Smiths, I still love you

Twenty-three years after their demise, Morrissey and Johnny Marr join forces to lash out at the Tory government.

The news that both Johnny Marr and Morrissey expressed their dislike of the Coalition government has added some extra warmth to my day.

It may make little difference, but it's good to know that some "rockstars" or famous people are not 100% cocooned in their own comfortable bubble, haven't totally given up on using their brain cells and are still aware of the crap that goes on in the real world.

Johnny Marr kicked off the proceedings the other day when he rebuked David Cameron's professed admiration for The Smiths. In a twitter message, the guitarist quipped: "David Cameron, stop saying that you like The Smiths, no you don't. I forbid you to like it."

And as the wider media picked up on his remark, another one came this morning :"Nick Clegg, hand over your iPod".

Most unexpected, Marr's former bandmate Morrissey called a truce on their long-standing feud in order to publicly back his words.

"I would like to, if I may, offer support to Johnny Marr who has spoken out to the media this week against David Cameron", said the singer in a written statement at true-to-you.net, articulating his concerns at David Cameron's love for hunting and his pledge to stage a Parliamentary vote on repealing the foxhunting ban next year.

"I must report that David Cameron hunts and shoots and kills stags – apparently for pleasure", added Morrissey. "It was not for such people that either Meat is Murder or The Queen is Dead were recorded; in fact, they were made as a reaction against such violence".

I guess The Smiths were always my favourite band for a reason.

Morrissey on the 'X-Factor era'

Good old Morrissey nails it right on the head. This is what he said in a statement to True to You:

"As we all now know, the world of music is purely market-driven – not even youth-driven anymore. Talent or merit or songs do not enter the equation for a split second; the campaign is the thing, the campaign is what is discussed amongst the public, the campaign is what impresses the press, and the songs are never a factor."

In the meantime, following a Facebook-based campaign, it looks like Rage Against the Machine's Killing In The Name may be in with a chance for the first non-X Factor related christmas no.1 since 2004.

Also on the subject: - Is Simon Cowell Killing music?; - Cowell dollar, plastic breasts and old fogeys; - Jan Moir loves the X-Factor.

Was Morrissey right to walk offstage?

Luck is not on Moz's side these days, but the episode highlighted how gigs are often spoiled by aggressive, hyperactive idiots.

You may have heard about this already: after he collapsed on stage in Swindon two weeks ago, mid-way through his second song in Liverpool, Morrissey was smacked on the head by a plastic bottle of beer. This prompted him to say "goodbye" and walk off stage (see video here).

Websites have been debating whether Morrissey was right to storm off or whether he overreacted and let down the thousands who'd paid £35-plus to see him.

The Guardian opened an online thread: "Was Morrissey right to walk off stage after being hit by a bottle?". Amidst trite puns based on Smiths song titles (he obviously thought he was being terribly original), a journo called David Simpson found the time to write that Moz's "refusal to carry on does seem a bit excessive". Some pointed out that it's not fair that up to 8,000 had their night spoiled by a single idiotic bottle-thrower. Others wrote that that's the "spirit of rock'n'roll" and that you've gotta take it on the chin etc.

I say good on you, Morrissey. If there is something I've never understood, it is all those ejits who spend money on gigs only to act like the girl in The Exorcist on speed. Seriously. Fair enough you're excited (that's the whole point), fair enough you feel some adrenalin running. But the moment some people make it into a gig they simply turn into demented juvenile cavemen with little actual interest in the concert itself.

It's always puzzled me. And sometimes put me off going altogether - though luckily only for a few seconds.

I always conceived going to gigs as a rare (and expensive) chance to see your favourite artists in person. To savour their music live. To see how they play those songs without overdubs. To watch them on stage and study their movements, appreciating each moment.

And yet, there's always a sizeable minority that spoils it for everybody else, acting like absolute twats, trampling on people, kicking and pushing Heysel-style, chucking bottles into the crowd and various other acts of barbaric aggression.

And I'm not talking about gigs where you expect this as routine (I expect someone to make the point that old Sex Pistols' gigs were defined by such actions, "rock'n'roll, duuude"). Morrissey live is hardly Napalm Death material.

According to some people, it doesn't matter you've forked out £40 or so. You make it into a gig and you're expected to give up your basic rights not to be elbowed in the stomach, pushed or shoved around like a sack of shit.

And funny how it's always the males, have you noticed? Good old testosterone pumping through the veins, right? Perfectly in line with the old delusion that being manly equals acting like some Hyperactivity Disorder-ridden dickhead with anger management issues on top.

So this time I don't blame Morrissey for getting pissed off. And as for the objection that "it's not fair that Moz let one person spoil it for 8,000 fans": how many would it take then to justify his storming off? Would twenty bottles be acceptable, or would his critics still blabber that 7,980 fans suffered from the action of 20 idiots?

Get Off The Stage: Morrissey - Brixton Academy 28 May 2009

“You're not a true fan of Morrissey unless you've had a cancellation”. Mark Reed reports.

With the steam of his stunning 2004 comeback spent, it's the usual album-tour-album treadmill from Morrissey. Despite working at near enough full speed for the past six years, releasing three albums, two live sets and a best of (not actually that far off the prolificity of his former band The Smiths six year life), Morrissey can't seem to do any right.

With five of the last eleven gigs cancelled at short notice, Morrissey meanwhile is someone who simply seems to take a somewhat relaxed approach to touring. Even in the days of The Smiths, the notoriously impulsive man often failed to show up at airports and video shoots and recording sessions : as if the vocation he had been gifted was simply too much hassle. Truculent, devious, unreliable. I know a man with time on his hands.

Whilst there's no denying Moz is probably seriously ill and unable to perform, has anyone considered that perhaps he needs to have a less vigourous touring schedule and more days off?

Because there's hundreds of people in London with expensive hotel rooms, booked flights and trains, and time off, staring at an empty stage in Brixton, doing something they'd rather not be doing because a 50 year old man seems to make a career out of not turning up to work. And whilst the adage is Morrissey Does Not Work For You, it also seems to be that Morrissey is an entity who is keen to find excuses not to sing his life. Work Is A Four Letter Word.

It's not as if Morrissey is an amazing concert proposition these days : his svelte and tight band of the nineties has slowly evolved into cheaper, more pliable, and somewhat lumpen musicians who do exactly what they are told, when they are told, dress how they are ordered, and act as 'ambassadors' for the Morrissey brand. One could argue that this life-as-art ethic is an extension of Morrissey's vision. Or one could say that The Nation Of Morrissey is a bit of a dictatorship. The band may be effective, but simply put, with the absence of the genius foil of Alain Whyte and the Gary Day / Spencer Cobrin rhythm section, Morrissey's band has become a bunch of jobbing salary men. Watching Morrissey these days reminds me of Iggy Pop and Bowie videos from the late Eighties – bands made of too many musicians and bloated egos of singer to whom no-one ever says “No”. These musical Alan Michael Sugars yelp “YOU'RE FIRED!” at brilliant musicians with personality and replace with cheaper, and more obidient replacement parts. A musician is not a piece of moulded steel, an axle or a new gear, but an artist.

So, whilst we could be watching Morrissey bludgeon 'This Charming Man' with ex-members of The Red Hot Chilli Pumpkins (in confidentiality contracts) as his backing band, 15,000 people in London will find themselves doing Something Else. For those for whom the Morrissey pilgrimage is of no small concern or expense, those who travel long distances to see Moz in his capital city – and there are many who book precious holiday and spend the little money they have doing this – find themselves loafing oafs in all night chemists whilst precious Morrissey consistently and persistently cancels at the last minute day after day after day.

It's too late for people to cancel hotels, or flights, or time off work. I don't mind if you forget me, Morrissey. But you've become Papa Jack, and you're losing friends and allies faster than the government. You silly old man, get off the stage.

UPDATE : Since publication, a few people have suggested I am a "low life 3rd rate writer".. I thought I'd clarify a thing or two. I'm fed up of the large number of last minute cancellations Moz seems to commit with increasing regularity. If he's not as young as he used to be, don't have such a frantic touring schedule and rest more.

Morrissey has performed a few hundred concerts in his life. He's also cancelled a rather large proportion of those. Of the last nine scheduled concerts in London, he's cancelled or postponed eight of them. On his 2009 US Tour, he cancelled seven out of 33 dates. On his 2009 UK tour, he's cancelled eight out of 15 shows. On his 2008 UK Tour he cancelled 2 and a half shows out of 11. On his 2007 US tour, he cancelled 9 shows. Let us not forget that he cancelled / abandoned two and a half dates in 1992, a US tour in 1994, abandoned a UK tour in late 1995, and cancelled proposed European shows in 1996. He was also known to 'go missing' at airports, TV shows, and other venues, as well as cancelled dates in Europe and America from the days of The Smiths onwards.

Ultimately the issue here is whilst Morrissey may be genuinely ill, he has consistently made a habit of treating his fans with little respect, cancelling concerts profusely and at short notice, and showing contempt for those who make considerable sacrifices to see him perform. Maybe his fans should simply 'cancel' a show and no one turn up at all? How could anybody possibly know how he feels?

Happy Birthday, Morrissey

His music may be past its prime, but I won't forget what this cantakerous old genius always meant to me.

And so, believe it or not, today Morrissey turns 50. I was too young to discover The Smiths while they were around, so when someone passed me a tape of Strangeways Here We Come the band had already split. But as soon as the first notes of A Rush And A Push And The Land Is Ours kicked in I knew I had fallen in love. It was around 1991 and Morrissey was to remain a regular feature of my life and my favourite singer for at least fifteen years.

Before I knew it I started a quest to get hold of every single Smiths or Morrissey release that my pocket money would allow. As I flicked through their sleeves I was fascinated by the perpetual theme of 50s and early 60s imagery that each them evoked. I loved the fact that Morrissey seemed to make a stand about a lot of things. Meat Is Murder, The Queen Is Dead, Panic, November Spawned A Monster, Margaret On The Guillotine. I couldn't think of any other artist exploring such a wide variety of social themes and with such a generous dose of irony, wit and black humour. Try and disagree that 'Charles don't you ever crave to appear in the front of the Daily Mail dressed in your mother's bridal veil' is one of the best lines in British pop ever.

But social observations aside, Morrissey became who he is because of his unique capacity to articulate feelings - most of his fans would tell you that his lyrics are almost like a mirror to their most intimate thoughts. The way I saw it was that Morrissey was the potential best friend of anyone unable to fit in with the crowd.

Late Night Maudlin Street from Viva Hate is the one that holds a special place for me. A song about the emotional turmoil of moving from the house you grew up in, "it's as if he boiled down all the bruises and the fucked up dreams you've let go and tipped the essence down into a pretty scent-jar and sealed it off. And when he starts to sing he takes the seal out and you can smell it. You're pinned into your seat as if it's a wall of noise but it's not, it's subdued and quiet, and you can't breathe in case you frighten it away". And that's a quote from Nick Hornby's A Long Way Down I just nicked, because I don't think there's a better way to define it.

A special mention should also go to the wonderful Vauxhall and I that gently ferried me through my A-Levels or the underrated Southpaw Grammar and Maladjusted - back from the wilderness years when the country had dumbly turned in awe of Oasis and being a Morrissey fan was almost considered the equivalent of being a freak.

When Morrissey made his grand comeback in 2004 I couldn't believe the long overdue attention he was finally getting. For the first time ever though, his new album didn't quite cut it for me and nor did Ringleader of the Tormentors in 2006.

And yet for all his u-turns, tantrums and moments he pissed his fans off, his impressive body of work over two decades has made the history books and is here to stay. For whenever I think of what it's going to be like in a few decades' time when I'm old, I guess I'll look back at the best years of my life and Morrissey and The Smiths will be, without a doubt, amongst my most special memories.

Happy 50th birthday, Morrissey.

Morrissey, All You Need Is Me, "non-review"

A call for an all-round press boycott of any of Morrissey's future releases

This is the last time we are going to review Morrissey at Hagley Road to Ladywood. And we're going to mark our farewell with a "non-review". Our argument, in fact, is that Morrissey's recent legal exploit against The Word magazine and the NME will make it impossible from now on to offer a balanced and objective review of his artistic output without fear of receiving a judicial writ issued through the letter box. So if you're here in search of advice about the standard of his latest single All You Need Is Me, please do look elsewhere. We simply haven't got the financial means to take that risk.

First, the background. Still fuming after the NME article saga, Morrissey didn't like David Quantick's review of his Greatest Hits CD as published in the March issue of The Word. Morrissey's lawyers argued that Quantick's article "could have been construed to suggest that Mr Morrissey was a racist, held racist opinions or that (as the child of migrant parents) he was a hypocrite". Hence, the libel action. Probably fearful of a lengthy (and above all, incredibly costly) legal battle, The Word nipped it in the bud with a "sincere apology". Coming next on Judge Judy, NME's separate legal challenge over the infamous Tim Jonze interview discussing Morrissey's views on immigration in Britain.

Now, we have read David Quantick's article and - although no doubt scathing, superharsh and certainly spurred by the journalist's deep dislike of Morrissey - the fact that it ended up the subject of a libel case is simply kafkaesque. If Quantick's one was worth a libel case, then we may as well draw the curtains on any negative critique. Sleep tight, Boy George, Jarvis Cocker, George Michael and other past victims of press butchering and public smear. Scared of potentially ruinous court bills and eggshell-treading exercises, music reviews may even turn out more sycophantic, pointless and artificial than they already are.

For instance, take a look at Morrissey's own 1991 Get Off The Stage. The lyrics go :"You silly old man/You're making a fool of yourself/So get off the stage" as well as "And you think you can rouse us/But the song that you just sang/It sounds exactly like the last one/And the next one/I bet you it will sound/Like this one".

Now, just hypothetically, imagine a reviewer wishing to point out the hypocrisy of Morrissey's own lyrics when placed alongside the singer's lacklustre output of recent years, songs that sound the same, extensive churning out of Greatest Hits and recent tours punctuated by egotistical 10ft-high M O R R I S S E Y letters on stage. Could a journalist express her honest viewpoint? Would publishers let her, knowing that the use of the word "hypocrite", like The Word, may expose their arse to the risk of huge legal damages? As a matter of fact, even a humorous quip hinting that Get Off The Stage itself may carry more than a resemblance to the West Country's finest The Wurzels may be result in Morrissey's lawyers being unleashed on the grounds of slander.

As we're no great lovers of music journalists, the good thing may be the end of headlines based on lazy puns from Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now and other anti-Morrissey cliches. But are barristers really the way forward? Think about it. A reviewer wishing to write that Morrissey may have become a parody of his former self? That would be derogatory. The implication that a riff may be reminiscent of another artist's work? "Construed as deliberate smear", his lawyers may strike back. Branding him "closer to organised prostitution than anything else", as Morrissey himself once described Madonna? Surely there's legal ground for slander there? And of course we are not trying to imply that, by spraying judicial writs left, right and centre (something only a very wealthy person could afford), Moz may have turned into your textbook millionaire bully. No doubt that too would be defamation of character.

As such, and after some serious wrangling, Hagley Road to Ladywood is calling for an all-round press boycott of any of Morrissey's future releases.

No doubt the millionaire rockstar couldn't give a toss about an independent, shitty, skint website run by a bunch of losers, let alone our loss of love for The Man.

But for us, believe us, this is truly a turning point. The lyrics that moulded us as people, the songs that scooped us out of terminal depression, the sleeves that made us dream, the music we were proud to listen to, the times we stuck up for him in the face of ignorant denigrators.

Obviously Morrissey thinks he is doing the right thing and may even ask his faithful lawyer(s) to record a few guitar overdubs.

Here, however, is where we get off.

[Morrissey's "All You Need Is Me" is out next month on 3 different CD formats]

The Week's News Round-up

Hagley Road's new weekly feature - Taronja reassesses this week's news

Hillary Clinton and the faux-snipers

She may be desperate but she's still getting away with truth-butchering. Hillary Clinton's devastating faux pas about her make-believe Bosnian ordeal would fare alright in a mental ward. Back in the 90s, her speech went, she came under heavy sniper-fire during her stateswoman-like tour of Bosnia-Herzegovina at the height of the Balkans war. Worse though, was her half-arsed confession of lying. "I misspoke", she said, "due to intense campaign-induced stress". That's what I call inspiring a generation. Try the same trick at your next job interview. Tell them your CV features chairing BP and NATO. If anyone objects, simply let them know you "misspoke". Due to intense job-hunting stress.

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Que Viva Sophie!

When the murder of a beautiful, innocent 20-year-old girl is in any way related, there's no way it can come under the guise of good news. However, the two ghastly scumbags behind the ruthless killing of Sophie Lancaster were handed life sentences and that's the least justice could come up with. The case pointed up everything that's going to the pits in today's society. Britain's disturbing escalation of violence; herds of 15-year-old chavs roaming about at night while their parents couldn't care less; a local council that had money to waste on one of the murderer's hip hop video of glorified violence but not enough funds to hire a couple of park wardens. Rest in peace, Sophie.

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Holier-than-thouTony Blair, the salesman of the Iraq war, the guy who presided over the most barefaced lie in British political history, the messianic Prime Minister who turned both blind eyes when Israel was bombing the crap out of Lebanon, and the list goes on (…) spoke of the need for more religion to be involved in order to resolve world conflicts. No doubt Osama bin Laden would be in perfect agreement with him on that one.

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Cultural heat?

The money-making celebrity gazette Heat was praised across the board as the most popular magazine amongst British teenagers. A few eyebrows were raised as many wondered what the fuck is going on if a magazine solely based on Britney Spears' acne and Kerry Katona's pregnancies is officially sanctioned as culturally relevant. Until Philip Hensher of The Independent decided that the cynics were worth a spank or two. His argument? Heat may have been at the forefront of celebrity harassment and in bad taste a few times, he conceded, but Heat also stands for terrific values. And they would be…you may ask…? It doesn’t endorse stick-thin models and even condemned anorexia. Next. A mother hails her bully kid as a model of erudition. Why? He may be a bully, but at least he makes it to school once or twice a week. Hurray.

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Rub your hands, lawyers. Morrissey is in town

Are you going to sue our arse, Morrissey, if we tell you that your libel actions left, right and centre are looking very off-putting? Mick Jagger, John Lennon, Bono and Paul Weller, Sting and the Gallaghers, Jarvis Cocker and Joe Strummer, John Lydon and Bryan Ferry, Boy George and Amy Winehouse all received at some point in their career some incredibly defamatory press coverage. He's lost it, he's loopy, he's delusional, he's a junkie and he's a terrorist, he's a communist and he's a charlatan, he's a fascist and he's stirring hatred and inciting drug use. But they didn't stoop as low as turning it into a libel exercise. My favourite rockstar isn't about libel action, Morrissey. Now, that's hurting your reputation, not shitty articles in the NME or Word magazine. Who, in turn, may sue us for calling their articles "shitty". After all, isn’t that also defamatory?

Morrissey, That's How People Grow Up

Single review

Morrissey's dreadful new single That's How People Grow Up smells of desperation.

An official statement on his website begs all fans to go out en masse and propel him up to number one so that he can win "the war against the crashing bores".

Perhaps from the heights of Los Angeles Mansions and suites in top Roman hotels reality gets a bit elusive, but who past the mental age of 13 would buy a record purely so that it hits no.1 in the charts?

Not so long ago, Morrissey would have slammed as "crashing bores" those who'd give priority to "chart wars" as opposed to putting out a quality record with meaningful lyrics, memorable sleeves and -preferably- songs that save your life.

I've heard That's How People Grow Up and the fact that I can't remember a single moment of it may have something to do with its mediocre, middle of the road value. It could have been on You Are The Quarry or Ringleader, you wouldn’t have noticed.

It doesn’t help that its release coincides with yet another Greatest Hits (the 4th one in ten years if you also include a live release). And it doesn’t help that, with the cheap aim of shifting more copies, Morrissey decided to stick a 15-year-old photo of his butt cheeks on the sleeve.

What artistic value has that got, exactly? Does it really matter if you reach no.1? So that your ego can get even bigger?

Forget chart battles, Moz, and sort something out before old, loyal, fans get fed up with the same old song.

It pains me to think that perhaps the time has come for my favourite singer to gracefully knock it on the head.

Morrissey's NME

Neither a racist, not a victim. Questions the NME should have asked.

Last week some serious sleep was lost in Britain. Tabloids and papers alike were at pains to figure out if:
a) Morrissey may truly be a BNP-courting racist or:
b) liberal Britain has lost its marbles once and for all as they throw hissy fits each time the word i-m-m-i-g-r-a-t-i-o-n is uttered.

As always, once the flurry of catchphrases, simple formulas and panic buttons is cast aside, it becomes clear that reality is neither black nor white. But whoever thought the NME was going to fare any better than that is, forgive me, a bit of a pranny.
And so I don't believe Morrissey is a racist at all. Nor did he use "inflammatory language" (everything's become "inflammatory" in today's Britain, you start wondering how those poor firemen cope). More, I don't even think he's a Tory and, anyway, does it matter? By the same token, I don't happen to think the NME is part of the world conspiracy that a long time ago set out to victimise poor-old Morrissey. He's been in the game too long -25 years and still counting- not to be aware that (especially) British papers have a natural inclination to sensationalise and misrepresent. You fart and the headlines proclaim that, shock/horror (!), you shat yourself; you put on a pound and you turn out the salad dodger.
So, if you don’t want to take that risk, simply, turn them bloody interviews down.

The NME's fault -and a big one at that- is that it totally failed to challenge Morrissey with REAL, factual and intelligent arguments. And a lot was there to be said. In that respect, Morrissey nailed it right on the head when he wrote in his subsequent statement (3 December) about the dreadful dumbing down of the weekly music rag. What Moz called "the relentless stream of 'cheers mate, got pissed last night ha ha' interviews" is a faithful depiction of today's NME. Then again, had Morrissey stayed in England, he'd have also noticed that "fuckin'ell, mate, got paralytic last nite, I'm so 'ungova" is by far today's young Brits' most likely topic of conversation.

So what could the NME have said to stand up to Morrissey's remarks instead of simplistically spurting out talks of "inflammatory language", Enoch Powells and BNPs?

Firstly, for instance, by pointing out that the true victims of an open-immigration policy are always gonna be those at the lower end, no matter what ethnicity, creed or religion. Have a look at the prophets of labour casualisation. You'll note their tendency to remark about too many foreigners on English soil goes hand in hand with their distinct reluctance to employ people on a decent competitive wage. Cue legal and semi-illegal agencies having a field day as they contract out vulnerable immigrants who'd take anything (and also share a room with ten others) so that their British bosses' profits can get even fatter. As immigrants are unaware or too afraid to claim their rights, wages are fast driven down. Ken Loach's latest film, "It's A Free World", as well as a recent BBC undercover investigation , both highlight the gravity of the situation. Incidentally, ask the Tory voter in Sutton Coldfield who'd grunt about bloody foreigners if he/she is quite happy to employ an English housekeeper on a proper wage instead of their current Ukranian one on four quid an hour. Local authorities and government can patronise us all by robotically going on about 'inclusion', 'equal opps' and 'black history' exhibitions, but factual reflection on the UK's inner city ghettos and the true plight of the lower classes - of all races, I maintain- is forever going to be blighted by cries of "racism" and "inflammatory language".

Also, did anyone sense a whiff of hypocrisy when the Irish Blood, English Heart singer spoke of "every accent under the sun, except British, in Knightsbridge"? Worse, when Mozza remarked that "if you travel to Germany, it’s still absolutely Germany. If you travel to Sweden, it still has a Swedish identity. But travel to England and you have no idea where you are", that -on his part- is naivety at the very least. How Anglo-centric (and blind) can you be? Doesn’t it click that his is the typical simplistic view of the post-colonial little Englander abroad? I'm sure to the eye of a sov-donned Brit getting pissed in the Mediterranean, tacky Torremolinos feels "distinctly" Spanish, or central Paris quintessentially French (and by the way, why not ask an old Frenchman in central Paris if the place "hasn't lost its identity?"). Ask the week-package language student in Brighton and he'll tell you how "very English" it all is.

But, the question is, would Morrissey care to ask the few Spaniards left in Marbella or Benidorm if the place doesn't feel overrun? What about 'loss of identity' when you walk up and down la calle only to stumble upon an English pub or a chippie after the other? It's alright when a million (and counting) ex-pats grab hold of Spanish homes driving prices through the roof, isn’t it? It's alright when Brits move to Spain en-masse without bothering to pick up a single word of the local language...What would the locals have to say about foreign accents there? Or how about, not registering as local residents (hence dodging tax) but still making full use of hospitals, rubbish collection and other public services all along the Costa Blanca? So, you see, dear old Moz, loss of identity is happening everywhere, Germany, Sweden and Spain included. It isn't like the Daily Mail would hint, that "they all wanna come here".

It's not just about hearing accents down the street.

Morrissey, "Ringleader of the Tormentors"

"Your songs are not as good as they once were".

A review of Morrissey's new album

I bet he knows it. Ok, what a joy when your new album is strutting triumphantly at no.1. But what an odd state of affairs, to reach your commercial peak when your inspiration's gone to the dogs. If you think that Morrissey endured years and years of stick right when he was putting out some seriously inspired good stuff. He was pilloried while, for better or for worse, each of his 90s albums had some real depth, a specific tinge, some experimentation. Yes, even the clumsy stammer that was Kill Uncle, the rockabilly hooks of 1992's Your Arsenal, not to mention the heart-rending Vauxhall and I which, while the NME was busy issuing its anti-Moz fatwa, was hailed by his fans as up there along with the best of The Smiths. Those were the days when Britain was in awe of the flash in the pan of Oasis, Blur & co. Yet Mozzer seemed on a one-man mission, a release after the other, Boxers and Southpaw Grammar sporting some of his most daring music to date, brutal and violent, the guy clearly with a score to settle against bucketloads of nasty, nasty press. Put simply, if you liked Morrissey solo in the 90s you were considered a freak. It's only with the unimaginative Maladjusted (1997) that some cracks finally showed, even though Morrissey could still pen gems like 'Trouble Loves Me'.

What follows is well documented. The tale of a massive comeback after seven years in the wilderness without a record deal, Morrissey finally being paid his dues with a place in history. Were it not for the old law of pendulum-swings and revivals due every 20 years, the change of heart would be all but inexplicable. In 2004, you had to like Morrissey. His new label invested on him and did so heavily. He was the flavour of the year, TV, radio and magazines, namechecked by the new hordes of 80s revivalists. Yet it was obvious that You Are The Quarry sucked, as simple as that. Just one big clump of MoR, and ten more listens down the road you still wouldn't remember a single tune (except...maybe... 'First of The Gang To Die'). Which is why many long term fans hoped for a reprieve when the release of Ringleader of the Tormentors was announced. His move to Rome was seen as a promising change of scenery for a man in desperate need of new ideas. And yes, his interviews are still the most interesting ever. In a music-scene epitomised by the cerebral death of stuff akin to Channel 4's Popworld, it's always refreshing to read Morrissey telling it like it is.

But the music? Ringleader of the Tormentors is Quarry-part 2, just a touch better. Mostly, another clump of unremarkable MoR starved of hooks and brilliance, stifled by those trademark- alas- mildly dull distorted guitars. Little sticks in your mind. In a word, bland. You can even sing the tune of You Are The Quarry's 'I Like You', on top of the new single 'You Have Killed Me'. It just goes nowhere. And it's the usual collection of "i-forgive-you, please-god-help-me, I-live-longer-than-intended", none of the genius social observation of Your Arsenal, the wit of Bona Drag, and only glimpses of the passion of Vauxhall And I. It's only when the trite and tiresome tangle of sapid guitars keeps quiet that the music and vocals do have a chance to shine, like in the gorgeous, stunningly wholehearted 'Dear God Please Help Me' (featuring arrangements by Ennio Morricone). In fact, the whole album is gagging for those dreary guitars to shut up. As such, the few moments with new ideas are indeed quite brilliant: Tony Visconti's laudable production is tangible on the 'Panic'-like choir of 'The Youngest Was The Most Loved', or tracks that don't rely on the usual MoR formula (the glam-stomp of 'The Father Who Must Be Killed', the eastern swirl of the touchingly anti-Bush 'I Will See You In Far Off Places', the drums and trombone of ‘I Just Want To See The Boy Happy’ and the eerie piano of 'Life Is A Pigsty').

In 1990 Morrissey wrote a b-side called 'Get Off The Stage', a scathing attack on ageing rockstars who just can't jack it in. How ironic, how foretelling. In the meantime I'll stick the title 'Your songs are not as good as they once were' on this review. It sounds, would you believe it, almost Morrissey-esque.

"Loves and hates and passions just like mine"

Johnny Marr is one of my heroes, the guitarist and songwriter of one of my favourite bands ever, The Smiths. He wrote the sweetest and most touching article you could ever imagine. It's about friendship and how sharing such intense emotions and experiences with (band)mates stays with you forever. The article was penned for today's The Independent and I think the whole world should read it so here is the link.