The Smiths grace new (March) issue of Uncut

Most months, attracted by some tempting cover designs, I eagerly scour the three rockpop mags on the supermarket shelves - MOJO, Uncut and The Word. And, nearly every month, I put them back, unbought, disappointed by the small proportion of content that really interests me.

The new Uncut is a case in point. A spell-binding Smiths cover, and a promising long feature on their Top Songs. But, blow me, when I open the mag, I find it’s yet another of those self-serving celebfests – telling me what Rockaday Johnny or some such thinks about Girlfriend In A Coma and the rest. I just don’t wanna know, thanks.

The rest of the mag has some mouthwatering features – notably on new product by Lucinda Williams, Bowie, Bryan Ferry, The Fall, Nico, Soft Machine and Uncle Bobby D. All look eminently readable.

Problem is, alongside the Smiths cover feature, they occupy a total of about 26 pages - of 140 – less than 20%. The rest of the issue is devoted to the kind of poprock (and movies) which just doesn’t ring my bell.

So I passed on the new Uncut. Yet again. It fared rather better than the competition, though: I didn’t even bother picking up the new MOJO, with yet another (yawn…yawn) Beatles yawn...yawn...) cover (yawn…yawn…).


Gerry Smith