The Smiths - Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before

What this video is

Produced during the final weeks of The Smiths as a functioning band, this video captures the group's visual identity at its most codified: Salford locations, literary iconography, and the Morrissey lookalike motif crystallise years of carefully constructed imagery. The song was banned from UK daytime broadcast by the BBC following the Hungerford massacre of August 1987, making the video a document of censorship-era…

Why it matters

Represents the apex of UK indie pop's investment in literary-visual identity as a genre marker. The Smiths' music video output under Tim Broad defined a template — location-based, performance-free, auteur-inflected — that would influence British indie video production well into the Britpop era.…

The director

Tim Broad (1955–1993) was a British music video director and cinematographer. He was best known for his long-term creative collaboration with Morrissey, directing numerous videos including those for 'Suedehead', 'Everyday Is Like a Sunday', and 'November…