Single, 1986
. . .
“Now I know how Joan of Arc felt”
“Bigmouth Strikes Again” just might be my favorite Smiths song. Though it got released later than it should have.
In late 1985, full of momentum from the sessions that produced “The Boy With The Thorn in His Side” and its attendant b-sides, the Smiths spent the autumn recording their third studio album, with the working title of Margaret on the Guillotine , finishing it before the year even ended, with an eye for another release early in 1986, following the pattern of their debut and Meat is Murder.
But that’s not at all what happened, as the album, re-titled The Queen is Dead after its rollicking title track, didn’t actually come out until June, 1986, which, as things turned out, was probably for the best.
You see, as 1986 rolled around, The Smiths were beset by twin crises, one external and one internal. The external crisis, caused or at least exacerbated by their revolving-door management, was their fight to leave Rough Trade (and sign with EMI), causing Rough Trade to put a full stop on releasing any new Smiths material for the foreseeable future.
Given that they were sitting on The Queen is Dead, easily the best work The Smiths had yet produced, this was driving everybody crazy, to the point where Johnny Marr and his guitar tech drove seven hours — in the middle of the night, during a blizzard — from Manchester to London to try to, well, steal the tapes. That was about as successful as you might expect.
The second crisis was far worse: Andy Rourke’s heroin habit was finally affecting his stage performance. He’d done fine in the studio — as we’ll discuss soon enough — but he started fucking up live gigs, and legend has it, he was kicked out of the band by way of a note Morrissey stuck on his windscreen. Morrissey has denied this, but he was definitely pissed that his band had a heroin user in it. After all, when he was young, he didn’t even know what drugs were!
And things went from bad to worse for Andy Rourke: almost immediately afterwards, he got arrested during a bust at his dealers house.
After Rourke’s booting, Johnny Marr decided to bring Craig Gannon, who’d played with Aztec Camera, The Bluebells and The Colourfield into the fold. Another thing that is disputed was whether or not Gannon was to replace Rourke, or if Marr had decided he needed a rhythm guitarist onstage so he could more easily do some of the trickier things he wanted to onstage. Marr says he originally brought in Gannon to be the bassist, Gannon says he never touched a bass while with the Smiths. BTW, both things can be true.
That’s because, instead of the bust making things worse for Rourke, Morrissey changed his mind and tossed Rourke back into The Smiths, and apparently because he had only “smoked” smack instead of injecting it, Rourke kept his shit together. And Craig Gannon was now the second guitarist.
Shortly thereafter, they came to a compromise with Rough Trade: the label would release The Queen is Dead, and one more record, and then they were free to release their next five albums on EMI. Perhaps a time traveler showed up and told Rough Trade what was going to happen in the next year. Perhaps nobody wanted such a great record to go unheard.
In any event, while Rough Trade wanted the preview single to be “There is A Light That Never Goes Out,” Johnny Marr wanted it to be “Bigmouth Strikes Again,” because he wanted to release it as the single back in late 85 before the lockout and so in May, 1986, we finally got some more new Smiths music.
For me, “Bigmouth Strikes Again” was love at first listen. Possibly because it was influenced by the immortal “Jumpin’ Jack Flash,” — always a great place to start — and possibly because it was so fucking weird from start to finish.
It starts off with a roiling Marr acoustic guitar chuggle, with Mike Joyce twirling on his high-hand and Andy Rourke providing yet another big bassline, giving Morrissey plenty of space to sing the opening verse.
Sweetness, sweetness I was only joking when I said
I’d like to smash every tooth in your head
Oh-oh, sweetness, sweetness, I was only joking when I said
By rights you should be bludgeoned in your bed
Wait. Did I say “opening” verse? I meant to say “only” verse, as “Bigmouth Strikes Again” is fucking around with what a song could even be, though you might not even notice that as Morrissey launches into the hilarious, self-deprecating bridge, wayyyy too soon in a song to have a bridge.
And now I know how Joan of Arc felt
Now I know how Joan of Arc felt
As the flames rose to her Roman nose
And her Walkman started to melt
The first sensing that something is terribly, awesomely off with “Bigmouth Strikes Again” — I mean besides the image of Joan of Arc sporting a Walkman — is during the second time Morrissey sings “now I know how Joan of Arc felt” he’s joined by, well a chipmunk backing vocal. Which you might not even notice at first, because of what happens next.
If on “The Boy With The Thorn in His Side,” Johnny Marr’s little fanfare prior to the opening chorus was a way of saying “and now, here’s Morrissey,” then on “Bigmouth Strikes Again” Morrissey returns the favor with a little “doodle-doodle-oooh” before Johnny Marr, well, just fucking takes off.
It would be gauche, of course, to accuse Johnny Marr of doing something so based as taking a guitar solo, so let’s just call it a guitar break, and it comes out of nowhere, like — oh, I dunno — Keith Richards on “Sympathy for The Devil.” Marr uncorks a lightning-quick torrent of notes that is beautiful, nasty and — with Morrissey’s “hoooo-hooos” in the background — instantly kicks the song to the next level. And amazingly, it’s just getting started, as his guitar twirls us directly into the chorus.
Bigmouth la-da-da-dada, Bigmouth la-da-da-da
Bigmouth strikes again
And I’ve got no right to take my place
With the human race (Oh, oh, oh-oh)
Bigmouth la-da-da-dada, Bigmouth la-da-da-da
Bigmouth strikes again
And I’ve got no right to take my place
With the human race
And now, shit is getting strange. The chipmunk backing vocals are all over the place — Morrissey, of course, credited as “Ann Coates”, though apparently Kirsty MacColl had originally sang on it too, but they decided to go with the crazier option — totally taking the piss out of a chorus that was already taking the piss in the first place.
And now I know how Joan of Arc felt (Oh)
Now I know how Joan of Arc felt
As the flames rose to her roman nose
And her hearing aid started to melt
At this point, Marr is tossing out slide leads in the background, Morrissey is overdubbing “oooooooooohsss”, Ann Coats is squeaking it up and you would think it would be impossible to get any better. Which of course it does, as Marr starts shredding his guitar at the same point Mike Joyce starts up an incredibly brutal drum roll, which then sets up another guitar solo break, with Marr just slashing at his guitar unmercifully for a few bars, white heat bouncing against your skull.
After that, it’s a zillion repetitions of the chorus, everybody still in overdrive right up through the fade. All in all, an absolute tour de force, though once again, in the U.K., it failed to chart as high as such an amazing single deserved, stalling out at #26. And, of course, like “The Boy With The Thorn in His Side,” it’s one of the reasons that side two of The Queen is Dead is so incredibly powerful.
“Bigmouth Strikes Again”
“Bigmouth Strikes Again” Live on the Whistle Test, 1986
“Bigmouth Strikes Again” live in London, 1986
“Bigmouth Strikes Again” performed by Johnny Marr, Glastonbury 2019
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