A long comment, by request from an old 'fan' of my scribblings. Ranges over various recents posts. Anonymous Trolls - you should know the score by now.
Billy Bragg is right. Of course Morrissey doesn't need a conventional corporate record deal. He just has an 'entitlement mentality' due to his pedigree and genuine past glories. He could sign to the same label as Bragg 'Anti- and trust to the Universe for a slow-burn, slow-build success, but he needs Billboards all over this town....
http://www.anti.com/home/
Prince had the same problem, expecting lavish corporate funding for rambling triple albums of identikit funk-aerobic-workouts. No one bought it, not surprisingly.
If Morrissey/Prince are not a profitable proposition, they need to drop their advance/sign-on fee to a level that recognises the risk to the capital that corporate funders would be making. Or Morrissey could put up half the advance/publicity fund/tour support from his own accrued wealth, sharing proportionality in any subsequent profits. If there are any......risk/reward, etc. Capitalism. Which is what modern music production is.
Or he could organise a 'whip-round' from the fan base to cover costs, a la Marillion and others:
'Please mind that this album was entirely self-recorded and self-funded. all proceeds go DIRECTLY to the artist, and will help fund the realisation of future productions.
Buy Now name your price'.
http://starfish64.bandcamp.com/album/a-matter-of-gravity
Instead of bemoaning the lack of traditional/reactionary record deal offers and attendant promotional 'product push', Morrissey could critically reflect on his peers:
Kate Bush vanishes for 12 years, releases 'Aerial' in 2005, a double-album with birdsong and guest appearance from Rolf Harris. Sells by the truckload. She does perhaps a dozen interviews. Sells over a million copies. No tour. Vanishes.
Has another hiatus of 6 years, returns with 're-interpreations' old songs: 'The Diector's Cut' in 2011. Video with Robbie Coltrane and Noel Fielding. Of course, Kate doens't appear in the video. Again, minimalist approach to interviews/promotions. Yet the Audience arise en masse to grasp the new artefacts. Kate Bush toured ONCE in 1979/80. Has no intention of becoming a 'tour-whore' for cashflow. Too busy with the old work/life balance, raising her son.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzqF_gBpS84
She does it her way, 'my way': total absolute artistic control and integrity. That's why she is, by a long mile, a more significant and provocative auteur and cultural phenomenon than Morrissey or Prince combined.
Then there's Sade. Vanishes for 10 years to raise a daughter/organic garden in Stroud with her fire-fighter/SAS beau. Record company have no right to contact her or her band. The band contact them when their ready. From nowhere, releases 'Soldier of Love'. Only publicity is brief appearance on Jonathan Ross. Sells by the truckload. Top American charts. Go figure.
Ditto Krafwerk.
Why do these artists have absolute control and confidence to do it 'my way', rather than engage with a collapsing music industry? Why do they have so much power / prestige with corporations?
Because they produce on a budget and sell at a profit. And it's always rigorous quality, no filler or dross. Their Audience trust them, buy without a twinge of doubt.
Morrissey's audience is reaching the end of their tether with Dad-rock by numbers, with not even an attempt to produce a challinging sonic landscape. Wasn't Moby meant to be lined up as a producer at one stage? Let's hope Stephen Street is back in the frame!
Morrissey craves a world that no longer exists (thank God). In a world of multiplicity and fractal diversity, he simply can no longer get his face-time attention whore needs met without resorting to ever more bizarre and ridiculous comments (Ireland/Royal Family, etc)
He was very good at Glasgo, but he could have splashed out on some fireworks like Beyonce, even if he can't do the U2 Star Wars trip.
His vexation at being unable to control his 'public image/persona' is indicative of a control-freak, reactionary 'messianic' delusion: banning cameras/social networking from his concerts. Just like Prince banning 'you tube' background music clips. Beyond petulant.
Oh, for the good old days when all analysis, comment and pronouncements could be solely mediated via the compliant corporate music press (NME, Melody Maker) etc. Morrissey is a 'fish out of water'. He bewails internet nu-tech yet pleads with fans from the stage to download a new single to their mobile phones at Reading Festival! Consistency is not my middle name....
The really interesting question about the the festival pairing of Morrissey/Prince is if they'll meet and chat. Will Prince challenge Morriseey over his 'half-way house' vegetarianism. Prince is vegan. Now, that's what I call a possible hard-core conversation.
At Glasto, didn't Moz sing 'the "pleather' runs smooth on the passenger seat"?
'Action Is My Middle Name' is potentially superb if it moves from a 'four-track demo' to a fully realised production that stretches and amplifies it's many germinal gems of lyric and melody. The other two songs are vapid and desperately obvious re-hashes of past mediocrities. Keep the 'last gang in town': Boz and the lads, but, please: bring in a producer who will stretch you all to the limit and beyond.
I stil think Morrissey's best days are ahead of him. But only if he genuinely steps outside his 'comfort zone'. The bizarre and unlikely triumph of Beyonce moving from the Vegas patina of her corporate recordings to live mass hysteria / communal ecstasy showed what can happen when an artist is brave enough to face down their own fears and ignore the doubters and haters: something truly wonderful can emerge. Anything that pisses Zane 'smug' Lowe off is a breakthrough.
Her final orgasmic rendition of 'Halo' was the sight of someone breaking through to an entirely astral level of live genius. If Morrissey really wanted to 'upset the apple carts' he would have duetted with Beyonce instead of Tricky's mumbling rap with her. It's very revealing that Morrissey eulogises female singers of the past yet studiously ignores the incandescent pop divas of today.....
Morrissey could have been Elvis. Still could be as important, in my opinion. But he doesn't seem to want mass adultation. Yet complains when investors and the Audience tire of his 'victim script' that he is the ignored, alone 'outsider', rejected by a conformist, corporate music cultures. Nonsense. He's become the corporate, conserative conformist. His music is series of nostalgic, conformist templates.
PS: Zane Lowe - you have revealed yourself to be a real disappointment. Jay-Z vaporised Noel Gallagher. Beyonce vaporised you. Queens Of The Stone Age? More fool you. Why did you sign up to interview Beyonce if you had no intention of watching her performance. Petulant. Futile. Diss yourself. Not her.
PPS: I wonder what would happen if a 'flash-mob' at a Moz concert took off their shirts to reveal 'f*** Morrissey' tee-shirts?
An historic night of riots and mayhem to put the Liverpool Arena kerfuffle to sleep, no doubt...Not that I'm suggesting such an insult. Not that I'm suggesting the Audience rebel against the sheeple compliant 'fans' who seem to think their cultic adoratin of Morrissey precludes intellignent analysis from more discerning Audience members.
Morrissey attacks, criticizes, even denigrates far and wide -the Morrissey-baby David-handbag quote being the career nadir of his 'raconteurship'. He can dish it out: seems he can't take it....hence 'f*** Morrisey Solo'.
This site has very little to do with 'Morrissey'. It's some kind of 'group therapy' for people affected by his alternately healing and poisonous transmissions. And great fun. Thanks to DavidT: don't be intimidated.
regards
Waynes Rooney (aka: BrummieBoy)
