Morrissey 'Swords' (Commercial Marketing) Released 26/10/09

Say what you like about Morrissey – and many have – but over the past three decades he has been responsible for some of the most thought-provoking, occasionally antagonistic prose ever set to music. While the arguments still persist over which era of his solo career has been his most proficient, few can dispute that 2004’s ‘You Are The Quarry’ represented an undoubted return to form not seen since his earliest offerings since The Smiths split. Its also no surprise that with this post-millennial rebirth has come a surge of interest in his live shows, and with said performances usually featuring a healthy selection of songs co-written with the erstwhile Johnny Marr, interest is yet to wane even if the standards of his two subsequent long players has.

Of course most of the recent discussions surrounding Morrissey have centred on his health, culminating in last month’s collapse at the start of a show in Swindon, not to mention numerous cancellations both of scheduled tour dates and festival appearances prior to that. For someone having just entered his fifty-first year on the planet, Morrissey is still the consummate professional, so it was little surprise when after being given the all clear by doctors after the latest scare he was back on stage playing live just five days later.

Its something of a far cry from the solo artist whose career seemed in tatters in the early part of the 1990s when first grunge then Britpop seemed to usurp him into irrelevant exile forthwith. If anything, the subsequent comeback is testament to the tenacious nature of the man himself, and even though age is no longer on his side, he can still cut a bilious, sardonic aside with the best of them, even if his targets are slightly more ambiguous than in his younger days.

His latest collection, ‘Swords’, is a compilation of twenty b-sides and bonus tracks taken from the singles off his past three albums, while a bonus eight-track CD focuses on some of the highlights from his show in Warsaw earlier this year. While there’s no disputing the quality on display throughout many of the compositions here, ‘Swords’ doesn’t quite flow as an album. Although the running order hasn’t been arranged chronologically, there are still oddments which sound forced (‘Shame Is The Name’), out of place (the live rendition of David Bowie’s ‘Drive-In Saturday’) or simply forgettable (‘The Slum Mums’) in comparison to the far superior title tracks of the 45s they were culled from.

Nevertheless, to expect ‘Swords’ as a whole to rival the likes of ‘…Quarry’, ‘Years Of Refusal’ or ‘Ringleader Of The Tormentors’ would be pernickety and instead highlights just how impressive the material on those three albums is when the likes of ‘Ganglord’, ‘It’s Hard To Walk Tall When You’re Small’ or ‘Munich Air Disaster 1958’ didn’t make the final cut on any. Compare these to the likes of ‘Glamorous Glue’ or ‘Billy Budd’ for example, both considered to be highlights of the disappointing ‘Your Arsenal’ and ‘Vauxhall And I’ collections and it illustrates the gaping chasm between the indecisive Morrissey of his most forgettable period and the rejuvenated one still going strong today (just about at any rate…).

Although most diehards will no doubt already own the vast majority of ‘Swords’, the live CD being the most obvious exception, this compilation is a valuable compendium for anyone that’s always had a soft spot for Davyhulme’s finest yet only recently found themselves lured back in by His Master’s startling resurrection.