chuck Berry?

Erm, yes? Chuck Berry was the R. Kelly of his day.

"1959 Berry was arrested for taking a 14-year-old girl, Janice Escalanti, across state lines for “immoral purposes”, a crime for which he eventually served two years in prison. But that was almost 60 years ago, some might say: different time, different morals! Well, kinda.

That he was then accused of installing a video camera in the ladies’ toilet of his Missouri restaurant is less easy to jazz hands away, given that it happened in the not distant year of 1989. After tapes from this camera were found in Berry’s home, he was given a suspended sentence and settled a class action with 59 women.
"
https://gulfnews.com/entertainment/hollywood/chuck-berry-music-legend-sex-offender-1.2001678

And Boz duck-walking like a twat in the background nearly ruined Morrissey's Johnny Carson performance. It made them look like a pub band. I find it embarrassing to watch.

I was watching a documentary recently, I think it was about Buddy Holly and The Crickets, where one of the members talked about how there was tension between the rhythm guitarist and the rest of the band because he was duck-walking on stage during performances which they felt made them look like amateurs and rip-offs. Boz attempting it had the same effect, not helped by the fact that he wasn't the least bit smooth or graceful in doing the move.
 
Erm, yes? Chuck Berry was the R. Kelly of his day.

"1959 Berry was arrested for taking a 14-year-old girl, Janice Escalanti, across state lines for “immoral purposes”, a crime for which he eventually served two years in prison. But that was almost 60 years ago, some might say: different time, different morals! Well, kinda.

That he was then accused of installing a video camera in the ladies’ toilet of his Missouri restaurant is less easy to jazz hands away, given that it happened in the not distant year of 1989. After tapes from this camera were found in Berry’s home, he was given a suspended sentence and settled a class action with 59 women.
"
https://gulfnews.com/entertainment/hollywood/chuck-berry-music-legend-sex-offender-1.2001678

And Boz duck-walking like a twat in the background nearly ruined Morrissey's Johnny Carson performance. It made them look like a pub band. I find it embarrassing to watch.

I was watching a documentary recently, I think it was about Buddy Holly and The Crickets, where one of the members talked about how there was tension between the rhythm guitarist and the rest of the band because he was duck-walking on stage during performances which they felt made them look like amateurs and rip-offs. Boz attempting it had the same effect, not helped by the fact that he wasn't the least bit smooth or graceful in doing the move.
There is that footage of Boz landing flat on his ass while attempting it that is pretty great. (and likely the last straw for Morrissey) The whole rockabilly greaser schtick was embarrassing and amateur to the extreme. Style over substance, and far removed from the dignity of The Smiths.
 
Erm, yes? Chuck Berry was the R. Kelly of his day.

"1959 Berry was arrested for taking a 14-year-old girl, Janice Escalanti, across state lines for “immoral purposes”, a crime for which he eventually served two years in prison. But that was almost 60 years ago, some might say: different time, different morals! Well, kinda.

That he was then accused of installing a video camera in the ladies’ toilet of his Missouri restaurant is less easy to jazz hands away, given that it happened in the not distant year of 1989. After tapes from this camera were found in Berry’s home, he was given a suspended sentence and settled a class action with 59 women.
"
https://gulfnews.com/entertainment/hollywood/chuck-berry-music-legend-sex-offender-1.2001678

And Boz duck-walking like a twat in the background nearly ruined Morrissey's Johnny Carson performance. It made them look like a pub band. I find it embarrassing to watch.

I was watching a documentary recently, I think it was about Buddy Holly and The Crickets, where one of the members talked about how there was tension between the rhythm guitarist and the rest of the band because he was duck-walking on stage during performances which they felt made them look like amateurs and rip-offs. Boz attempting it had the same effect, not helped by the fact that he wasn't the least bit smooth or graceful in doing the move.

You should be happy now though............they all stand as still as statues. Gigs are about as exciting as taking a packet of codeine.
 
There is that footage of Boz landing flat on his ass while attempting it that is pretty great. (and likely the last straw for Morrissey) The whole rockabilly greaser schtick was embarrassing and amateur to the extreme. Style over substance, and far removed from the dignity of The Smiths.

What do you think Shakespear's Sister or Nowhere Fast or Vicar in a Tutu were? You absolute tard. Rockabilly and the fifties aesthtic were always part of the Smiths ...........Twat.
 
Your Arsenal was meant to be big in the USA

His kill Uncle Tour had to be stopped in the USA, for safety reasons, read it in Morrissey Shot, the photobook Linder Sterling made, with written intro

put on Bethoven is Dead, [not recorded in the US, but at the end of the tour, London and Paris] and you feel how the Arsenal shows were

it is Mick Ronson's last work [producing,composing], he died soon after [Your Arsenal]

please wait, don't loose faith....have a good weekend all
 
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The whole rockabilly greaser schtick was embarrassing and amateur to the extreme. Style over substance, and far removed from the dignity of The Smiths.

The music of the Smiths was influenced by rockabilly and rock 'n' roll in general.
- Rusholme Ruffians (sounds like Elvis's Marie's the Name of His Latest Flame, which the Smiths actually covered, as heard on Rank)
- Nowhere Fast
- Girl Afraid
- Shakespeare's Sister
- Vicar In a Tutu
- Death At One's Elbow
- Is It Really So Strange?


Then looking at Morrissey's solo career, he actually completely embraced the rockabilly style and substance of Alain and the lads. He released:
- Pregnant for the Last Time
- The Loop
-
The version of Sing Your Life on At KROQ is even more obviously rockabilly than the original version.
- Your Arsenal is heavily influenced by rockabilly, glam and blues. You're Gonna Need Someone on Your Side & Certain People I Know are prime examples (Gary even plays double bass on Certain People I Know).
- Sister I'm A Poet was turned into a rockabilly song during the as Your Arsenal tour, as heard on Beethoven Was Deaf
- Morrissey was even playing The Loop in 2009 on the Years of Refusal tour, with Matt Walker playing double bass.
 
The Kill Uncle tour was probably his most successful to date, so no, he was not dead despite mostly lukewarm critics of Kill Uncle, which was praised by Les Inrockuptibles in France for instance.
Yeah exactly right. He was hardly perched at the edge of a cliff before Your Arsenal. The Kill Uncle tour was massive.
 
Your Arsenal is a very good album. But Fiona Dodwell is not a very good writer -- this "article" just blandly states the obvious and offers no fresh insights.

The album also suffered from bad single choices. The preceding singles We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful and You're The One For Me, Fatty were rightly slated in the music press and are nobody's favourite Morrissey songs. They might be the two weakest songs on the album. It was only after the album release that people realized that Your Arsenal was not going to be a string of novelty singles with woeful titles.
 
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