The Smiths drummer Mike Joyce hails Fontaines DC: “They can do no wrong”
It is remarkable to consider how, over four faultless studio albums and just five years in the mid-1980s, The Smiths changed the tide of rock music. While OMD and The Human League were tinkering with synthesisers, Morrissey and Johnny Marr teamed up for the guitar revolution. The move could be seen as bringing pop music back to basics, but this traditional rock formation was eminently pioneering thanks to Marr’s innovative string work and Morrissey’s poetic, angsty lyrics.
The seminal work of the Morrissey-Marr partnership tends to overshadow the contributions of The Smiths’ rhythm section. While it’s difficult to be so creatively abstract in the fields of bass guitar and drums in a jangle-pop foursome, one only has to listen to Andy Rourke’s blinding bassline in ‘Barbarism Begins at Home’ and Mike Joyce’s drumming in ‘How Soon is Now’ to realise The Smiths were solid in all four corners.
In a recent interview with Far Out Magazine, Joyce picked out the band’s 1984 single ‘How Soon is Now’ when asked what Smiths track he enjoyed performing the most. “I don’t actually play a lot of Smiths tracks [these days],” Joyce admitted. “But I suppose I did some work with Craig Gannon, the ex-Smith, for a short while, and we did play a couple of Smiths tunes. I think it would have to be [1984 single] ‘How Soon Is Now?’, just for the groove.”
“For a lot of The Smiths tunes, I wouldn’t say they’re very complex, but I don’t really sit on a groove with a lot of them because there’re a lot of guitar changes. So, in terms of sitting on the groove, ‘How Soon Is Now?’” he pondered. “In fact, Donald Johnson – one of Manchester’s finest drummers, from A Certain Ratio – he said to me, about that drumbeat, ‘Mike, I don’t think you realise just how cool that drumbeat is.’ I said, ‘Well, you know, I just played drums for what I thought worked for the track, and that’s all I can do.”
Later in the interview, as a connoisseur of post-punk sounds, Joyce discussed his thoughts on the current wave rock groups. As far as Joyce was concerned, one salient group hovers far above the rest.
“Fontaines DC. Absolutely in love with them,” Joyce revealed. “I went to see them live a number of years ago and just fell in love. It was the first time that I’ve had that experience since the Buzzcocks [in the mid-’70s]. There are a lot of great bands, but this was the one that really got me in the heart. Absolutely stunning records, stunning live… faultless, as far as I’m concerned.”
“There aren’t any bad Fontaines DC tracks; it’s just that I prefer some more than others,” he added. “As far as I’m concerned, they can do no wrong. I’ve become a bit obsessed with them. I was quite nervous when I went to see them live because I just thought, ‘Are they going to be able to come up to my expectations after listening to the album?’ And they certainly did; more than that. So Fontaines DC are right at the top of the pile.”
“The best thing to come out of Ireland since my mam and dad,” Joyce jovially concluded.
