On Tuesday, February 26, 2013, Titan Books will release the revised edition of Simon Goddard‘s Songs That Saved Your Life: The Art of The Smiths 1982-87, which provides details on every Smiths song as well as a history of the band and their performances, in Paperback and for Kindle.

Thanks to Titan Books, we have three exclusive excerpts from Songs That Saved Your Life, which you can read right here below. Take a read from the book and let us know what you think!

The 23-song Smiths compilation The Sound Of The Smiths is available in MP3 format for only $5 right now, so grab it for the discounted price you can listen to the songs while you read the book.

Johnny Marr, best known as the guitar player for The Smiths, whose hypnotic and intense sounds contributed to the success of that band and put them as one of the top of the New Wave heap during the 1980s, is releasing a solo album (his first) entitled The Messenger on February 26, 2013.

The Messenger is streaming online in full now and you can hear the full album right here below (via Rolling Stone).

Marr has also done stints in Modest Mouse, The The, and other bands, but it’s his work in The Smiths that he’s the best remembered and in which he made his mark. Employing a kind of single-note guitar playing with a cool ambiance throughout, he remains a high influence on musicians, and not just those in the New Wave and post-New Wave genre. Smiths frontman Morrissey’s songs, which were mostly about teenage angst on not a gnashing punk style, but more of a tender, aching sensitivity, were perfectly matched and meshed with Marr’s highly original guitar playing.

Morrissey has been in the news a lot lately after the former Smiths singer had to cancel a string of recent and upcoming tour dates after he was hospitalized late last month and diagnosed with a bleeding ulcer and Barrett’s esophagus. (There was also that awkward issue with David Bowie not allowing Morrissey to use a previously unseen private photograph of the two of them taken in 1992 for the upcoming reissue of Morrissey’s “The Last of the Famous International Playboys” single.)

The singer is expected to make a full recovery, and is booked for an appearance in LA for Jimmy Kimmel Live on February 26, with his return show scheduled for February 27 at the Balboa Theatre in San Diego, CA. But when he makes his way on March 1 to LA’s Staples Center, the sold-out show will reportedly be “meat-free,” with only vegetarian fare available and the McDonald’s outlets in the arena closed for the night.

Morrissey, a long-time vegetarian and animal rights advocate, will be donating a portion of ticket proceeds to animal rights group PETA (People For The Ethnical Treatment Of Animals). The performer released a statement saying, “I don’t look upon it as a victory for me, but a victory for the animals.”