Maladjusted - Morrissey > Reviews > Maladjusted Indeed

Author's product rating:   

Originality	Average
Lyrics	Standard
Quality and consistency of tracks	One hit and lots of B-sides
How does it compare to the artist's other releases	Unmemorable
Value for Money	Satisfactory

Advantages:	A few decent songs for fans
Disadvantages:	A very mediocre record

Recommend to potential buyers:

no

Full review

Recorded quickly and released in 1997 with little fanfare, Maladjusted is by some considerable distance the most half-arsed and mediocre collection of songs ever put out under Morrissey's name. Morrissey doesn't seem especially inspired by the ho-hum music he is forced to work with here and everything, including the lyrics and artwork, are below his usual standards and attention to detail.

He regrouped several years later and returned to form, but Maladjusted seemed easy to portray as the beginning of a terminal decline at the time. The record has a homemade, knocked together sound and doesn't repay a repeat listen. Reviews were mixed, with some ok ones, but I believe Maladjusted is close to being a terrible album. Only one or two bright spots save it from being a total waste of time.

The Songs

Maladjusted

The title track is a mildly diverting and sprawling epic with wild amped guitars and a sample from the film 'Cockleshell Heroes' at the start. Morrissey's lyrics, like the music, are all over the place with no real narrative.

A 'Stevenage overspill' and 'low cut blouses' suggest the song (told in the first person) might be about a prostitute. It doesn't really go anywhere interesting or get out of first gear. Like the album as a whole it's all a bit flat. 6/10

Alama Matters

'Alma mater'. Get it? Released as a single to promote Maladajusted, Alma Matters is a nice enough pop song with a chorus and a mildly catchy guitar riff and some more obviously Moz lyrics and preoccupations than some of the other songs on this record;

'So the life I have made
May seem wrong to you
But, I've never been surer
It's my life to ruin
My own way'

Nothing remarkable though. 7/10

Ambitious Outsiders

A dank, threadbare and bleak piece of music is used by Morrissey to labouriously meditate on serial killers (my guess anyway) who move into your neighbourhood and keep the 'population low'.

Just the thing to pop on as you get ready to go out on a Saturday night! 5/10

Trouble Loves Me

Probably the best song on Maladjusted and the one tune that can stand alongside Morrissey's better solo work on albums and complilations like Vauxhall and I, Your Arsenal and Bona Drag.

The song has a deceptively languid but pleasant air as Morrissey, in a resigned manner, tells us that trouble will inevitably dog his every move despite his best efforts to avoid it. 8/10

Papa Jack

A complete waste of time. A spartan piece of music that sounds like it was knocked up by John Shuttleworth and Morrissey clearly couldn't be bothered to even pretend to be interested in it. Morrissey sings about someone (or something) all alone and in decline but you won't really care.

He could be singing about himself at the time but the use of the word 'Jack' as in Union Jack led to a possible interpretation of this song as being about Britain, which is a bit cheeky in my opinion, if true! 4/10

Ammunition

A decent enough song but nothing great. It has a few good guitar flourishes as Morrissey, in a pleasant mood in contast to his usual misanthropic mode, tells us that he has no time for revenge anymore and is happy with what he has 'found'.

Because Ammunition is not an obviously flat-out terrible song like other tunes on Maladjusted the temptation to overrate it slightly is there because of the competition it faces on this iffy album, and by giving it 7/10 I've probably done this. On Vauxhall and I or Your Arsenal, 'Ammunition' would probably be placed into the 'filler' category. 7/10

Wide To Recieve

Another pleasant song with nice backing vocals, a bit falsetto, this is very gentle and somewhat reminiscent of Hated For Loving on Vauxhall and I. Morrissey is 'wide to recieve' 'almost anything you'd care to give'. It's ok. Amusingly, Morrissey tells us that;

'I don't
Get along with myself
And I'm not too keen
On anyone else' 7/10

Roy's keen

With the slightly awful pun-title (Moz is a Manchester United fan), Morrissey, in a half crap and half enjoyable chirpy singalong tune, sings about a Jack the Lad window cleaner. There are numerous slightly dodgy double-entrendres but the song's general goodwill just about saves it from being completely dismissed.

Morrissey's usually sharp wit seems to be missing on much of Maladjusted and Roy's Keen is no different. 7/10

He Cried

Like the title track, He Cried tries to be a bit of an epic but the music just isn't up to scratch and, subsequently, the whole thing comes across as a trifle labourious and contrived. Like the album as a whole it just isn't good enough. Like many songs on Maladjusted the song lurches into different gears without ever meshing together or - most importantly - paying off the listener with a great hook or chorus or interesting section.

The end result is all rather bland. 6/10

Satan Rejected My Soul

The final song is confirmation that Morrissey needed to go home, have a cup of tea, and rethink his career. It is just awful. It tries to be all shimmering guitars and poppy but it's all so clumsy and heavy-handed. The idea of Morrissey's soul being rejected by the devil, Moz standing there with a suitcase after having the door to Hell shut on him, is reasonably amusing but I really hate this song.

It's a blah b-side and nothing more. 3/10

He turned it around again in the end, but Maladjusted was a seriously subpar album that found Morrissey, and his musicians, bereft of ideas. It sounds like something recorded over a weekend and chucked out for the sake of it. Really, it should have been scrapped and its motley collection of ho-hum and sometimes dire songs put out as b-sides, perhaps on future releases.

Definitely the low-point of Morrissey's career, and thankfully, his recent material has been much more interesting and a vast improvement.

Maladjusted is a pedestrian record only for die-hard Morrissey fans and completists.