morrissey = the new david byrne

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

ok usually when i do this kind of thing i frame the question fast and badly (or i wd never frame it at all) and koganbot becomes testy towards my fuzziness

but here is MY "explanation" of morrissey = he brought something to the boywing of britrock = called CAMP -- as in polari, as in an angry bitchy code against the UNSTYLISH USELESSNESS of the STRAIGHTS -- except that, since he wz militantly coy abt his sexuality (korrektly, as "coming out" would have stripped a powerful ambiguity out of what he wz doin), his camp was developed as a kind of MALE HET camp...

ANYWAY -- i have always bin ambivalent abt camp as an attitude (it's quickwitted and funny but it's also a compensatory attitude adopted by those who take themselves to be victims and are sniping secretly back...)

and given the shifts since the mid-80s in fashions in sexuality and within sexuality blah blah, i think morrissey's STYLE (sex! yes! but not for me...) reveals itself as a lot more reactionary a-and larkinesque than it did at the time

(again i feel i have not got at the nubbin of what i'm on about but have at it anyway)

Comments

So How Is It That The Pet Shop Boys Are Supposed To Be Better Than The Smiths

[koganbot]

Not to change the subject or anything, but how is it that the Pet Shop Boys are supposed to be better than the Smiths?

Re: So How Is It That The Pet Shop Boys Are Supposed To Be Better Than The Smiths

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

who sez such a thing? where i am now i pretty much equate them as being two different expressions of the same thing.

Re: So How Is It That The Pet Shop Boys Are Supposed To Be Better Than The Smiths

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

well an obvious way in which they were not doing the same thing as the smiths = they liked DISCO and therefore used it -- and thus (in the 80s) they did not gather a self-identified band of fans in the same way (i guess bcz their locus of interation was clubs full of clubbers rather than the rock-stage)

if the votes on poptimists are what is bein judged here, psb are "supposed to be better than the smiths" bcz er er more ppl like em more and that's it -- psb are just not very divisive in the UK

Re: So How Is It That The Pet Shop Boys Are Supposed To Be Better Than The Smiths

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Hah my route back into chartpop (which at the time included the PSBs) at the height of my Smiths fandom was the Pet Shop Boys' Record Mirror front cover with the quote "We're the Smiths you can dance to".

Possible other difference in perspective: I don't have sex vs I do have sex but am not very good at it.

Re: So How Is It That The Pet Shop Boys Are Supposed To Be Better Than The Smiths

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

PSB are not as self-pitying to my ears! They can deal with some pretty miserable subjects but they never wallow in them: Neil's voice is always slightly outside the situation even when he is the main protagonist in the lyrics: there's this self-awareness of the miserabilism, the dual knowledge that a) these emotions are sad and all-consuming but also b) it's not the end of the world and I should buck up a bit, and I will soon, after this song.