Morrissey A-Z: "Hold On To Your Friends"

I think Vauxhall and I is the best studio album Morrissey has ever done, including the ones he did with The Smiths. It sits firmly on my list of the greatest albums of all time.
 
Probably my favourite Morrissey song, great life advice. It has a special significance for me. For ages I ignored the song for no particular reason, when I finally got round to listening to it it came as something of a revelation.
 
I think Vauxhall and I is the best studio album Morrissey has ever done, including the ones he did with The Smiths. It sits firmly on my list of the greatest albums of all time.
I suspect you may be correct there Gregor Samsa. If this isn’t the The Smiths/Morrissey album that I listen to the most, it must surely be up there in the top three. It is also the only Morrissey album that I can get away with playing in the background when non-Morrissey-fan friends visit – anything else and they tend to roll the eyes… ‘not bloody Morrissey again’. I of course relent, after all, I want to hold onto them…
 
I can see how some would wonder why he chose this as a single, and that’s understandable. But at the same time, I feel it would be criminal to not release it as a single and just leave as an album track, it’s that good.

The rich layered texture and tones of the acoustics and distorted guitars is really wonderful, a beautiful balance of warm and aggressive. And I love when the song bursts with those backing vocals choir like. Lovely lovely lovely. The mood of it makes me imagine what would happen if Joni Mitchell and Marc Bolan had gotten together to write a song.


“Resist - or move on
Be mad, be rash
Smoke and explode
Sell all of your clothes
Just bear in mind:
There just might come a time

When you need some friends”


💜


think it’s nice to hear this ...



In a 1994 interview to Details magazine, Morrissey said of this song

"It was written about somebody I know in relation to their treatment toward me. (...) It is a lack of trust. I'm simply waiting for people to do something damaging. And they inevitably do."

http://www.passionsjustlikemine.com/lyrics/moz-hotyf.htm


makes me think of Found Found Found and You’re Gonna Need Someone On Your Side.
 
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What can really be said? It'll be difficult to cough up insight about most of the Vauxhall tracks, as perfection hardly needs analysis. I always thought it was curious how similar the music of "Hold Onto Your Friends" is to the outro of "Pretty Girls Make Graves." Intentional or not, I consider this the closest thing (along with "Let Me Kiss You") to what a good, modern Smiths song may have sounded like had they never broken up.

The lyric employs one of my favorite Morrissey tricks, wherein he knowingly admonishes the subject for things of which he's clearly guilty himself.
 
In a 1994 interview to Details magazine, Morrissey said of this song

"It was written about somebody I know in relation to their treatment toward me. (...) It is a lack of trust."

Sounds like someone bummed him too hard and didn’t want to share the safe word!
 
What can really be said? It'll be difficult to cough up insight about most of the Vauxhall tracks, as perfection hardly needs analysis. I always thought it was curious how similar the music of "Hold Onto Your Friends" is to the outro of "Pretty Girls Make Graves." Intentional or not,

I get the feeling Alain was listening to a lot of Smiths when writing songs for this album, you can also hear it in Ignore Me and WDYFOFYourself, especially the earlier guitar version.

I consider this the closest thing (along with "Let Me Kiss You") to what a good, modern Smiths song may have sounded like had they never broken up.

The lyric employs one of my favorite Morrissey tricks, wherein he knowingly admonishes the subject for things of which he's clearly guilty himself.

don’t we all? :oops:
 
"...don't feel so ashamed
To have friends"

Indefinable for me, but this line has it all - I remember feeling frozen to the spot when I first heard it.

You preach what you need to hear. Especially true for Morrissey in this instance.
 
Great song, possibly one of my favourite Morrissey songs. I used to be part of a very explosive friendship group, and I was generally the one trying to make peace between the sides. This song meant a lot to me back then, and again now, with lockdown and everything.
 
I think Vauxhall and I is the best studio album Morrissey has ever done, including the ones he did with The Smiths. It sits firmly on my list of the greatest albums of all time.
I do like it but, it’s not my favourite Morrissey album.
I also think there are a couple of other artists who have bettered Vauxhall (IMO)
Still a top LP but I know it better
 
What can really be said? It'll be difficult to cough up insight about most of the Vauxhall tracks, as perfection hardly needs analysis. I always thought it was curious how similar the music of "Hold Onto Your Friends" is to the outro of "Pretty Girls Make Graves." Intentional or not, I consider this the closest thing (along with "Let Me Kiss You") to what a good, modern Smiths song may have sounded like had they never broken up.

The lyric employs one of my favorite Morrissey tricks, wherein he knowingly admonishes the subject for things of which he's clearly guilty himself.

I think, I hope, he's singing about himself.

On the Marr side, the closest thing to a new Smiths song is probably either Hi Hello or New Town Velocity.
 
I do like it but, it’s not my favourite Morrissey album.
I also think there are a couple of other artists who have bettered Vauxhall (IMO)
Still a top LP but I know it better
I didn’t say it was top of my list of favorite albums. ;)
 
Simply one of the best Morrissey songs ever. Insanely relatable and as is typical for Morrissey's lyrics, I've just never heard a song about this before.

The guitar playing, everything...it's all so beautiful and intricate. The song just always makes me stop dead in my tracks, like most of the songs on Vauxhall. How did they get this album to sound the way it does?? How??
 
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