The guitarist who was “the biggest influence” on Johnny Marr
Manchester, as a city, has produced a ridiculous amount of beloved bands – everybody from Happy Mondays to Frank Sidebottom has made their mark on the city’s cultural landscape. Of all those bands, though, none seem to have as dedicated and melancholic a fanbase quite like The Smiths. The indie rock band has provided a soundtrack to the lives of angsty teenagers since their inception in 1982. At the forefront of the group was the songwriting partnership between lyricist Morrissey and guitarist Johnny Marr.
After their first meeting at a Patti Smith gig in Manchester, the pair eventually formed The Smiths a few years later. Marr had been teaching himself guitar by playing along to vinyl LPs for years prior, forming his first band at the age of 13. His jangly, upbeat playing style became synonymous with the sound of The Smiths, along with Morrissey’s crooning. The Smiths, in general, were an incredibly influential group, and Marr’s playing style, in particular, certainly changed the face of guitar-led indie rock indefinitely.
As anybody who has ever tried to learn the tab for The Smiths’ ‘What Difference Does it Make?’ will know, Marr is an incredibly skilled musician. His complicated riffs and effortlessly fast dances around the fretboard have wowed crowds and intimidated guitar players for years. The Mancunian guitarist has enjoyed a successful solo career since the breakup of the band in 1987, in addition to playing with the likes of Modest Mouse, The Cribs and briefly The Pretenders.
So, where does it all stem from? Some may assume Marr was beamed down from another planet where everybody has mastered the guitar and has also been able to maintain the same haircut for upwards of 40 years, but his playing style is actually more influenced by folk music than otherworldly powers.
Speaking to The Observer in 2022, Marr revealed that, despite his cultural awakening in the early punk scene, he is most influenced by Scottish folk guitarist Bert Jansch, though it was not immediately obvious. “The biggest influence on me would have to be Bert Jansch. When I was about 14, a friend of mine told me he’d got into this folk group called Pentangle. And I immediately thought: ‘Well, OK, I don’t need to know any more about that’”. An understandable reaction for a teenager in the midst of witnessing the punk explosion of 1976.
Continuing, Marr says: “When I was round at his house, he played me ‘Basket of Light’ by Pentangle. And I couldn’t believe what I heard, especially from the guitar: it was jazzy, it was bluesy and kind of funky, it went off all over the place. I could see straight away that there are people who are influenced by Bert Jansch that don’t even know it”. So, although a popular story is that Marr was inspired to start a band after seeing the Sex Pistols at Manchester Free Trade Hall, it turns out that a Bert Jansch record could be equally important to the formation of The Smiths.
Expanding on the Pentangle guitarist’s influence, Marr espoused, “Anyone who got into Nick Drake – totally into Bert. Anyone who got into Led Zeppelin’s acoustic stuff, Neil Young, Donovan, therefore The Beatles. No Bert Jansch, no Back to the Old House, no Unhappy Birthday, even my electric stuff. So it runs all the way through what I was doing in The Smiths. All roads lead back to Bert Jansch”.
There you have it; without the contributions of Bert Jansch, the sound of guitar-led indie rock today might be completely unrecognisable. Yet another reason not to write off folk music.
