Johnny Marr reflects on a decade of evolving solo work.
In celebration of his 60th birthday Johnny Marr, generous man he is, is giving his fans the gifts.
Firstly the splendid coffee table book Marr’s Guitars, and last week the announcement of a 2024 tour in support of Spirit Power, his first solo Best Of collection.
Time works differently for Johnny Marr: the very fact that he’s about to enter his seventh decade recalls the awe of just how young he was when he knocked on Stephen Patrick Morrissey’s door all those years ago, a band he then left before he was 25. You’ll know the rest of the potted history by now, but as Marr approached his half-century, he put his hand to something new – a solo career.
It went remarkably well (especially for someone not renowned for singing) and here we are ten years on. Even for Marr the last decade has been a remarkably fertile period of four albums (one a double) and a smattering of stand-alone singles, all of which are collected here.
Sequenced non-chronologically, the evolution is palpable. The Messenger, the track which announced his solo career, seems comparatively basic now, all distracted synths and robust rhythms. Similarly the comforting, wistful melancholy of New Town Velocity and the glam-pop stomp of Upstarts didn’t especially break the mould (though both still sound great) but European Me, despite the jangling arpeggio, had a surprising melody which indicated envelopes were being pushed. Logically, he started from his comfort zone and pushed out.
Easy Money (from 2014’s Playland) is maddeningly catchy and veers on just the right side of annoying, Candidate has a grandiosity and sense of scale while the crunching, learning-to-soar chorus of Dynamo offsets it.
That album was perhaps the point at which Johnny Marr decided anything was possible; in 2015 he delivered a mighty cover of Depeche Mode’s I Feel You for Record Store Day, opening his voice to match the driving engine of the music (fully worthy of its inclusion), while standalone single The Priest – a collaboration with Maxine Peake detailing a night in the life of a homeless person – is densely depressing but a compelling listen.
Thereafter, everything was fair game. The compilation opens with the neon canter of Arnatopia (as do many of his live sets) – on which he’s so enthused he doesn’t even bother with a chorus – and then rattles through the singles, the early material complementing the murky power of Spirit Power And Soul (another bravura vocal) or the pure carefree joy of current single Somewhere.
On the vibrant Spiral Cities his funk guitar chops come to the fore, while the guitar merely whispers beneath the bruising synth riffs on Sensory Street and little can match the sheer majesty of Hi Hello.
The new wave of Night And Day flies as Tenement Time snarls, while Walk Into The Sea (the only non-single) is his most ambitious work to date, a panoramic build-up evolving into a skyscraper of a song with righteous vocals. Lastly, new song The Answer is more boisterous than Somewhere, all coiled guitar and indignation.
Yet consistently, as it has been throughout his entire career, the melody is king. A fitting celebration for an iconic musician.
