That’s Mr. Johnny Fucking Marr to you
Since most of you are attending the concert for The Killers and “Special guest” Johnny Marr (in my opinion should be the other way around), and I know that most of you might not be familiarized with the excellent, deep, diverse and long career of Johnny Fucking Marr, me and my best friend Alexis (El Vago) spend some time (probably more than we should have) curating a few songs from what the different phases of Marr’s carrer. These are only a few of our favorite songs and I hope you enjoy them as much as we do, so you wont go to the concert thinking “who’s this guy”?
If you’re more interested in his career, you can reed this article in Wikipedia about his work, or this resume in ALLMUSIC, hell, if you are really interested you can even read his autobiography.
The Smiths
Johnny Marr’s mythic career started with the legendary band “The Smiths” (as you can tell by the shirts that I wear, I also like them a lot). He acted as the guitarist, co-songwriter and half of the soul of the band, creating music that will last forever in the hearts of cringy teenagers (such as myself). These are two songs that are a must and most likely will be played in the concert.
1. This Charming Man
I like the Wikipedia description, where it states that the song is defined by Marr’s jangle pop guitar riff and Morrissey’s characteristically morose lyrics, which revolve around the recurrent Smiths themes of sexual ambiguity and lust (ain’t we all?)
A little video of Johnny Marr explaining the main riff in the song
2. Please, Please, Please, let me get what I want
Short yet beautiful and powerful, this song reminde us of a claim that we all have made.
An excellent performance of Johnny Marr of the same song
Bonus: Heaven Knows I’m miserable Know.
If you’re a grad student, you’ll get it.
80-90’s collaborations
After the Smiths split in 1987, Marr participated in a shit ton of collaborating with big names, such as The Pretenders, The The, Billy Duffy, Pet Shop Boys, Bryan Ferry, Billy Bragg, Kirsty MacColl, Black Grape, Jane Birkin, Talking Heads, and Beck. These are our favorites of that period.
3. The Talking Heads - [Nothing but] flowers
This is my absolute favorite of that era. Right after the split with The Smiths, Marr was invited to collaborate with The Talking Heads, another mythic group in their last studio album: “Naked”, which is a little bit weird but I like it. Marr’s post-The Smith’s sound is all over this song, and his contribution is so unique that when you hear more recent versions of this song from David Byrne (former The Talking Heads singer), its just not the same. Note: If you’re from the Plant Sciences department, you will love this song as well.
4. The The - The Beat(en) Generation
Even if this song was written in the late 80’s, it still resonates with so much true an energy nowadays. Matt Jhonson (The The’s singer, songwriter, leader, and basically everything) and Marr met even before The smiths era, and according to Marr’s autobiography, they made a deal in colaborating in some albums. And from that collaboration appeared two albums: Mind Bomb (1989, which is an absolutely fucking mind bomb) and Dusk (1992). It is very difficult to select a representative song out of this collaboration, but I think this one might do. If you have time, I recommend both albums.
Bonus: Pretenders - Windows Of The World (1988)
In this video you can see a rather young Jhonny Marr (almost immediately after The Smiths split) playing with The Pretenders.
Electronic
Electronic, according to Wikipedia was an English alternative dance supergroup formed by singer/guitarist Bernard Sumner (of New Order) and guitarist Johnny Marr (of The Smiths). They co-wrote the majority of their output between 1989 and 1998. These are our favorites from that era:
5. Get the message
6. Tighten Up
Collaborations post 2000
The most remarkable collaboration of this era are with Modest Mouse (MM), The Cribs and 7 Worlds Collide. “It’s perhaps no coincidence that when he was with The The, Modest Mouse and The Cribs, all three scored the biggest albums of their careers” (guitar.com). It’s interesting to mention that Marr claims that Isaac Brock, the singer and leader of MM is “the greatest lyricist I’ve ever worked with”. Some remarkable songs of this period are:
7. Modest Mouse - Dashboard
Bonus: Noel Gallagher & Johnny (Fucking) Marr - Champagne Supernova
Solo career
After having so many collaborations, Jhonny finally stepped up and became the forntman of their own bands. He started with Johnny Marr and the Healers (2000–present), where they released the album Boomslang, and now he’s the front man of Jhonny Marr and his musicians (hahaha), where he has released four studio albums: The Messenger (2013), Playland (2014), Call the Comet (2018) and his most recent album Fever Dreams Pts 1-4 (2022), which he might be playing in this concert. This might be the most complicated part of this post, because the man has done a lot of interesting stuff that is impossible to summarize in only two songs.
9. Easy Money
This song is easy money, so good!
10. Night and Day
This is a really good song to listen to be in the party mood and to slam against each other in the moshpit.
Bonus: Johnny Marr and Maxine Peake - The Priest
Marr collaborated with british actress Maxine Peake in making a song about the homeless in britain. It’s a relly interesnting song and worth of mention.
Movies music
As if it wasn’t everything, this guy also makes music for movies! He has collaborated in several ocassions with the legendary Hans Zimmer, and he’s actively participated in the soundtracks for movies such as Inception (2010), The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) and No Time to Die (2021).
11. Billie Eilish - No Time To Die
Here is Jhonny Marr performing with Billie Eilish on the main song for the James Bond movie no time to die (2021).
The Killers + Johnny Marr
As these guys have been touring together, they go on stage to perform some songs from The Smiths, something that we can expect in this concert.
12. The Smiths - What She said
13. The Smiths - This Charming man
14. The Smiths - You Just Haven’t Earned It Yet Baby
I hope with this list of songs you might be able to enjoy a little bit more the first part of the concert and understand me when I scream “That’s Johnny Fucking Marr” durin the concert. Cheers!