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Vinyl

Vinyl love: The Smiths “Rank”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: The Smiths
Album Title: Rank
Year released: 1988
Year reissued: 2011
Details: Remastered, includes promotional poster, double LP, part of box set that includes booklet and poster

The skinny: I’m finishing off this eight-part series (thankfully, for some) with the album that I will rarely be apt to spin, this out of all the pieces in this “Complete” box set. I am not really all that fond of live albums. Indeed, this is one of only three live albums in my vinyl collection and I likely would have never purchased this one had it not come included with the set. “Rank” was an obligatory release by the band’s British and North American labels, coming out over a year after the group split and over two years after the live show at which it was recorded.  It’s an interesting listen but would probably only be that to their most hardcore fans. However, it is one of only two places in this collection where one can hear the excellent track featured below, which as Morrissey admits on the live recording was the band’s newest single at the time.

Standout track: “Ask (Live)”

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: The Smiths “Louder than bombs”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: The Smiths
Album Title: Louder than bombs
Year released: 1987
Year reissued: 2011
Details: Remastered, double LP, part of box set that includes booklet and poster

The skinny: Last week, I received another comment from fellow blogger, Aphoristical, with which I could not disagree: “Their discography is kind of annoying.” He was referring to The Smiths, of course, and this is the reason why purchasing this “Complete” vinyl box set of their full-length releases was an easy sell for me. “Louder than bombs” was released a mere three months after the focus of last week’s ‘Vinyl love’ post, “The world won’t listen”, rendering this latter one all but useless as compilation. Like a lot of their discography, the two compilations share a lot of the same tracks but each are missing songs the others don’t have and vice versa. For me, though, “Louder than bombs” is the ultimate introductory compilation, and this is mostly because it was my own intro to the band, the first album cover I remember seeing, the first spin in the CD carousel, etc. And yeah, the song below, mostly due to its short length, found its way on pretty much every mixed tape I made in the 90s. Cheers… and be safe and healthy everyone.

Standout track: “Please, please, please, let me get what I want”

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: The Smiths “The world won’t listen”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: The Smiths
Album Title: The world won’t listen
Year released: 1987
Year reissued: 2011
Details: Remastered, double LP, part of box set that includes booklet and poster

The skinny: Happy Sunday! Are you getting tired of seeing pictures of the pieces from this box set yet? Patience. Just a couple installments to go. This compilation, whose title is an expression of Morrissey’s frustration at the band’s lack of exposure, gathers together a bunch of the band’s singles and their b-sides, released between 1985 and 1987. As a record, it’s one that doesn’t see the platter often because of the compilation that was originally released a mere months after this one and that one will be featured next week. That other one is a big favourite of mine and the song featured below is one of only two songs from this one not available there.

Standout track: “The boy with the thorn in his side”