The Smiths' career coincided almost exactly with my time as a full-time student. Their first single came out half way through my gap year, and this last release came out two days before my MSc thesis was handed in. The South Bank Show profile of the band was first broadcast the night before I started my first proper job at the Manpower Services Commission.
I haven't listened to Strangeways for ages. As with Talking Heads: 77, if I reach for a Smiths album, it would almost always be the first one or Hatful of Hollow. There was a big feature in one of those grown-up music magazines (Mojo, Uncut or Word) a few years ago that sought to argue Strangeways could be their best album. But I suspect, cynically, that this was merely an excuse for putting The Smiths on the cover once again, hoping to incite a 'heated debate' in the letters pages among people who really ought to have something better to do with their time (like, errr, write blogs or something).
It certainly sounds more expensive than the early albums. I like Side 1, but Side 2 sags. Is that long intro to Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me really necessary? And is the sample of the mob/crowd in that intro lifted from the (shorter) intro to Rush's Witch Hunt (on Moving Pictures)? It sounds similar to me.
 MusicBrainz entry for this album
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