Morrissey featured rather heavily towards the end of BBC 4 documentary "Inky Fingers : The NME Story". It mentioned how Morrissey was the magazine's biggest selling point, and their stance on the Finsbury Park incident. It also featured TOTP performances of "Everyday Is Like Sunday" & "First Of The Gang To Die".

Morrissey features heavily towards the end of this excellent documentary on BBC4 currently showing.. including a vintage TOTP Everyday Is Like Sunday, worth seeing for Morrissey's outstanding hair! A young Morrissey's letters to the NME are also discussed.

Saw the above on Saturday at Lyric Theatre in Hammersmith. Some Smiths/Morrissey fans in the audience. Very odd, not for purists (I felt a bit strange!) although fairly good string quartet arrangements of 20 Smiths songs:

Last Night I Dreamt ...
Rubber Ring
Unloveable
How Soon Is Now?
Shakespeare's Sister
Oscillate Wildly
This Night Has Opened My Eyes
What She Said
I Started Something ...
I Won't Share You
Barbarism Begins At Home
Back To The Old House
The Hand That Rocks The Cradle
There Is A Light ...
Miserable Lie
I Know It's Over
Asleep
Please Please Please ...
Well I Wonder
Some Girls ...

Has anyone else seen this surreal show?

from Evansville Courier & Press:

Morose Corgan 'Embraces' his continued long downer (registration required)
By ERIC DANTON, Music critic
July 4, 2005

Life is just one big drag for Billy Corgan. The onetime Smashing Pumpkins frontman has sounded miserable for nearly 15 years, which is a long time to sustain despair. Even the famously tormented Morrissey converted his angst into witty sarcasm years ago.

Morrissey actually has a sense of humor, though, while Corgan is just morose. There's no respite from the gloom on "The Future Embrace," Corgan's solo debut. It's one long downer, as the bald singer and guitarist moans his way through a dozen songs. "There's a light/A certain kind of light/That never shone on me," he whines on "toLOVEsomebody." You'd be forgiven for thinking Corgan means daylight, given how pale he looks on the album cover, but he's probably referring to love. It's a theme on "The Future Embrace," which is full of lyrics that are desperate in their desire to belong to something, anything.

The music is a funereal mix of chilly robotic rhythm, swirling synth lines and grungy guitar. There's a disappointing sameness to many of the songs, although "Mina Loy (M.O.H.)" stands out, thanks to a vicious guitar line and something approximating a structured vocal melody.

Such attention to form is in short supply here, however, and without it Corgan's embrace is cold indeed.

In a collected review of new music books in this weekend's New York Times, Morrissey gets a mention in a piece about THE THRILL OF IT ALL: The Story of Bryan Ferry and Roxy Music:

"After this, though, it's not clear why the book needs to continue for another 100 pages, particularly when Ferry's subsequent recorded output has been so spotty and the details of his life aren't exactly a mystery. It's not as if he's Morrissey, after all."

Read more at the Times website (link - registration required)

KROQ listeners were asked to vote for their favorite bands of all time (and, I can only assume that some listeners voted over and over and over again...) Smiths/Morrissey made it to #23 (one place above Blink 182), but it's hard to take the list seriously considering that Green Day was voted the #1 band of all time.

Some of the other amusing placements (all of whom were ranked higher than His Mozness) were No Doubt at #6, Linkin Park at #13, and System of a Down at #16.

K(orporate)ROQ, once heralded as THE great indie rock station, has since degenerated into a sad mix of MTV bands you can hear on just about any other Clear Channel-type station in the country. (Ok, so they do throw in some good stuff from time-to-time, but it's mainly crap!) The good news is, if you live in Los Angeles, you can still hear some kick-arse music on Indie 103.1.

Just a reminder - a repeat of..

Pop and Politics - Chrissie Hynde

The series about politically active musicians looks at The Pretenders vocalist, tracking her journey from punk icon to animal rights protester. Featuring interviews with Morrissey, Stella McCartney and Professor Colin Blakemore. [S]
Sat 9 Jul, 23:00-23:30 30mins