My Love Affair With The Smiths

This is a post I've been meaning to write for some time. I've thought often about writing it, but always felt as if I should leave things longer so that there would be more for me to say.

Over the past 6 months, The Smiths have come to totally monopolise my entire listening schedule. They're one of those bands who are cherished and despised in equal measure and, ever since they first arrived on my radar a few years ago, I didn't feel very inclined either way. I certainly didn't hate them, but kamikaze like devotion given by their fans and the Godlike status that music journalist and publications afforded them totally baffled me. I just didn't get it.

They broke in up in 1987 and, whilst I love older music, they just didn't seem to be relevant to me. I'd see people commenting on the internet that they were "the only band who ever mattered" and my response would just be "...really?" The only way they ever seemed to push themselves into reality nowadays seemed to be, for me, Morrissey's sarcastic jibes directed at whatever he took a dislike to in that particular interview. Whenever I discussed the bloke with anyone else who had a passing knowledge the consensus seemed to be "what a bell end". Indeed, one of my friend likes to joke that his autobiography will be called The Horrible Things I Say. When Morrissey announced his autobiography was complete, I joked to my friend that he'd have to rethink his title. "No" he replied, "mine's not gonna be titled Moaning Vegan C**t".

So, if you'd asked me just under a year ago, I'd have said that it was highly unlikely that I'd ever become even a passing fan of The Smiths or their maverick frontman, the Pope of Mope, the sullen, carrot eating, Mancunian twazzock.

But then one day, roundabout December I guess, I just got it. Something just clicked. I scrolled across The Very Best of The Smiths in my iTunes, which I'd swiped a couple of years ago from my dad. I just thought "hmm, let's have another listen shall we. You never know". I started listening to "Ask", mainly because its title stood out amongst the otherwise verbose song titles.

Still possessing the view that The Smiths were, essentially, a bunch of miserable knobheads, the shimmering, joyous, bouncy riff of "Ask" took me totally by surprise. For 3 minutes, 10 seconds, I sat there utterly entranced. The song was one of the most euphoric, cleverly written, unabashedly free pieces I'd ever heard. My tiny little 18 year old mind was totally unravelled by this romantic, detailed, lush explosion of song writing.



After falling in love with "Ask", I dove head first into the rest of it. I don't know where to begin because all of it just began to open itself up to me. "Panic", "The Boy With The Thorn In His Side", "William, It Was Really Nothing" were the ones that stood out fastest, but it all began to make sense. I got a hold of their studio albums and immersed myself in each of them, especially The Queen is Dead and The Smiths.

I'm in love with them now. Like I've never been with a band before. So what is it? What does it for me, when for so many others they're a repellent band of miserabilists?

The main thing for me is that Morrissey, lyrically, hits it on the head every time. He's not a self pitying, arrogant twat lyrically - certainly not in The Smiths. For me, almost every word that drips off his tongue in The Smiths lyrical catalogue, perfectly captures whatever emotion he's talking about, because he sings about things that I can identify with. There are plenty of songs which I love because I can apply the lyrics to my life, and indeed some artists who, mostly, I embrace lyrically. But so often I've found myself listening to people describing how there's one artist above all others who is just THE ARTIST for them. The life changer. And I'd never really felt like that about anyone. No one quite got it. Until The Smiths. A band from 25 years ago, still as relevant now as when they changed the world back then.

Take, for a example, "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out", regarded by many as the best Smiths song, and not without reason. I could go into detail about the whole song, but the chorus is just one of the best moments in the history of music. For me, it's the perfect description of friendship:

"And if a double decker bus,
Crashes into us,
To die by your side,
Is such a heavenly way to die.
And if a ten tonne truck,
Killed the both of us,
To die by your side,
Well the pleasure, the privilege is mine".

I mean, what more could you ever want to say to someone that you love dearly? People might say that this is a fairly morbid declaration to make, but he pulls it off so elegantly. It's in his vocal delivery, but also in the choices of phrase - "the pleasure, the privilege is mine". He makes it sound like dying alongside the person you hold dearest is like taking one last, grinning bow before the curtain whips you out of sight.

I see nothing but truth here, and elsewhere in Morrissey's lyrics. He said once in an interview with Miracle Maker that The Smiths were formed because it was "...time that the ordinary folk of the world showed their faces". In an age where pop music is full of brainless morons who produce the most banal, emotionally bankrupt dross imaginable, dumbing their audience down and treating them like idiots, and even "indie music" has been bastardized and simplified by years of scroungers like Razorlight, Kaiser Chiefs and The Wombats, The Smiths speak to me and articulate things in a way that I can't imagine any other group could. I'm not a massive social outcast, but as someone whose tastes vary a lot from most people I know, hearing The Smiths is such a comforting thing. Plenty of music is MADE for musical outsiders, but not a lot of it really talks about what it's like to BE a musical outsider. Their song "Panic" sums it up best, and I feature some lyrics from that later.

Something you begin to realise with The Smiths as soon as you give them the attention they deserve is that they are not the miserable gits that some people take them for. When you understand The Smiths, even singing their most tragic sounding songs is a euphoric kind of experience, because they're so true. Morrissey sums it up perfectly in this interview, the date and source of which I can't locate:

Why is it that you never write a song that could be described as happy?
"Do you really think that I don't? Not even with a massive stretch of the imagination? Isn't there a happiness, a certain release in actually saying things? It's like when you turn around to your best friend, and say - 'Well, actually I despise you, and I've despised you since we were in third year' - I mean, that's really a massive relief, don't you find? Turning around to your parents and saying, 'I'm not living in this dump anymore'... come on, connect the two ... get your knitting needle out!"

I wouldn't call that happiness. Smug, maybe.
"But it is! It is! It's like shedding skin! It is a form of happiness. We shouldn't think of happiness as one thing! Happiness is eating an ice cream, happiness can be Bernard Manning... it can be... an old woman falling off a donkey! I don't know, for heaven's sake, I don't know."

The very act of just SAYING something, even if it's expressing sadness or dislike, lifts a weight of your shoulders that equates to happiness - if you're willing to expand your definition of happiness.

More than that however, The Smiths are bloody hilarious. John Peel once said they're the only band who can make him laugh out loud. Too bloody right! Try this from "William, It Was Really Nothing":

"How can you stay with a fat girl who says
'Ohhhh, would you like to marry me?
And if you like you can buy the ring!"

Or "Frankly, Mr Shankly":

"Frankly, Mr. Shankly, this position I've held
It pays my way and it corrodes my soul
Oh, I didn't realise that you wrote poetry
I didn't realise you wrote such bloody awful poetry, Mr. Shankly"

Or "Panic":

"Burn down the disco,
Hang the blessed DJ,
Because the music that they constantly play...
IT SAYS NOTHING TO ME ABOUT MY LIFE!
Hang the blessed DJ"

Or this rather unsettling image of Prince Charles from "The Queen is Dead":

"I said Charles, don't you ever crave
To appear on the front of the Daily Mail
Dressed in your Mother's bridal veil ?"

Morrissey's wit is one of the most captivating things about him, and it's got him into a lot of trouble, but it's one of the best things about his lyrics. Also, his vocal delivery can give lyrics which aren't immediately hilarious a strangely comical air, like "Bigmouth Strikes Again".

The way that The Smiths music combines with the lyrics is stunning as well. There are plenty of Smiths songs which are downbeat and tragic sounding, but there are an equal number which musically are stunningly exuberant and euphoric or thumping and danceable - "The Headmaster Ritual", "The Boy With The Thorn In His Side", "Panic", "Vicar in a Tutu", "Girlfriend in a Coma", "Jeane", the list is endless.

I've gone on far too long here, but whilst we're on the subject of music, Johnny Marr's guitar work, combined with the hugely underrated bass and drum work of Andy Rourke and Mike Joyce, basically formed the template for all indie music ever. The more I listen, the more I appreciate that all of the indie music I love owes nearly everything to The Smiths.

Like I said near the start, I never, ever thought I'd become an ardent lover of The Smiths. But I'm captivated. My love for other bands hasn't diminished, but my perception of what makes a band MATTER is being strongly altered. I mentioned at the start that I once saw on a Smiths fan page, before I started liking them, that one user has simply written "the only band that ever mattered". Part of me hesitates to say it but, for me, that's starting to be more than a little bit true.

My 10 Favourite Indie/Alternative Guitarists

I'm a huge fan of lists. Reading them, writing them, passing comment on them, theorising about them. It surprises me then that it's been some time since I last posted a list on my favourite of anything. So I thought it was high time I picked one of the many lists that floats aimlessly around my head on a regular basis and put it to paper. Or the internet.

Based on my current listening habits, and discussions I often have with myself, I thought I'd share my 10 favourite indie/alternative guitarists. I don't want to get too theoretical about that title by the way. Let's waste no time defining indie and alternative - any of us with any musical sense know in our heart of hearts what we're on about. One key stipulation though is this: there is a difference between what I hold as my FAVOURITE of something and what I regard as the BEST of something. I hold strongly to the truth that, in music at least, there are objective bests. Music that is factualyl, for various reasons, better than other music. But that's a very long discussion for another day. For now, these are my favourites. The ones that tickle my current fancy. Care to share yours after?

10. Alex Turner

As frontman of Arctic Monkeys, Alex Turner is most often hailed for his songwriting abilities, lyrical genius and eternally stunning vocal delivery - all of which deserve the prasie they receive of course. But behind that, people forget that that, despite the fact that band mate Jamie Cook is officially on lead guitar, Alex is the man behind all of the most beloved moments of Arcitc fretwork. The intros of "A Certain Romance" and "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor", the riffs of "Teddy Picker", "Fake Tales of San Francisco" and so many more, the epic shreddery of "Brianstorm". The Arctics were rightly hailed as the best of a new generation of British guitar groups, and the Alex Turner was the one with his fingers changing history on the fretboard.

9. Nick Drake

Now, this is a bit of a cheat. Nick's one of the most famous folk musicians of all time, hardly an indie kid, but I feel he falls firmly enough in an "alternative" kind of taste, and plus, he never gets recognition for his brilliant guitar playing. Like Alex Turner, the focus with Nick is always on his song writing and lyricism, but people overlook the fact he was a stunningly gifted, nimble fingered guitarist. The sound he created with just an acoustic guitar in his hands was mindblowingly beautiful. It was so full, so rounded and always flowed with a seamless grace that, in my mind, is unrivalled amongst folk musicians. "From The Morning", "Cello Song", "Introduction" and "Time Has Told Me" are all gorgeous examples of what this man could do with a guitar. His death at 26 is one of the most tragic musical deaths in my mind, but his legacy has grown steadily over the years, and you can hear his indelible influence in the music of the new generation of folk artists like Laura Marling.

8. Albert Hammond Jr.

If you were creating a list of the 10 BEST indie guitarists, Albert would be a heavyweight contender for a top spot. Back in 2001, The Strokes' exuberant, fuzzy, fresh faced indie rock hammered life into a music scene which was rolling in its own commercialised filth, still hungover from Britpop and grunge. The garage rock simplicity of "Last Nite" set the indie world on fire and the saviours had arrived. With their debut Is This It?, an album based on the insistent riffs and solos of dear old Albert, they changed the face of any guitar rock which has emerged since. The success of any bunch of white kids with guitar in their hands since 2001 is attributable entirely to The Strokes and how, with Albert at the guitar helm, they changed the sound of indie rock. "Take It Or Leave It", "New York City Cops" and "Someday" all sound as fresh as they did 10 years ago, even if their new material doesn't quite measure up. Rarely has someone called Albert ever been this badass.

7. Stevie Jackson

This is probably a name that will illicit a few "huh?"s from a lot of people, even fans of indie music. Jackson is the lead guitarist of Belle & Sebastian, probably the only band who could ever be called "twee-pop giants". Belle & Sebastian have a love-it-or-hate-it kind of sound, but Jackson's squeaky clean, lushly reverberating guitar lines are an instrumental part. People who are familiar with Belle & Sebastian can find it easy to perceive the group as simply "the Stuart Murdoch project", just an outlet for the creative juices of their frontman. Indeed, the first few albums were just that. He is still the drivign creative force, but the band have been growing ever stronger as a unit since 1998's The Boy With The Arab Strap. Whether through his own compositions or the embellishments laid on top of Murdoch's songs, Jackson's guitar work is one of the most defining features of the band's sound. Melancholy, romantic and gorgeously retro, it just hits a sweet spot in me every time - the sublime riff of "I'm A Cuckoo" and the huge sound of the guitar on "Another Sunny Day" are my personal favourites, but his embellishments are so nuanced and integral to the sound of a classic band that picking his best moments is a difficult, difficult task. The sound he's carved for himself has been an inspiration to countless bookish, hopelessly romantic teenagers craving something sweet and clean in the world.

6. Bill Ryder Jones

Now, our Bill inhabits a similar realm to Stevie Jackson in that his guitar work in The Coral sits side by side the stunning songwriting of frontman James Skelly, being just as integral in crafting the sound of one of Britain's must under appreciated bands of the past 10 years. The band first exploded onto the scene in 2002 with the timeless "Dreaming of You", with Ryder-Jones' scratchy jangles and nifty little solo helping to truly cement the song's magic, to such an extent that his guitar work on the rest of their self titled debut gets overlooked. The sweeping clang of opener "Spanish Main" was a pretty decisive statment about how prevalent he was going to be on the album, and indeed he was. As the band came into their own psychadelic way of doing things on subsequent albums, Ryder-Jones only flourished in crafting a distinctively decorative, warm, jangly sound. Some of the places that his sound shines brightest might be "Put The Sun Back" and "Bill McCai" but, again, his guitarwork doesn't showcase itself in specific moments but in its stunning role in The Coral's overall sound. Shame he left before the band's last album, Butterfly House. I hope he's got more up his sleeve.

5. Jonny Greenwood

Jonny Greenwood is one of those guitarist who you come to describe and you just think "what words are there?" Radiohead are a band who have become so revered that it's hip on the nth level to dislike them, and to class them as one of your favourite bands is often to be regarded as someone with a fairly unadventurous taste in indie music. They're one of the few genuinely huge indie bands of the last few decades, and, whether you think that's a cause for celebration as it demonstrates some mild remnants of taste clinging on for dear life in the vacuous, post-Armageddon corridors of the general public, or a cause for woe indicating how people think all you need is some weirdo dancing like an electrocuted halibut and making strange wailing noises to be artistic, there's no denying that Jonny Greenwood and his revolutionary guitar work have been part of the beating heart of the band. The bleak screeches of "Paranoid Android" still send electric shocks up spines the world over. The scorching wails of "Just" just kick arse every time. Even though there's been an auspicious decline in the amount of obvious guitar work on Radiohead records in recent years, 2007's In Rainbows showed that Jonny hadn't lost any of his guitar finesse whilst he'd been arsing about with that ondes martinot. Even the few splashings of guitar present of most recent release The Kings of Limbs were inspired, and proved, to me at least, that one of the best things about Radiohead has always been the guitars.

4.Tom Campesinos!

Not his real name of course, Tom Campesinos! joins with the rest of his bandmates from Los Campesinos! in keeping his full name a secret, opting instead to mark himself out with a Ramones style mark of loyalty to the band. Los Campesinos! are one of my favourite bands of all time and, for a band who only released their first LP in 2008, the intense love that their fanbase feels for them is terrifying. I think they have the destiny of becoming a true cult classic band and, like many bands in that bracket, their sound is a love-it-or-hate-it affair. It's overwhelming, cacophonous and lyrically as blunt and (sometimes) uncomfortable as being beaten to death by a large, metal-alloy statue of one of your ex-lovers. Tom's guitar lines are at the heart of the band's punchy, abrasively euphoric sound, and they consistently have the kind of earworming quality which causes them to be chanted back to the band at gigs - see "Death to Los Campesinos!", "You! Me! Dancing!", "Straight In At 101" and plenty more for evidence. The band have released 3 albums in 3 years, an astonishing feat in itself, but made all the more impressive by the maturation of their sound on all fronts, including Tom's guitar work. Last year's Romance Is Boring had a stunningly unified sound, with the guitar work underpinning the albums most emotionally intense moments, notably fan favourite "The Sea is A Good Place To Think Of The Future".

3. Lee Ranaldo/Thurston Moore

It doesn't get much more alternative than this does it? I've cheated a bit here and put the two Sonic Youth heavyweights as one entry, but that's because the interplay between their guitars is so awesome and integral to Sonic Youth's sound that the pair's work is inseparable in my mind. Sonic Youth formed out of the largely pretentious no-wave/noise scene in 1980s New York, and, after trying a few other guitarists, Thurston and his girlfriend Kim Gordon met Ranaldo and were buzzing about the work he'd done with avant-rock afficionado Glenn Branca. Sonic Youth, with Ranaldo in particular, were obsessed with exploring the possibilities of SOUND, rather than just the standard notes a guitar was expected to produce. This meant that they employed heavy use of alternate tunings, which, when the band began to gain prominence as a popular rock group, was fairly off the wall. The band have always been and will continue to be explorers of the sonic world, but their music has always been grounded firmly in song writing, stemming from a love artists ranging from Bob Dylan to Thurston's fetish faves, The Carpenters. This marriage of noise and experimentation with structured and pop influenced song writing essentially birthed altnerative rock as we know it. The ripples caused by albums like Daydream Nation is untold. Whilst their have been more than a few moments where they've disappeared up their own arse, it's all been done in the name of taking guitar music to a new level. There are plenty of great guitarists in the world, but it's very rare that someone comes along and turns the guitar into something new entirely, reinventing it for a new generation. But that's exactly what Thurston and Lee did. The ultimate guitar anti-heroes.

2. Graham Coxon

Choosing between Graham and my number one was a heck of a challenge. There's just nothing I do not love about this man and what he does with the guitar. Again, as the axe man of Blur, he's one of those guitarists who can sometimes get lost in the shadow of the band's front man, Damon Albarn. Graham is, from my knowledge of guitarists, the most underrated of them all. Nearly everything that fell of his fretboard in Blur, and in most of his solo output as well, is just gold. "Beetlebum", "No Distance Left To Run", "Coffee & TV", "Tender". "SONG 2!" Genius. Sheer, unabashed, irresistible genius. Even album cuts like "Bank Holiday" or "Badhead" have this subtly magical charm about them. He never blasted out with neanderthal like solos like Noel Gallagher. He preferred the wryest, most cleverly placed bits of fretwork, which Damon Albarn described as "more like anti-solos". His solo material however has proved that he can wail with the best of them - "Spectacular", "You & I" and "Freakin' Out" all being beloved, punk influenced gems. He's even demonstrated his terrifying dexterity with an acoustic guitar on 2009 album The Spinning Top. Graham's sound has had such an influence on British indie bands in the past 10 years and, even if it hadn't, it's never anything less than a joy to listen to.

1. Johnny Marr

Well, here we are. I said at the start that I resolutely distinguish between the BEST of something and my personal FAVOURITE of something but, in this case, my favourite is also the best. There is not another man who can ever be said to have more of influence on indie guitar music. Ever. Being part of The Smiths, our Johnny is probably top of the class when it comes to putting up with the reputation of your frontman, but that never seemed to stop the two of them creating indie music as we know it. Inspired by the likes of The Byrds and Buffalo Springfield, Jonny engineered a trademark "jangly" sound which could soundtrack every area of The Smiths' emotionally panoramic catalogue. I very rarely agree with Noel Gallagher, but one of the few times I have was about Johnny Marr: "There's nothing he can't do with a guitar". The Smiths (well, Morrissey) possess that strange aura of being both at once romantically understated - the backbone of the indie aesthetic - and subtly flamboyant. That's as evident in Marr's guitar work as it is in Morrissey's lyrics and personality. The dexterity of the guitar parts on songs like "The Boy With The Thorn In His Side", "Ask" or "This Charming Man" is just sensational, yet never exhibitionist. "How Soon Is Now?" has one of the most cataclysmically bleak and massive riffs ever, and yet somehow, through Johnny's magic, heavenly touch, it never becomes overbearing. His sound is just so engrossing and enveloping, whilst still being technically unrivalled in modern music. Morrissey's introspective and terrifyingly clever lyrics were the beating heart of The Smiths, but Johnny Marr's guitar work was the flesh and bone that wrapped it up and gave the band form. Without The Smiths and without Johnny Marr, no-oe on this list (apart from predecessor Nick Drake and contemporaries Sonic Youth) would have ever started making the music they do. The Smiths are, like many acts on this list, a love-or-hate kind of band. I'm firmly in love but, even if you're not, there is no arguing, in any sphere of existence, theoretical or otherwise, that Johnny Marr is the greatest indie guitarist of all time. As well as my favourite.

Scattered Black and Whites #2 - "Panic" by The Smiths

I've been through a fairly long and protracted process in my relationship with The Smiths. I knew my dad listened to them, and he's generally pretty solid for someone who has purposefully made a note of buying each Snow Patrol album. Then when I started reading the NME, I would see their name mentioned in reverence, which had a pretty strong impression on my malleable 15 year old mind which was striving pathetically to work out what was worth listening to and what wasn't.

Then I became aware of passing references to Morrissey. As a massive twat.

Then I started seeing references to The Smiths as a bunch of pretentious, miserable, flower waving fops.

So I was in two minds before I even got round to listening to them. And when I did listen to them (finally) I fell straight into the "well what a bunch of gloomy gits" camp. Any time I saw Morrissey pop up in the musical press, I felt like slapping him.

I remained this way for some time. A couple of years in fact. Then I started listening again. I thought "there HAS to be more to them. They can't be hailed as the most influential indie group of all time and be as crap as I think they are".

So I did. I listened. My ears and my brain were doing some intense wrestling. And finally, there was a breakthrough. I don't know exactly why, or why it happened when it did, but it did.

Listening to "Panic", the chorus lyrics just smashed right into my brain.

"Burn down the disco
Hang the blessed DJ
Because the music that they constantly play
IT SAYS NOTHING TO ME ABOUT MY LIFE
Hang the blessed DJ
Because the music they constantly play"

I can fully understand why those lyrics, to the uninitiated, look a bit self pitying and drastic. But for me, they are hilariously true! Listening to this I just suddenly started picturing all the times I've walked past clubs or cars or listened to radios blaring out utter, UTTER crap. "Panic" articulated that in a way that I've never fully been able to without feeling like a self righteous douche. And it's the first time that I'd ever really heard anyone SING about how vacuous the popular music around them is. Plenty of artists SAY it, but SINGING about it struck a chord in me. I get a bit sick of people who listen to good music but are quite happy to sit back and let other people be lulled into listening to vacuous, shallow and extortionate musical spam and not say anything about it; about the people listening or the talentless and self interested cons making and producing the stuff. That final chorus is just, in my mind, irresistible. "HAND THE DJ, HANG THE DJ, HANG THE DJ! HANG THE DJ, HANG THE DJ, HAND THE DJ - HANG THE DJ!"

Most importantly though, aside from being a great song for me on its own terms, it opened a big ol' floodgate of appreciation. It started me off on a turnaround which turned into a love affair. I fell in love with The Smiths and it's been increasing exponentially over the months since.



I can appreciate that not everyone's going to get The Smiths. There are lots of things people say about them that I can argue against but I can understand that for some people they still don't click. And however erudite, insightful and wry Morrissey was in the 80s, he's one of the biggest twats on the face of the earth now. But let's not talk about that.

Dum Dum Girls - "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" (The Smiths Cover)

I have been listening to untold amounts of The Smiths recently (and expect a post on that shortly) so I was pretty chuffed when I saw that Dum Dum Girls have covered "There is a Light That Never Goes Out" for their upcoming EP, He Gets Me High. The original is of course always coming up in "Greatest Songs Ever" lists and the like, and regarded by many fans as the band's finest hour. It's been covered umpteen times by a million different artists, but this cover really grabs me!

The girls give it a heavier, almost grungy twist, with Dee Dee's vocals drizzled like honey over the mix. Often with covers of big, famous songs like this one, the vocal delivery lacks any real emotional resonance, and the vocalist doesn't seem to be able to put any personality into lyrics that are embraced by so many (which is sort of peculiar) But Dee Dee's delivery on some lines is wonderful, and somehow manages to stay as seductive as she's sounded on everything else she's ever sung on! Genuine sex appeal on a Smiths track is something to be proud of. The line that springs immediately to mind is "to die by your side is such a heavenly way to die" (which is just a phenomenal lyric) The whole thing is urgent and frenzied, a buzzing and anthemic bundle of distorted guitars and thumping drums. Obviously it's not better than the original, I would never make such a heinous claim. But it's pretty darn good!

I'm looking forward to the forthcoming EP, and hoping that Dum Dum Girls end up as more than a flash in the pan badn from 2010. Click here to go and listen to the track over at Quarterwhipped.

6 Reasons Why I Love My Record Player

My 18th birthday present from my brother was a record player. I didn't actually get to use it until late November, my birthday being mid-October, due to some delivery issues and a broken needle. When the day finally came, I was overjoyed as I'd wanted one for quite a while, for a few reasons. My dad has heaps of old vinyl which were lying untapped in his office cupboard. Also, I was constantly hearing that the sound quality of vinyl is superior and wanted to really check it out for myself. I'd long been of the opinion that buying something physical when it comes to buying music is so much more important and wonderful than downloading, so getting a record player was a logical conclusion of that. Also, lots of singles and special releases by bands only come out on vinyl so I wanted in on where the action is.

So after a few months perusing old records and acquiring new ones, I sitting back and listening to my dad's old copy of Neil Young's Harvest - the case of which is just one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen - I started thinking about what had grown on me about the wonderful machine in the months I'd owned and used it. Here are the six reasons I came up with as to why I now love my record player:

1. I Stop Flicking Through iTunes
Now I'm someone who does purposefully listen to whole albums in one sitting and who's very against the consumerist attitude towards music in today's mainstream, where people's listening habits are conditioned to listen to lone hit tracks, not whole albums or bodies of work. But even I end up flicking aimlessly through iTunes or the internet sometimes, bouncing from track to track without really taking anything in, finding something new I want to listen to before I even finishing what I'm currently listening to, especially when I'm searching for loads of new music. Having a record player kind of frees me of that. I put something on and that's it, it's spinning and playing on the other side of the room and I leave it going, spinning onwards. It's a really liberating feeling when I've been used to trotting through iTunes for most of my musical life. And as a result...

2. I Get More Done!
A less artistic and conceptual note but it's true, I'm more productive when listening to a record on a record player. It's on the other side of the room, playing away. Not at my finger tips, beckoning me to fiddle and shuffle every three and a half minutes. This kind of belies the argument that people don't want to listen to vinyl any more because it's too inconvenient to put on and turn over half way through. What do you reckon is more time consuming - scrolling through iTunes for the duration of each song in order to find what you next want to listen to, or getting up once for about 20 second every 20 minutes to flip a record over?

3. The Sound Quality IS Better!
It really is, and I'm so glad this argument proved true once I started listening to vinyl. Everything is noticeably clearer and sharper, especially if I have the tracks on iTunes or CD as well and compare them. The constituent parts, individual instruments etc. become a lot clearer and more obvious (even if my record player's built in speaker does lack a lot of bass) yet the tracks seems stronger and more vivid as a whole for it. It's wonderful. I bought a 7" reissue of The Smiths' "The Boy With The Thorn In His Side" from the sublime Banquet Records in Kingston, slapped it on when I got home and the the sound that came out just blew me off my feet! It's a song I've listened to umpteen times, and also a song which I've always loved for the sound and production; but on vinyl it was just made even more brilliant. So much richer and more vibrant, more alive and brimming with SOMETHING which I just can't put my finger on. And the romantic crackle of old vinyl is something that just melts my heart so often. It's interesting to think that loving that crackling sound is something which people for whom vinyl was/is the primary/sole means of listening to music don't really experience because it's totally normal to them. But for me it's something nostalgic and romantic which logically I guess shouldn't colour how I treat the music. But it does, and I'm glad.

4. I Think About The Structure of The Records More
I'm a huge lover of slapping on an album and listening to it the whole way through as one piece of work, but it's sometimes a lot more difficult to do that when I've got iTunes in front of me or the CD case, and I'm glancing at how long each track is, what the name of each one is, when the singles you like are coming up etc. And it's easy to just pause it, toddle off to do something and then come back and pick up where you left off. But when I listen to an album on vinyl, there's none of that. It all flows seamlessly, and it feels so much more adventurous. It's another thing that makes it quite liberating to own and use. You get more lost in the whole thing, you don't always know exactly what track it is or what it's called, which makes you even more keen to listen. I experienced this when I got a vinyl copy of The National's 2002 album Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers and I just loved fading into a whole new set of songs that I had no idea about, unaware of what was what and where was where. This album also highlighted the significance that the final track on the first side of an LP can have. The first side ends with the song "Murder Me Raechel", one of the most thunderous and heavy moments on a record that veers from the most tentative, fragile moments imaginable to heartwrenching screams and guitar thumps. When it finishes and there's silence halfway through the album before you turn it over, I was just left blown away by that song and how it marked a sort of peak in the album; and it contrasts wonderfully with the much gentler track which follows.

5. I Get to Go Into Record Shops!
Proper independent record stores are so much better than entertainment franchises like HMV. I'm not going to hate on HMV because there's plenty good to be said for it, but when it comes to buying independent music, independent stores are (surprisingly) the best place to go; specifically for vinyl in this case, seeing as pretty much nowhere else sells vinyl any more. It cwas quite daunting when I first started frequenting record stores as you get the feeling that these beardy music fan boys behind the desk are looking down on you and judging you for every record you linger on, but once I got over that I discovered that most record store staff are actually reall, really nice guys who are genuinely glad to see you in their store; not because you're spending money, but because you're buying new music! I've had some great chats with record store workers and most of them really know their stuff - who's who, what's where. And then you find out about gigs, in store performances and other cool stuff like that. I've already mentioned the wonderful Banquet Records in Kingston, and they have the wonderful habit of putting rather cheery and personal notes into anything you order from them. You don't get that from the fat girl in HMV.

6. It's A Conversation Starter.
As you can imagine, very few people my age (18) have record players nowadays, and I'm certainly the only one of the vast majority of friendship groups who uses one. So raising the topic and talking about the benefits of it, and subsequently talking generally about music, is something I really enjoy. I especially enjoy the fact that it's given me a lot to talk about with my parents, my dad especially, as well as my brother. As soon as I got my record player I raided my dad's huge stacks of vinyl and picked out stuff in their that I liked the look of, already knew about or that he recommended. It was so interesting listening to him talk about when and where he bought stuff, why he bought it, what he remembers about it, things like that. I hope I'm like that with my kids one day!

I understand that buying a record player sadly won't be for everyone. But if you're really into music and love it lots then I thoroughly recommend it. It's been great just over the last few months and I hope I have many years of record spinning to come!