Until this book arrived, I had assumed that the gruesome twosome of Marr and Morrissey's absurd self-mythologising was informed by a camp-tastic irony. Clearly not given Morrissey's potty mouthed outbursts and similar ill-advised vitriol from Maher which has been helpfully resurfaced in this thread. Once they'd both been exposed as hustling bitches who set out to shaft (variously) their schoolfriends, band members and business associates in that hilarious High Court case of mortifying, destructive DRAMA! : then it was all over bar the descent into reputational oblivion which has now consumed both of them as far as I can see. The only unjust element remaining is that Marr is somehow seen as less implicated than his delusional accomplice in this failed scam, purely because he has some residual sanity and listened to his lawyers when they advised the game was up, to settle and move on whilst The Diva had years more of hugely amusing hissy fits, going to the House Of Lord Fraud Whores to beseech them to help him hold on to his £$, not his friends. How ironic that the 'rebel' who claimed to be against wealth and privilege, famously ineptly dissing the Queen Of England, ended up on his knees before a brace of bishops, peers and ancestors of William The Conqueror offering up the last shreds of his credibility in hopes they would side with his silly attempts to rewrite contractual obligations and history. The only sadness, for me, was that Morrissey didn't take this all the way to the EU 'Court Of Human Rights' in Strasbourg for a final cataclysmic dénouement. When the arts collective commonly known as 'The Smiths' appeared prior to the Interwebz it was still possible to 'do a Bowie' and pull off fairly impressive feats of reinventions. Loads of acts/artists did it, Madonna taking it to the gaudy max, of course. Morrissey's juvenilia genius move was to focus and locate that reinvention via Art in his locality and its history, in a way that blindsided the culture and was ridiculously impressive for a while. Alongside the musical historian Marr's co-opting of famous guitarist sonic landscapes like Rory Gallagher and the rest, it was all to make a wonderful palette, an Altar Of Influence that stands the test of the passage of time even as Morrissey is in endless karaoke mode and Marr isn't that fussed, TBH, as far as I can see. There's more to life than being more and more rich and famous: unless, of course, you're trapped in an existential cul-de-sac like the prat Steven. I read Rogan's book as a Loki prankster provocation and the reaction was baffling as by as the archival power of the Interwebz was debunking and deconstructing the auto-hagiographies of every 'star', including Bowie. But David read the runes and gave up all that stuff whilst Morrissey did his Carry On PR with an endless whining war with co-dependent click-bait press until the readership either got bored or threw up in disgust at Morrissey's 'Der Spiegel' downfall. Rest in peace, Mr Rogan, you did us all a favour, and it was funny as fcUK to watch the reaction as you savaged the neurotically curated fake Hall Of Mirrors that both Marr and Morrissey co-created. #TGIF. Sun is shining, I have some spare time, so I can have some fun on here annoying clowns in Croatia and Carlisle. It's A Wonderful Life when you're not lost in space and time seeking money, power and fame....best wishes...BB
PS:
Marr-Morrissey?
(why does the lyricist get precedence over the musicologist, by the way?)