Morrissey's recording approach

[Desert Bee]

...I keep on reading how Morrissey used to have his music composed around his vocals. How does that work? Besides what i can derive from my past sentence, I just find it hard to imagine how you can come up with a "rockabilly" song and then write the music around it.

Can someone explain if this is particularly hard to do or does it come easy to musicians.

Cheers.

 

[Franzanna]

...I keep on reading how Morrissey used to have his music composed around his vocals. How does that work? Besides what i can derive from my past sentence, I just find it hard to imagine how you can come up with a "rockabilly" song and then write the music around it.

Can someone explain if this is particularly hard to do or does it come easy to musicians.

Cheers.

I think he stopped doing that soon after The Smiths. That's what I think. If I haven't just made this up, I think it had certainly died out by Your Arsenal.

 

[Wozzer]

You'll need one hell of a vision to come up with proper lyrics and vocal melody without anykind of supporting instruments. It's a shame Morrissey hasn't spoken more of the methods how he actually creates the songs. I find the subject soooo very interesting.

Any good interviews concerning the subject?

 

[pronocturn]

There's an interesting bit in the recent Jerry Finn obituary here that talks about how he attempted to change Moz's recording practice from the old (demo instrumental tape submitted -> lyric ideas jotted down at home -> Moz enters studio with band to knock out song, Moz records vocals -> song eventually finished) to a more conventional music/lyrics band balance in the studio.
I always found it strange (though not exactly unrewarding) how disjointed the 'old' process was, and how Moz would often sing oddly over the already written music (singing a verse over the intended chorus part, etc). But it wasn't always the case (even back to Smiths days, for instance Half A Person and a few others were written with Moz/Marr sitting jamming face-to-face, according to Goddard).

 

[Danny_]

Unfortunately, journalists never seem very interested in asking Morrissey about his working practices. They are much more interested in trying to find out if he has a sex life.

 

[Not Right in the Head]

Unfortunately, journalists never seem very interested in asking Morrissey about his working practices. They are much more interested in trying to find out if he has a sex life.

So are most of his here, judging by the discussion that's generated when his sex life is mentioned. On a similar note, last week I was considering starting a thread to discuss Morrissey's poetical style, rhetorical devices, literary tropes, etc., but was warned against it by another SoLowist who thought that it'd be a no-reply thread.

 

[Dave]

What could he possibly say about it? It's work. I think it would be like interviewing a waitress about what she thinks of as she makes your milkshake.

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

So are most of his here, judging by the discussion that's generated when his sex life is mentioned. On a similar note, last week I was considering starting a thread to discuss Morrissey's poetical style, rhetorical devices, literary tropes, etc., but was warned against it by another SoLowist who thought that it'd be a no-reply thread.

I would be very interested in participating in a thread like this. I'm only interested in Morrissey for literary reasons. Really.