The Queen Is Dead - The Smiths

Album: The Queen Is Dead
Artist: The Smiths
Label: Rough Trade
Release date: 16 June, 1986
Peak chart position/sales: (UK) #2, Gold

RATING: 3.5/5 stars


Despite their beautifully evocative style, superbly dry wit and impressive prolificness, The Smiths have never quite made it to the top: such is the curse of the alt rock/indie pop genre. Forever doomed to hover just below the smothering layer of pop culture, such gems as The Queen Is Dead have to be content with a more selective, cult following, rather than Adele-like accessibility. But what The Smiths were denied in widespread appeal, they have made up for in staying power, and what is undoubtedly their career masterpiece has continued to sell consistently ever since its first release.

The anarchist title is not a bluff, as Morrissey confirms on the lengthy 6:25 title track with: "Farewell to this land's cheerless marshes/ Hemmed in like a boar between archers/ Her very Lowness with a head in a sling/ I'm truly sorry - but it sounds like a wonderful thing". It's not quite the blood, spit and fears of The Sex Pistols' punk ferocity, but with sarcasm and razor-sharp wit, The Queen Is Dead aims some rather eloquent insults at the hierarchy. The Smiths' flippant rebelliousness continues on Frankly Mr Shankly, an anti-ode to their tight-fisted producer. With building disdain and ever-decreasing tact, Morrissey proclaims he'd "rather be famous than righteous or holy any day" and manages to call the eponymous subject of the song a "flatulent pain in the arse" with amusing gall but no less cool than when he earnestly wishes to "go down in musical history".

From here.

As a band, The Smiths' musical elements seem to fit unobtrusively together: fat, throbbing bass provides a solid bed for Morrissey's carelessly floating vocals to soar above, bright acoustic strums from Johnny Marr add wistful poeticism or striding electric swaggers, and Mike Joyce's drums serve to either build the tension or accompany Morrissey's anguished howls at full throttle. The effectiveness of their teamwork is at perhaps its most breathtaking in the "I Know It's Over", so bone chillingly vulnerable in the cold, caustic nakedness of the lyrics. "Oh Mother I can feel the soil falling over my head/ And as I climb into an empty bed/ Oh well, enough said/ I know it's over - still I cling/ I don't know where else I can go".

The Smiths close the album on an upbeat, with the relentless thirst for life that is the stunning and melodramatic "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" followed by the lyrically weak, yet impossibly funny, "Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others" - of which even Morrissey has said he preferred the music to the lyrics.

The songwriting partnership that was Morrissey and Johnny Marr should not be taken lightly - every song on The Queen Is Dead reeks of a refreshingly daring creativity, which with its wash of carefree naivete, produces a spine-tingling unpretentiousness that will up your music collection's indie/hipster factor exponentially. This mid-80s masterpiece is a must-listen of slightly angsty and youthfully irreverent alt-rock that will forever stand out as an uncommonly witty loss-of-innocence album.

Worthy of the playlist? - Yes, yes and yes again. One of those albums that doesn't have a dud track in sight - well worthy of the wishlist.


Listen to: I Know It's Over, Bigmouth Strikes Again, There Is A Light That Never Goes Out