The Smiths' "The Queen Is Dead" Named Greatest Album by NME

That late?! I gave up on NME in the late 70's. Maybe I'm older than you

 

This!

I can't stand Van Morrison for instance. He sounds like a drunk shouty old boring git to me with absolutlely no Soul whatsoever.
It's like Punk never happened.
That's just my opinion and I'd rather seek out some new music but I'd hazzard a guess I may be in the minority
here....

 

Thanks for listing them. Pretty dull and worthy list isn't it. I also cannot believe anyone still really listens to Pulp, Oasis, Strokes anymore. Let England Shake and Strangeways, In Rainbows, Station to Station in particular jump out as unworthy suprises.

 

I thought I saw it in ninth place

 

Well said. Also the NME are probably trying to back track on their years of Morrissey bashing when they lost the plot around the "baggy" years.

 

Hey at least they pretend music from the 60's till NOW matters.

Many of us in here and rolling stone, pretend music was born and died between 1965 and 1975 (( for the most part, and a bit of exaggeration....))

 

The version with How Soon Is Now, right?

 

Well, being from the US, the Sire LP was my first encounter with that album, so that's kind of what I'm most accustomed to. But the UK Rough Trade, without HSIN, would still qualify as my favorite Smiths studio album on the strength of so many other amazing songs, like Headmaster Ritual, Nowhere Fast, Well I Wonder, That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore, etc.

 

I also got to know it from the US version and to me, there's a gaping whole there when I listen to the UK version (like on the RT CD, I had to burn a copy with How Soon Is Now in the spot where it resides on the US version.)

 

Do be honest Kevin I think those ignorant old dinosaurs are becoming less and less common on here as more new members come onboard, in the last year or so I think more open minded and progressive people in their 30s and 40s like us who have much wider musical tastes are joining, I put that down in part to the resurgance in vinyl and people coming back to it, this is by far the best audio/music forum on the web.

 

Right on

 

It was an observation. There's absolutely no point in criticising lists; they only serve one purpose - to fill space. Unless you seek the opinion of every person on the planet, they're worthless.

 

OK, don't want to argue with your choice which is your choice and everything, but I'm suprised. I think MIM is spoilt by two of the worst Smiths songs (Barbarism and the title track). The other tracks are very good but I feel the production is a bit mechanical and cold, the songs don't breathe very well.

Where as QID doesn't have a weak track (even Mr Shankly has a great lyric and a decent tune). The production is much better (they finally got it right) and it contains the songs that really get to the heart of The Smiths IMO (Light, I Know It's Over). Additionally it's like a real album in the sense it has a flow and feel to it, and a great opening song. MIM sounds more like a collection of songs. I can lose myself in QID completely but when I listen to MIM it's like I'm listening to a collection of songs.

Anyway, that's my argument.

 

Well, that's years of accumulated qualitative survey methodologies out the window. Who knew?

 

God, I hope not - for your sake!

 

In your opinion, obviously. Whatever the no. 87 album is.

 

In my opinion, the only bad song on MIM is the title track, and even that's not like their worst song or anything (well-meaning but histrionic lyrics aside). MIM's production is not ideal (I've always found it a bit murky), but the insane melodic brilliance of songs like Headmaster Ritual, Well I Wonder, etc. makes those flaws easier to overlook.

I agree that QID has a better production, but it also contains Vicar in a Tutu, which is in my view one of the worst and most trivial songs of their entire career. How that song wound up on the album when so many other far superior tracks ended up as b-sides is a vexing mystery. I've also never liked how side 1 kind of drags under the weight of two back-to-back slow numbers, I Know It's Over and Never Had No One Ever. I like both songs, but putting them back to back like that negatively affects the flow of side 1, imo. Other than that it's a phenomenal album.

 

I know, I'm weird, but to me my favorite Smiths (non-comp) album is Strangeways, Here We Come.

My favorite Smiths release, by far, is Louder Than Bombs.

 

Thanks. Your opinion*really* matters to me.
Just an observation.

 

Y'welcome, as does yours to me. Presumably you DO like the opinion of music journos on the sole basis that they express the same opinion as you. This week, at any rate. The reason I stopped buying the music comics in the early 90s was that I like forming my own opinions. Was the 'list' formed entirely by the journos?. Or was every reader asked to vote?.

 

I actually disagree. One good thing about "lists" like these is that, if the person(s) creating the lists seem to have similar musical tastes as yourself and you see some albums that you don't know, it's a good way to actually sample something new that you might actually like. Or not.

 

''IF''. That's always assuming that the journo is given licence to make the list based on his/her own opinions. It's always and only about their opinion. At that particular time. If all of us here made our own list, why would we possibly expect anyone to care?. If people were sending me free records and CDs every week, would you not expect me to be swayed when a particularly nice promo item comes my way?.

 

I believe it may be some innovative/modern, new fangled fashion/idea called a reader 'SURVEY' or something?

 

How many readers?. People change their minds all the time. Surveys can be made to say exactly what you want them to say. What's the publication's circulation? If a certain publication aims it's copy at a certain demographic, they can be fairly sure what the list will look like. It can be as simple as knowing the circulation figures whenever a certain act is on the cover. I'm not a fan of lists, you probably guessed; sorry my opinion makes you so angry, but in the end.............it's only the latest list. The more space it fills, the better for all the journos.

 

My dear boy, you have jumped to conclusions mis interpreted my indifference and gentle sarcasm as anger.
It's a 'top 500' which will change again no doubt either next year or the one after.
It matters not really. And I couldn't indeed, care less.
Change is what matters you know, new music, uncharted lands. Hitherto unexplored regions of the musical landscape and the interesting points therein.
The mechanics are semantics and having a discussion about another group of people's opinions on a selection of 500 records is ultimately, pointless wouldn't you agree?

Let us talk about (whisper it) .......... the music.....

Otherwise we're just going around in circles.

And as John Lydon would say it's "very, very booooorrriiinggg"