The book draws on extensive archival research of print and audio-visual media as well as original interviews with the key figures, including Shane MacGowan, Johnny Marr, Kevin Rowland and Cait O'Riordan. Combining its assiduous research with fresh critical insights, the book offers new analyses of the musicians, as well as previously undocumented accounts of their lives and work. The book highlights the diversity and complexity of second-generation Irish identities and experience and details the diverse ways in which this generation has shaped popular music in England. Accessible and...

For five short years in the 1980s, a four-piece Manchester band released a collection of records that had undeniably profound effects on the landscape of popular music and beyond. Today, public and critical appreciation of The Smiths is at its height, yet the most important British band after The Beatles have rarely been subject to sustained academic scrutiny. Why pamper life's complexities?: Essays on The Smiths seeks to remedy this by bringing together diverse research disciplines to place the band in a series of enlightening social, cultural and political contexts as never before....

For five short years in the 1980s, a four-piece Manchester band released a collection of records that had undeniably profound effects on the landscape of popular music and beyond. Today, public and critical appreciation of The Smiths is at its height, yet the most important British band after The Beatles have rarely been subject to sustained academic scrutiny. Why pamper life's complexities?: Essays on The Smiths seeks to remedy this by bringing together diverse research disciplines to place the band in a series of enlightening social, cultural and political contexts as never before. Topics...