Barbarism Begins At Home

"I came up with the riff the day that Troy Tate came up to Manchester to meet with us. It was almost because our first proper producer was about to arrive that I thought we needed a new song, maybe, and it was a sunny afternoon. We played it in the daytime, which was unusual because there were these machinists working downstairs on the floor below, and we wouldn't want to be working stuff out at high volume. There was no drums there, it was just me and Andy jamming like we used to when we were 14 or 15. I know a lot of fuss has been made and Andy is, quite rightly, proud of that bassline, but, personally, harmonically I don't think it comes anywhere near Andy's other stuff. 'Nowhere Fast', 'That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore', 'The Headmaster Ritual', all tower above it. It was one of those things where it was a good idea at the time, but later, as we played it, I didn't think it really represented the band. The overall thing, all of it, was a little bit corny."

"Barbarism Begins At Home is a bit naff. I don't like the tune - there's no emotion in it."

"With 'Barbarism Begins At Home,' a lot's been made of the funky aspect of the bassline, but that track harks back to what I was doing with Andy before The Smiths. I guess it came out of this love of retro kind of James Brown records, and things like Rip Rig & Panic and The Pop Group. That period of anemic, underfed white funk. It's me and Andy being townies in Manchester, liking a bit of the American No-Wave thing. James Chance, I guess."

-Johnny Marr

I have uploaded a Guitar Pro file here(right click to save).


Here are the scans from the Meat Is Murder songbook:




Thanks to Ted Maul for these scans.


Here's another great version by Daniel Earwicker:




Here's juttkeys:




Here's buckleyboyben:




Here's IFoughtTheLaw369 with two full-length versions on guitar and bass:






Here's sonofdrcross on bass:




Here's a full-length version from nicknoh69:




Awesome acoustic version by WilliamFs11:




Here's lunachangue with his Ric 330:




Here's barjabulon:




Here's davidguitarist91 on his Les Paul:

Stretch Out And Wait

"'Stretch Out' I think, is in open G tuning: D,G,D,G,B,G."

- Johnny Marr

From the quote above, Marr says he 'thinks' the song is in open G, but the general consensus is that it's actually in open E. For instance, Headmaster Ritual is definitely in open E, and Johnny would sometimes play Stretch Out And Wait immediately afterwards, on the same guitar.

I do have a Guitar Pro tab file that I have uploaded here(right click to save as). This is a really accurate transcription to my ears, in the correct tuning(!). marrzipan also transcribed his version and I have included it in this same zip file. These versions are both in open E, but they are both different.

Here is the complete score from the "Louder Than Bombs:Off The Record" book:














Here's marrzipan's version. This is one of the very few versions of the song on youtube that are played in open E, as marr played it. So cool!




Here's a very nice acoustic version by 3rd Monty Effects:


Here's a cool cover by theglimpse, who also plays the song in open E:




Here's dhowellbassist on a ric 360:




barjabulon covers a short snippet here, very well:




And here is the Smiths playing live on June 29, 1985. Here we can see that Marr has his telecaster tuned up to open E:

Girl Afraid

"I had just got back from New York and was obsessed with Little Richard. I just kept thinking, 'What'd sound like Little Richard on guitar?', which is how I came up with it."

"I started to think about piano melodies. For example, Girl Afraid, which is an extra track on the Heaven Knows single; I started off playing 'pidgin' piano in the studio one day and transferred it to guitar. When I wrote the song I was conscious that it should have a fast New Orleans piano part. It turned into a Kinks-style, real 60's erratic drum beat bop, which is fine but it started off as a piano part!"

- Johnny Marr

Girl Afraid is one of my favorite Smiths songs. The intro is just jaw-dropping in it's virtuosity, and I love the way it just ramps up from an awesome intro, to a menacing verse riff, to the amazing harmonized chorus chords/riffs. It's like packing 3-4 songs worth of great riffs into a single 2 minute song.

I have uploaded 2 Guitar Pro tab files here.


Here is the complete score from the "Louder Than Bombs:Off The Record" book:














Here are the chords from the Complete Chord Songbook:





Here's Daniel Earwickers first attempt, on a Rick 12 string:




Here's his second, which he does in more of an "instructional" style. Really cool! We could definately use some more videos like this:




ResidentSmith78 does a good attempt here. It's rough in a few places, but one thing to note is that he starts the riff at the 3rd fret, which is what Johnny does.




Here is a really awesome version by markpaterson, on a strat through a JC-120:




Here's a full length(!) cover by isisluna23:




adameater does a slowed down, step by step lesson here:



His full version is here:




moz77 does a slowed down version here:




barjabulon does a great job here, and the camera angle is perfect:



Here's his slowed-down tutorial of the intro:




Masterful version by johnnymare:




And here is viniciuskiko, with a cool version of Rourke's bass part:

Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others

"The song, as it was, just faded in, so i thought we had to do something a bit more interesting. Basically, I put all the reverb on the drums up so it sounded like it was coming in from some large hall, then faded it down really quickly. Then I took all the reverb back off and faded it up again. The effect was supposed to be like the musics in a hall somewhere, it goes away, then it comes back and it's nice and clean and dry. A bit like opening a door, closing it, then opening it again and walking in."

-Stephen Street

"Other times, I'd drop off a cassette of some music at Morrissey's house. He lived about two miles away, and I'd ride round there on my Yamaha DT 175 and post them through his letterbox. 'Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others' was done that way. All the music for that came in one wave while I was watching telly with the sound down."

"Some things just drop out of the heavens, and 'Some Girls...' was one of them. It's a beautiful piece of music."

"I think I used a Rickenbacker 330 with delay on and a Strat for the outro. A lot of chorus and delay, I think."


- Johnny Marr

This one has a lot of renditions on youtube, which is great. It's a challenging part, but it's something that once you hear, you want to learn... at least I feel that way. A lot of people have taken it on, so I have posted as many good versions as I could find

Also, there are 2 Guitar Pro tab files I uploaded here(right click to save). One is for the live version, but it's not complete.

Daniel Cárdenas informed me that the Guitar Pro version posted here was in a weird tuning(second string was tuned up 1/2 step) and was in the wrong key. He transcribed the song into the correct key, and I transposed the fretboard positions into something that I think is more accurate. I moved the figures down one fret, which eliminates 1st fret barre chords and utilizes more open strings and open chord positions. I have left the older version in the rar file for comparison purposes. If you can help improve it further, let me know.


Here is a scan from Guitare Xtreme, a French magazine:



Thanks to reader Dupont Dupond for the scan.


Here are the scans from the Complete Chord Dictionary:




Here are the scans from the Queen Is Dead piano songbook with guitar chord boxes:








Daniel Earwicker's first attempt:

His second attempt, this time a fairly definitive cover of the 'live' version:

tomscotland on a strat:

goleirinho, whose version is the first left-handed video I have posted!

elvismarinho's cover:

and here's Stevebanany:

smitestyle is next:

sonofdrcross again does both guitar and bass really well:

Here's buckleyboyben:




Here's another version by barjabulon:




Here's Salvia02390 with his take on the live version:




Here's two spot on guitar and bass covers by johnnymare:






Here's a great bass cover by my friend John Biscuiti:

And lastly, here's The Smiths at their final show. Johnny plays it, um, like a ringin' a bell. Just totally effortless and smooth, it's

amazing.

The Headmaster Ritual

The nuts and bolts of The Headmaster Ritual came together during the first album, and I just carried on playing around with it. It started off as a very sublime sort of Joni Mitchell-esque chord figure; I played it to Morrissey but we never took it further. Then, as my life got more and more intense, so did the song. The bridge and the chorus part were originally for another song, but I put them together with the first part. That was unusual for me; normally I just hammer away at an idea until I've got a song. It's in open D turning, with a capo at the second fret. Again, it was heavily overdubbed. It was a very exciting period for me - realising I could hijack 16 tracks all for myself.

I wrote 'The Headmaster Ritual' on acoustic. It's in an open-D tuning with a capo at the 2nd fret. I fancied the idea of a strange Joni Mitchell tuning, and the actual progression is like what she would have done had she been an MC5 fan or a punk rocker. I knew pretty much what every guitar track would be before we started. There are two tracks of Martin D-28, and the main riff is two tracks of Rickenbacker. I wasn't thinking specifically of the Beatles' 'Day Tripper' -- even though it sounds like it -- but I did think of it as a George Harrison part. The Rickenbacker belonged to Phil Manzanera of Roxy Music; I'm told that it was originally owned by Roger McGuinn. All the guitars are in open tuning, except for one of the chorus guitars, which is done on an Epiphone in Nashville tuning, capoed at the 2nd fret.

I've got an Epiphone Coronet with one pickup, and I string it with the high strings from a 12-string set. It's a really zingy, trebly guitar. I used that on a lot of things that people think are 12-string, like the end of 'The Headmaster Ritual'.

For my part, 'The Headmaster Ritual' came together over the longest period of time I've ever spent on a song. I first played the riff to Morrissey when we were working on the demos for our first album with Troy Tate. I nailed the rest of it when we moved to Earls Court.

'The Headmaster Ritual is one of my favorite guitar tracks.I wrote it over a period of two years, always looking for the next section I needed. I saw the Radiohead version, yeah. I showed Ed O'Brien the chords, but maybe he was looking out the window!

- Johnny Marr

First of all, here is a fairly recent video of Johnny playing the song on his old '85 Les Paul Standard:


I've located a Guitar Pro file for this that is pretty accurate, and I have uploaded it here.



Here are the scans from the Smiths Best Complete Score:













Here are the scans from the Complete Chord Dictionary:





Here are the scans from the Meat Is Murder piano songbook with guitar chords, for completists. Thanks to Ted Maul for these scans:









Daniel Earwicker's first take on the song:




And his second:




djs1986, on guitar and bass:




Here's Radioheads version:




Here's eluedy with his version, my favorite of these.




Here is chiasson65, with an amazing bass cover:




Here's WilliamFs11 on acoustic, in open E. Stunning.




Here's an awesome version by markpaterson on a Epiphone Elite Riviera through a JC-120:




Here's adameater doing the chorus part on acoustic:




Here's PinkMoonchild08 on a tele, appropriately phased-out:




Here's nicknoh69 on a goldtop les paul. He really nails it:




dhowellbassist does another great cover here:




abyface does a great full-length version:




Here's daveyc25 on a Ric 330:




Here's barjabulon with a close-up view:




Here's ecb97tp on acoustic:




Here's stereovaritone on a red hollowbody:




Here's Jonasmacca on a tele: