Your Arsenal

Just flew by. It's decent, but not outstanding Favorite Songs: We'll Let You Know, National Front Disco, I Know It's Gonna Happen Someday

I thought it was going to be much worse, good background music to be honest

Came with low expectations but this is great. Gives off that optimistic late winter - early spring feeling.

There's a British lightess that you got to love about it. The sound is great and production brings out some more aggression compared to most of Morrissey's catalog. As for the songs, it's a mixed bag. Some great ones, some goofy stuff, some nice and some a bit too much. Overall, what can you do, it's all in relation to the Smiths. And it lacks the brilliance of Johnny Marr. Still a solid album with bangers. A 3 plus

klassisk morrisey

Honestly not as bad as I expected, and clearly the least annoying Morrissey album I've got so far. It still feels surprisingly "new wave" for a 1992 record, but the addition of typical 90s alt rock guitars somehow makes it work. Morrissey hadn't entirely become a prickhead back then (ok, he was already showing off his abs with the subtlety of a drunk elephant, but I'll let that slide), and most songs manage to keep a good balance between bleak and energetic. I don't really vibe with it, so it's certainly not something I'll listen to again ; but it was all right as a one-time experience. 5/10

Morrissey at his solo best. A few strong, melodic tracks and a welcome rockabilly groove. For once, his voice is a real asset.

3,5 and minus 0,5 for Morrisey being an arse

I am not a fan of rock music, and I did not like The Smiths musics. This missed for me.

Surprisingly good album, I didn't expect the guy from the band that made The Queen Is Dead to make non-boring music. I really like the guitar melodies on this one. :3

(decent 6/10) Starts off surprisingly strong, the heavier instrumentals really benefit Morissey's vocals on this record, and the bass is pleasantly trebly and audible giving it that early 90's alt rock edge that I love from this period. After the mid-point though it devolves into the usual self-loathing that a narcissist like Moz employs to garner sympathy from their peers and the closing track "Tomorrow" is just the icing on the cake for that (the tune itself is still alright though). Probably not the worst Morissey solo album I've heard but not one I'll actively seek out either.

Once again I have to address the elephant in the room. His politics are abhorrent to me, and now with the fullness of time you can see them peeking out here, but the art itself is exciting and an album I loved at the time. The glam stomp and heartfelt ballads would be perfected on the following Vauxhall and I but there’s pure Morrissey on here too. The political snark of Glamorous glue and the heartbreaking closer tomorrow. He’s a berk, this is something that speaks to me strongly

Not for me, far too dreary and depressing

Fuck Morrissey but unfortunately this isn't bad.

Nothing transformative here. But still a great listen if you are a member of Smiths and Morrissey fan clubs

It's fine

Worth listening to just for the song, "You're the One For Me, Fatty."

eher unterklassig, verglichen mit seinen anderen alben resp. the smiths.

Lieblich und etwas langweilig

Eh, it was fine. Not really an upgrade on the Smiths, and the lyrics foretell what an angry old man he will become

i got what you need, fatty

Another Morrissey project, and this one is the most inoffensive I've heard yet. I do like some of the aspects the album offers. As always, his voice remains as soft as ever and is nice to the ears, the kind of shoegaze-ish guitars in the first couple of tracks sound really great and loud, and the very calming "Seasick, Ye Still Docked" and "I Know It's Gonna Happen Someday" are very pleasant and truly relaxing. But as a whole, there is nothing that I find to be memorable. Nothing is catchy, emotional nor interesting. It just a decent produced album with the performances being the bare minimum of entertaining so the album doesn't bore me.

Great album with all the best morrissey hallmarks both lyrically and musically. I’m gonna come out, though, and say I don’t like the cover. There’s nothing interesting about it except that he’s holding the microphone in a vaguely phallic way. This album deserves a better cover, especially with the bangers the smiths were consistently putting out. But otherwise a great album.

Top form Morrissey, so about a three.

Not his best work it was fine.

Typical of my listening to anything Morrissey - the first couple of tracks are great, then it gets a bit boring, then some just awful songs, and more average stuff to finish off. Still didn't make a fan of the man or his music.

So dramatic

*Groans* Another Morrissey album. These are almost getting annoying at this point. Of course, it's mediocre without being anything special. It's not even the politics of it all that piss me off, it's the insipid music. Every Morrissey album sounds the same, even though this one is slightly more aggressive in tone. None of them belong on the list. This album is ranked #14 of 26 albums for 1992. Other 1992 albums rated by me: Dirt(3/26)-5 The Chronic(4/26)-2 The Predator(5/26)-3 It's A Shame About Ray(11/26)-3 Connected(19/26)-1 Hypocrisy is the Greatest Luxury(21/26)-2 Lam Toro(23/26)-3

Morrisey may be an ass but his music is good.

#493/1001. Not really the Smiths…Morrissey was an interesting part of the band, but not the whole band. This is mostly rather basic and boring pop with an (at least by voice) interesting singer

So the last Morrissey album felt like the band just dissolved into the background, in comparison this is much more rock forward release. I thought this might help it but it actually made the whole thing feel a bit more mundane and boring. I don't really have strong feelings about this one way or another. A couple tracks did grab my attention, I know it's Gonna Happen Someday I thought was a standout, but a lot of this album seemed pretty forgettable.

The generator heard that I'm not a fan of Morrissey in my review a couple days ago, so it decided I must hear more! In all seriousness, I did actually enjoy this album more than the last one, but I'm still not exactly a fan. He does come off as a major prick a lot of the time.

I thought this album opened strong with an enjoyable first few tracks, but definitely got weaker as it went on. Probably my least favorite Morrissey project I've gotten so far (or maybe I'm just getting tired of how many are on this list).

Kill em with sadness.

Close to Morrissey's peak as a solo artist. 4.5

3 stars

-Tracks longer than 3:59: Way too many -Long tracks interesting or special: No -Album shorter than 58 minutes: Yes -Will listen to album again: Not a chance Overall: I know people love them some Morrissey, but my god his voice is annoying. I see from other reviews there is more on the way, I hope I won’t see them for a while. 1/5

I like Morrissey, but this album isn't as interesting as others. Still pretty good.

Try as I might, I can't really get into The Smiths, and especially Morrissey. I feel like it's adjacent to things I like, but it just doesn't do much for me.

*Four* Morrissey albums AND *three* Smiths? A joke? Maybe, maybe not, but those numbers make the whole 1001 thing a joke. No way any artist aside from Bowie or the Beatles should have more than a trio of selections here. Look, I get you want to big up your UK artists, but this is a mockery. Choose ONE Morrissey and stick to it. I might otherwise of given this a mid-3 vote, but my 1 here is a protest. Bah.

Decent Morrissey outing, but not in the upper echelons. I miss the jangles.

3/5

I'm a grown man, I'm not listening to fucking Morrissey

Can’t stand this dude, but he sure is a talented prick. Top tracks: We’ll Let You Know, Certain People I Know, I Know It’s Gonna Happen Someday

This album start very strong but like a lot of Morrissey albums it goes in a direction that is very dull.

Probably coloured by my opinions of Morrissey now but I don't see why I would listen to a Morrissey album when I could listen to a Smiths album

This album grew on me the longer I listened to it. The songs at the front of the album are more heavy rock (with a kind of country edge), but over time the songs became more moody and atmospheric, and I can tell he's influenced by his former band, The Smiths. Morrissey has the perfect voice for this kind of music. Highlights for me were, "Seasick, yet Still Docked" and "Tomorrow".

he desperately needs Johnny Marr around to smack him any time he gets too Morrissey

meh total. 5/10

Mittelmäßig

Great Morrissey album with some ballads and some great post punk tracks

He did all he needed to do with the Smiths. And I am unwilling to separate the artist from the art.

Best album of his I've heard.

Enough of a departure from the Smiths to be interesting. But Morrissey can’t help sounding like he sounds, and I can’t see myself wanting to listen to this a second time.

Probably a 3.5, but very easy to listen to. Is this what happens when there is this much Morrissey on the list? Rounding up due to enjoying the humor and “I Know It’s Gonna Happen Someday” predating “Creep” by two months.

what an awful man, but he sure does know how to catch a vibe (musically)

Cool. Second Morrissey. I wasn't into my previous outing of his on "You Are the Quarry". Bit shit, innit? Reminds of that one fella from the UK office whose comedic stylings now consist of waxing poetic about how offensive and crasse his comedy is without actually telling a single joke. You Are the Quarry is similar in that it acts all high and mighty with its garden variety cynicism and misanthropy without having a good vocal hook or lyric in its compact disc. Anyways, I've somehow managed to go half of this list with only having heard one Smiths album and one Morrissey album, so I can't write off his solo career just yet. "Meat Is Murder" is a pretty fantastic album, and I'm hoping this will prove to be the same. Here goes. While I am quite down and out about the quality of Morrissey's solo career, it's hard not to dislike his vocals. He is a pretty good singer and performer. Still, he's put to limited use on this album. The instrumentals are spotty, the vocal hooks are limp, many of the songs drag on for longer than they're welcome and the lyrical content is occasionally eye-rolling. Morrissey retains his jangle pop roots on this album, but with a harsh, reverberating, stadium rock atmosphere that I don't think works. Many of the songs sound quite muddy and unfocused because of this new stylistic approach, and the single, lone guitars don't do much to be engaging, either. All in all, I found this album to be a bit vacuous, though part of me does want to give it a second chance somewhere down the line. This music is in my sphere of interest, and as I said earlier, I do favour Morrissey as a vocalist. For those reasons, I couldn't bring myself to dislike this album, though I'm just as equally unenthused by it for my reasons listed earlier. As a result this album falls right down the middle for me. Book time. A whole host of controversies surround this album. There's Morrissey wishing Smiths biographer Johnny Rogan died a series of dramatic deaths, "The National Front Disco" and Morrissey performing the aforementioned song at a concert with skinhead backup dancers while waving a Union Jack flag. The audience apparently threw bottles at Morrissey until he left the stage. I have no idea what reaction he was expecting from doing that, but based nonetheless 👍 Mick Ronson (guitarist for Bowie's Spiders From Mars band) produced this album, and the book entry closes out by saying "...Your Arsenal was certainly Morrissey's finest and most confident work for years." Wikipedia has fuck all on this album, though it was well-respected by the critics and performed alright on the charts. Of the eight countries where it charted, it notably peaked at No. 29 in New Zealand, No. 28 in Canada, No. 21 in the US, No. 12 in Australia and No. 4 in the UK. It also reentered the charts in the UK and Hungary when a remaster of the album was released in 2014, notably peaking at No. 18 on the Hungarian charts. Yeeeeah, nah. Four list albums for Morrissey is just way too many for this guy, and I don't have any reason to believe this is his finest hour. Bye-bye. In place of this album, I humbly submit "Keep It Like a Secret" by Built to Spill for inclusion on the list. I've never listened to the album and I'm only familiar with Built to Spill because of their proximity to Modest Mouse, though I am aware that it's a classic release in indie rock.

Fucking Morrissey. An album from my birth year. Honestly, at best it's just ok, and a lot of the time it's bad. The lyrics are fucking terrible if you're a positive empath. The music wanders into Americana with the rockabilly, ew, just completely unnecessary. Or well, I can just recognize that flow isn't my thing and he isn't the one to make it listenable. 1.9/5

Rock. Was alright. Not much to say.

morrissey is such a terrible person we can only let him have 20-30 hits

I know he’s a prat but I liked it!!! 3.9

A good sound

What a voice

It sounds like the Smiths, but not morose!

not terrible but also not very good. All sounded kinda samey, i do like the acoustic guitar tones and even the production overall, but was just bored most of the time.

We hate it when we have to listen to these shallow lyrics. Aha aha ha. oho ho ho ho.

A lot better than I expected. Solid rock album but maybe slightly unassuming to be included in this list

Morrissey nimmt sein drittes Soloalbum im Februar 1992 in den Utopia Studios in Primrose Hill auf, den Rest im März im Wool Hall Studio in Bath. Am Pult sitzt Mick Ronson, früher Gitarrist bei David Bowie, und man hört ihn sofort: Aus dem zurückhaltenden Indie-Pop der ersten beiden Soloalben wird hier ein Glam-Rock-Rockabilly-Hybrid mit echtem Biss. Erschienen ist Your Arsenal am 27. Juli 1992 bei His Master's Voice. Die neue Band um Alain Whyte und Boz Boorer gibt Morrissey einen Unterbau, den er vorher nicht hatte. "We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful" knallt als Opener rein, "Glamorous Glue" hat diesen lässigen Glam-Groove, und bei "You're the One for Me, Fatty" merkt man, dass ihm sein Humor nicht abhandengekommen ist. Anders liegt der Fall bei "The National Front Disco" — der Song lässt bewusst offen, ob er eine Perspektive beschreibt oder sie feiert, und diese Ambivalenz wird ihm bis heute vorgehalten. Kommerziell lief es glänzend: Platz 4 in den UK-Charts, eine Grammy-Nominierung, ausverkaufte US-Shows bis hin zur Hollywood Bowl. Ob das Album seine Kontroversen wirklich verdient oder eher ein Missverständnis war, darüber streiten Fans bis heute — mich lässt "The National Front Disco" jedenfalls nicht kalt. Ein hartes, unbequemes Album, das genau deshalb hängen bleibt.

Morrissey and The Smiths are about as "meh" as it gets for me. I enjoy it a bit, but overall neutral about the music for the most part. 3/5.

I was not previously familiar with this album. It is a bit more rock-forward than the material I know from The Smiths. There are some glam rock influences present here that I like. Overall it was a good and enjoyable listen, but not particularly memorable. I would listen again but might not seek it out specifically.

A bit too miserable for me, but seemed ok

SEMBRANO DEMO DEGLI SMITHS. MOLTO PULITO E GODIBILE, NONOSTANTE GLI STRUMENTALI NON ABBIANO UNA FORTE IDENTITÀ. “WE’LL LET YOU KNOW” LA SPUNTA PER ME COME MIGLIOR PESZSZO. 3/5

From the first track, which sounds like a Tin Machine tribute act, you realise that this is Morrissey trying something different. The second track, a sort of Jean Genie derivative, makes you suspect that what he's trying is to be Bowie. A few songs in and you understand that he might be trying something different and Glam, but what he's not trying to be is good.

You wouldn't have thought Morrissey would have survived without Johnny Marr, but here he is fronting a band with an absolutely monster rock guitar sound. Fuck that guy, but this record is better than it has any right to be.

begon aardig rockend... daarna werd Morrisey toch weer de zeurende zaag....

Your Gooner

3 sterne

I only know Morrissey as a grandad who spews questionable opinions on foreigners, but I tried to judge the music on its own merits. Ultimately, it's just fine. I get that it was influential for 90s indie, but listening back now, it feels completely tied to its era and pretty unpolished. 6/10

Back when National Front Disco was ironic

4.0/5 - Good, but somewhat forgettable. From what I've heard from other reviews, the forgettable British music is only going to get more frequent as time goes on, so this is probably good practice to mentally prepare myself for what is to come.

If it wasn't Morrissey I'd probably give it four stars. What I mean by that is that he's capable of so much more even without Johnny Marr. The songs are competent well produced often harder than you would expect from marsey with distorted tones. The lyrics contain the same rhetoric as they always have but just a little more jaded.

Yeah I just don't like Morrisey, some alright guitar riffs here though

Moz does Bowie, what's not to like?

this was a slog, no standout tracks

I can't help myself

UGH. I really hate Morrissey, and like the other albums this site has forced me to listen to, I'll be spending the entire time listening to the album giving a thumbs up to each 1-star review. Yeah, I hate this. Again the only real upshot of being forced to listen to yet another Morrissey/The Smiths album is that there's one fewer album of theirs to listen to in the future.

Have never heard of album or band. Cool opening. I like the guitar. Good not great song writing. Similar vibes with glamorous glue. I like the background track a lot. Great guitar. Just OK lyrics. It’s a fun song tho. And then obviously love the fade into well let you know. Better writing on this one too. National front disco is fine. Good pop track. Ok lyrics. Good vocals. Really cool guitar outro. Certain people is another fun one. Good writing on this one. Works really well guitar. We hate it is a little goofy. Very Brit pop. Just ok. Same thing on fatty. This one is even more Brit pop fake Beatles. Not my type of song at all. Seasick is better. Really good percussion in this one. Better vocals. Cool opening to I know it’s gonna happen. Nice change of pace. Closes out with tomorrow which is very Brit pop again. It’s fine. Nothing special. Overall good not great album. In JAA range, some fun songs, some very generic songs. But nothing horrible. 2.4/5 stars.

I could never turn on Morrissey as a musical artist. When a song he’s involved with comes on my stereo hilarity is bound to ensue. Even without the rest of the Smiths. People pretend that’s not the case bc he is such a unlikable person, but his vocal styling and melodic tendencies are so his own that it transcends whoever musician happens to be backing him.

I really liked it. The guitarist pushed sharper riffs, glam feel, and driving momentum. The bass and drums are more assertive and make the songs. Sure there were songs that were meh, but several were good.

Man what is this lists obsession with Morrissey? Everything I’ve heard from him sounds similar to a grating degree. Like he sounds derivative… of himself. Boring. I guess the beating heart of the Smiths was pumped by someone else

Some great tunes. While bit of filler

You're a 3.5 for me, Fatty

The Smiths but not as good

whenever i listen to morrissey's solo work, i always feel that there's something lacking. i'm sure the guitarist, the bassist, the drummer he recruited for this album are all great, but they don't pack the same punch that johnny, andy, and mike did when working with morrissey. this album is great regardless, has a good first 4 track run.

Å Morrisey, jag har haft svårt för dig sen The Smiths splittrade. Men nu när massa vatten under broarna lyssnar jag och inser hur eklektiskt och bra detta är. Med små blinkningar till populärmusikhistorien utspritt i ackordvändningar, melodislingor och textsnuttar. Mycket mycket bra. En stark fyra.

I've sort of dreaded getting a Morrissey album on this list, but besides a few singles, this is my first time listening to him solo. I thought Marr, Rourke, and Joyce were integral to fulfilling Morrissey's artistic direction as much as he was to them, but he's very clearly capable of designing a new style all his own and still find an impeccable band for himself. There's not a song I would skip on this, it's a delight to hear him backed by distorted guitars for a change and the shining track, We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful shows an obvious declaration that he's the same Morrissey ever, but backed by a stadium-glam sound I couldn't have expected. And I usually don't like glam, nor rockabilly.

I never really appreciated The Smiths, or Morrissey, but they’ve influenced a lot of bands I like so maybe I should

I always thought I didn't like Morrissey but I really enjoyed this album. The songs were fun and all sounded unique.

1.75 - confirmed not really a Morrissey fan.

music is love