Should be an interesting ramble chat.
Adam Buxton Podcast 51 – Johnny Marr
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Musings on the byways of popular culture
Musings on the byways of popular culture
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Just this minute finished it. Pretty open on the band split. Like him a lot; always interesting, articulate and funny.
He has 100 guitars! In a guitar room.
I recently finished his excellent book, so listening to this was a nice postscript. He does come across as a genuinely open-hearted, gregarious guy (although it was nice to hear on the podcast that those who cross him are persona non grata; reading through the book, it seemed at times that everyone he’d ever met was his best friend forever 😉 ). I wonder what he really thinks about who Morrissey has become, or whether he’s gonna take up the challenge thrown down by the Guardian? Or should we be more circumspect, like Johnny himself, and consider his past a different country?
https://www.theguardian.com/music/commentisfree/2017/oct/03/morrissey-fans-are-about-to-give-up-on-him-johnny-marr-please-stage-an-intervention
Thought his book was…ok. Bit of a strange childhood, well, certainly compared to mine. Lots of freedom and independence.
Still non the wiser as to why the Smiths split though.
If it isn’t clear from the book, the podcast spells it out: after years being the band’s de facto manager as well as producer and songwriter – the ‘hub’ of the whole thing, in his words – he was mentally and physically exhausted, not looking after himself and having to deal with legal and business issues that he really didn’t have a clue about, all at just 23. On top of this, he and Morrissey were beginning to have different ideas about the musical direction of the band, and he’s quite open in explaining that he didn’t envisage playing with the same people for decades, he was actively looking for different collaborations. I think the consensus was that if he had been able to take a few weeks off, the band could and would have continued on for a while quite happily, but circumstances conspired to make his departure out of his control, but inevitable.
I recall reading that in past interviews with him – every time they got set up with a manager to take some of the burden off Marr’s shoulders, Morrissey would contrive some way to get them fired, forcing Marr to take up the reins again.
There’s a bit in the book where, years after the split, he meets Morrissey in a pub. Morrissey is knocking back the pints and expresses surprise that Marr is teetotal, the roles having been reversed in that regard. It struck me that if Marr wasn’t teetotal then it would have been rollicking night and they would have worked together again. Drunk Morrissey was definitely up for it; sober Marr not so much.