They're both nostalgic for a time and place they hated
This is brilliant and I think the thing that makes them get so deeply under the skin. It's a hard feeling to explain, yet there it is, powerful as daylight.
Hell, Eminem practically wrote that song to his wife.
Also this is a great point and I am gonna steal it on the radio HA HA.
I also think they get a lot of their sexiness from their pain and their ambiguity. Also they both like playing with sexual signifiers -- Morrissey from doing that whole asexuality dance with the press, Eminem from joking about being gay even while being horribly homophobic in his lyrics.
OH ALSO. I think it's really interesting that Latino kids are, apparently, really into Morrissey. It makes sense -- he's so dramatic and romantic and angsty, and he sings clearly enough that you can get the words even if you're just learning English.
OH ALSO. I think it's really interesting that Latino kids are, apparently, really into Morrissey. It makes sense -- he's so dramatic and romantic and angsty, and he sings clearly enough that you can get the words even if you're just learning English.
Yeah, I read an article about that in Spin - so strange, yet it fits.
sad about Marc Almond
Me too. I know most people don't know him much beyond "Tainted Love" but he did some very beautiful (he's a fine singer), lush, smart, dark albums later. I particularly like
Mother Fist.
I know most people don't know him much beyond "Tainted Love"
I had a friend who was obsessed with his Jacques Brel tribute album. Whenever I went over there, that was the only thing on the stereo, for weeks. So I'm familiar with that album, but none of his others.
I had a friend who was obsessed with his Jacques Brel tribute album. Whenever I went over there, that was the only thing on the stereo, for weeks. So I'm familiar with that album, but none of his others.
Well, his later stuff was very Jacques Brel influenced, so you've got a sense of it.
I had a friend who was obsessed with his Jacques Brel tribute album. Whenever I went over there, that was the only thing on the stereo, for weeks. So I'm familiar with that album, but none of his others.
Jacques Brel's widow said that, if she had her way, Marc Almond would be the only person allowed to do her husband's songs.
Jacques Brel's widow said that, if she had her way, Marc Almond would be the only person allowed to do her husband's songs.
Although she withdrew that after his (brilliant) hi-nrg version of Jackie. I'm very sad about this - I was a colossal Marc fan in the early '90s, and without him I'd never have discovers Walker, Azhnavour, Brel et al.
And as hec says, Mother Fist is one of the great albums of the '90s, and the title song is one of the top ten songs about masturbation.
"Sweetness, I was only joking when I said / that by rights you should be bludgeoned in the head..."
Bludgeoned in your bed - to rhyme with smash every tooth in your head.
RIO - if you have time, I dunno if you do, track down Simon Reynolds' book Blissed Out - it's where I stole the nostalgia for a place you hate line, and has about the smartest dissection of Morrissey circa 1991 I've ever read.
Bludgeoned in your bed - to rhyme with smash every tooth in your head.
I knew I'd muffed that, but trusted I'd be corrected in no time. I think tooth-smashing is the more violent imagery actually.
