Strangeways, Here We Come

The band recorded at the Wool Hall studios in Bath in March 1987. On the first night Marr, after drinking, voiced his frustration to Street about the expectation of a jingly-jangly sound. He went on to use fewer overdubs and more piano and keyboards, and the first song, A Rush and a Push and the Land Is Ours, has no guitar. Marr also arranged synthesised strings and saxophone, and Street programmed a drum machine. It is the only Smiths album on which Morrissey plays piano, on Death of a Disco Dancer. Marr dropped a metal-handled knife on his Telecaster on Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before. Girlfriend in a Coma, Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me and I Started Something I Couldn't Finish were the singles. The last two recordings, I Keep Mine Hidden and Work Is a Four-Letter Word, were made in May.

The title comes from Manchester's Strangeways Prison. The cover shows the actor Richard Davalos, looking at a cropped James Dean. Marr left in July, and the album came out after the band had split. It reached number two in Britain, where it stayed for 17 weeks, and 55 in the United States, and was certified gold in the UK in October 1987. Morrissey, Marr, Joyce and Street have all called it the band's best.

Rolling Stone's review called it one of their best and most varied records. The NME's Len Brown wrote that it was the balance of Morrissey's mortal humour and Marr's beatific melodies that established the band's final greatness. Douglas Wolk of Pitchfork described it as the Smiths' album about desperately trying not to repeat themselves, and found the autoharp on I Won't Share You thrilling. Ben Hewitt of The Quietus wrote in 2017 that it was his favourite Smiths studio album because it was the least traditionally Smiths-like.