Set the Boy Free

by Johnny Marr

  Andy and I waited anxiously, and I was hoping that the gentleman was grooving irresistibly to ‘Hand in Glove’ at full volume in a state of euphoria, punching the air with the realisation that he’d discovered the biggest new guitar band in England. He came back quickly and coolly handed the tape to me.

  ‘Yes, it’s good,’ he said, ‘but I can’t really do anything. You’d have to let Geoff hear it.’

  ‘Good,’ I thought, ‘he said it was good, he didn’t say “go away”.’ But still, it wasn’t exactly the reaction I was hoping for. I thought he’d at least be out of breath after all that grooving. ‘Who’s this Geoff?’ I thought. ‘Who’s Geoff?’ I said.

  ‘Geoff’s the head of the label, and he decides what we put out,’ said Simon. ‘Perhaps you could send it to him?’

  ‘Send it’ – that definitely sounded like a brush-off, and my heart rate quickened as I feared my opportunity was slipping away. ‘Can I see him?’ I asked. ‘We’ve come all the way from Manchester.’ I was getting a bit desperate; I knew how good the song was and that all they had to do was hear it and they’d love it.

  ‘Geoff’s in a meeting all afternoon. I can’t disturb him now,’ said Simon politely, and then gestured over to an office where a tall man was stood talking by a window.

  It was clear that this was as close as we were going to get for the moment. I wasn’t about to badger the man or prostrate myself before him, but my instinct also told me that I was on the brink of a crucial moment. As we turned to walk out of the building, I nodded to Andy to follow me into the warehouse, where there was a loading bay filled with hundreds of boxes. I started to act like I was stacking records. So far, so good. There was so much activity in the loading bay with people coming and going that no one noticed any interlopers, even if one of them did look like Stuart Sutcliffe. I kept watching the office where I’d seen Geoff, waiting for him to come out. An hour or so passed, and then I saw him come out of the door and make his way down the corridor, looking very busy. Here was my chance. I walked up to him and took out our tape, and as he went past me I grabbed his arm and said, ‘Geoff … hi.’ He stopped, and I was surprised myself at how unexpected the moment was. ‘I’m in a band from Manchester, we’re called The Smiths, and we’ve done a song we’d really like to put out on Rough Trade.’ I needed to let him know about our commitment to it coming out, so I said, ‘If you don’t want to put it on the label, we could put it out on our own label and you could distribute it.’ Geoff was calm and seemingly unconcerned at being accosted by a tiny northerner.

  ‘I’ll listen to it over the weekend,’ he said.

  I believed him, and in my happiness and enthusiasm I blurted out, ‘You won’t have heard anything like it before.’

  Mission accomplished. As I walked out of the Rough Trade building and carried on down the street, it felt like I was living in a movie. I was imagining things and scenarios for me and my band, and they were actually coming true. I left Notting Hill to go and stay with Matt Johnson in Highbury while Andy went back to Manchester.

  Since I’d last seen him, Matt had been busy putting together his own situation, which wasn’t a band in the traditional sense and had been christened The The. Still only twenty-one, he had signed a five-album deal with CBS Records and had recently put out two great singles called ‘Uncertain Smile’ and ‘Perfect’. When I got to his house, a very beautiful girl answered the door who I recognised from the cover of i-D magazine, which we’d sold in X-Clothes. She introduced herself as Fiona, and she was Matt’s girlfriend. She showed me into the flat where Matt was crouched on the floor, wearing headphones and surrounded by equipment that was strewn all over the carpet. A Casio keyboard and a black Fender Strat and drum machine were all plugged into a little four-track cassette recorder, and there was an electronic autoharp lying around and some microphones, one of which was plugged into an echo pedal. I hadn’t seen anyone working this way before. It struck me as incredibly modern and inventive; he was totally self-sufficient. When he’d finished what he was doing, he played me his new track. It was built around the electric autoharp lying on the floor, and it was a sublime song called ‘This Is the Day’.

  Matt and I went out to celebrate seeing each other again. Driving through London’s West End in his old Rover, we caught up on everything from synths and recording techniques to the film music of Bernard Herrmann and our mutual fondness for glam rock. He told me about his recent acquaintance with the New York underground scene, and he quizzed me about my band and what was going on in Manchester. It was great to get together with Matt again. He was curious about everything and seemed to always be on some kind of quest. We stayed up and talked again about how we should do something together sometime, but for now we had our own missions. When I left Matt’s place the next day, he was back on the floor, surrounded by his equipment. He was about to embark on a serious creative roll, producing an album called Soul Mining that would become much loved and hugely influential. I went back on the train to Manchester, about to discover that The Smiths had just landed a record deal.

  I got into Joe’s office on Monday morning to hear that Geoff Travis had called to say he loved ‘Hand in Glove’ and wanted to release it on Rough Trade. We called the rest of the band and Angie came over and the whole building was buzzing like it was happening for everyone.

  Up until that point, releasing a record with my own band had been the height of my ambition. I had imagined it since I was very young, and had pursued it purely on instinct and desire, not knowing how it might actually transpire. For all my proclamations to friends, and my clear predictions for the band, I was still trying to will my desire into destiny, but now it appeared that it was actually about to happen. It took about twelve days for Rough Trade to manufacture ‘Hand in Glove’. Morrissey had supplied them with the cover design. I was impressed and also relieved to have someone in the band with a strong vision for our aesthetic, and the B-side of the single was a recording we’d made of ‘Handsome Devil’ from the mixing desk at the Haçienda show.

  Joe had told me that a box with twenty-five records would be arriving at the train station, and I walked across town and through Piccadilly Gardens to pick it up like I was in a dream. I collected the box, stood on the station approach and ripped open the packaging. The record sleeve was a metallic silver, with a blue photograph and the name of the band on the front. I took the record out of the sleeve and stared at it. There it was: the blue-and-silver label with the band’s name, and below the song title the names ‘Morrissey and Marr’ in brackets. I stared at it as swarms of people hurried by, and I took the moment in. I’d finally done it, and with a great song and the right sound. ‘Hand in Glove’ was beautiful, and from then on I’d just have to take everything as it came and see what happened next.

  Because we were now on Rough Trade, it meant that not only would the band have a record out but we also had a new home with new people to get to know. Joe was busy planning things with the label boss Geoff Travis, and an engaging American record plugger called Scott Piering, who would play a major part in the band’s development. The three of them immediately started booking us gigs in London and at small venues around the country, and everyone at Rough Trade was swept along on a wave of anticipation. Our new record company acted like they thought we were going to be successful and were special, and because they did we believed even more that we could be.

  The Heatwave

  ‘HAND IN GLOVE’ came out on 13 May 1983, within a month of me bringing the tape to the record company. Our first public airing was on The John Peel Show on BBC Radio 1, and Angie and Andrew gathered around with me and Joe in his kitchen to hear it. It was important that it sounded really good. The John Peel Show was the only radio programme that anyone I knew bothered to listen to, and it was a beacon for my generation. Getting played by John Peel didn’t mean that we were automatically about to become pop stars, that was not the point, but it did mean that as far as the alternative music world was concerned we were getting i
n the game. When I heard our single on the radio for the first time it sounded right and it proved to me that we belonged. It sounded good to Peel and his producer John Walters too, and we were invited to the BBC studios in Maida Vale to record a session for the show. Scott Piering had assumed the role of our de facto custodian at the record company as well as our radio plugger, a role that the band and Joe were grateful for, as he showed us the ropes at Rough Trade and the BBC and steered us towards people and situations that would be good for us and away from some people who weren’t.

  Walking around the maze of corridors at the BBC, I felt simultaneously like a card-carrying professional musician and a schoolboy required to show due deference around the establishment. We had left Manchester in the van at 7 a.m., and four hours of bouncing around on a mattress and talking excitedly in a fog of hash smoke had left me fairly frazzled, but once I was directed to the BBC cafeteria and got loaded up on chocolate and lemonade I was ready to go. The producer who had been assigned our session surveyed the scene without acknowledging us, and it was apparent that his demeanour for the day would be that of a disapproving Latin professor on a wet afternoon. I wondered how he would accomplish the task of capturing our blistering sound and maverick spirit while seemingly being so fed up, and I was drained just looking at him. But the band got up to speed from the very first song, and we managed to rise above his mood with our growing professionalism and our enthusiasm for what we were doing. There was always a really strong and positive atmosphere when we were in the studio, no matter where we were. We were excited about what we were doing and we couldn’t get our ideas down quickly enough.

  Once we had recorded the main take of a song to our satisfaction with the basic guitar, bass, drums and vocal tracks, Morrissey would then re-record his vocal quite quickly, and when that was done I would go through the drum track to make sure it was right, so Andy could then work on the bass if we wanted to change or refine anything. After this, the recording became fun for me. We knew we had the foundations of the music right, so I could then devise whatever guitar overdubs were needed and experiment with ideas, using the different techniques I was learning along the way. The other band members encouraged me to do whatever I wanted, and trusted me to deliver something good. As the day went on in Maida Vale, our work ethic and endeavour was noticed by the producer, who started to involve himself more. At one stage he even made a joke, something about us being miserable because we came from the north. It seemed we had brought out his sense of humour, even if it was patronising, and to be fair we were singing a song called ‘Miserable Lie’.

  The producer’s reaction to our songs was something that I would very much have to get used to in the future. Our lyrics and some of the comments Morrissey was making in the music press were starting to get us attention. From the off I knew it was best to let Morrissey do all the talking to the media. He had his agenda and world view, partly because he was older, but mostly because he was just so good at it. As far as the band’s relationship with the media went, I could see that our frontman was an expert with the press and could do a better job of it than me and almost everybody who sat down to interview us. I thought his interviews were often very funny, and the controversies over the early lyrics came as a surprise. I considered it all part of being in a band that was thought-provoking, and whenever Morrissey got criticised or pressured about anything I was supportive and went into back-up mode, both in public and in private.

  We’d been put on a bill in Camden before The Fall, who were the current reigning kings of Rough Trade – or more accurately the band run by the reigning king of Rough Trade, Mark E. Smith – and I’d been told by a Rough Trade employee that Mr Smith had complained to the label about all the time they were putting into us. It was a big show for us and we were nervous. Luckily the guy doing sound was someone I’d met at my very first show with Sister Ray in Wythenshawe, and he did his best to make us feel like we belonged and got a fair shake. As the night went on it was apparent that it would be an important one for the band. We were being talked about a lot, and it was a London show on a Saturday night to a sell-out crowd. As we were about to go on, Scott Piering stopped us to get a photo of the band. We leaned against the wall and in a second we got the shot that would become the first famous Smiths image: Morrissey stood at the front with his flowers, Mike and Andy were in white T-shirts, and I stood at the back in the black leather coat I’d got when I worked at Ivor’s and the Ray-Bans I got from X-Clothes.

  The summer of 1983 was an incredible time for me. I was nineteen and playing with my band in London. I had my first single on the radio and there was a heatwave. The Smiths had been lined up to play a few shows opening for The Sisters of Mercy. I knew of their music and I thought they were good. They had an admirable attitude towards their audience, who they seemed to regard more like guests at a communal gathering than fans; their attitude towards their support acts was admirable too. When you’re the opening band you get used to being ignored by the headliners, and the road crews of headliners can sometimes act like you’re an intrusion on their turf. Throw into the mix the fact that you’re from out of town, and your day can be a struggle. The Sisters and their crew went out of their way to make sure we were looked after, and I would occasionally spend time before we went on with their singer, Andrew Eldritch, who was very cool. If you’re decent to begin with you should be hospitable to a new band, especially when they’re young. You need help when you’re starting out, and whenever I received some kindness in those situations I appreciated it and never forgot it.

  It was at the shows with The Sisters of Mercy that I started getting pre-gig nerves. Anyone would think that receiving sudden praise for being the next big thing would give you more confidence, but I had to adjust to the acclaim that was coming on like a tidal wave from every angle. It wasn’t that I thought we weren’t worthy; it was because I had my own guitar style with no flash solos, and I didn’t know what this new world was expecting from me. The band had gone from trying to convert a few people standing at the bar and not really getting it to stepping out as the next big thing, and my attitude of ‘you won’t have heard anything like this before’ had suddenly disappeared. I would be back to normal as soon as the first song started, but I missed how it had been when our backs were against the wall and so I had to recalibrate a new attitude. One night in the dressing room at Dingwalls I came up with the logic that having some money in my pocket would make me feel lucky, and because I didn’t have any I asked Joe if he could loan me some. He gave me a £10 note, telling me he needed it back afterwards. We walked onstage and played a dazzling show to an adoring crowd which finished with our first stage invasion. After that I never went onstage again without putting a £10 note in my pocket.

  After every gig the band would drive back to Manchester with Ollie and Joe in the van. There were no windows, and the four of us would sprawl on the mattress, not listening to music but just talking and joking the whole journey. We went back to play the Rock Garden after only a few months since our first gig there, and as we poured out of the van and on to the pavement in Covent Garden we met the first ever Smiths fans, called Josh and Anna, holding flowers in the sunshine. It was a new thing to see people dressed in imitation of us, and I looked around and noticed that all of the band were wearing different variations of bespoke black Crazy Face jeans. Morrissey’s were baggy with a low seam at the back, Mike and Andy’s were drainpipes, and mine were the kids’ ones with the fraying at the bottom. Morrissey and I had beaded necklaces and we were wearing the same brown corduroy shoes. We all had the same kind of clothes with slight variations, and we looked nothing like anybody else.

  It was around this time that we added another important member to the entourage. Grant Showbiz had been the soundman for The Fall and Alternative TV, and amazingly enough had been someone Andy had told me about in school after seeing him at a concert by the band Here & Now. Grant was an unusual and outgoing figure on the London live circuit, and as with Scott Piering, we w
ere lucky to find someone who had some experience. Grant believed in us and was totally dedicated to doing a good job for the band.

  Our agreement with Rough Trade had been for only one single, and they were eager for us to do a longer deal with them and record our first album. We were being courted by the major record companies, and Joe had been getting requests from Virgin, Warners and Polydor, among others. CBS were making the most serious noises, and a couple of suits came backstage to meet us a few times and were nice enough. Morrissey and I went to some meetings as much out of professional curiosity as anything else, and it was interesting to compare the major scene with our independent label. What struck me most about the majors was that I didn’t see any records anywhere in the offices, whereas at Rough Trade and Factory there were boxes all over the place. I didn’t consider that there might be a warehouse somewhere with millions of records in them, but even so I expected to see some records around the place. The other thing that I noticed was the huge pictures of shiny pop stars I didn’t like, which confronted me from the moment I entered the building. It’s funny how important little things like that can be when you’re meeting big business – it was important to me anyway – and in the end both Morrissey and I knew that we’d be better off sticking with Rough Trade.

  Geoff Travis came to Joe’s office in Manchester with the Rough Trade contract for Morrissey and I to sign. For the two of us it felt like we’d reached the summit of the mountain we’d been climbing since the first day we met. Mike and Andy were there, and although they weren’t asked to sign the contract, Mike signed it as a witness. The advance payment would be £4,000. We were all really happy. We were going to make an album, and another and another, and more singles. That was everything I wanted. When Geoff took off back to London, Angie and I went out with Mike and Andy to the Haçienda to celebrate. The two Petes came with us, and we hung out with Andrew in the DJ booth, playing records and drinking cocktails.