Johnny Marr reveals the first single he ever bought
Johnny Marr’s epiphanic music moment came early. At just age ten, the future Smiths guitarist purchased his first single from a bargain shoebox in a furniture store and uncovered a life-changing world of glam rock.
A young Marr picked up a 45 record, not knowing what it was, entirely because of the picture of Marc Bolan on the label. Discussing the moment, he later told Pitchfork: “I figured I was getting more bang for my buck! I fell in love with that image. The song was ‘Jeepster’, and I didn’t have to learn to love it because those thunking guitar riffs were so great.”
‘Jeepster’ was released in 1971 and featured on T. Rex’s pioneering glam-rock album Electric Warrior. It’s a guitar-led love song based around the metaphor of the singer being a “Jeepster” for his girl’s love. The instrumentals are borrowed from Howlin’ Wolf’s 1962 track ‘You’ll Be Mine.’
The life-changing experience of listening to one T. Rex track led Marr to spend all of his money on buying singles, a habit he says hasn’t really left him. Neither has his love for T. Rex, which he recalls that when ‘Metal Guru’ was released from the band’s 1972 album The Slider, he was “knocked sideways”.
Marr said: “Hearing it for the first time was one of those things that can only be described as transcendent – people who’ve had those moments with rock music will know what I’m talking about. It’s not something you can get from anything else.”
T. Rex played the track live on Top of the Pops in 1972. In the performance, Bolan and his bandmates don bright, glittery outfits and long hair as they command their instruments with ease. Marr recalls how the performance stunned him as a child: “I got on my pushbike, aged ten, and rode and rode for miles until I got lost in this park in the early hours of the morning,” he said. “It really affected me that deeply. That feeling was something I wanted to create in music.”
Marr continues: “By this time, I was already trying to hold some chords down on the guitar. I was very serious about it. I had a crummy acoustic that took a lot of love and dedication to play, but I never had to be told to practice. I never had a lesson.”
Marr’s early dedication led him to become one of the most celebrated guitarists of all time, gifting The Smiths listeners the same transcendent feeling T. Rex gave Marr. Though his style leaned towards melodic jangly riffs rather than thunking guitar, the influence of glam-rock and T. Rex on Marr remained. The band even wrote their 1986 pop indictment ‘Panic’ based on the track.
Marr told Les Inrockuptibles: “When we wrote ‘Panic’ Morrissey was obsessed with ‘Metal Guru’ and wanted to sing in the same style. He didn’t stop singing it in an attempt to modify the words of ‘Panic’ to fit the exact rhythm of ‘Metal Guru.’ He also exhorted me to use the same guitar break so that the two songs are the same!”
Listen to the first single Johnny Marr ever bought below.
