The Smiths: Hatful Of Hollow [RHINO]

Why you'll love it

Sixteen songs, most of them in their urgent BBC Radio 1 session versions, plus "William, It Was Really Nothing" and "How Soon Is Now?" Hatful Of Hollow went to No. 7 in the U.K., stuck around the chart for 46 weeks, and Q later ranked it among the 100 greatest British albums ever.

This edition

• Rhino reissue (cat# 2564665882)
• 16 tracks: BBC session recordings plus the non-album singles and B-sides

About the album

The Smiths existed as a band for just five years, from their promising beginning in Manchester in 1982 to their fractious dissolution in 1987.

Pretty crazy, then, that the quartet had already amassed enough choice non-album singles, radio sessions and assorted other odds-'n'-sods by 1984 to put together a compilation as crucial to the complete Smiths experience as Hatful Of Hollow. But there you have it: the Smiths' run was a short one, but an inarguably good one. "William, It Was Really Nothing," "How Soon Is Now?," "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" and "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want" have certainly stood the test of time, in any case; most bands would kill to write one of those evergreens within the first two years of their existence, let alone all of them. And this would be why Hatful Of Hollow remains such a popular title four decades on.

Also at Kops: more The Smiths on vinyl · browse Alternative

Tracklist

Listen

On Rhino (cat# 2564665882), a reissue of the 1984 compilation.