Smiths "Louder Than Bombs" NME

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DANNY KELLY rattles and hums over the latest Smiths re-issue

THE SMITHS
Louder Than Bombs (Rough Trade CD)
4 x CD Singles (Rough Trade)

PASS ME my trusty old soapbox! The music on this latest batch of Smiths 'product' (doesn't that hideous - though utterly appropriate - word just drive a stake into your heart?) is mostly so familiar that I feel no qualm whatsoever in an unashamed rant...

Back in the dawn of time, y'see, when Rough Trade first emerged, there was much controversy about the label's name, it being the slang term for those pathetic male wretches who survive around London's railway termini by selling their soft-skinned arses to the highest bidder.

The 1988-style Rough Trade (and its 1989 model too, I'll wager) have bettered themselves, risen, ahem, above their station; now the ass they flog is not their own, but that of The Smiths. And it makes me, the very Smiths completist/fanatic/bore at whom this stuff is aimed, bloody nauseous.

Of the four EPs, two - The 'Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now'/'Suffer Little Children'/'Girl Afraid' and ‘The Boy With The Thorn In His Side'/'Rubber Ring'/'Asleep' sets - are identical, in both content and artwork, to their original British 12" issues; the other two are, to the Smiths collector at least, more tempting...

'Barbarism Begins At Home' was never a single in this country, and now appears clad in the infamous picture of Viv ‘Spend Spend Spend' Nicholson modelling a ridiculously mini skirt beneath the looming shadow of a pithead winch. The tried and trusted versions of 'Shakespeare's Sister' and 'Stretch Out And Wait' complete the package.

'The Headmaster Ritual', similarly, was only a single in Holland. There it had a beautiful sleeve (a small boy in a cowboy suit lost in the rapture of play) and four live tracks to support it. Now it has a different cover (Ms Nicholson again!) and one less of those b-sides. The catch here is that all the live stuff (including 'Stretch Out And Wait'!) has turned up in this country on the flip of the 'That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore' 12".

Which brings us to 'Louder Than Bombs', about which there are two things that need immediate expression; one: it is a pretty brilliant compilation of The Smiths work up to and including 'Shoplifters', and two, it is an indictment of the record company's attitude toward the public. ..

Twenty-four tracks long, it was originally compiled as a beautifully packaged double album to introduce our American allies to the wonderments of Hale's heartiest. At roughly the same time we, the UK mug punters, were asked to cough up for the infinitely inferior 'The World Won't Listen', little suspecting that within 18 months it would be rendered meaningless by the widespread availability of
'Louder...'

'Meaningless'? No less than twelve of the 'World... ' tracks (Including, naturally, 'Stretch Out And Wait'!) are duplicated on 'Louder...', but the latter is also blessed with such treasures as 'William. . .', Heaven Knows...', 'Hand In Glove' and, the list goes on. In any other industry, purchasers of The World Won't Listen' would be entitled to a full refund!

A final thought: to what extent are Mssrs Morrissey and Marr - who stand, presumably, to cop a not-so-pretty penny - willing participants in all this nonsense? I honestly think we should be told. (The Music— 10, The Packaging—8, The Ethics—can a number stink?)