(Credits: Far Out / Apple Music / Soundcloud)
Wed 3 December 2025 15:30, UK
By now, it feels like there would be very little that Johnny Marr and Morrissey would ever agree on. Once the tightest of collaborators and most prolific of duos, the two men now don’t even interact beyond the occasional public spat.
It’s perhaps one of the biggest tragedies in music, wondering what the hell really happened to the band. As Morrissey has descended further and further into questionable politics and behaviour, it’s easy to understand now why Marr distances himself. But back in the late 1980s, when The Smiths quit when they were still really only just getting started, the swift collapse was a mystery.
The band only formed in 1982, but by 1987, it was all over, surely making them one of the most influential goddamn acts with one of the shortest life spans. At the time, the reason was chalked up to a personal one, although a clear answer never really came about. Marr claimed that Morrissey himself was planting articles in the press claiming the band were breaking up, meanwhile Morrissey started pouring his upset about the breakup into solo material.
It was a collapse that stood completely at odds with the beginning. Back in the golden days, the two would sit together and write hit after hit, once famously writing ‘There Is A Light That Never Goes Out’, ‘Frankly Mr Shankly’ and ‘I Know It’s Over’ in one day. They were a musical team unlike any other, and then it all crashed down.
However, in both of their reflections on the band in the years that passed, a musical tether remains in the form of a mutual favourite song. As they both considered the band’s discography, the two estranged artists on either side of the acrimonious split still deeply love one tune: ‘Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me’.
“Last time I met Morrissey, he said it was his favourite Smiths song,” Marr said in a 1993 interview. Reflecting on a final conversation with his old friend, he added, “He might be right.”
Clearly, he thought Morrissey was right, as in the years since, Marr has often mentioned the 1987 track as his top pick of the band’s work, calling it “the best thing we’d done”.
“I’m often asked what’s my favourite Smiths song,” Marr said at a Q&A for the release of his memoir, Set the Boy Free. Typically, it’s a question artists avoid, but he’s always had his answer.
“I’ve always been able to say it’s ‘Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me’ because I think it captured all those things that are transcendent, esoteric, that spiritual quality that means so much to me,” he said, adding, “That was captured not just by me but by every member of the band.”
It’s not just that the song captures that mutual feeling, but the fact that Morrissey loves it too surely means that the magic endures in some way, still tethering the two men together, even as they stray further and further from the friends they used to be.
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