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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A unique work of genius, October 25, 2003
I remember getting this album when it first came out, a bit nervously. And when Speedway ended I jumped up and cheered in an empty room, unable to stop myself. It wasn't the Smiths. It didn't matter. The sound and the lyrics are strange, detached -- Morrissey tells the stories but doesn't live in them the way he did on Meat is Murder, for example -- and yet compelling. The professional outsider tells his stories with sympathy and intelligence and passion. We end with the most affecting moment of closeness anywhere in Morrissey's work: "In my own sick way/I've always stayed true to you." I still listen to it, and it still makes me want to stand up and cheer.
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16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent equal to what was already Moz's masterpiece, June 30, 2001
After some false starts and ill-advised intents to shock with his music, Morrissey at last found a good reason to have left his seminal rock band The Smiths with 1992's YOUR ARSENAL. In fact, the album was successful enough to win Moz an audience in America, who had only existed as a cult following to the Smiths. While YOUR ARSENAL was hailed as a masterpiece almost the minute it came out, the big question was what to do for an encore. The answer was simple: come up with an album that's just as good as ARSENAL but certainly not the equal of that musical miracle. Hence, 1994's VAUXHALL & I. Ever since his days with the Smiths, Morrissey has never been afraid to acknowledge his inspiration in 1970s glam rock, and YOUR ARSENAL was like his version of ZIGGY STARDUST. But he probably realized he wasn't a kid anymore, for VAUXHALL & I is from a man who's now in his mid-30s, and is possibly bidding farewell to the confrontational image that was in his Smiths days. Starting out immediately with the mellow "Now My Heart Is Full", this song shows that Moz is beginning to grow up, but not by selling out. The sounds on VAUXHALL are mainstream, but the lyrics are anything but. "Lifeguard Sleeping, Girl Drowning", "The Lazy Sunbathers" and the closing eyebrow-raiser "Speedway" (are the rumors about Moz being a racist true?!!) would certainly not have found its way on top 40 radio in America, but in England it might have, for their idea of pop music is something a bit more advanced than ours. Speaking of which, one song off VAUXHALL almost did capture the American public. "The More You Ignore Me, The Closer I Get" just barely missed the top 40 here, and was deservedly Morrissey's biggest hit in America with or without the Smiths. The lyrics are still distinctively Morrissey, but something about this song makes it easier for the uninitiated to accept. Other modern-day Moz classics include "I Am Hated For Loving", "Used To Be A Sweet Boy", "Billy Budd" (another baiter for those who question Moz's sexual preference) and "Why Don't You Find Out For Yourself". At this point in Morrissey's career, he was quite prolific with the wonderful YOUR ARSENAL following the lame KILL UNCLE (1991) by only about 15 months. VAUXHALL & I would be followed by the progressive-rock-influenced SOUTHPAW GRAMMAR (1995) by about the same time length. But after 1997's MALADJUSTED, Morrissey fell silent after his record company dropped him, and since then he has been without a home in the business. Last I heard, he was still shopping around for a label, so while it may be now 4 years since the last Morrissey record, we'll still have wonders like ARSENAL and VAUXHALL to keep us company until Moz's newest pop masterpiece is unveiled.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Mature, yes; trendy, no, August 23, 1998
By A Customer
Certain people I know have slagged this album for not being as "energetic" as SOUTHPAW GRAMMAR and MALADJUSTED, and for me it's all the better for it. If one subscribes to the biography theory of art, then the losses Morrissey was experiencing in his life (two close friends of his died around this time) during this album's creation drove him to brilliance. Highlights range from the "riff-oriffic" lead single "The More You Ignore Me, the Closer I Get" to the charging, moody "Spring-Heeled Jim" to the wistfully beautiful "Why Don't You Find Out for Yourself" (who else can get away with a line like "I've been stabbed in the back/so many times before/I don't have any skin/but that's just the way it goes"?) and the chillingly angry album closer, "Speedway." I hold this album to be the pinnacle of Morrissey's solo career, and hope he may again return to this level of heart-felt brilliance...everything he has released on album since (note I said albums; his last ten b-sides have been better than most of these album tracks, from "Nobody Loves Us" to "Now I Am a Was") has felt tossed off, and that's more than a shame -- the early Morrissey would not much care for the 1998 version.
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